December 18 marks International Migrants Day, a date established by the United Nations General Assembly in 2000 to highlight the importance of respecting and protecting the human rights of migrants, and to highlight their contribution to development.
This idea that migration is wealth is at the heart of all the work carried out by the Elín Associationa humanitarian organization that since 1999 has been dedicated to the reception and accompaniment of migrants in Ceuta. Today we highlight it through the words of Sister Paula Domingo, ccv, who has been working there since its foundation 25 years ago.
I came here in September 1999, with two other sisters. Really, my life has been to share with migrants and refugees what I am and what I have, from a strong faith, convinced that I am here because God wants me to be here.
From my experience of faith, where I feel that God, through Joaquina, has called me to live this reality, is where I enjoy and rejoice in it, because for me it has been and is an impressive richness. More than 20,000 people have passed through the association, volunteers and migrant boys and girls; and, really, for me this is a great, great wealth that I will never be able to thank God and Joaquina so much. Because if I am here it is because the congregation has made it possible for me, and at all times I have felt very supported and respected in this choice of life, of being at the side of migrants and refugees.
Ceuta is a Spanish city in North Africa, located in the Moroccan territory; it is situated on a peninsula with a border of 8.3 km with Morocco, everything else is surrounded by sea. For the migrants, who come from different countries of the African continent, Ceuta is the door to a better life, which they reach after overcoming a double 10-meter barbed wire fence, with a number of harmful elements, which hurt them and cause them to arrive with very serious traumas and injuries. According to Paula, “they arrive very, very crushed psychologically because they have had to overcome a very hard route”. However, because of the border nature of the city, migration there is viewed with fear and rejection, so they feel unwelcome.
25 years ago, Paula and two other sisters of our congregation inaugurated the Vedruna activity in the city, always with the intention of making a welcoming presence, raising awareness and defending the human rights of migrants. At that time, the situation was a little less difficult than today, as the border was still under construction and many people managed to enter the city of Ceuta.
The sisters were received in the house of the Adorers Sisters, who gave them a space to welcome migrants, both minors and adults. Thus began a work that continues to this day.
In 2002, the need for a more social structure became evident, open to people of not only religious ties, but of different beliefs and possibilities. And also to have a social coverage to denounce violations that occurred in relation to migrants and refugees. The three sisters and five people from Ceuta thus created the Elín Association.
The word “Elin” comes from the book of Exodus, and is the name of an oasis that God’s people found when they were looking for the Promised Land; a place to stop and rest and continue. What is the work of the Elin Association to honor this name?
It really has a very similar origin: the children arrive in Ceuta after crossing a very hard desert, through different countries, and an even harder fence, ten meters long, with a double fence, with concertinas… For them, arriving in Ceuta is really a little bit like arriving in that oasis, Elin, where they can rest, regain strength, restore their dignity and prepare for the future by living an experience of family, of equality, where they can feel like people.
At the same time, they know that Elin is not a place to stay, but a place to pass through. Just as it happened to God’s people when they arrived at their oasis: they knew that this was not the promised land, but they were able to enjoy what God was giving them at that moment, making it possible for them to rest, replenish their strength and prepare for the future.
So, I understand that Elín is not a foster home, where they can stay to sleep and live.
No. It is a day center: we are open all day long, from ten in the morning to eight in the evening. Here we welcome them, we accompany them on a personal level, with the hospital, doctors, formalities… And we also have a lot of activities in the afternoon to prepare their future and help them feel at home.
What is the day-to-day life like?
In the morning we accompany them, do interviews, meet with them, share activities in universities and institutes, accompany groups arriving from the peninsula to learn about the reality of migration in Ceuta…
In the afternoon we have the Spanish class, which is the most important, because we know that language is the key to enter the culture and society. It lasts two hours, and there are different groups with different levels, in which we always try to have a person who speaks their language: English, French, Arabic… For this, we have a large group of volunteers who participate with us.
After the Spanish class we do other training activities, recreational activities, workshops… The objective is to share and get to know each other, to get to know the Association, the Spanish and their cultures, and to be able to continue advancing in this experience of family life.
What are the current objectives of the Association?
From the beginning, the Association has had three fundamental pillars very clear, which all its members live in community, as a family:
1. Equal welcome. We believe that all people are equal in dignity and rights: therefore, all the relationships we create are equal. What differentiates us from migrants are the opportunities: they have had less than us, but in terms of dignity and rights they have the same. It is an equal and reciprocal welcome, because not only from us to them, but we also need them to welcome us. With the openness that they show us from the moment they arrive, only from there is a relationship of equality. Something that strengthens these equal relationships is that in the association we do not give material things such as food, clothes or money. The value we give is the bonds: that is why they feel like family, they themselves inform others who are arriving of the experience they have in Elín and bring them here. This is how we grow and become a family.
Awareness-raising: we know that there is a lot of ignorance on the subject of migration, that information is spread that is not real, that we are deceived by presenting migrants as dangerous, helpless, needy, and that they cannot contribute to our culture. Our position is quite the opposite: we live migration as a richness, because we constantly share and know all the riches they bring. We do awareness-raising activities within the Association, where we get to know and relate to each other; and then we take this same experience outside. We work in high schools, at the university, with people from outside. That is where we make it possible to see migration as a richness, and not as a problem, because that is our experience. Our experience is that the migrant person is a person with a lot of richness: with a great capacity to overcome difficulties, to know other cultures, to integrate, to collaborate and to participate. From this richness, we feel that we all grow together and create a more just society.
3. Denouncement: We cannot say that we are living in an equal reception if the people with whom we share our lives are not respected in their rights. When this happens, from the Association and with them, we ask for their rights to be respected. And when they are not respected, we denounce these situations. For this we have different activities: a circle of silence every month, the march for dignity that we do once a year for the people who die at the border, communiqués and documents that we do in relation to this issue.
How is the current migration situation in Ceuta? The latest report of your website is from 2020, and a lot will have changed since then, could you give me a little bit of the most recent snapshot of that?
The people we receive usually come from countries at war, with great difficulties or situations of violence. They do not always come from the same countries. Right now we have people from Sudan, Guinea Conakry, Burkina Faso, Mali, Sierra Leone, Morocco, Algeria… Most of them come looking for safety: we know that in Sudan and Mali there is war, in Burkina Faso there is terrorism and violence, in Guinea there is a violent regime. More than from poverty, they are all fleeing from the violence and war they are suffering in their countries.
They are mostly young people, from 16 to 30 years old, with a great capacity to overcome: they come with great resilience. They are able to laugh and tell, after a while, how they have been tortured, persecuted, beaten. Really, these people bring a great strength of wanting to improve their lives, and try to make this have an impact on their families. They are very committed to their families and seek a better life for their loved ones.
They are all very peaceful people: in the 25 years we have been in Ceuta, we have never experienced any violent act or situation of mistreatment. The most important thing they bring to us when they arrive is the ability to always smile and be open to a better life.
What is the relationship of the Association with the Carmelitas de la Caridad Vedruna congregation?
Since its foundation, the Elin Association has been closely linked to the spiritual life of the congregation, while at the same time we have always been open to many people of different beliefs and ideologies. This has made it possible for us to always have very pluralistic people who are part of the project. We consider ourselves apolitical and re-religious, in the strictest sense, because we are open to different ideologies. For example, we have been celebrating Easter since 2005, where we participate with the children, and many of them are not Christians, but Muslims or Hindus, but we share a very beautiful experience of universal faith.
From the congregation we have always been between two and four sisters, and we have participated in everything. It has been a free participation, at no time have we been hired by the association, but we have always been unconditional volunteers. Many volunteers also come, and among them there are people who come from a deep experience of faith. The Elín Association would definitely not be what it is without the congregation. That is very clear: we are a strong driving force within it.
How is the spirit of Saint Joaquina present today in Elín’s work?
I think it can be perceived from everything I have been telling you. It is in the family spirit, the welcoming in equality, the space where all people have a place, where we can feel that we are brothers, sisters, because God is father. Where we can live so strongly that equality that Joaquina, from the beginning when she founded the congregation, wanted to maintain among all the sisters, that there should be no distinction. That is what we live here: that air of family, that welcome in equality, that respect for the person, wherever they come from and however they are.
I feel like a Vedruna to the fullest, I feel like a daughter of God to the fullest, a sister to all people; that is my experience of faith and life.
I always say that here we live death and resurrection. God manifests himself to us every day in the hard moments, but at the same time he manifests himself to us with the life that they bring, with the life that we can make with the people who also come as volunteers. For me, it is really a very strong life experience, where death and resurrection make me feel that what I live is worthwhile and God is in it.
To learn more about the Elín Association and the possibilities of collaborating with it, you can visit its website:
