This letter reveals a whole lot about how Jubilee thought and action work in far southern Mexico where the López Pérez family live, work, and minister. In 2022, with your donations, Jubilee could send only a few hundred dollars to support this family and the “freelance” start of a new Jubilee ministry in Tapachula.
With open arms we welcome a new project spearheaded by Cynthia Moe-Lobeda, “Building a Moral Economy.” Cynthia is at Pacific Lutheran Seminary, Berkeley, California. The project website, https://www.buildingamoraleconomy.org/, gives us a great overview and introduces the rest of the project’s team of thought leaders and activists.
Every Saturday, between 12 and 15 young people between the ages of 14 and 22 meet with us. We sit in a circle, without hierarchy, and ask a simple but powerful question: How are you feeling? Thus begins an intimate space where laughter, tears, and emotions flow freely. We not only listen to joys, we also open ourselves to pain: frustrations, family problems, anxiety, and even depression.
This letter to you is written mostly by people in Mexico who were invited to speak directly to you, our donors and people interested in Jubilee updates. Angelica Juarez Jimenez Swanson from the Jubilee Circle in San Mateo speaks first. Recently, she’s been deeply involved in one chronic issue hurting lives there. Similar in-depth ministry is happening on so many other issues across the Circles of Jubilee.
In 2000, as a new millennium began, so did Jubilee Economics Ministries (JEM). A Core Group met monthly in Chicago and planned a couple of trips to Chiapas, Mexico, in support of Indigenous people and Fair Trade growers. At that time, the Indigenous Zapatista Movement came to international attention as they protested NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement) and other strategies of globalization that oppressed them. One elder told us, “NAFTA and globalization are the latest forms of genocide.”