Border pilgrimage: Theology of Migration
Journeying Towards Compassionate Understanding
1.5 unit graduate course (CE-616) offered by the Franciscan School of Theology – Open to all FST/USD graduate students
A four-day immersion to Tijuana and Mexicali January 23-26, 2025
With Zoom pre- and post-immersion classes
This course experience is anchored in a four-day immersive learning experience in Tijuana and Mexicali, Mexico, visiting ministries that serve migrants across the US border. You will encounter migrant families, hear their stories, and learn from front-line service providers and human rights advocates.
As a result of this class, you will be able to articulate your own theology of migration. This program is in partnership with Via International and its Via Migrante initiative, as well as several migrant shelters sponsored by Catholic Sisters.
Here is the schedule:
- One pre-trip class on Zoom: January 7, 2025; 4:30-6pm
- Four-day immersion to Tijuana and Mexicali, with secure accommodations in Tijuana and safe transportation provided by Via International, Thursday through Sunday inclusive, January 23-26, 2025 (full days)
- Two post-trip classes on Zoom: February 4 and 18, 2025; 4:30-6pm
This course nurtures ethical reasoning skills using the See>Judge>Act methodology, and a moral imagination for a more compassionate world. Students will develop and deepen their own moral vision informed by human rights, Catholic social teaching, biblical wisdom, liberation theology and the moral vision of Pope Francis. As a result of this class, students will be able to
- Analyze the moral discourses and rhetorical strategies that shape societal responses to refugees, migrants, and migration;
- Design and deliver moral arguments that address contested topics in migration;
- Propose ethical solutions guided by compassion, spirituality, and social innovation.
Student deliverables include reflection on their experiences and the creation of outreach education program materials.
Tuition for this class will be the same as for any other FST class, and is eligible for financial aid (if applicable). In addition, each student will pay a $150 program cost for the pilgrimage, most of which will provide stipends to support the migrant ministries we visit.
FST will pay for the following (for FST students only):
• Three nights secure accommodations at the Casa De Luz, sponsored by Via International,
• Ten meals provided by current, former migrants supported by Via International, including some at migrants at shelters, and
• Bonded transportation with a professional driver in Mexico
Online MTS-FT students are encouraged to consider taking this course, although they will not get course credit for it, and would have to fund their own travel to the FST campus.
USD students will incur additional fees.
Each student must possess and carry a passport.
Please contact Keith Warner, OFM (keithwarner@fst.edu) for more information and costs.
Your instructor, Keith Douglass Warner OFM,
is an Associate Professor of Ethics & Spirituality at FST and a practical social ethicist.
Publications
Articles from the 2024 Border Pilgrimage
A tale of 2 realities: Immigration, advocacy, and faith in America
At burial ground for unidentified migrants, sisters pray for the dead
On US-Mexico border pilgrimage, sisters ponder response to migrant hardships
More on the See>Judge>Act methodology applied to ethics of migration
