Dumping Ground
In a place where even people are considered refuse, no one would listen to the educated, accomplished pastor. Until he became one of them.
an interview with Saul Cruz
October 1, 2007
To an outsider, Armonía Ministries looks like a remarkable example of local leadership in some of Mexico's poorest communities—a network of schools, medical clinics, and community centers led by community members themselves. And it is. But Armonía ("Harmony") is also a cross-cultural mission—not just because it welcomes short- and long-term volunteers from churches in the United States and Europe, but because its founders had to learn to cross daunting class and cultural barriers. Saul (pronounced sah-OOL) and Pilar Cruz founded Armonía in 1987 just as Saul, who holds a Ph.D. in psychology, was rising to prominence as a national leader in World Vision Mexico. As he describes in this interview with Christian Vision Project editorial director Andy Crouch, Armonía's story is one of unlearning many of his assumptions about success and significance. It's a story that holds many lessons for anyone who would cross barriers of education and privilege—anyone who is asking the Christian Vision Project's question for 2007: What must we learn, and unlearn, to be agents of God's mission in the world? When you began working with World Vision in Mexico City twenty years ago, how engaged were Protestant churches with the needs of the poor?
In 1985 there were about a thousand Protestant churches—for a city that was estimated at that time somewhat over 8 million people—with an average of 60 members. We took a socioeconomic map of Mexico City. At that time, 8 percent of the residents of Mexico City were wealthy, some of the wealthiest people in the world, in fact. Then 17 percent, at that time, were middle class; 75 percent were poor, most of them surviving on less than a dollar a day. Then on this ...
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