Goals most U.S. fathers take for granted—building a family and living in peace—seem like luxuries in Central America. And hopes of life free from the grasp of organized crime “gangs” feel more like fantasies than achievable dreams. 

Moisés Almonte*, 23, is one of thousands of Salvadoran fathers whose aspirations for their families flamed out in the heat of gangs’ ferocity. They have been threatened and forced to flee their homeland for refusing to join the Mara Salvatrucha gang, more commonly known as MS-13.

“A month and a half ago, the Mara left a note on the door of my house,” Almonte said. “They demanded I serve as a ‘post’ (sentinel) or as a trafficker in my neighborhood.”

He understood the consequences of resisting the cartel. “I fled, because they had murdered other neighbors on my block for refusing to join them,” he reported.

In El Salvador, uncertainty compounds persistent fear, he added. “You don’t know who is a Mara and who is not. They dress normal, like anyone else.”

Almonte fled El Salvador with his 2-year-old daughter. U.S. immigration officials decided he could seek asylum in this country. Thanks to the efforts of the House of Love and Justice ministry at the Valley International Airport in Harlingen, Texas, he reunited with his family in the United States.

But a logistical snag almost prevented the family reunion, noted Elket Rodríguez, Fellowship Southwest’s and Cooperative Baptist Fellowship’s immigrant and refugee advocacy and missions specialist who assists in the House of Love and Justice ministry. 

“Moisés and his daughter were mistakenly dropped off by a hotel shuttle at the Harlingen airport,” Rodríguez said. “I had to transport them urgently to the airport in McAllen, Texas, so they wouldn’t miss their flight.” 

Stories like Almonte’s—of talented young men, many of them fathers, who refuse to join gangs—are common in Central America’s Northern Triangle (El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala) as well as in Mexico, Rodríguez said.

“There is a misperception—perpetuated by the media and by people who never have listened to migrants—that the majority of men who come to the United States are criminals,” he said. “But the men who are fleeing are overwhelmingly the ‘good hombres.’ The ‘bad hombres” don’t have an incentive to leave their countries, because they can coerce entire communities at their will.” 

Fellowship Southwest supports The House of Love and Justice as part of its immigrant relief ministry all along the U.S.-Mexico border. If you would like to support this ministry, as well as our network of pastors serving migrants elsewhere on the border, click here.

* His name has been changed to protect this father and his family.