Edgar and Ligia Rivera: A new kind of Mennonite history
by Robert Martens

 Guatemala’s history is one of the bloodiest of the nations of Latin America. In 1954, president Jacobo Arbenz was overthrown by the CIA in collusion with local landowners, the Guatemalan military, and the Catholic Church. A spiral into seemingly uncontrollable violence began. Coup followed coup, and the late 1960s saw the emergence of rightist paramilitary organizations, otherwise known as death squads. In response, a guerrilla movement entered the country from Mexico, and a long civil war ensued. More than 450 Mayan villages were destroyed and over one million people displaced, most of the brutality being committed by the US trained Guatemalan army and by state sponsored death squads. In 1992 the Nobel Peace Prize was won by Rigoberta Menchú for her work in bringing to light the killings of Guatemala’s indigenous people. Finally in 1996 the 35-year war ended with a peace accord between the government and guerrilla forces.

 It was within this turmoil that Edgar and Ligia Rivera, currently members of Cedar Valley Church in Mission, grew up. Both were born in Guatemala City into families of moderate income. At the age of four, says Edgar, “I decided I will not be poor.” He recalls that, while attending a Catholic elementary school, he saw guerrillas with guns running upon the walls. As children, Ligia and Edgar often heard the sound of bombings, and sometimes “hid under the bed.” Ligia, also raised as a Catholic, first met Edgar at the age of fifteen. She had attended school with Edgar’s sister for three years, but did not meet her future husband until she was invited to a birthday party for his grandmother. The two dated for four years and nine months before they married. Edgar attended university (a “blessing,” he remarks) while Ligia studied to be a beautician at a technical institute.

 In 1982 a coup brought the nominally Protestant Efraín Ríos Montt to power, and his government escalated the scorched-earth warfare in the countryside, coupled with disappearances and torture. Edgar had been involved in social work with orphanages and the youth movement. He had also gone to military school, and had helped in the campaign of a national youth leader who was a good friend. In the prevailing context, all this was enough to make him a target of the authorities. Edgar was kidnapped by the intelligence service and held for seven days. During this time he was handcuffed, blindfolded with masking tape, and severely tortured. “Everyone was praying for him,” says Ligia. Edgar responds, “When I was kidnapped, I met God.”

 On the seventh day, a man hit Edgar with a pistol and said, “You are going to die tonight.” Edgar, however, experienced spiritual epiphany: “I felt a hand lifting me, and I knew I would not die.” Sure enough, that night he was dumped at the side of a road. Edgar wasted no time. Sadly parting from his wife and three children (a fourth would later be born in Canada) he fled for his life to Honduras. There he experienced a conversion, primarily as a consequence of reading. After three months, Edgar managed to move to the US. Before he left, however, Ligia came to Honduras with the children.  Then the family parted once more. “I didn’t know,” says Edgar, “if we would meet again.” In Chicago he was met by a friend, and began work as a janitor. Ligia joined him there half a year later. (The children stayed behind temporarily with friends.)  Within three months Edgar was a supervisor, and within three years he was working for Minolta; Ligia was a skilled labourer in a factory. The Riveras lived in Chicago for seven years and prospered, despite the fact that they were “illegal aliens.” They longed, however, for a permanent and secure home.

 In Guatemala, Edgar had attended church only to appease Ligia, so when she arrived in Chicago, “I didn’t believe,” she says, “that he was a Christian, but he was very different and very happy.” “Ligia,” Edgar responds, “was not a believer when she arrived in Chicago... She was my first convert.” The Riveras had little or no knowledge of the Mennonite church at this point, despite the fact that the Iglesia Menonita de Guatemala, the Guatemala Mennonite Church, had a presence there since the early 1970s. Indeed a seminary named Semilla (seed), with the aid of North American Mennonite churches, was established in Guatemala in the 1980s.  According to its website, the seminary “draws inspiration from the experience of the early Anabaptists who also attempted to develop church communities and live their faith in a context of social and economic injustice.” The Riveras had their first contact with Mennonites in Chicago, and were immediately intrigued by the Mennonite/Anabaptist heritage.

 They were referred for help with immigration to the Mennonite congregation of Reba Place and the Overground Railroad, an organization that specialized in immigrant aid. “I had a lot of hate in my heart,” says Edgar, “Hate had kept me alive.” He had been accustomed to carrying a machete, but when he attended Reba Place, it “was a shock” to have it preached that we should love our enemies. “Being peacemakers has helped my healing process immensely.” Many years later, he still bears the marks of the handcuffs on his wrists from the kidnapping experience. “I’m being romantic,” he says, but “when the marks disappear, I’ll be ready to return to Guatemala.” As for post traumatic stress disorder from the torture, he hasn’t been deeply affected. “I feel blessed that I was not mutilated... I have nothing to say to God but thank you.” Ligia, on the other hand, says she never felt the hatred that Edgar did, but during the kidnapping, “I really believed he was coming home.”

 The Riveras were further referred to MCC as refugee claimants. Due primarily to political considerations, it was impossible for them to apply for refugee status in the United States, and the couple chose to emigrate to Canada. The Canadian immigration authorities presented the couple with three choices: Montreal, Toronto, or Vancouver. In a library the Riveras watched a video of Vancouver, which showed boats sailing in serene weather, and they made what seemed an obvious choice. They were tired, Ligia says, of the cold winters. They were now again a family, having been reunited in 1987 with their children whom they had been forced to leave behind temporarily with relatives in Guatemala. It took three years to get the proper papers to qualify as permanent residents of Canada. The Riveras left Chicago on June 28, 1989 and arrived in Mission on July 6 at 11:30 am. Ligia’s first thought was, “Wow, this is paradise.”

 They have happily lived in Mission ever since. Edgar resumed work for a time for Minolta and subsequently found employment as product manager in the railroad industry. Ligia has worked as a seamstress, and now is a full-time preschool teacher at Cedar Valley. Edgar has also served as outreach representative for Mennonite Church BC, and continues to be involved in church evangelism. “I don’t have a blind faith,” he says, “I have a solid faith.” The Riveras’ refugee experience might strike a chord with some of the older members of the Mennonite church who were driven from their Russian birthplace. Edgar fights back a tear as he expresses a profoundly spiritual revelation: “Wherever I am, that’s home.”

 What is the Riveras’ vision for the Mennonite community? The term, “Anabaptist,” says Edgar, is “related very much with help, the brother, the sister, anybody.” He quotes a visiting Latin American Mennonite speaker for whom he served as translator: “We got together, and decided to get back to our roots, and our roots are the peace position.” He talks about larger congregations which become “too comfortable” – “why should I sit next to a stranger?” But the Mennonite church, remarks Edgar, is “opening to the whole community – for survival.... If we continue as we are, we will disappear.” On the other hand, “We are a gifted church.... We are peacemakers,” not only in war, but “in the home, with families, with drug addicts.” And besides, “We have another gift, music.” Sometimes, Edgar says, “We try to get Pentecostal” and become involved in some “junk” in the interests of outreach. But “We are not Pentecostals.... There are tremendous values we can offer to the community.... I am an optimist.”