Juarez Murders Don’t Deter US Volunteers Building Homes For Charity

There were so many murders in Juarez, Mexico, last year it?s called ?Death City,? but a group of Zeeland men will head there Wednesday, armed with hammers and heart, according to a report in The Grand Rapids (Mich.) Press

The 30 men, most from Zeeland?s Community Reformed Church, will pour concrete and hammer nails on the outskirts of one of North America?s most dangerous cities this week, building houses for Mexican families now living in shacks.

They?ll cross the border from El Paso, Texas, with staff from Casas por Cristo ? Houses for Christ ? a nonprofit that has built 4,000 homes since 1993 with help from 7,000 volunteers a year, many from the United States.

As the men toil, the city of Juarez continues to reel from killings in drug violence that has spiked in the past three years. Last year, there were more than 3,100 murders in the city of 1.5 million people, almost double the homicides in 2008, when the first explosion of violence occurred.

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