Angels Rushing In Where Others Fear to Tread

  CIUDAD JUÁREZ, Mexico — Angels are not a common sight here in Mexico’s most violent border city, where the public cemetery is putrid and overflowing, and where a handful of churches worship the skeletal saint of death, Santa Muerte.
But at crime scenes and busy corners recently, more than a dozen angels have appeared — 10 feet tall, with white robes and wide feathered wings. The fact that these angels are mostly teenagers from a tiny evangelical church on a dirt road makes their presence no less striking: they carry signs to murder scenes that say “murderers repent.”
“It’s incredible, one of the most spectacular things I’ve seen,” said Jesús Nuñez, director of Tocando Puertas, a local social service agency. “It’s dangerous, but they keep doing it.”
Ciudad Juárez, it must be noted, is no stranger to speaking up. Marches against violence are more common here, and Juarenses are less afraid to be quoted by name — perhaps because this city has so much experience with tragedy. The mysterious killings of dozens of women who worked in factories here over a decade ago even predated the rash of drug-war violence that intensified in 2006.
The activism here also veers toward the colorful: this year, a group of women on pink motorcycles started delivering food to the poor neighborhoods that are recruiting grounds for gangs.
But the self-named Messenger Angels are among the boldest of the bunch. They got started last year, after intense conversations at a Christian church on the city’s outskirts, Psalm 100. Carlos Mayorga, 33, a leader of the group, said the church’s young people had become frustrated with the relentless violence and wanted to do something hard to miss. So they persuaded city officials to donate old curtains that became angelic robes. They raised money for makeup and collected feathers for wings that jut above their heads.
Then they wrote up signs that by and large speak directly to criminals and corrupted officials. “We wanted to prick the consciences of the people who have caused this city so much pain,” Mr. Mayorga said.
Early on, the angels focused on busy intersections. They stood on folding metal chairs for extra height, their robes reaching over the chairs and down to the ground. Israel Santillan, 15, one angel, recalled that there were always a lot of people honking in support and asking if they were being paid.
Later, to make sure they reached their target audience, they started going to crime scenes, where their angelic messages were often greeted with odd stares, and occasionally tears.
They have also set up in front of prosecutors’ offices and police stations. A few weeks ago, the group stood outside police headquarters, challenging the renowned chief, Julián Leyzaola, a former military officer both praised and derided for his get-tough approach here and previously in Tijuana. Before long, the authorities told the angels to leave. When they refused, Mr. Mayorga and another adult leader were temporarily detained.
“They felt threatened,” Mr. Mayorga said. “We knew the risk.”
Some of the young angels said they felt proud that the operation had such a visible impact. And on a recent Friday night, as they prepared for another evening of demanding repentance, few of them were concerned about safety. They mostly seemed to enjoy dressing up.
In the parking lot of the small church, a faux-stone storefront on a hill offering views of street trash, stray dogs and luminous Texas across the border, silver hair paint swirled with dust. Two girls, giggling at their made-up faces, tugged at signs that had been packed on top of a green van with a bumper sticker that said “Love for Juárez.”
One girl wanted a message for the police, the other for criminals. “Maybe the sicarios” — Mexican slang for assassins — “will see this and think God is coming for them,” said Karen Olguin Rivas, 14. “The people here, they need to change.”
The drive to their first location was not without trouble; at one point, a pair of the enormous wings flew off the top of the van. Rising and twisting in the air, feathers flying, it was an apparition few Juárez drivers knew quite how to handle.
Generally, though, the Messenger Angel idea seems to be catching on. The group has been traveling lately to other dangerous cities — Matamoros, Torreón — where they join with other young Christians dressed as angels. The messages there tend to be just as confrontational.
Mr. Mayorga said he hopes that somehow, eventually, they will help bring peace. “The idea is to keep going,” he said. “We have to.”