Bringing families back together that have been separated for as many as 20 years

The Church of Scientology of Los Angeles partners with Hispanic and Latinx organizations to provide them with resources to celebrate and keep their cultures alive. The Church is committed to supporting the human rights and traditions of these diverse and vibrant communities. And a planning meeting hosted by the Church this week, at the beginning of Hispanic Heritage Month, was a perfect example of the importance of these programs.

There are nearly 5 million Hispanics and Latinx in Los Angeles County, including more than a half-million Central Americans. Los Angeles County is also home to 4.4 million immigrants. A December 2021 report found immigrants in the City of Los Angeles paid nearly $15 billion in taxes and held more than $38 billion in spending power. And the city’s immigrants make up nearly 72 percent of the essential services workforce.

Leaders of the Los Angeles Guatemalan and Mexican communities met at the Church of Scientology Los Angeles this week to discuss and launch a project of great importance to Latinx and Hispanic Southland families. Thousands of Mexican and Central American immigrants living in L.A. County have been separated from their elderly loved ones for as many as 20 years. Many of their aging parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles might qualify for visitor visas but they don’t understand how to apply for them or they lack basic documents they need. These community leaders decided it was time to tackle the problems and reunite families.

The leader of the Guatemalan Migrants Network, Walter Batres, volunteered to collect names and addresses of elderly relatives who may qualify for these visas. The president of the nonprofit Tlaxcala USA offered the administrative and legal assistance of his organization. And an L.A.-based businessman agreed to travel to Guatemala to get the program off the ground by interviewing and assisting elderly relatives located by the Guatemalan Migrant Network who could apply for their visitor visas.

The initiative, launched this week at the Church of Scientology Los Angeles, is similar to one supported by the Church of Scientology of the Valley that is helping bring elderly relatives from Oaxaca, Mexico, to Los Angeles on visas that permit them to come and go to the U.S. for family visits for the next 10 years.

The Church of Scientology and Scientologists are deeply committed to human rights, inspired by the words of Scientology Founder L. Ron Hubbard, who wrote “human rights must be made a fact, not an idealistic dream.” The Church of Scientology and Scientologists sponsor United for Human Rights, an international, not-for-profit organization dedicated to implementing the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Two of the Declaration’s 30 articles are particularly relevant to this project of reuniting families:

Article 13: The Right to Move

• Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.

Article 16: The Right to Marriage and Family

• The family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State.

The Church of Scientology of Los Angeles is designed to provide ideal facilities for Scientologists on their ascent to higher states of spiritual freedom and to serve as a home for the entire community—a meeting ground of cooperative effort to uplift people of all denominations. It was dedicated by Scientology ecclesiastical leader Mr. David Miscavige in 2010.

The Church of Scientology Los Angeles is featured in an episode of Inside Scientology on the Scientology Network, available on DIRECTV channel 320 and streaming at Scientology.tv, through mobile apps and via the Roku, Amazon Fire and Apple TV platforms.

For more information, visit the website of the Church of Scientology Los Angeles.