True compassion is to provide help

This is a response to Gerald Aleksy's letter entitled, "We are compassionate, but the law is the law."

I wonder what Mr. Aleksy would do if he and his family lived in one of the deadliest countries that isn't a war zone? One of those places is El Salvador and many of the people crossing our southern border are from El Salvador and other Central American countries. "Latin America is where the most murders in the world happen," reports Robert Muggah, a Brazilian crime researcher.

"Criminal violence, while potent, is just part of a dangerous cocktail" of crime in Central America, writes Ariadna Estévez of Mexico's National Autonomous University. Women are also a target, in 2015, Honduras had the highest rate of feminicide - or female murder - in the world.

If my family were living with violence, corruption and poverty, I'd certainly do whatever I could to protect them. Mr. Aleksy says "the first and best solution is don't come." For me, the first and best solution is to help these families in whatever way I can. That is compassion.

Cathy Truesdale

Wheaton