EL CERCADO, Mexico — A married couple who had served for 28 years as Baptist missionaries in Mexico were murdered Jan. 31 at their home near Monterrey in El Cercado, Santiago, Nuevo Leon. John Casias, 76, and Wanda Casias, 67, were strangled with electrical cords when intruders broke into their house and stole a safe, televisions and ministry vehicles, along with other items.
The area has suffered heavily from attacks by drug cartels in recent weeks, including the murder of the mayor of El Cercado, leading to the tentative conclusion that the crime was committed by people serving narcotics traffickers.
Drug traffickers in Mexico oppose the message of Christ because it turns people away from their business, and thus Christians have been among the targets of the criminals. Christians noted that the assailants would not have needed to kill the missionary couple in order to rob them.
In Puebla, intervention by state authorities after Protestants came under threats of expulsion and death led Catholics in San Rafael Tlanalapan to agree to allow evangelicals to construct a worship place in the town far from the Catholic church building. Last fall, Catholics threatened to crucify the Protestants if they didn’t leave town immediately. Parishioners later revealed that a local priest incited them to make this threat, and after this became public, Catholic authorities transferred the priest to another town. Catholics (not “traditionalist Catholics” who mix Catholicism with indigenous practices, as previously reported) in San Rafael Tlanalapan, near San Martín Texmelucan, about 60 miles from Mexico City, had reportedly threatened to burn down or otherwise destroy the homes of about 70 Christians.
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