President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador swept into office in 2018 after campaigning against corruption, promising to calm the country and pledging to promote morals and values, including the enactment of a "moral constitution."

Soldiers appeared recently at the diocesan migrant shelter in the northern Mexican city of Saltillo and demanded to see the identifications of its guests.

Sister Munoz said she does her best to inform migrants of the risks and realities on the road. She also tries to disabuse shelter dwellers of any erroneous ideas—such as the existence of immigration documents for them—and does not sugarcoat her answers.

Motives for the crime are unknown, and the assailants remain at large.

The Mexican bishops' conference has appealed for assistance for thousands of migrants stuck in Chiapas state as Mexican officials step up enforcement and stop issuing travel documents.

Pope Francis has donated $500,000 to assist migrants attempting to travel through Mexico, but who are increasingly being impeded by Mexican officials from reaching the U.S. border.

A Nicaraguan bishop said he will leave the country indefinitely as concerns for his security increase -- presumably the product of his criticisms of the Central American nation's president.

"There are people who have to be here for 15, 20 days, so those who are only passing through, we can't receive them. We have no space."

In announcing the plan, Interior Minister Olga Sanchez Cordero said issuing humanitarian visas would allow for "orderly" migration and ensure migrants' rights were protected.

This article discusses the many--and complicated--reasons why people in Central America have been fleeing their homes in trying to reach the United States in search of better lives, often at great danger to themselves and their families.