“People Can Turn Their Back on You, but God, Never”

Dipaz family home in Andes, ca. 1980.

In 1982, Moises Dipaz Ruiz and Graciela Narrea Hinostroza and their seven children, Marino, Lucio, Alejandro, Marcelina, Maria Lourdes, Clara, and Mauricio, lived in a small village in the Andes Mountains, growing their own food and raising a few animals. One day, members of a terrorist group came into the village and executed 21 locals, including Marino. A week later, in the middle of the night, a group of militants brutally killed Moises and Graciela in front of their children. Mauricio, then three years old, remembers that as his father lay dying, he asked Mauricio for a drink of water and told him not to cry.

Lucio, who was 15, went to Lima to find work. After struggling to find work, he finally secured a job harvesting sweet potatoes. His five siblings soon joined him. For a while, they lived with an aunt, but she was unable to care for them. She gave them a small plot on which they built a little structure. For years, their main staple was sweet potatoes, eaten raw, because, as Alejandro said, “we didn’t have any matches or any way to cook them.”

They frequently went to outdoor markets after closing time to collect food that had fallen on the ground. On one of these days, Clara remembers, she was standing in front of a fruit stand. The owner asked her what she was doing. “Looking,” she answered. He asked her why. “Because I’m hungry,” she said. He filled a bag with fruit. She took it home and shared it with her brothers and sisters.

Lucio saw two missionaries on the street and remembered that he and Alejandro had been baptized before their parents were killed. He ran after the missionaries, and they told him where to find the church. For a while, a senior missionary couple, Shirley and Verlan Andersen, took special care of the children.

When it was time for Mauricio to start school, his sisters, Marcelina, Maria Lourdes, and Clara, who had never gone to school, started with him. Every year, the four of them moved to the next grade together.

Lucio, the family’s main provider, had a great desire to serve a mission. He had a dream that made him believe God would take care of his family. He left Alejandro in charge, and Alejandro was indeed able to find work.

Today, the Dipaz siblings have been sealed to their parents. They have stable occupations and can now serve others. “I have helped many people because some angels helped us without knowing us,” said Clara. “I have followed this example because I was blessed with a little more money.”

The siblings remain close, visiting one another frequently. Clara said they have found refuge in each other, not in drugs or alcohol. “It is the gospel that has kept us united.”

“People can turn their back on you, but God, never,” she said.

Dipaz siblings, ca. 2017