The Huichol Indians live high in the Sierra Madre Mountains of Western Mexico. They live much as they did 1,000 years ago, still dressing in beautifully embroidered costumes and sustained by an annual corn crop.

MPI and our sister organization Amistad International work together to meet the needs of the Huichol through a flying clinic, installing community water systems, agriculture training, health education, and evangelism.

Pastor/Pilot Dagoberto Cirilo serves the Huichol Indians by mission plane in this roadless region of deep canyons.

The plane is essential in transporting physicians, patients, food, plastic water pipe, & many other needed services.

This flying clinic has been serving the Huichol Indians since 1953.  Pioneer missionary aviator Pastor Bill Baxter brought the first medical care to their Huichol and built the Huichol's first primary school in 1954.

More than 30 years passed before the first Huichol were baptized. There are now more than 100 baptized Huichol. They have one church and a few branch Sabbath schools.

Volunteers nearly completed a church building in 2003, but before the roof could be put on, Huichol authorities demanded construction be halted.  We are waiting for the Huichol government officers to change in the near future, hoping to find friendlier faces.

No evangelism by outsiders is permitted among the Huichols, but Adventist Christians are allowed in most areas because of our sincere compassion and our long history of humanitarian service among their tribe.

In August, 2005 Adventist Christians were driven from their village of Agua Fria by village leaders, charged with refusing to follow native religious practices of using liquor and hallucinogenic peyote cactus.  They have been relocated to a remote undeveloped area of the Aguas Milpas reservoir, accessible only by motorboat. 

Six families struggle to survive, living under tarps, planting crops in poor soil, yet happy they can worship the true God without fear of evil spirits of their former persecutors.

Education is the greatest asset to reaching the Huichol for Christ. 

These Huichol young people studied at Colegio del Pacífico, a boarding school
near Navojoa, Sonora so they can return to work among their own people.