15 April 2025, El Paso, Texas, Steven Zimmerman – Scams abound. Not a single day goes by that we don’t encounter someone trying to part us from our hard-earned money.
There is a new scam in El Paso and Las Cruces; some have already been victimized.
Many of us in the Borderland attend Mass at a local parish. We understand the needs of our Church community and what our priests go through to ensure those needs are met. However, scammers have begun preying on parishioners, pretending to be the parish priest and seeking your help. The problem is, it’s not your parish priest contacting you.
These clergy scams begin with an innocuous message: “Can you do me a favor?” The message comes from con artists posing as clergy. The “favor” is often buying gift cards for a phony need.
“This scam happens about once every few weeks. If you have any questions or need to verify, please contact the parish office,” wrote Queen of Peace Catholic Church on their Facebook page on 14 February 2025.
And, as Queen of Peace Catholic Church posted once again, this time for Holy Week:
“I got a text message saying it was from the Father at my church,” says Ruth Armendarez of Las Cruces, New Mexico. “The message said, ‘I’m in a very important meeting otherwise I would have called you. I need to get an Apple gift card for a member of our parish. Her daughter is fighting cancer at UMC.’ There are no children with cancer in our parish. I knew better.”
Others were not so lucky.
“I sent the numbers off of a prepaid Visa card to someone I thought was our priest,” says one man, an El Paso resident who asked we not share his name. “I thought it was our priest because he knew so much about El Paso.”
These scams are becoming increasingly ubiquitous. Even at my parish, the Basilica of San Albino, there is a warning about this scam announced before Mass and in the bulletin.
My other cellphone number is from Lubbock, Texas. I recently received the following message: “It’s Fr. Beal, and I will need your help. I am moving around to see those who can not [sic] make it to church. My car has had a breakdown and I don’t have my wallet. Can you help me?”
I did respond to see how far the scam would go. I was asked to purchase four $500 Apple gift cards and send him photos of the back of each card. Mechanics now accept Apple gift cards?
I asked “Fr. Beal” for the shop’s name, saying I would call and pay them directly. I was told that the shop didn’t have a working phone.
On a hunch, I responded, “Alaye, why are you doing this? You know you are not a priest in Lubbock,” was the last text message I could send. Alaye is a term Nigerian Yahoo Boys (scammers) call each other.
The response was a large amount of profanity, and then I was blocked.
Remember, if your parish priest needs your help, he will likely talk to you face to face, not over text from some random number. If you still believe you are talking to your parish priest, call the Church office before you send any money or gift cards.