My experience with the "People of Faith Root Causes Pilgrimage to Honduras" delegation was memorable. One plea from groups and individuals was that we persuade our government not to send aid to Honduras because it is used by the government, its army and police forces to oppress the people. They said that the ordinary poor people, 60% of the population, never see aid from the U.S.
GSR recently held a discussion with Sr. Carmen Sammut, president of UISG; Sr. Pat Murray, executive director of UISG; Sr. Sharlet Wagner, president of the LCWR; and Sr. Carol Zinn, executive director of LCWR, about abuse of sisters, the role of women in the church, interreligious dialogue and work at the margins.
Pilgrimage to Honduras: I was particularly happy to be part of the delegation traveling to Honduras in a "reverse caravan," since it meant a return to the country where I had ministered for almost 19 years.
The Life - Changes and challenges called the founders of congregations to discover and present-day women religious to rediscover their charism. GSR heard about it from our sister panelists this month as they responded to this question: How have you or your congregation taken your mission or charism and adapted it to the culture of your surroundings or your country's history?
GSR Today - "We need to look as a nation to our obligations and reach out to help people — especially since we are a rich nation. The U.S. government is obliged to help people in desperate situations."
A group of about 75 people, including two dozen women religious, will travel to Honduras to see for themselves why tens of thousands of people have fled for their lives.
We wanted to visit the children in detention at the border. We wanted to know what a day in their upset lives looked like; who was caring for them; whether they could play and pray and sing.
Dominican Sr. Donna Markham, president and CEO of Catholic Charities USA, challenged the group of students, professors and clergy in her audience March 12 at Georgetown University's Dahlgren Chapel to a thought experiment. Making them visualize the story of the good Samaritan, she asked them to graft it onto their own lives, imploring, "Who is lying by the side of the road?" and later, "Am I one of the priests or Levites who passed by?"
Give kids paper and crayons, and they will give you their hearts. At Tucson's Casa Alitas, a Catholic Community Services short-term shelter for immigrant families released from detention, kid's artwork covers the largest wall in the house. Guileless and profound, art by immigrant children puts the border rhetoric of adults to shame.
A group of city commissioners in the border city of McAllen, Texas, voted in mid-February to remove from a building a popular Catholic-administered center run by Sr. Norma Pimentel, who has been praised by Pope Francis for her work with migrants.
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