by Susan Rose Francois, CSJP
As we said goodbye to 2018 and welcomed in 2019, we faced the ongoing repercussions of increasingly uncivil discourse and a broken-down body politic. Migrant families continued to suffer from the chaos at the border, while social service agencies and volunteers, including many Catholic sisters, struggled to provide enough shelter and support to those released by immigration authorities.
Two children, Jakelin Caal Maquin and Felipe Alonso-Gomez, lost their lives in federal custody after their parents had requested refuge and asylum. Other families, who had been forcibly separated months earlier, continued to be kept apart from loved ones over the holidays, not sure when they would be reunited. Those children finally returned to their parents faced the recurring trauma of the experience of detention and separation. (Download the document below to continue reading)
