Tag Archives: immigration

Lighting a Candle

prayer, reflections, , ,

I normally volunteer and stand public witness on Sunday mornings at Delaney Hall, the private for profit immigration detention center run by the GEO Corporation under a 15 year $1Billion government contract. This weekend however I was away until Sunday afternoon attending an intercongregational formation weekend with our Candidate. (One of my current roles in community is as Candidate Director. Candidacy is the first stage of initial formation before Novitiate).

Tomorrow is the Feast of the Immaculate Conception. In many Latin American countries, such as Columbia, tonight is celebrated as Dia de Las Velitas. We held a beautiful prayer this evening at Delaney Hall, reading the names of 16 of the friends who have been released and united with their loved ones.  We lit candles in their honor and prayed in Advent Hope that all families will be reunited. You can see a family with small children in the background of this photo, speaking to the guard to get on the list for visitors. This is real life.

When I told our Candidate that I was going to Delaney Hall this cold December evening, she said she wanted to come with me. We handed out pasta and hot chocolate and a tshirt to a woman who the guards decided violated the (arbitrary) dress code, among other things. It is a simple ministry of presence in the company of good people.

There were lots of volunteers this evening, so at one point we decided to stand by the table with the candles to pray. The two of us prayed the Sorrowful Rosary using this guide from CLINIC with stories of immigrants.

As we were praying a family with a grandmother, mother and little girl walked by on their way to talk to the guard. The mother stopped, looked at the table full of candles, and said “Dia de las Velitas.” They paused and little candles. It was a powerful moment I will not soon forget

Mary, Mother of Jesus, you who experienced being a refugee, you who were denied room in the inn, pray for these Holy Families. Comfort them and intercede on their behalf with your son Jesus that justice will prevail, that their loved ones will be treated with human dignity, and that they will be reunited with their families. Amen.

“Justice shall flourish” – Living Advent

reflections, , , , , , ,

This morning I attended (virtually) an immigration court hearing for a gentleman detained at Delaney Hall awaiting an opportunity for due process regarding his irregular status. The judge and government attorney were in the court room. The respondent was online from a very dreary closet sized room at the detention center. His attorney, and some other community supporters were online. It was quick – in fact I am grateful my nun training kicked in and led me to log in early, because when I logged in the hearing was already in process before the scheduled start time.

Before the hearing, I prayed with the readings for this second Tuesday of Advent. From Isaiah 11:

A shoot shall sprout from the stump of Jesse,
and from his roots a bud shall blossom.
The Spirit of the LORD shall rest upon him:
a Spirit of wisdom and of understanding,
A Spirit of counsel and of strength,
a Spirit of knowledge and of fear of the LORD,
and his delight shall be the fear of the LORD.
Not by appearance shall he judge,
nor by hearsay shall he decide,
But he shall judge the poor with justice,
and decide aright for the land’s afflicted.

And from Psalm 72:
He shall rescue the poor when he cries out,
and the afflicted when he has no one to help him.
He shall have pity for the lowly and the poor;
the lives of the poor he shall save.
Justice shall flourish in his time, and fullness of peace for ever.

Justice is not flourishing in our time for many families, especially our immigrant brothers and sisters. Today I read about some troubling developments in a post by the National Immigration Law Center that should concern those seeking justice for the afflicted of our day. ICE is trying to take away bond eligibility for long-term residents. Fortunately, just before Thanksgiving a district judge blocked a July ICE policy memo declaring that anyone who entered the country without permission is not eligible to request to be released from detention to bond, no matter how long they have been in this country. And in rare cases where bond is issued (it is a complicated process and 80% of people in detention do not have legal counsel), ICE regularly appeals the judge’s bond decision, which automatically blocks the person’s release while the appeal is pending. Due process is being systematically withheld in the supposed land of the free. Cruelty is the point, and it seems the design is to make life miserable while immigrants who have not committed (or been convicted of) any crimes are held in prison for months awaiting their day in court to address their violations of civil immigration law.

Now for some good news. The gentleman whose hearing I attended virtually today to show community support did have legal representation. He has been a law abiding resident of this country for eleven years, working and paying his taxes. He has two US citizen children. And today, the judge approved his bond at $7,000. That is a huge burden, but thankfully there are community groups who provide bond support for immigrant families. Please join me in praying that the government does not appeal the judge’s bond decision and that this gentlemen is released from detention soon and reunited with his family while he navigates the legal system and seeks to regularize his immigration status.

Living Advent means that we must realize that part of how justice and peace shall flourish is through our actions, our prayer, our advocacy, and our presence. May we live in active Advent hope and work for the day when the words of Isaiah and the psalmist are fulfilled.

Thanks and giving at Delaney Hall

reflections, , , , ,

Yesterday evening I joined a group of volunteers outside Delaney Hall, the for profit immigrant detention center located in an industrial area in Newark, New Jersey. We provided support to families visiting their detained loved ones on this national holiday.

There was the mother bringing her 2 day old to meet the child’s father for the very first time. Yes 2 days after giving birth! Such a tiny baby.

There were the elementary school age kids whose eyes lit up when I showed them a selection of donated Hot Wheels cars, still in the packaging, and said they could choose which one they wanted to take home.

There was the teenager who didn’t want to leave home on a cold Thanksgiving night and the Mom who made him come so he could see his Dad on this family holiday.

There was the family in tears as they were turned away by the guard because he decided (arbitrarily) that they didn’t arrive early enough, even though they were there half an hour before the assigned visiting hour for their loved one’s unit.

There were many others. Otherwise ordinary families forced by our unjust immigration system to stand on an active driveway at night in the cold in order to see their loved one.

It felt wrong somehow to wish them Happy Thanksgiving. But they wished us Happy Thanksgiving as we passed out slices of pizza and  plastic red cups filled with pasta, warm food to feed their bodies and help them stay warm. They thanked us as we handed out blankets, hats, gloves, and scarves for them to use while they waited outside the gates for up to an hour in order to ensure the guard put them on the list of allowed visitors for their loved one’s unit.

GEO Group runs this immigration prison on a 15 year $1Billion tax payer funded contract.  Their CEO told shareholders on an earnings call that they expect to earn a $60 million profit this year alone detaining migrants at Delaney Hall.

Yet they choose not to use those profits to provide an indoor waiting area for families visiting loved ones. They recently installed a metal shed with no walls or heat on the active driveway and filled it with cold metal benches. This is insufficient and provides no safety or real shelter from the elements as we move into winter.

Federal Holidays are supposed to be full visiting days and follow the weekend daytime schedule. In fact the guards announced to visitors last weekend that Thanksgiving Day and the Day after would be all day visiting with one hour visits for each unit. Then on Tuesday a sign was posted that Thanksgiving would follow the regular Thursday evening schedule. No mention of Friday. That meant having to wait outside in the dark for a half hour visit. We wondered if they were understaffed on the holiday. In any case it led to confusion and hardship for the families.

One family I have gotten to know did not have to wait outside this Thanksgiving. After four months of detention because of his irregular status, their loved one finally was released on bond the night before Thanksgiving. His wife wrote me:

“Yes, he was set free last night!!! 🙌 We barely slept last night because we were so happy and relieved. It is so nice having him here and seeing how he is experiencing everything new again. Praise the Lord on this Day of Thanksgiving for all His wonderful blessings and how He heard months of cry’s and prayers and gave us our hearts desire.”

They now face an uphill battle with the courts, but they are reunited and he is safe. He lost a lot of weight in detention due to the conditions and the quality of food provided.

Please pray for all those in detention, 1,000 at Delaney Hall and more than 60,000 nationwide. Pray for their families. Advocate for them to receive due process and humane treatment. We cannot be silent.

(Photo borrowed from Instagram of another volunteer @christinehou. I am not in the photo as it was taken after I left a little early because my feet were so cold!)

Souls of the Just and Hope

reflections, , , , , , ,

Today is the Feast of All Souls, also known as the Day of the Dead.

This morning I celebrated this Feast with immigrant families waiting to visit their detained loved ones outside Delaney Hall, the private for-profit immigrant prison in Newark, NJ. Despite the estimated $60 million annual profit GEO Corporation makes on the operation, they force families to wait outside for hours on an active driveway for a chance to see their loved ones. Thankfully a group of dedicated volunteers are there each visiting day to provide practical support with beverages, food, chairs, blankets, hats, gloves and perhaps most importantly compassion.

In the first reading for today from the Book of Wisdom we hear: “The souls of the just are in the hand of God.” And in the second reading from Romans: “Hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.” Every time I am at Delaney Hall I leave with more hope, even in the face of the intentional cruelty done in the name of my country, because of the goodness of people.

Today one of the families woke up at 5 am to make tamales and Mexican hot chocolate which they brought to share with others families and the faithful volunteers who are there during visiting hours to support the visitors. The family told us they wanted to give to us like we give to them. I will admit this brought tears to my eyes. And I was not the only one. (Plus the tamales and hot chocolate were delicious)

Homemade tamales!

Other volunteers brought toys and art supplies for the kids. And there was even a face painting station. For children whose families have been torn apart and who wait for hours outside a chain link fence topped with concertina wire for a chance to see their detained mom or dad, these simple gestures also give them a chance to be a kid and have some good memories to see them through.

Face painting

Other volunteers set up a colorful altar, an ofrenda, for the Day of the Dead. We remember our loved ones who have gone before, so fitting as an emotional and spiritual support for the families visiting their detained loved ones.

Indeed hope does not disappoint because God’s love is poured out freely into our hearts. We in turn pour this love into the world, especially places and spaces of suffering and oppression.

In the words of the collect from today’s liturgy:

Listen kindly to our prayers, O Lord,

and, as our faith in your Son,

raised from the dead, is deepened,

so may our hope of resurrection for your departed servants

also find new strength.

Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,

who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,

God, for ever and ever.

Amen

May We Be A Sanctuary

events, prayer, social sin, , , , , , ,

This morning a small group of us prayed outside the gates of Delaney Hall, the for-profit immigrant prison operated by GEO Group in our name. We gathered outside for a simple prayer service while the first group of families were forced to wait on an active driveway outside the gates for the chance to visit their loved ones detained in this 1,100 bed facility. This was the second week of the Let Us Pray Sunday morning prayer service outside Delaney Hall. Different faith traditions will be leading prayer each week. This week’s prayer was in the Christian Tradition and organized by Pax Christi NJ.

We began singing the song, Please Prepare Me, praying that we might be a sanctuary for the families and their detained loved ones.

We then listened to the word of God: Jeremiah 17: 5-11, Romans 12: 1-12, and Matthew 11:28-30. I was then honored to offer a brief reflection on the scripture readings, which is copied below. It was a beautiful experience of church with friends and strangers praying together that we may find refuge in God and be rooted in love.

Reflection by Susan Francois, CSJP – Delaney Hall (August 31, 2025)

Scripture: Jeremiah 17:5-11, Romans 12:1-2, Matthew 11:28-30

Chances are, right now, you have a piece of paper or a coin in your pocket with the words “In God We Trust” written on it.  Our currency has carried these words since President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed a law making “In God We Trust” our official national motto in 1956.  The context of this law, of course, was the Cold War. The inclusion of the motto on our nation’s money was seen as a response to the anti-religious stance of the Soviet Union.

We just heard proclaimed words from the prophet Jeremiah, in which he reminded his community to trust in God, not people and not money.  His preaching was in a different context. He was worried that the people were placing their trust in the wrong things and turning their hearts from God.  He wanted them to understand that actions have consequences.  He predicted (correctly as it turns out) that they would be exiled to Babylon.

I can’t help but wonder what he’d make of our context today.  Take the last line from the passage from Jeremiah, where he compares a partridge that broods but does not hatch to those who acquire wealth unjustly.  In the end, they are just fools. Unjust fools.

The building behind me is operated by GEO Corp under tax-payer funded 15-year $1 Billion contract.  GEO’s own press release announcing the deal in February proudly predicted that the “contract is expected to generate in excess of $60 million in annualized revenues for GEO in the first full year of operations.”  

And yet, even with all this profit, families with small children, pregnant mothers, and elderly relatives of persons detained behind these walls are not provided with a safe place to wait for the chance to see their loved ones before they are deported.  They are required to wait hours in the hot sun—and with this being Labor Day weekend, we know colder and wetter weather is around the corner—without shelter, without access to a bathroom even. I suspect that the prophet Jeremiah would have looked at this private-for-profit prison operation and declared that the GEO shareholders are earning their wealth unjustly.  

Let’s shift Jeremiah’s focus from those detaining our migrant brothers and sisters to their faithful loved ones who come to stand at the foot of these gates today.  Despite the odds, despite the difficulties, no doubt even in despair, they come each weekend in hope to spend a few moments with their loved ones.  “They are like a tree planted beside the waters that stretches out its roots to the stream.  It does not fear heat when it comes, its leaves stay green.”

The leaves that sustain them, I suspect, are rooted in love.  Love for their husband or wife, son or daughter, mother or father, brother, sister, or friend who are inside these walls.  Love for each other. Those of us who have been privileged to volunteer here these past few months have seen so many actions of kindness and love between strangers on this driveway. Volunteer to visitor. Visitor to visitor. Visitor to volunteer.  

By our very presence—as visitors, as volunteers—we are refusing to conform to this age of inhumanity where cruelty seems to be the point.  We trust in love, and my Christian tradition teaches that God is love.  Jesus, God-with-us, love incarnate, invites us in the passage we heard from Matthew’s Gospel to find sanctuary in his love, where we will find rest.

May we be love.  May we be loved.  May we be sanctuary for one another.  May we trust not in the unjust laws of men or the unjust pursuit of profit through human suffering, but in the love of God.

Inhumane Profits

ethic of resistance, social sin, , , ,

Imagine this scenario. Your daughter is a newlywed. While she is not a US citizen, her husband is, and she is trying to navigate the legal system to adjust her own status. She shows up at the immigration office for her regularly scheduled appointment, from which she does not return home. You finally make contact to learn that she is being held in immigration detention at Delaney Hall, a private for-profit prison run by GEO Group under a 15 year contract granted by the Trump Administration in February worth $1 Billion. You call the detention center to learn about visiting hours, yet the phone number listed on the website is disconnected. The GEO website and the ICE website both say that there are daily visiting hours, but when you make your way to the warehouse-like building where your daughter is detained, located on a highway with a nearby sewage plant and industrial estates spewing toxic smells while tractor trailers barrel by, you learn that daily visitation has been cancelled and you can only visit now on Saturday and Sunday. So you manage to come back on Saturday morning, only to be barred entry again because you are wearing open toe shoes on this summer day.

This is not a made up scenario, but the story I cobbled together this morning after greeting this mother outside the gates of Delaney Hall after she had been denied entry. In the end she was able to visit her daughter because I lent her a pair of shoes that Sister Sheena and I had brought with us for this very situation. The guards are able to bar visitors if they judge that they don’t meet the dress code, which in addition to open toe shoes can include sleeveless tops or shorts/skirts that are deemed to be too short. Other visitors who lined up outside the gates this morning to lay eyes on their loved ones were turned away for other reasons. Some thankfully were able to enter the facility to see their loved ones. About an hour later I saw these folks leave the facility, their faces showing a mix of emotion as they rushed back to their cars. I held each of them in prayer as they walked by.

I was able to greet the woman whose story I tell above to return her shoes. She and her son-in-law told us that her daughter is doing ok. They were holding back tears as they thanked us for the loan of shoes and more importantly for our kindness. They told us how much it meant to them that those detained at Delaney hall are not forgotten. I promised to pray for both of them and her daughter.

My friends, horrible things are not only happening in our name, but corporations are making a profit, paid by our tax dollars, on this inhuman treatment of our immigrant brothers and sisters. This attack on human dignity is incentivized. We cannot be silent. We must pay attention. We must listen to and tell the story. That is why I held aloft a sign that I made during my prayer time this morning – “History has its eyes on you.” Sheena held a sign that said “For Profit Prisons are Immoral.”

For the past ten weeks a faithful group of ordinary folks, including Pax Christi New Jersey, have been standing witness outside Delaney Hall to keep “Eyes on ICE” and provide support to the families attempting to visit their loved ones. They offer clothing when needed to pass the dress code, water and snacks for those who have travelled far to stand in line outside in the heat, and information sheets with helpline numbers for immigrant aid organizations. Perhaps most importantly they show that there are good people who are watching, standing witness, and calling out this social sin with real life consequences and who want to offer support. I hope to join them whenever I can. Sadly, this inhumanity for profit is happening just a twenty minute drive from my home.

This for profit prison is convenient for the immigration industrial complex because of its proximity to Newark Airport. “The location near an international airport streamlines logistics, and helps facilitate the timely processing of individuals in our custody as we pursue President Trump’s mandate to arrest, detain and remove illegal aliens from our communities,” said acting ICE Director Caleb Vitello when GEO was awarded the contract in February.

While we were there this morning, we witnessed a van full of immigrants leave the facility, escorted by unmarked vehicles, presumably on their way to a deportation flight at the airport. We were able to just see the men inside through the tinted windows. Hopefully they could see us outside as I held up a sign saying: “Fathers, we see you. We are fighting for you and your families. Stay strong!”

St. Edith Stein, pray for us … a Saint for these times

reflections, , , , , , , ,

I have long been haunted by a quote by Edith Stein, St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, Carmelite nun, Jewish daughter and sister, philosopher, one time atheist, convert, contemplative, martyr of Auschwitz .

“Nowadays I always feel transported into Napoleonic times, and I can imagine in what tension people lived then everywhere in Europe. I wonder: will we live to see the events of our days become ‘history’? I have a great desire to see all this sometime in the light of eternity. For one realizes ever more clearly how blind we are toward everything. One marvels at how mistakenly one viewed a lot of things before, and yet the very next moment one commits the blunder again of forming an opinion without having the necessary basis for it.” Edith Stein: A Self-Portrait in Letters, quoted in the People’s Companion to the Breviary.

This quote is included in the office book published by the Carmelites of Indianapolis. It is the reading for Week IV, Friday, evening prayer. The first time I heard this read during community prayer when I was a candidate back in 2005, my heart stopped. I didn’t know much about Edith Stein, except that she had been killed in a concentration camp. But it led me to learn more about her, which only made the quote that much more powerful.

When she was a professor of philosophy she studied the problem of empathy. Writing in 1925–the same year that Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf was published–she proposed that the capacity for empathy ensures “openness among human beings” rather than separation or alienation. She engaged in her philosophical study of this capacity for empathy because she believed it “to be descriptive of human reality and the foundation needed for productive action” for life in the human community.

Now, on this sad day almost 100 years later, a day which our nation’s present leader has chosen to round up children, women and men–largely of one ethnic group–transporting them to camps, separating families and causing terror to thousands of people, I cannot help but ask for her intercession.

Nowadays, I sometimes feel transported to her times. And it is a scary time to be, one that rocks one’s faith in humanity and causes one to cry out to the heavens. What tension we live in today. Are we complicit? Are we bystanders? Or do we stand on the right side of history, crying out “Not in My Name,” and acting on behalf of human dignity?

And then of course there is today’s Gospel reading, the Good Samaritan, which makes it crystal clear what we are to do. What sad twisted irony that the raids against our immigrant brothers and sisters are set to begin today when this Gospel is proclaimed in churches across our nation. Of course, no doubt, many families are staying away from church today, afraid that they might be swept up, no matter what their legal status. And others listen with deaf ears.

Today, the Carmelite Nuns of Great Britain shared a quote from Edith Stein on their Twitter account in which she reflects on today’s Gospel reading.

“‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’ This commandment is valid unconditionally and without qualification. The neighbour is not the one whom I ‘like’ but any and every human being with whom I come into contact, without exception.”

Without exception. Unconditional. Without qualification.

When Edith Stein was arrested by the Gestapo in 1942 in the chapel of her monastery in the Netherlands and taken to a transit camp for deportation, eventually to Auschwitz, she commented: “I never knew that people could be like this, neither did I know that my brothers and sisters would have to suffer like this. … I pray for them every hour. Will God hear my prayers? He will certainly hear them in their distress.” 

When she arrived at Auschwitz, she ministered to God’s people in distress, even as she was one among them.

“It was Edith Stein’s complete calm and self-possession that marked her out from the rest of the prisoners. There was a spirit of indescribable misery in the camp; the new prisoners, especially suffered from extreme anxiety. Edith Stein went among the women like an angel, comforting, helping, and consoling them. Many of the mothers were on the brink of insanity and had sat moaning for days, without giving any thought to their children. She immediately set about taking care of these little ones. She washed them, combed their hair, and tried to make sure they were fed and cared for.” –Edith Stein,  A Biography, quoted on Carmelites of Boston website.

And so I pray.

St. Edith Stein, Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, you who studied empathy, lived a life of compassionate love, pray for us. Inspire empathy, respect for human dignity, and action for justice. Lead those of us who might become bystanders instead to solidarity and compassionate love. Help us to pray for conversion of heart in those who wield their power without enough apparent capacity for empathy or neighborliness. Most of all, be with those who suffer. Comfort the mothers, fathers and children facing inhumanity in these dark times. Pray for us all, that our hearts may become wider, wide enough to encompass all our neighbors, unconditionally and without exception. Amen.