From First Hand Encounters to Advocacy
SMOS Immigration Team
~ A few years ago, my employer sent me and a co-worker on a “mission trip” of sorts to be part of a team of solar company workers from all over the country to build a solar drip irrigation project in a poor village in Nicaragua. Since then, their government took a very oppressive turn and some of those same wonderful people I met have had their lives severely impacted. A couple years later, I went on a mission trip, with fellow church members from across the country, to Reynosa, Mexico to build small homes for refugees who were turned back from our border and were trying to eek-out an existence around a local city dump… On both trips the wonderful caring people I met in those countries – reminded me that our brothers and sisters around the world who are experiencing such hardships – are real people with real legitimate needs and concerns and with real dignity and worth. Not that long ago, we heard some of the observations and concerns expressed first hand by our own St. Margaret’s students who took a trip to another Mexican border area.
In Leviticus (19:33-34), we read: “When a foreigner resides among you in your land, do not mistreat them. The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt.” To see so many immigrants and refugees be treated so inhumanely now by our own government through ICE, and while at detention centers around the country – is a shameful atrocity… when Jesus speaks of the Last Judgement (in Mat.25:35ff), he makes a clear distinction between those who welcome and those who do not welcome the stranger, regarding the fate awaiting each.
Pope Leo in his message on human dignity at the Jubilee of Migrants, October 2025 said, “No one should be forced to flee, nor exploited or mistreated because of their situation as foreigners or people in need! Human dignity must always come first.” Our own ministry at St. Margaret’s provides opportunities to make a difference with these oppressed people in our midst. Please consider plugging in to one or more of those opportunities – like the Welcome Neighbor STL Int’l. Dinner on the 20th or the Immigrant Accompaniment Program, for which there are upcoming trainings on the 17th and 27th of this month. (More info on the parish website.)
During the Summer months, this column will be highlighting the good work and parishioners involved in one of our various Social Justice Ministries. Each week, we will feature an article from a different ministry, written by one if its members, as a reflection on the calling to Catholic Social Teaching at St. Margaret of Scotland.
