The Practice of Solidarity

Refugees: La Sagrada Familia

“Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother, ‘Behold, this child is destined for the fall and rise of many in Israel.’ (Luke 2: 34)

It’s impossible to read the Gospel of Luke without considering the manner in which he highlights the experience of the poor, the oppressed, and the marginalized. In good Ignatian practice, I read today’s gospel through the lens of our current immigration crisis and found God encouraging me toward a deeper awareness of those who want a better life but cannot find it, those who are judged negatively by society, and those who seek safety and refuge.

While working at a Jesuit-sponsored immigration center in Mexico, I was assigned to enjoy lunch and a casual conversation with migrants from one of the larger segments of the recent Central American caravan. After brief announcements and a welcome from the local program leader, one of the young men, a migrant named Jose, led the group in prayer. I was struck by his courage, fortitude, and maturity; perhaps the hard-won results of a life filled with the pain and burden of violence and neglect. Following the prayer, the volunteers interspersed among the delegation and we proceeded through the cafeteria serving line. I was then seated with my lunchtime conversation partner; it was Jose! It’s been a privilege to share occasions of working one on one with migrants in Mexico and on our southern border, but I wasn’t fully prepared for this truly sacramental experience of breaking bread with Jose and coming to understand elements of my own brokenness as he courageously shared his story.

When designing service opportunities for our students, it makes sense to begin with the end goal in sight: to respect, to understand, to listen, to love, and ultimately, to move toward empathy. But what about when we are the volunteers rather than the educators? I hadn’t considered this in light of being the actual volunteer... Sometimes we have an idea of what we want out of an experience of exercising our faith, but we cannot conceive of what we will encounter when we enter into the world of the other. Hence, we can unknowingly reinforce the barriers that society had previously placed between people of different cultures and socioeconomic circumstances. Deductive reasoning and preconceptions can cheapen our experience and leave us as simply neutral observers.

When connecting with Jose, I entered into the sufferings and painfulness of his journey from Honduras. It was something for which I was not fully prepared. We don’t have to accept the invitation to be witnesses of the pain and suffering of another human being, but when we do, even when we feel ill-prepared, something clicks, and in the moment of that insight, somehow we start to heal together. This young man, and the young people in the caravans, invite us to see when we are the proud and the arrogant, and conversely, when we are the servant leaders. Witnessing the journey of the women, men, and children arriving at the border is as startling as meeting the infant Jesus in the Temple: There is a miracle of new life in the face of extreme physical violence, loss of loved ones, and inhumane economic circumstances.

Jose is a representative of the poor “who will always be with us” and an invitation to discover who we are in their midst. Harkening back to the Gospel, just as Christ, they proclaim our rise or our fall as a collective humanity and invite us into the intentional practice of solidarity.

Author: Rich Perry, Director of Community Service