by John Sorce
john.sorce@theleaven.org
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Last month, and across the street from Washington Park here, a woman was left stranded inside the walls of the Kansas City Immigration Court building — her husband dragged from her side.
Janet Schlake, a court watcher and a recently retired Catholic school educator, was an eyewitness. Court watchers observe and document court proceedings to promote transparency and hold the legal system accountable.
Schlake had just been sitting in the waiting room when she noticed two men walk up to a couple who were there for a hearing.
They were asked to go with the men, and the couple looked confused as to what was going on.
“As they were out in the hallway, you could hear scuffling and the wife was crying,” Schlake said. “That was hard to hear.”
It turns out that the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) had detained the husband on the spot.
The couple is originally from Colombia and were living in St. Louis with their two children. The wife did not speak English or have a driver’s license, so she was stranded by herself in Kansas City.
Schlake recounted this event to some 70 people gathered at Washington Square Park for a Rosary for Immigrants on Oct. 22 across the street from the Immigration Court — the same building where that event took place.
“The biggest message I have from this is the way this woman was treated,” Schlake said. “I’m not sure what her husband did, but I know she didn’t do anything and was just stranded here.”
The rosary was part of a call to action that builds on the binational Mass held at the U.S.-Mexico border in San Luis, Arizona, on Oct. 12 where bishops from both the United States and Mexico called attention to the urgent crisis facing migrants.
Then, as part of a day of witness on the Nov. 13 feast day of St. Frances Xavier Cabrini — the patron saint of migrants — Catholics across the country are called to pray publicly for migrants as part of “One Church, One Family: Catholic Public Witness for Immigrants.”
The Oct. 22 event came together in a partnership of the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas and the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph.
“One of my mentors, Don Bakely, taught me, ‘When you don’t know where to start, anywhere will do,’” said Deacon Bill Scholl, the consultant for the social justice office of the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas. “We only had about a week to pull this together, so we thought let’s try this as a dress rehearsal — promoted by word of mouth — so we can be ready for an even bigger turnout on Nov. 13.”
Deacon Scholl noted that a rosary was chosen because it serves as a “nonviolent way of witnessing for the sanctity of life, and it shows Catholics care for the sacredness of all life and will defend the helpless.”
“Plus, we want to ask for Our Lady’s intercession to bring God’s grace into this situation because that is the only way we are going to resolve the immigration issue,” he added.
Also part of the organizing team is John Gilchrist who with Tom Bickimer were trying to decide on the proper response to Archbishop Shawn McKnight’s pastoral letter on immigration. (See The Leaven, Aug. 22.)
The two then went to Deacon Scholl with the idea of bringing attention to the indiscriminate deportation of immigrants.
“It’s important that we get people in this community to visibly demonstrate our Catholic faith,” Gilchrist said, “because our teachings are very clear about this issue.
“Hopefully, we give Catholics and other Christians the idea that this is what our faith is calling us to do.”
The rosary was recited in both English and Spanish, and a sense of peace could be felt among the crowd.
“That was very powerful,” said Trinidad Molina, program coordinator at Advocates for Immigrant Rights and Reconciliation (AIRR) in Kansas City, Kansas. “There’s such a powerful place Catholics can have on this issue to bring the presence of peace, and everyone in this crowd could feel that peace through the rosary.”
“I can’t tell you how pleased I am to see that we have gotten to this first step,” Gilchrist added. “I’m really hopeful that going forward we can maybe have a couple hundred people at something like this.”
Another rosary will be held at the same location on Nov. 13.
“Our Lord came to set the captives free,” Deacon Scholl said. “It seems right now in this nation, so many of us are chained up by our algorithms. So many of us are stuck in a perception that is fed to us by a computer, and we get into conversations where everyone has their own facts.
“We need to break those chains. We need to learn more about this issue and try to get our friends and neighbors to be open and have eyes to see so that we can come together and fix the problem.”
More information about Catholic Public Witness for Immigrants can be found online at: 1family.us.
