I just returned from a trip abroad with some of my children. It was a great adventure. We enjoyed the beauty and hospitality of the country we were visiting and did our best to avoid the headlines from home. It was sad, however, when friends living there asked about what was happening in our country, the country they love to visit. They voiced their concern for us and asked many questions. We didn’t have answers.

It is increasingly challenging to have a joyful heart these days, given the headlines we tried to avoid while traveling. Yet, we are called to be joyful and to avoid hardened hearts.

Earlier this week I met with a woman interested in the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius. During our conversation her story unfolded. She is a naturalized citizen who has lived here for decades. She is a lector for the Spanish Mass at her parish, and over the last few months has taken on a new role - the role of gatekeeper, as all the doors but one are locked during the Spanish Mass. She stands outside to ensure everyone gets in. She is prepared if ICE agents show up and jokingly asked if I would visit her in jail. She is serious about standing guard so her community can worship together in peace.

She worries about her three adult children, born in this country, more than she worries about herself in terms of being stopped and questioned or taken into custody. She discussed the need to carry proof of citizenship papers, even though she has been a citizen for many decades. Despite her fears, she is a joyful woman who intentionally seeks to deepen her faith. She smiled and wove humor into our conversation.

I sat in my car for a few minutes after we parted ways. How did we get to a point where a hardworking woman with three grown children, a husband and a peaceful life suddenly sees everything change? How does she maintain her joyful spirit despite living with in fear? How is it that she does not give in to despair?

If we believe that scripture offers insight, then, as this woman has done, we turn to God.

Today’s first reading sets the tone for the others in terms of the power of persistent prayer. Abraham repeatedly asks God to save the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah even if most of the inhabitants are sinful. Each time God replied, “I will not destroy it.” As long as there were a few righteous people in the cities God promised to spare everyone. Abraham was not afraid to reach out to God to the point of being somewhat obnoxious as he repeated his question over and over.

The gospel continues the theme of persistent prayer. Jesus offers the example of a man asleep when there is a knock on his door, with a friend asking for help and wanting some bread. The man tells his friend that everyone is asleep in the house and tells him to go away, but the man at the door does not give up, and it seems he gets the bread he asked for.

Jesus then goes on to encourage his disciples to pray for whatever it is they are seeking: “…ask and you will receive; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.”

As we live these days with situations that cause fear and outrage it is prayer that will open our hearts and minds to how we can offer love to others and work for justice. While prayer is not magic, it does calm us and quiet us, allowing us to listen to where God is leading us. Given the circumstances we face today it seems to me that prayer is the best way to figure out how to move forward.

Peace, 

Anne                                                                                        

How Do I Keep from Crying?

By Betsy Potts

The Gospel this past Sunday was the story of the Good Samaritan—an outsider, a foreigner, an “other”—who stopped to help a stranger who had been beaten and robbed.

Two others before him had ignored the stranger.

Today, that stranger is the immigrant, who is being rounded up, beaten, and sent away.

What are we doing? This isn’t about politics. This is about good and evil; moral and immoral; humane and inhumane.

As Fr. Greg Boyle of Homeboy Industries says, “No human being is illegal…We stand with anybody who’s demonized or left out, or excluded, or seen as disposable. We stand with them. We will never abandon you, ever…”

My heart hurts. For the undocumented. Human beings. Who work hard, love their families, and care for the vulnerable. I know a family whose mother is undocumented and lives in fear. I have a friend whose sister broke her ankle and is afraid to go to the hospital. I know a gardener who is afraid to go to work. They live in fear of being routed out of their homes, their places of work, of being beaten and put in detention camps (please compare pictures of Alligator Alcatraz to Nazi concentration camps).

I hear people say, but they didn’t come in properly. Does the “proper way” make them any less human? Being brought over as children—for some—was the way they came into the US. They know no other life.

Why can’t they be given a path to citizenship that doesn’t demand crippling expense, being sent back to their birth place (many of whom haven’t seen it since they were babes in arms), and then waiting many more years.

This is not a matter of politics. It’s a matter of justice. Of decency. Of love.

Below is an excerpt from Fr. Greg Walgenbach’s sermon this past Sunday (July 13, 2025). He is serving at the Archdiocese of Orange in Orange County, CA and at St. Bonaventure Parish in Huntington Beach.

From Fr. Greg’s sermon:

“There was a man who was going about his daily work to provide for his family when he was chased down by men in masks and pointing large guns who threw him to the ground and beat him. Rather than leaving him for dead, they disappeared him into a vehicle and took him to a detention facility… His only crime? None. He’d never even had a parking ticket? He was taken because although he has an American citizen wife and three boys who have served in the Marine Corps (1 veteran, 2 active duty), and although he’s been in the country for over 30 years, he is undocumented. … Some took videos of the horrific beating. Some have offered accompaniment to the family, even going with them to court, as our own Bishop Vann did earlier this week. He did so as a pastor of souls, to be a good neighbor, to witness first hand whether justice is taking place or not…Thankfully, he posted bond and (after yet another weekend in detention) hopefully he will be back with his family tomorrow as he continues his legal case for adjustment of status. What does it mean to be a neighbor to this man? To his family? To the many others like him who do not have high profile cases? (We can also change character in the story and consider the majority of migrants who are themselves good samaritans every day, caring for their families, contributing to their communities, serving in essential industries, loving their neighbors…)

 “I imagine there are some wondering whether it is appropriate to focus in a homily on a topic that seems political rather than spiritual, religious, moral, or theological. To that I say that the fact that we tend to see the question of immigration as a political question before it is a spiritual, religious, moral, theological, human (!) one is a problem, especially for those of us who are followers of Jesus…”

For the full sermon: https://www.facebook.com/gregorywalgenbach/posts/notes-for-homily-xiv-sunday-in-ordinary-time-july-12-13-2025-st-joachimst-bonave/10228574327931002/

That is why I work at my church’s food pantry and deliver food to the frightened, the marginalized, the demonized. That is why my husband is going to training to accompany migrants to court hearings. That is why he has an appointment with our pastor to clarify what our parish is doing for the “least of us.”

Betsy Potts is a long time volunteer with Ignatians West.

Ignatians West Welcome Two New Board Members!

MAILING ADDRESS

8601 Lincoln Blvd., Suite 180-306 • Los Angeles, CA 90045

ADMINISTRATIVE OFFICE

Center for Catholic Education • University Hall, LMU

PHONE

805-443-0812 (C)