FAITH Accompaniment Program

The FAITH Program provides spiritual accompaniment and a compassionate presence for our migrant and asylum-seeking dear neighbors who have immigration hearings in the Edward J. Schwarz Federal Courthouse in downtown San Diego, California. A project by Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic Church, the San Diego Catholic Diocese and San Diego Organizing Project, FAITH is an ecumenical ministry grounded in bearing witness, building trust and providing pastoral care for individuals and families during their immigration court hearings.

Sister Maureen Evelyn Brown, CSJ and Ryan Martin-Spencer, the Director of Mission Integration at the Academy of Our Lady of Peace (OLP), wrote brief reflections on their recent experiences volunteering with the FAITH Program.

Ryan Martin-Spencer

My daughter Kyra, a graduate in the Class of 2022 from the Academy of Our Lady of Peace high school in San Diego where I serve as the Director of Mission Integration, encouraged me to attend an orientation to become an official FAITH volunteer. We attended the training together, along with some other OLP faculty, alumnae and parents.

Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish, a Jesuit parish in San Diego, helps to coordinate the FAITH ministry. Fr. Scott Santarosa, SJ, pastor of Our Lady of Guadalupe, encourages FAITH volunteers to actively reach out to, speak with and offer to pray with the dear neighbors whom we encounter in the courthouse. 

One of the most memorable and moving shifts that I have served as a FAITH volunteer over the past few months included serving with Kyra as we both encountered and accompanied a family of four. 

Following Fr. Scott’s lead, I asked the family of four if they wanted to pray together as they sat in the waiting room for one of the courtrooms. The parents didn’t feel the need to pray but kindly appreciated the offer. However, their young teenage daughter commented on the beauty of one of our rosaries and asked if she could take into the courtroom to pray. Of course, we gave it to her.

Another FAITH volunteer who was already seated in the courtroom as an observer shared that when the young girl began silently praying with the rosary during the official proceedings between her parents and the judge, her prayerful demeanor and presence totally transformed the atmosphere within the courtroom.

No one in the family was detained, but the father needed to check in with ICE on the second floor to get an ankle monitor. We accompanied the family to the second floor and while the father and mother waited their turn to check in with ICE, we stayed with the young teenage daughter and her younger brother in the hallway.

Kyra and the young girl developed an instant connection and talked about their interests and hobbies for almost half an hour, providing a touchstone of common humanity through storytelling and even some laughter, which shone a ray of hopeful light in the midst of the intentionally dreary hallway outside of the ICE check in room where so many of our dear neighbors experience uncertainty, fear and dread. 

As the father concluded his ICE check in for an ankle monitor, the mother approached a small group of us FAITH volunteers, and thanked Fr. Scott specifically for his pastoral leadership within the FAITH ministry. The mother tearfully shared that for her, FAITH represents the best of America and reminded her of why she and her husband risked so much to come to the United States. It rekindled within her the sense of hope that our country symbolizes for so many around the world. 

The emotional gratitude shared by the mother and the heartfelt way that my daughter Kyra connected with and joyfully listened to and shared with the couple’s daughter provided a small and brief reprieve from the fear, pain and devastation that our vulnerable dear neighbors so often experience in the second-floor hallway of the federal courthouse. 

We cannot prevent our dear neighbors from being detained in the courthouse and held in unjust conditions in the basement (which a New York Times article recently highlighted), or from having to wear ankle monitors, but we can—by the grace of God’s unifying love—allow a light of faith, hope and love to be shone through our prayerful hearts. We can provide at least a spark of reassurance for our vulnerable sisters and brothers that there are people who do care about their dignity and who do see them as beloved children of God, and that America can still be the place of hope that they thought it was when they risked so much to journey to our country.

Sister Maureen Evelyn Brown, CSJ

After receiving the training to be a compassionate presence in the court rooms, two other parishioners and myself from St. Thomas More Parish have been attending court sessions. Immediately, as we enter the building to be checked in, I feel a deep sense of sadness and dread; knowing that just below my feet, in the basement of this building, are many immigrants who have fled their home countries, and are now imprisoned here, not knowing what will happen to them and if they will ever see their loved ones again.

My experience of sitting with families, our “dear neighbors”, in the court room as they wait their turn for a hearing has been profound. I make loving eye contact with them, placing my hand over my heart and indicating that I am praying for them. They appear to be very touched by my presence along with other FAITH volunteers. Frequently, they have their infants and toddlers with them, who are so innocently playing, not realizing that one or both parents might be taken from them.

My biggest challenge is to also pray for the ICE agents whose very presence is terrifying, but who are also the “dear neighbor”, that they will see the harm in which they are participating. I pray that they will treat those now being incarcerated with respect and gentleness.

I find it helpful to remember what another volunteer shared, “We are like the women who stayed with Jesus, as he hung on the cross, bearing witness to his pain and sacrifice and letting Him know that He was not alone.”