God’s call often comes in strange ways, but a call for help from officials at Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to the faith communities in El Paso, Texas, on Wed., June 4, was more than startling. News of surging numbers of unaccompanied minors detained at the southern border, requiring the creation of warehouses on military bases to accommodate them, was followed by the disturbing stories out of Arizona. Now they were coming to El Paso.

GSR Today - World Refugee Day, June 20, provides a prime time to become oriented, more attentive to the world in which we live and to commit ourselves to a “globalization of compassion.” More than 51 million people have been forcibly displaced from their homes (in addition to those fleeing from poverty and environmental disasters).

Momentary ministry: sisters and other advocates try to help minors who are coming to the United States all alone from South America, but the increasing numbers of children arriving at shelters and processing centers are making the work of legal representation and follow-up services difficult.
Related - We mobilized to meet their needs and on NCRonline.org
How to treat unaccompanied immigrant children at center of policy debate

As passionately as she believes that education is the most reliable means of escaping the dire effects of poverty, Karen Dietrich says that the challenge of urban education goes well beyond achieving good test scores.

"For it is not light that is needed, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder. We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake."

Moved by the way Catholic sisters at her high school loved and cared for all the students, Tariro Chimanyiwa decided to join the convent. More than four decades, later, Chimanyiwa, a Domincan sister, is still serving children at Emerald Hill School and Home for the Deaf on the outskirts of Zimbabwe’s capital, Harare. Sr. Tariro, as she is affectionately called by the children, is a warm, soft-spoken woman who started out as a teacher 34 years ago and now heads the school.

Sr. Cresencia Lucero is co-chair of the Task Force Detainees of the Philippines, which has been working to assist political prisoners and their families for 40 years. A Franciscan Sister of the Immaculate Conception, Lucero talks about new patterns of human rights abuses and how they are addressing them.

Viewpoint on NCRonline.org - On March 27, Pope Francis and President Barack Obama met to discuss, among other topics, their shared concern about the moral and economic crisis of growing income inequality. Pope Francis has deplored "unfair economic structures that create huge inequalities," and President Obama has called inequality "the defining issue of our time." Our Catholic faith teaches that addressing inequality must include just wages and working conditions for those in the labor force.

GSR Today - A farmer in central Washington is running for state government and, to boost support, plans to give away two pistols and a military-style rifle to three lucky people who provide names, zip codes and email addresses to his campaign website.