Jesus, Mary and Joseph in you we contemplate the splendour of true love, to you we turn with trust.
Holy Family of Nazareth, grant that our families too may be places of communion and prayer, authentic schools of the Gospel and small domestic Churches.
Holy Family of Nazareth, may families never again experience violence, rejection and division: may all who have been hurt or scandalized find ready comfort and healing.
Holy Family of Nazareth, may the approaching Synod of Bishops make us once more mindful of the sacredness and inviolability of the family, and its beauty in God’s plan.
Jesus, Mary and Joseph, graciously hear our prayer.
Need for Sponsorship for Children Being Released from Detention this Week
Citing the unrelenting spread of the coronavirus, on June 26 U.S. District Judge Dolly Gee ordered that all children currently held in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody for more than 20 days must be released by July 17. That’s this Friday. The order applies to all three of the family detention facilities in the United States. Two are located in Texas. Gee's decision could lead to the long-awaited release of entire families. Until now, ICE has been reluctant to release children held in family detention centers.
The Trump administration has offered families a binary choice: Stay together in detention or allow the children to be transferred to a sponsor or family member somewhere in the United States.
St. Austin supports the efforts of the Diocese of Austin in keeping children with their families, and we hope that the release of the children from custody will not involve further family separations. As the release date quickly approaches, a number of nonprofit organizations are working hard to identify sponsors in Texas and Pennsylvania who could sponsor, house, or otherwise support any families in those centers who might not have a sponsor lined up already. Here are some of the immediate needs:
Advocate to release the families and not just the kids.
Secure quarantine locations relatively near the three detention centers that can potentially host the families currently being held for at least two weeks.
Identify long-term sponsorship options for families who don't have sponsors already.
Identify long-term sponsorship options for adults not impacted by this decision who are at detention centers across the country who are terrified about Covid-19 moving through the centers they're in and work on getting them released.
Short-term quarantine and long-term sponsorship for a group of transgender asylees who are currently in Mexico, waiting to cross the border/present themselves to ICE/DHS until they have sponsorship lined up. (They'd ideally like to stay together, at least in the near-term -- so they are looking for an option that can house about a dozen people.)