Lenten Fast for Families Draws Attention to Immigration Reform Efforts

The traditional Lenten practice of fasting is being paired this year with the latest round of an ongoing campaign called Fast for Families, intended to bring attention to the campaign for immigration reform.

On Ash Wednesday, more than two dozen presidents of Catholic colleges and universities pledged to fast for 24 hours in support of the effort.

Their effort is one piece of the latest iteration of Fast for Families, which also includes weekly commitments to fasting, local ongoing fasts and cross-country stops at in-state congressional offices by national leaders of the campaign that last fall was based in a tent on the National Mall.

In a letter announcing their fast, the college presidents said their 24-hour act of solidarity and prayer “for those who still suffer because of cruel and impractical immigration policies” was a symbolic way of opening the season of Lent by remembering “Christ’s journey of suffering in the desert wilderness” by praying for immigrants who hunger and thirst for justice.

The presidents said they “draw encouragement from students on our campuses who work tirelessly to turn this vision into a reality. Brave DREAMers are inspiring their peers to join them in the struggle for justice and dignity. Catholic students are praying and mobilizing and calling on Congress to act.”

The presidents invited students, faculty and fellow administrators to join them in “this communal act of prayer. Pope Francis’ powerful witness to the dignity of migrants and call for everyone to confront our ‘culture of indifference’ inspires us to act.”

They noted that many of them wrote to Catholic members of Congress last summer urging them to use their positions of influence to “put the common good and families before partisan politics. As our political leaders delay, immigrant families are torn apart. More migrants die in the desert. We pray that by joining others across the country in this small act of sacrifice, the hearts of elected officials will be touched and leaders will be moved to act.”

Meanwhile, the national leaders of the Fast for Families continued making stops on two cross-country routes to events held at the district offices of members of Congress. Typical was the stop in Phoenix by Eliseo Medina of the Service Employees International Union, who fasted last fall for 22 days in the tent on the National Mall, before ending his fast in November during an ecumenical prayer service.

In Phoenix, after events at offices of the Arizona congressional delegation, he sat with people who had been fasting for weeks in hopes of helping their relatives who are in immigration detention, facing deportation.

Medina’s bus and another bus making a similar path across the northern part of the country are to converge in Washington for an event April 9. The paths are scheduled to take them to stops in 70 congressional districts.

An event sponsored by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops will bring several bishops to the Mexican border at Nogales, Ariz., at the end of March. There, they will tour the border area and visit some of the church-supported programs to aid migrants. They’ll celebrate a Mass on the border April 1, said a USCCB press release.

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