Catherine's Cafe Vocation Blog

In the Midwest this week, the ice and snow are melting.     As I go about my day, I watch the dripping outside my window.     I hear the seeping water and, sometimes, huge icicles crashing down to the ground.     As temperatures rise all over the world, melting ice is contributing to rising sea levels.     Global ice loss has increased rapidly over the past decades, and scientists can connect human activities to the root of this phenomenon. Specifically, since the industrial revolution, carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions have raised temperatures.   Can I allow what I witness outside my window to connect me to the plight of the universe?  Am I willing to become one with the polar bear and the glacier, uniting in a creation web of interconnectedness?     How will this experience of communion change my behavior?  Will I try to conserve my use of water?  Will I find ways to avoid traveli...

Recently I had the opportunity to volunteer at the U.S./Mexico border in El Paso, TX at La Casa de Refugiado - House of Refuge. The Casa is not really a house but is a refurbished factory rented by Ruben Garcia, founder of Annunciation House, to receive the hundreds of people released from detention by ICE and needing shelter as they prepare to travel to their sponsors in many different parts of our country. A few times a day, ICE delivers a busload of people, mainly families with young children, who have been in detention, some for up to two months. They arrive tired and frightened, not knowing what kind of treatment to expect. What a privilege to be the first U.S. citizens to smile and say welcome; help them contact their families; provide soap and shampoo and towels for their first shower in a long time; invite them to choose a set of clean clothes; provide the children with a playroom full of toys, art supplies, and balls to play soccer; provide hot, nourishing meals prepared ...