How We Return

In January of 2025, I joined my colleague, Jorge, in Chicago to help staff the Ignatian Solidarity Network’s Undocu Network Summit.

This wasn’t the first time I’d gathered in winter with this dynamic group of college students—all young people with complex migration stories and status. Some citizens with mixed-status families, some with temporary immigration statuses, like DACA or TPS, some undocumented.

All gathered to offer mutual support as they navigate life as college students while managing the realities of a deeply broken and unjust immigration system in the U.S.

This was, however, the first time that this gathering aligned with a news cycle and inauguration that ushered in a deep sense of fear in these young people during the gathering.

The summit happened to align with inauguration weekend, and news leaked and then broke with fervor that the incoming Trump administration planned to launch widespread immigration raids in Chicago that very weekend.

With vulnerable students gathered in Chicago from across the United States, our team sprang into action to ensure that each young person could return home as safely as possible.

While those Chicago raids didn’t materialize, the anxiety and fear I witnessed in those young people led directly into the turbulent months of 2025, marked by immigration raids, the violence of immigration enforcement officers, a dismantling of government agencies and humanitarian work both in the U.S. and abroad…and the list goes on and on.

As we move through this time in our nation, I find myself often utterly overwhelmed by the scope of brokenness and injustice. At times to the point of numbness, fatigue—verging on apathy or even despair.

I often find myself seeking the wisdom of the Holy Spirit, with the question: “how do we return to who we’re called to be in the face of all of this?”

The simplicity and clarity of today’s readings give me, give us, a guide.

We return to who we are from the precipice of numbness, fatigue, apathy, or despair by simply loving God, and loving our neighbor.

We quiet the noise of each new injustice. Of the news cycle. Of social media. And we remember—justice starts with loving God’s people. With caring for that young person confronted with the impossible task of navigating a broken, unjust immigration system, facing fear—for themselves, their families, their community. Justice simply begins with refusing to stop caring for each other. We begin with love.

When we wonder, “Can we, as a people, come back from this time of deep hurt and injustice?” this is our next step: to follow that greatest commandment, the commandment to be people whose love for God and love for neighbor compel us to action. Returning to that most foundational thing is the first step toward returning to ourselves and who we are called to be.