Note: This essay was written in the weeks between the Minneapolis killings of Renée Nicole Good and Alex Pretti.  It was crafted as a personal meditation from the perspective of three mothers – the author herself, Renee Good, and Mary, the Mother of God.  Honoring the integrity of the essay’s original intent, we have chosen not to update the text with details regarding Pretti’s death. However, we join the lamentations of people across the globe in mourning both of their deaths, as well as all those that have been taken at the hands of U.S. immigration law enforcement officers. 

Part One: A Mom in New Jersey

Last week, my husband and I dropped off our 16-year-old daughter, Natalie, for a one-week encounter experience in El Salvador. As we said our airport goodbyes – and knowing that Natalie would be completely mortified – I resisted the urge to raise my hands and publicly bless her and her peers. Instead, I quietly said a prayer for the safety of her group and the wisdom of her chaperones. I asked the Holy Spirit to guide each of them with clear eyes, open ears, and compassionate hearts.

When my father heard about Natalie’s plans to go to El Salvador over Christmas break, he looked at me in disbelief. “Why on earth would you allow her to do that?” he exclaimed. (As an aside, this is the same man who, in 1995, put me on a plane bound for an immersion in Juarez, Mexico – a trip that transformed my life, global perspective, and vocation in every way. And I owe it no small way to the man who raised his eyebrows at the thought of his granddaughter embarking on a similar journey. As Michael Scott would say: “My, how the turntables have turned.”)

My Dad wasn’t the only one with doubts. In sharing the news of Nat’s travel plans, many friends and loved ones were also quietly biting their tongues, questioning our parenting decision to put our kid on a plane to a foreign country during this time of global uncertainty and destabilization. They often smiled and nodded – “Wow! That’s GREAAAT!”- offering platitudes, while masking their pretty obvious skepticism.

To be honest, I had my own doubts as our phones began blowing up at 2:30 AM with breaking news alerts about the U.S. invasion of Venezuela. En route to the airport, I may or may not have frantically asked Chat GPT to calculate the distance between Caracas and San Salvador (For reference: in a straight line, it would be 1523 miles – “as the crow flies”). In my own mental gymnastics – and having already paid in full for the trip – I justified that this was far enough away so as not to put my daughter in any immediate danger.

In fairness to my dad and many others, El Salvador hasn’t exactly received the best press in recent years. For more than a decade, it has been demonized as one of the Central American countries fueling the migrant caravans. In 2025, it became known as the site of the infamous CECOT prison where some of the earliest deportees were shipped and imprisoned.

If the only things that I knew about El Salvador were based on that alt-right narrative, then I would probably have been reticent, too.

And yet…

Those who know me know that I love a good immersion program. In fact, one of the reasons Natalie attends her particular high school is to have access to experiences like this one. I knew that on this trip, she would come to know the real El Salvador – the beautiful, the complicated, and the resilient. I was excited for her to lean into the adventure.

The experience did not disappoint. During her travels, Natalie explored the legacy of Saint Óscar Romero in the chapel where his remains are venerated. She visited the assassination site of the Jesuit martyrs. She heard historical and scholarly perspectives from Central America in the late 20^th century, illuminating how fascist systems fomented death squads and – in the case of El Salvador – led to a violent and devastating Civil War.

Perhaps more importantly, though, she resided in a home with a woman and her elderly mother in a rural village. There, she was welcomed with kindness and hospitality and she learned how to make pupusas. Forced to forego showers and their elaborate skincare regimens, she and her friends learned instead about the scarcity (and luxury) of running water. They saw community resilience, conflict resolution, and mutuality in practice.

They listened to the personal witnesses of a father and son whose wife and mother had attempted to migrate to the United States, never to be seen or heard from again. For ten years, this family searched and waited, only for a DNA database to finally confirm that the deceased woman’s remains had been found in the Arizona desert. Her skull was returned to them in a box.

“Why on earth would you allow her to do that?” my dad had asked me.

Why on earth would I NOT allow her to do this?

As Pope Francis noted, it is this – our humanity – that ties us most intimately to Jesus: “The Son of God, by becoming flesh, summoned us to the revolution of tenderness.”  These human encounters, these human stories, these human relationships are what make our world – simultaneously and inexplicably – both earthly and divine.

This is the sacred mystery that our Catholic faith calls us to, time and time again. It’s not always tidy and safe, but neither is the world around us. Why would I ever deny my children the opportunity to witness the goodness of the human experience in all its complexity? Isn’t it my job – as her mother and primary teacher of faith – to equip and accompany her in this, rather than to shield her from it?

In a profound moment, Natalie was asked by her campus minister to stand in the same footsteps where Óscar Romero was assassinated and recite his final homily. (Be still, my proud maternal heart!) These are his prophetic final words, which she was able to profess in memory of him: “One must not love oneself so much as to avoid getting involved in the risks of life that history demands of us, and those who would avoid the danger will lose their lives, while those who, out of love for Christ, give themselves to the service of others will live.”

Those who – out of love for Christ – give themselves to the service of others. As Catholic parents, what more can we ask of Jesus than to summon our children to this sacred work of service? To call us to this, as adults and neighbors charged with building the Kingdom of God for and with one another?

For my children – and for all of us – I pray for the intercession of Saint Óscar Romero to open our hearts to this transformative understanding of the Gospel.

Part Two: A Mom in Minneapolis

In January, Renée Nicole Good, mother of three, was shot and killed by Jonathan Ross, an agent of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Minneapolis, MN.

Good was a U.S. citizen who had just dropped off her young son at school. His treasured “stuffies” could be seen falling out of the glovebox of her Honda SUV. Her car was obstructing the road, seemingly evoking the rage of incoming ICE agents. After a heated exchange, Good attempted to pull away and uttered what would be her final words, “I’m not mad at you.”

In Jonathan Ross’s own cell phone video that was released in the days that followed, three shots are heard being fired. Then an agent, presumably Ross, angrily spits out “f****** b****.”

We now know from Good’s autopsy report that one of the three shots entered the left side of Good’s head and was fatal.

While her wife, neighbors, and bystanders looked on, Good’s car rolled away into an embankment. As a nearby doctor attempted to approach with medical intervention, ICE agents prohibited him from getting close.

Renée Good, age 37, was pronounced dead at the hospital shortly thereafter.

So much has already been written about this tragedy. Expert and amateur analysts have combed over every second of the cell phone footage from various angles and perspectives, including the verbal altercation, the shooting itself, and the aftermath. Endless arguments have ensued over legality, questioning First Amendment protections, the role of ICE in our communities, and, as if in a cacophonous black hole, who was at fault?

These are important questions. But as a person of faith, they’re not my questions.

As a Catholic, what strikes me as more essential are questions about our shared humanity. For instance, when I think about this tragedy, the images juxtaposed in my mind are:

The mom, Renée Good, in her midwestern winter garb – unarmed. The masked ICE agents in flak jackets – armed with guns and anonymity.

The Honda SUV, marked by the typical signs of young family life. The charging ICE SUVs, emblazoned with “protect the homeland.”

The minor traffic violation. The quickly escalating and ultimately fatal power struggle.

The conviction of “I’m standing in solidarity with my neighbors.” The mandate of “I’m here to do a job.”

The irony of “I’m not mad at you.” The vitriol in that “f******b****.”

In recent days, that last piece – the “f****** b****” – is the part that has troubled my heart the most. How could one human being take out the life of a fellow human being and then immediately spew out something so hateful?

My heart has (begrudgingly) turned toward trying to understand ICE Agent Ross. Who was he as a human being? He was a member of the National Guard, completed two tours of duty in Iraq, and joined ICE in 2015. He married his wife, Patrixia – herself a Filipino immigrant and naturalized U.S. citizen – in 2012. In an interview with the Daily Mail, his father described Ross as “a committed, conservative Christian, a tremendous father, and a tremendous husband.”

When and how did his heart become so hardened? Did his wife’s personal experience of immigration not lead him toward empathy and compassion for those that he was tasked with deporting? Did his conservative Christianity not include an understanding of Imago Dei – that we are all, without exception, made in the image and likeness of God? Did his faith not teach him that God is love?

It’s unlikely that we’ll ever know Agent Ross’s heart. And, even with answers to these questions, his human frailty wouldn’t excuse or erase this tragedy.

My heart also turns toward the colleagues of Agent Ross, who did not administer CPR to Good and waited for three minutes before calling 911.  My heart questions the agent who actively prevented potentially lifesaving care. My heart aches for Becca Good, who can be seen on video collapsing after observing her wife’s lifeless body hunched over the steering wheel.

What has become of us – as human beings, as citizens, and as Christians? We claim to follow the same Jesus but seem to have different understandings of what the Gospel proclaims. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus was clear about who was blessed in the Kingdom of God: the poor, the grieving, the merciful, the peacemakers. He ends that sermon by calling upon the disciples to be the light of the world, “that others may see your good deeds and glorify your heavenly Father (Matt. 5:16).”

For me at least, this doesn’t leave much room for interpretation or debate.

I’m reminded of the words of poet William Stafford:

If you don’t know the kind of person I am and I don’t know the kind of person you are a pattern that others made may prevail in the world and following the wrong god home we may miss our star.

My friends, I think we may have missed the star. Because this – the hatred, rhetoric, violence, blatant disregard for human dignity – is not who we are called to be as followers of Jesus. In fact, Pope Francis told us the opposite: “True faith in the incarnate Son of God is inseparable from self-giving, from membership in the community, from service, from reconciliation with others.”

In full disclosure, I am not currently in a spirit of reconciliation. In fact, through all of this, my heart has been full of rage – righteous, reactionary, irreconcilable rage – on behalf of countless migrant families that have been separated, all those who have been wrongly imprisoned and deported, and the many immigrants I’ve come to know and love along the journey of my life, work, and volunteerism.

Rage, too, at the senseless death of fellow mom, Renée Good. It is not lost on me that, as my daughter was reciting Óscar Romero’s final words: “One must not love oneself so much as to avoid getting involved in the risks of life that history demands of us,” Renée Good was being executed for doing precisely that which she believed history demanded of her.

In my resolute stubbornness, the Spirit continues to pull me gently back to Psalm 95: “If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.”  With this, I am forced to pause and reflect. Where was the voice of Jesus on that fateful day in Minneapolis? Jesus, who while preparing for death on the Cross, said “Father, forgive them, they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34).

I can’t help but hear echoes of His voice in the final words of Renée Good: “I’m not mad at you.”

Part Three: A Mom in Bethlehem

Though we are in the midst of Lent, it was not long ago that we marked the end of the Christmas season – twelve days beginning with the birth of Jesus, followed by the subsequent flight of the Holy Family to escape the persecution of Herod, and culminating in the visit of the Magi on the Feast of the Epiphany.   As our global Church celebrated the Three Kings, my daughter was visiting El Salvador, and Renée Good’s life came to a tragic end on a Minneapolis street.

In the Christmas narratives, we hear a lot about the humanity of Jesus and the miracle of the incarnation, of God becoming flesh in the most vulnerable of circumstances – a baby, born not to royalty but to humble everyday people: “They shall name him Emmanuel, which means ‘God is with us’” (Matthew 1:23).

What I’m always most curious about in these stories, though, is the human person of Mary – a young, pregnant teenager. At the time of her labor, she and Joseph had come to Bethlehem in response to a government census. In those days, a woman would have traditionally delivered a baby surrounded by the nurturing, encouragement, and shared wisdom of the women around her – her mother, aunts, grandmothers, neighbors, and friends. In Bethlehem, though, she was faced with undergoing the birthing process without her “village.”

I wish we knew more about Mary in that manger scene, but the lack of historic and visceral details does invite us to imagine her in these tender moments: Mary, frightened and laboring on the unsanitary and uncomfortable floor of a barn, surrounded by livestock; Mary, who would have had to contend with all the clumsiness, confusion, frustration, and exhaustion of caring for and nursing a newborn son; and then the real kicker – Mary, fresh still adjusting to her postpartum body, hurried and hustled by her new husband Joseph to flee to a foreign country on the back of a donkey (All because an angel had told him in a dream that they weren’t safe!). In my own post-partum haze, I would have laughed – and probably cursed – my husband out of the room.

In art, Mary is almost always depicted in a soft, quiet, and unassuming way, giving off “Hail Mary, Gentle Woman” vibes. It’s hard for me to marry that image with the courage and tenacity it must have taken for her to get up and run for the safety of baby Jesus.

I’ve recently come to appreciate Mary’s story in a new light, perhaps because I am now raising a teenage daughter who is likely around the same age that Mary was when Jesus was born. Anyone who has lived with an adolescent girl knows that hell hath no fury like that of a teenager with something to prove. They are fiery, passionate, and 100% sure that they know everything.

I hear the Magnificat in the sweet voice of my own daughter: “He has thrown down the rulers from their thrones, but lifted up the lowly. The hungry he has filled with good things; the rich he has sent away empty. He has helped Israel his servant, remembering his mercy” (Luke 1:46-55). Through this lens, I imagine Mary as wide-eyed and determined – full of fear and fatigue, but also unbridled spirit and ancestral maternal instinct.

In many ways, the Holy Family’s flight to Egypt foreshadows the modern migrant story. King Herod the Great, threatened by rumors of the birth of the “King of the Jews,” ordered the death of all infant boys in Bethlehem. With no other options, Mary and Joseph took flight and sought refuge in a foreign land. There, they had no family, no friends, and no resources. Just two weary young adults, their newborn son, a few meager belongings, and an unwavering faith in God to guide their steps.

In this, the Holy Family is permanently tethered to the millions of migrants throughout human history as Pope Francis and Pope Leo have said. Like Mary and Joseph, each of these individuals has their own story. They, too, are often fleeing violence, persecution, and/or crippling poverty; they leave behind families, jobs, and lives with no guarantee of something better on the other side.

As Natalie heard during her time in El Salvador, these journeys are often marred by peril, and very few survive. Since returning from her encounter trip, she has frequently commented out loud, “Migration is SO hard and so dangerous. WHY would anyone do it if they had a choice?”

I can see my daughter carrying the weight of these stories, her adolescent brain trying to contextualize and reconcile what she has just experienced with what is happening right now with ICE in communities across the United States.

Out of the country – and shielded by spotty Wi-Fi and lack of cell service – Natalie had been blissfully unaware of what had happened two days prior in Minneapolis. But after landing back home, her Snapchat was on fire with an assault of memes and video commentaries arguing relentlessly, and often irresponsibly, about the death of Renée Good.

The unfolding events in Minneapolis are just the latest in a year of escalating ICE activity and intimidation tactics. Throughout 2025 – and now 2026 – migrants across the United States have been systematically removed from their homes, places of business, houses of worship, schools, daycares, cars, shopping malls, and beyond. We now know that many have been American citizens who were falsely detained. Others were documented immigrants and refugees but nevertheless removed without cause or because bureaucratic processes and delays revoked their legal statuses. Still more have even been deported to places that had nothing to do with their countries of origin.

Each of these is a human person with a story. But in the case of mass deportation, they are nameless, faceless, and robbed of human dignity.

For 2025, the Department of Homeland Security estimates the number of deportations to be around 600,000, but independent reports indicate a figure closer to 305,000 or 310,000. Ironically, this is comparable to what they were in 2024 under the previous administration. Thus, while the administration touts negative net migration, this has been due to factors beyond the deportations themselves.

The net impact of enhanced ICE activity, then, has been largely performative but nevertheless catastrophic. Today, Minneapolis and communities across the country are rife with fear and suspicion. The intentional “disappearing” of individuals and families feels eerily reminiscent of numerous other historical contexts that ended badly, prompting even the most conservative voices to speak out. Podcaster Joe Rogan recently noted: “We shouldn’t have militarized groups of people roaming the streets, just showing up with masks on, snatching people up … Are we really going to be the Gestapo? Where’s your papers? Is that what we’ve come to?” 14

Is that what we’ve come to?

As people of goodwill and of good faith, this is a good question to meditate on and, if needed, recalibrate. In these chaotic moments, we are called to quiet the noise and hear the voice of Jesus, anchoring ourselves not in rhetoric but in the Gospel. Even when it conflicts with our worldviews or political perspectives.

If today we hear his voice, harden not our hearts.

Our faith leaders have continued to remind us over the last year that policies like mass deportations, militarized searches, and family separation are “inhumane,” “indiscriminate,” “unacceptable,” and “incompatible with Church teaching” 16 . In a written response to Renée Good’s shooting, Archbishop Bernard Hebda of St. Paul and Minneapolis prayed for “consolation for the grieving members of the Good family; wisdom for our political leaders here and in Washington; prudence and safety for those charged with enforcing our laws; temperance on the part of those protesting; healing for those wounded by the divisions that cleave our state and our nation (especially our young); courage for our neighbors who have been living in fear; and a sense of hope for families directly impacted by the detention of loved ones.” Hebda went on to reference Psalm 29: “The Lord will bless his people with peace,” saying “I am confident that the Lord keeps his promises, but I am hoping that he won’t keep us waiting too long. Maybe I should be praying for patience.”

The Lord will bless his people with peace. From the Archbishop’s lips to God’s ears – and ours. Are we listening to what is being said in this prayer and in others? Are we open to a conversion of the heart, or have we become too hardened to the humanity around us?

I am president of a nonprofit organization called Goodfaith, and one of our favorite points of reference comes from Pope Paul VI: “If you want peace, work for justice.” We like it because, as humans, it holds us accountable and keeps us honest. Peace is often a nice concept in theory – after all, who wouldn’t want peace – but not in execution. Why? Because it’s messy, and humans are human. This quote reminds us that there is no magic wand in making the world truly right and just. There is only us – sleeves rolled up, self-interest set aside, willing to walk in dignity, solidarity, and subsidiarity with one another.

Which leads me, on the long and winding road of this reflection, back to El Salvador and the legacy of Óscar Romero. In life, the Archbishop was a vocal opponent to the violent tactics of his government, which made him an easy and obvious target. In death, he became a martyr for the poor and marginalized and a hero for those of us aspiring to do the work of justice in our communities. With gentleness, he reminded his people that they were not the first – nor would they be the last – to suffer unjust persecution. His words are as prophetic today as fifty years ago: “Let us not be disheartened, even when the horizon of history grows dim and closes in, as though human realities made impossible the accomplishment of God’s plans. God makes use even of human errors, even of human sins, so as to make rise over the darkness what Isaiah spoke of. One day prophets will sing not only the return from Babylon but our full liberation.”

Come quickly to our aid, Holy Spirit. The humans have made a real mess of things, but perhaps – as Saint Óscar suggests – you can use our errors to help us rise above the darkness.

Holy Mary, Mother of God, save your people.

Saint Joseph, save your people.

Saint Óscar Romero, save your people.

All you holy men and women, save your people.

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Image: “150811-O-CR964-004” (Public Domain) by usicegov