NEWARK, New Jersey (RNS) — Early on Sunday morning (Aug. 24), a dozen activists prayed in a circle before the barbed-wire gates of Delaney Hall, the 1,100-bed immigrant detention center that is the largest on the East Coast.
As a line of visitors, mostly family members of people who have been arrested, began to form in front of a guard booth, Kathy O’Leary, the organizer of the event, and Fr. Eugene Squeo led the service.
“We are here because we recognize the dignity of each and every human person,” Squeo, a retired diocesan priest of Newark, said in English, after first announcing the words in Spanish. “And no one should be treated cruelly or inhumanely.”
The “Let Us Pray” service, the first of what organizers hope will be a weekly gathering, lasted about 15 minutes and included mostly Catholic activists, with a few Protestant and secular participants joining. O’Leary, the region coordinator of New Jersey Pax Christi, a Catholic peace organization, handed out sheets of paper with songs, and the group swayed solemnly left to right as they sang in unison, “Christ be our light. Longing for light, we wait in darkness.”
A small altar sat in the middle of the circle holding sanctus bells, prayer cards and a photo of St. Frances Xavier Cabrini, the Catholic patroness of immigrants the leaders called on for intercession. Two people joined the group from the visitor’s line. Clutching the paper, both said they wished to r …