Hillsborough Group Heads To Texas To Help Migrants

HILLSBOROUGH, NJ — A group of 22 people is headed down to Texas this weekend, starting July 6 — not for vacation or job opportunities, but for an opportunity to help. The members of the Parish Community of St. Joseph, known as St. Joe's, are headed to the southern border to render aid to suffering migrants.

Michael Atlas, one of 17 college-age students traveling with five adult chaperones, told Patch the group will be headed to McAllen, Texas, a border town near the southernmost tip of Texas. They'll be led by Youth and Young Adult Minister Bob Ferretti.

Atlas said the group's 22 members are "incredibly enthusiastic," about serving people's needs. They're traveling for humanitarian reasons and are remaining apolitical on the issue, which has been on the front line of partisan battles.

They'll be splitting into two subgroups to accomplish two main projects and returning home on July 12.

One subgroup is headed to a newly built church to help tie up loose ends to prepare for the official opening. The other is headed to the Catholic Charities Rio Grande Valley Humanitarian Respite Center where, Atlas said, "we will be dealing directly with the immigration crisis that is widespread across the border.

"This particular center deals with roughly 500-900 people a day, as they are bused in by ICE before being sent out throughout the states to meet with sponsors who will host them as they legally seek asylum," Atlas said. "The respite center serves as a temporary shelter, where people are allowed to rest, bathe, and eat for a brief period of time.

"Most importantly, the center meets with the families, many of whom do not speak fluent English, and helps them prepare for the legal process asylum seekers are faced with."

Overall, our mission for this trip is to instill a little bit of hope in a place that is so desperately in need of it. Many border cities such as McAllen are facing this persistent immigration problem, as our neighbors to the south are forced from their homes by violence and poor living conditions, and turn to the United States for help and a chance at a better life. Our work at the respite center is a direct response to these families’ cries for help, as we do our best to show them compassion in a world that shows them very little.

They plan to spend a good bit of time getting to know the community of McAllen, exploring "how the influx of immigrants and subsequent border crisis affects the people living in the town, and how they respond to the complications it causes," Atlas told Patch.

“I’m really anxious to see what it’s going to be like in the respite center. You hear all these horror stories about how people are being treated at the border, and I’m not exactly sure what to expect. The only thing I’m sure of is that this will be a challenging and life changing experience,” said one group member, Ann Marie Masiello, Atlas told Patch.

“To be completely honest, I don’t know what I expect to see once I’m over there, but I expect to be very overwhelmed. The number of people passing through the center every day is both astounding and horrifying, and there’s a lot that needs to be done for each and every family. I’m just excited to be able to have such a huge impact on such a pressing national problem, it really seems like these people need help,” Atlas said.