Sunday. We got her up. The sun was out. But we stayed in and she went out. She returned when ther sun had gone and brought us stories from downtown, the east and the valley.
The story that made us think was the saddest: The small man had been murdered, his body discovered abandoned in a parking lot. It made the news. He was young, an immigrant far from home with a family here. They are poor. They speak no English. They are sending his body back to his country.
At the immigrant church, the minister introduces this family of sorrow to the 1000 worshippers, shares their story, states the need, and places the small bushel basket on the altar steps. Music plays, and slowly, for 10 minutes, hundreds of immigrants just like this family-- elders, children, young men desperate for work, mothers, teenage girls in heels too high, all make their way solemnly and knowingly to the basket where they offer their gift of accompaniment. They reach out and touch the little family, and return soberly to their seats, aware of how perilous and vulnerable lives are, especially those of the undocumented, unseen poor. They are only noticed and named when tragedy strikes.
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