In Phoenix, I stayed with a couple, Tim and Clare Broyles, who I met years ago through the ever expanding networks of Annunciation House. They received me in their beautiful guest house and we shared hours of conversation, me learning so much about how their journey together started, inspired by the sanctuary movement.
At one point, Clare shared with me about their living in Juarez (in the late 90s-early 00s) while she was pregnant with her first born, Sam. They did not have health insurance at the time, so she had all of her pre-natal appointments with a nun, Sr. Janet, who worked in a children’s health clinic across the road from their tiny house in Colonia Anapra. They recounted stories of Casa Peregrina, the shelter in Juarez that received any and all Central Americans seeking refuge from the aftermaths of the many U.S.-involved civil wars and conflict. They talked about how interesting and fun it was to live in Mexico at that particular point in history, with all of the chaos and informality and goings-on. They wanted to live simple, justice-oriented lives on the border and had plans to be there indefinitely, because that’s what mattered to them. The demands of raising their baby and the lack of funds and private space pushed them to move back to Phoenix sooner than they had hoped.
I was so inspired by their choice to live life so intentionally and with such trust in God, wanting to express solidarity with the refugees and immigrants arriving in Juarez/El Paso, leading with their hearts and gifting their child with dozens of tias and abuelas in his first year of life.
My experience working with Annunciation House was a treasured gift that transformed me and always nourishes me when I return. If God would have it that I would be able to participate in that lifestyle with a partner!! Pregnant!! With a child!!! What a wondrous and meaningful time that would be. Difficult, messy, stressful, inconvenient, yes. But probably so beautiful. And I am a person quite attracted to beauty!!
Tim is a theology teacher at Brophy College Prep, an all-boys Jesuit-Catholic high school, and he asked me to speak to his students about my life. “Tell them about your time at A House. Tell them about Catholic Charities, and what you’re doing right now, and how you discern the voice of God.” I love speaking with young people, and I love sharing myself, but that seemed like a tall order. I am amazed at the confidence he had to throw me to the front of the room and let me speak to these youth without any sort of formal outline. I agreed to go and prayed that I would say something that made sense to at least one student.
I jotted down some notes and some quotes in a journal that I have that says “big ideas.” It is my idea journal, my not-journal-journal, where I might write ideas (was that obvious?). I also have a proper journal where I write entries – sometimes recaps of my day, sometimes emotional musings, sometimes prayers – as well as a notebook where I keep track of lines/notes from books that strike me or that I want to remember. I also have a very large blank page notebook that I use for any kinds of classes, conferences, webinars, immersions, and my leadership cohort. This notebook was born in 2014 when I took my first philosophy class and my professor urged us to keep a special journal of photos, poems, and songs that we found beautiful. It is living a full life!
My time speaking with the students at Brophy (3 classes of seniors and 1 of juniors, to be more precise) was delightful. I realize how unusual of a speaker I am as I begin to articulate my story. The moral of my story is that being unattached, following the voice of God to wherever it leads us, changing course, and disregarding the traditional norms of the capitalist lifestyle (as someone with the privilege of generational wealth), are all perfectly worthwhile things.
Tim introduces me to the students as “a living example of a Jesuit educated person – a woman living for others” – a concept which the students are studying via the Superior General of the Society of Jesus Pedro Arrupe’s “Men for Others” speech from 1973. I am in disbelief that anything I have to offer would even approach this, but I speak to it anyways! I try to be clear that my pursuit of my own vocation is in service of my participation in the greater love story of living the gospel and building the Kindom of God on earth. I am humbly trying to center and de-center myself at once, to live in the beautiful pain and contradictions of being alive and value-centered in a world so overflowing with avarice, violence, and suffering.
Yes; gifted with conscience, intelligence and power each of us is indeed a center. But a center called to go out of ourselves, to give ourselves to others in love — love, which is our definitive and all-embracing dimension, that which gives meaning to all our other dimensions. Only the one who loves fully realizes himself or herself as a person. To the extent that any of us shuts ourselves off from others we do not become more a person; we become less.” -Pedro Arrupe, SJ, “Men for Others”
I tell the students that I hope they give weight, time, and energy to discovering what their values are, what is most important and true for them, and going forth with those things as a foundation.
After speaking with Tim’s senior classes, I journeyed onto the third floor of the building and found Steven Schillig, another teacher at Brophy whom I also met at Annunciation House in 2020. He was teaching Christian ethics to a class of junior students, who gave me the last 20 minutes of their day.
Steven’s students proved to be as attentive, interested, and reflective as the seniors below them. They asked lots of interesting questions – by the end of the day I was exhausted! I managed to tell a story of a Venezuelan man I met at Annunciation House in October 2022 whose life affect and story deeply touched me. In telling this story, I explained to the students the Darien Gap, a stretch of wild jungle in Panama that borders Colombia, which tens of thousands of migrating peoples cross every year on their journeys northward, often towards the United States. It is an incredibly dangerous and notorious stretch of the journey, as it takes days to traverse and there is no “civilization,” though there are plenty of organized crime groups and individuals who rob, violate, and even sometimes kill the folks who are crossing. Because it is so remote, many people die in the jungle and their bodies are left there. Everyone who crosses the Darien has seen death and dying.
As I am trying to gently but honestly explain this to the students (it was all tied up in my story of the Venezuelan man!), one of the students asks in disbelief “why don’t they just walk on the road?” I explained to him that there was no road, to which he laughed in disbelief. I realized that I was sort of breaking through his world view at that moment, and humbly suggested that google could verify all that I was saying.
The next day, after completing an amazing trek up Piestewa Peak in the Phoenix Mountains Preserve accompanied by none other than Brene Brown (on podcast), I joined Steven, Tim, and Clare for Taco Tuesday at a place not far from the school.
As we are sitting down, Steven starts with excitement. “Guess what! Last night, at 11 pm, I got an email from a student. It was a link to an article on the Darien Gap that just said “this is wild.””
It was a gift and delight to spend time with Tim and Clare and Steven on my journey. They are people who inspire me – and who inspire curiosity in me. They pray before meals, they seek to live what is real. They seek to give their gifts to the world, inspire others, create loving and healing spaces. In all of these faces, God shows me so much love.
Stay tuned for parts III and IV of my pilgrimage (January & February) … 🙂