What's Happening

June 30, 2026, Nogales, Arizona – For Elizabeth Guerrero, this past year has been one of learning. This May, she was one of seven women who learned more about the experience of immigrants at the U.S.-Mexico border.

As a Candidate with the Adrian Dominican Sisters, Elizabeth is completing her first year of formation. During this time, she has learned about the history of the Adrian Dominican Sisters and the Charism of the Dominican Order, improved her Spanish skills, ministered as a literacy tutor and a team member with Holy Family Parish’s food pantry, and come to know many of the Adrian Dominican Sisters.

The experience at the border was with Catholic Sisters Walking with Migrants, a program offered through the Kino Border Initiative (KBI) in Nogales, Arizona. Elizabeth was among seven women who participated in a week-long program in which, through various experiences, encounters, talks, and group discussions, they learned and experienced the plight of immigrants at the border.  

Early during the program, Elizabeth noticed a contrast between the experiences of different people. In downtown Nogales on the Arizona side, people were enjoying a pre-Cinco de Mayo celebration. “In the U.S., it’s celebrated and kind of commercialized – a parade of queens and princesses, some food booths, [and a choir] singing traditional ballads in Spanish. “We walked two blocks down and there we saw the border. We saw the wall, 20 feet tall with wire around it and another barrier so you can’t even get close to the border. It was a strange juxtaposition to see the pre-Cinco de Mayo festival and, just around the corner, a horrible scar between the two cities.”

Throughout the program, Elizabeth continued to see the differences in experiences – particularly the plight of migrants struggling to find a new life in the United States. The group spent one of the first mornings on a hike in the desert that simulated the kind of walking that migrants had through the desert of the United States until they passed the check points patrolled by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). 

“We walked through various parts of the desert – dried out river beds, through thorny brush and overhang of branches, and up to the top of hills that were rocky and had no cover whatsoever,” Elizabeth recalled. The journey could take five to seven days, and migrants frequently travel by night, often climbing a mountain without the help of a light to gauge where they are. 

Many migrants don’t survive the trek through the desert, and their bodies – and often the items they left behind – are discovered by KBI staff members or others on search and rescue trips. Staff members call the authorities and, if they find any identification, KBI keeps it in their records in case a family member calls about them. 

Elizabeth particularly resonated with a story she heard from a young husband who lost his wife in the desert. They were traveling with a group when his wife became dehydrated and could not go on, but the group had to continue. The husband was picked up by Border Patrol and he had to beg them to let him go back to his wife. By the time they finally allowed it, his wife was dead.

“That was a powerful experience of knowing that if I had been crossing, I would have been left behind long ago,” Elizabeth said. Because of recent knee surgery, she had trouble keeping up with the group. “The group slowed down for me or rested,” she said. “That was a powerful experience of knowing that if I had been crossing [as a migrant], I would have been left behind a long time ago.”

Participants also had several opportunities to prepare and serve meals to migrants staying up to 20 days at the Kino Center in Nogales, Mexico, a shelter for migrants.  The center offers “holistic, wrap-around services,” including an attorney who can work with them on their case and another who helps them navigate the U.S. and Mexican immigration systems, as well as a teacher who can work with the children, Elizabeth said. 

“What we learned from Kino is before this current administration [in the United States], the facilities were full and the Kino Center was serving 300 people every day,” Elizabeth said. “Now maybe 20 people are coming. The flow is going South now because people are trying to self-deport …. Even if you’re trying to leave the country, they could arrest you and put you in detention.”

Participants also heard from Judge Eric Markovich who hears about 50 cases in the morning in his Special Proceedings Courtroom in Federal District Court in Tucson, Arizona. Many have been in detention centers, and the judge often sentences them to time already served. 

Elizabeth learned that the migrants are given 20 days to decide if they will pay a fine to stay in the United States or if they will accept a bus ticket to return to the country they came from. She noted that some people have decided to stay in Mexico, possibly until a new U.S. administration takes office. 

Elizabeth, a third-generation U.S. citizen of Mexican descent, said the stories she heard during the experience reminded her of people she ministered with – people who were trying to rebuild their lives in the United States but were deported. The stories she heard “led to a realization for me,” she said. “The stories she heard “made me reflect on how much I take for granted because I was born in the United States … I started to see family members in the faces I was looking at.”    

 

Caption for above feature photo: Serving lunch to the migrants at the Kino Center in Nogales, Mexico, are, from left, Elizabeth Guerrero, a Candidate with the Adrian Dominican Sisters; Sister Theresa “Terri” Ann Schell, OP, a Dominican Sister of Peace; and Gregoria Bueno-Rodriguez, a sister who is transferring to the Dominican Sisters of Peace. 

November 25, 2024, Washington, D.C. – For more than 50 years, NETWORK, a social justice advocacy group, has been working with Catholic Sisters and other people of faith to lobby for social justice in national public policies, grounded in Catholic social teachings. What began in 1972 as an organization training Catholic Sisters to lobby for justice in the political sphere now extends to training the next generation. 

“We have a long history of working with college and high school students over our 52-year history,” said Chelsea Puckett, Grassroots Mobilization Outreach and Education Specialist. In the Fall of 2023, NETWORK launched the Young Advocates Leadership Lab (YALL), with chapters of college student advocates established in several colleges and universities, she explained. 

Through NETWORK’s involvement with Barry University, Chelsea said, she learned that a named fellowship was an effective way to keep the connection between NETWORK and the universities sustainable. Barry University was founded by and is sponsored by the Adrian Dominican Sisters. Now, heading up each campus chapter is a Carol Coston Fellow, named for Adrian Dominican Sister Carol Coston, OP, Founding Director of NETWORK. 

“We wanted to give them a way to connect, and who better than Carol Coston?” she said. 

Last Fall, NETWORK hired 10 Fellows to lead YALL Chapters at colleges in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, New York, California, Florida, and Ohio, Chelsea said. Nine of the YALL Chapters are established in Catholic universities – including Barry University. 

Meg Olson, Senior Grassroots Mobilization Organizer for NETWORK, sees in the students today the same spirit that led 47 Catholic Sisters to establish NETWORK. “Our students stepped in and said yes,” she said. “I think about that ability to trust the Spirit and say yes, just the way that Carol said yes” to establishing NETWORK.

The first cohort of Carol Coston Fellows began their work in March 2024. After taking the summer off they became involved in social justice advocacy in the fall of 2024. “They all joined us in our mission to work for justice,” Chelsea said. In the first year, the Carol Coston Fellows attended a conference in Washington, D.C., where they lobbied Senators; wrote letters to the editor; and built coalitions on their campuses with campus ministry, offices for mission, and women’s leadership institutes. “They collectively registered more than 1,000 people to vote on all the campuses,” she said.

In addition to working directly with the Carol Coston Fellows, Chelsea said that during on-campus visits, she also works with the students organized by the Fellows. “I’ve been really impressed by the coalition building that is happening on campuses,” she said.  

Meg said the Carol Coston Fellows were also involved in NETWORK’s Nuns on the Bus and Friends program, in which Sisters and other advocates ride a bus during election years to pre-determined cities, where they hold rallies and town hall meetings to educate local voters about the issues involved in the election. Carol Coston Fellows attended events at the bus stops in Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and Miami. They met the bus riders and people attending the events to “get a better sense of NETWORK’s mission,” Meg said.

“In Philadelphia, a student from St. Joseph’s University spoke at the [Nuns on the Bus] event,” Chelsea said. One 20-year-old public policy major, she added, had “an incredible ability to share her lived experiences with the challenges in our healthcare system.”

Although they work on separate campuses, the Carol Coston Fellows have formed their own community as well. At the beginning of the academic year, the Fellows gather in person. Meg said she is impressed by the “incredible community that they forge together. It seemed they had been friends forever.” They also learn from one another during Zoom sessions, she added. 

“We’ve learned how challenging voter registration can be in a time of heavy voter suppression,” Chelsea said. “Our students in some states were very discouraged.” Much of the experience in voter registration depends on the state. For example, Wisconsin had very early deadlines for voter registration.

“I’m very proud of the work that they’ve done in the last nine months,” Chelsea said. “I have learned a lot from them in their leadership.” Four of the Carol Coston Fellows are returning next year, while others are graduating. 

Chelsea and Meg are preparing to bring together the next cohort in March. Interested students at colleges and universities connected with NETWORK can apply and are asked to write essays, participate in several interviews, and submit recommendations from faculty and staff.  

“We really want to emphasize that this fellowship is open to folks of all backgrounds, including other religious and secular backgrounds,” Chelsea said. “Most importantly, it is open to people who want to do the work to build a beloved community,” a community envisioned by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., in which “everyone is cared for, free from poverty, hunger, and hate.”

NETWORK recently celebrated its 50th anniversary, but Chelsea and Meg are already looking to future anniversaries. “I hope the next time NETWORK celebrates its big anniversary, this program is part of it,” Chelsea said. “I hope there’s a lot of longevity and that we can develop a new generation of activists working for justice for all.”
 

Caption for above feature photo: Imani, a Carol Coston Fellow at Barry University in Miami, staffs an information table for National Voter Registration Day at the university.
Photo Courtesy of NETWORK