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October 12, 2022, Seattle, Washington – Mercy Housing Northwest, based in Seattle, is celebrating 30 years of making a difference in the lives of individuals and families by offering them access to affordable housing.
Mercy Housing Northwest began in 1990 with a meeting of 80 Sisters who wanted to address the issue of homelessness – especially when they learned that nearly a third of the people in the area who were homeless were children. The Edmonds Dominican Sisters – who merged with the Adrian Dominican Sisters in 2003 – were among four of the original founding communities in the Seattle area who started the organization that became Mercy Housing Northwest.
“To me, the best part is the kids,” Sister Judy Byron, OP, told The Northwest Catholic, the official publication of the Archdiocese of Seattle. “If we could give kids a stable home, they could have a good life.”
Most of the housing properties operated by Mercy Housing Northwest give additional help to families through services such as housing and financial stability, health and wellness, out-of-school programming for the children, and community involvement – which are “the anchors for the folks [who] live there,” Sister Judy said.
Read the entire article by Brenda Sexton in The Northwest Catholic.
Feature photo: An architect’s rendering of Cedar Crossing, a 254-apartment housing development through a partnership between Bellwether Housing and Mercy Housing Northwest. Photo Courtesy of Mercy Housing Northwest
September 23, 2022, Viera, Florida – In a guest Op-Ed column for Florida Today, Adrian Dominican Sister Lucy Vazquez, OP, spoke out against the practice of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis of “importing” refugees from Texas to Florida and then sending them to Martha’s Vineyard to make a political statement about immigration.
Sister Lucy wrote that this latest political practice “is a complete contradiction” of the Jesus’ statement in the Gospel that we will be judged on how we treat those in need – including immigrants and refugees – for “as long as you did it to one of these, the least of my little ones, you did it to me” (Mt. 25:40). While immigration reform is needed, she wrote, “we need to afford those who seek refuge in our country the dignity of human beings.”
Writing as a refugee from Cuba, Sister Lucy noted the hard work of her father and of other refugees who sought work to support their families. “Florida would not be as prosperous as it is today without the untold contributions of refugees from Cuba, Nicaragua, Venezuela, and other countries,” she wrote.
Read Sister Lucy’s guest column in Florida Today, “Political theater at the expense of refugees is unforgivable cruelty.”