Ash Wednesday 2015 Teach-In at St. Peter's University's King-Kairos Cent...

Kathy O'Leary leads a Teach-In as part of the annual Ash Wednesday Day of Actions for Immigrant Detainees from Liberty State Park in Jersey City (under the shadow of #TheStatueOfLiberty) to the Elizabeth Detention Center - at the King-Kairos Center at St. Peter's University in Jersey City, NJ.

On Wednesday, February 18th, people from across New Jersey representing over a dozen faith based, community youth and immigrant rights groups, including members from Pax Christi NJ, First Friends, American Friends Service Committee Immigrant Rights Program, and NJ Advocates for Immigrant Detainees, gathered in Jersey City and Elizabeth to call for the dismantling of the detention and deportation machine that is feeding the prison industrial complex.  For the sixth year in a row a group of pilgrims and well wishers congregated in #LibertyStatePark in Jersey City in front of the bridge to Ellis Island.  The pilgrims walked from Ellis Island to point out the hypocrisy of a country which claims to celebrate immigrants yet incarcerates so many. The days events are called “Our Justice Knows No Mercy”.

Participants drew attention to the interconnectedness of our county’s lack of mercy in the criminal justice system and the mass incarceration of immigrants and people of color.  “Whether it is the disproportionate treatment of citizen charged with a minor drug crime or an immigrant suspected of being in violation of civil law the argument of the ‘rule of of law’ allows legislators and ordinary citizens turn a blind eye to the disproportionate and inhume treatment of removing people’s liberty. As Thomas Acquinas said ‘justice without mercy is cruelty.”

Community & faith leaders, immigrant rights activists, community members, family of current detainees, former detainees and their families came together to hold vigils, rallies and protests including prayer, music and testimony to call attention to our country’s foreign policies that force people to migrate, to call for a halt to the detentions and deportations that are tearing apart families and to call for an end to prison profiteering. There was a vigil on Freedom Way in Liberty State Park, a teach-in at St. Peter’s University, King/Kairos Social Justice House, a prayer service with distribution of ashes at the Elizabeth Detention Center, & a soup supper and teach-in at St. Joseph’s Social Service Center in Elizabeth, NJ. The day concluded at the 19th annual vigil at the Elizabeth Detention Center, a for-profit facility operated by Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) where ICE first started incarcerating immigrants in NJ almost two decades ago.

The event was organized by Pax Chrisit NJ and First Friends and co-sponsored by: Casa Esperanza, Action 21, New Jersey Advocates for Immigrant Detainees (NJAID), American Friends Service Committee - Immigrant Rights Program (AFSC), Marianist Social Justice Collaborative - Racial and Immigrant Justice Team, Decarcerate the Garden State, St. Peter's University Social Justice Program, Peruvian American Coalition, Haiti Solidarity Network of the Northeast; Sisters of Charity of St. Elizabeth,  Dominican Sister's of Caldwell; Wind of the Spirit, Justice for Immigrants Task Force-Archdiocese of Newark


First Friends is accepting ‪#‎donations‬ of toiletries, gift cards, and materials for our Stamp Out Despair Campaign

For More information or to co-sponsor contact: First Friends at 908-965-0455 / interns@firstfriendsnjny.org

Pax Christi USA is a national Catholic organization, representing the Catholic peace with justice movement in the United States. Pax Christi reaches over a half-million Catholics directly every year with over 400 local groups throughout the United States, over 100 bishop members, 700 parish sponsors, 600 religious communities, and 50 college and high school chapters.

More information on the King-Kairos Center & The Social Justice Program at St. Peter's may be found here:

http://www.saintpeters.edu/social-justice/faculty-and-administration/
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Saint-Peters-College-Social-Justice-Program/172443685862
https://foursquare.com/v/kingkairos-social-justice-house/4d9b2894260c4eb9ca31174f


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