The Hero in My Story
One of the best of many gifts my parents gave me is my middle name, Francis, after my dad’s best friend, Francis Canfield, S.J. Fr. Frank ran the table on the Sacraments with me. He baptized me, gave me First Communion, sponsored me at Confirmation (where I also took...
Encourage One Another
The reason many parents of our scholars are forced to work in the garbage dumps is that they were robbed of the opportunity to learn to read or write as children. They have their own children now, who are flourishing in school because of scholarships you help provide,...
Our God Given Missions
Each of us has a vocation—a unique mission to live the life God intends for us. If we discern that vocation, He will equip us with everything we need to live it out. My six siblings and I have incredible parents who taught us to live our God-given missions. My dad...
This is Personal
We invest in service immersion trips with our partners because they make global issues personal. It’s one thing to read that one out of ten people in the world live on less than $2 per day. It’s another thing to have a friend who grew up working in the garbage dump to...
From the Blue Mountains to Mountains of Waste
Coming out of the pandemic, we are working more closely with school and church partners committed to Learn, Serve, and Grow with our scholars in developing nations throughout the entire year. David's reflection, below, gives a sense of what that feels like for...
Changing Life Experiences
How would your teachers have described you in the third grade? If you have children at home, ask them what three words their teacher would use to describe them. I would love to hear what they say. Before coming to International Samaritan, I asked a group of students...
Too Young to Die
“Seventy is the sum of our years, or eighty if we are strong” (Psalm 90:10). Honduran women on average live to be about 74. But what if you live near a garbage dump, where the life expectancy is only 35? Iris, the mother of our sixth-grade scholar Bryan, died after...
Does the Fountain of Youth Exist?
Twenty-two years ago, I was privileged to live and serve with Jesuit Volunteers in Tacna, Peru, teaching English and coaching basketball. The small city sits along an arid slope halfway between the Pacific Coast and the Andes Mountains in the Atacama Desert, one of...
A Sister Can Make All the Difference
When five-year-old Selam transferred to an elite Catholic school in the middle of her first-grade year, she found herself on the outside looking in. Her new classmates had attended school together since pre-school. They already had forged friendships and friend...
A Second Chance
"When they kept on questioning Jesus, He straightened up and said to them, 'Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.'” John 8:7Have you ever been given a second chance when you did something wrong? What if that opportunity had been...
We Need Your Prayers
I was boarding a plane to Washington, DC, on Thursday when I received a jarring call from one of our team leaders. She told me that “Freddie” and six of his friends had gone to play soccer on Sunday, and they have been missing ever since. They left their cell phones...
Training for Life
“Do you not know that in a race all the runners compete, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it. Every athlete exercises self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable." 1 Corinthians 9:24In this...
