Over 300 leaders, clergy, religious, and bishops from 20 organizations gathered last week in San Antonio to celebrate five years of Recognizing the Stranger, a West/Southwest IAF training, leadership formation, and parish organizing strategy. 

The Convocation was highlighted by a video message from Pope Francis, who offered his “closeness and support” to the IAF network and its work to organize with immigrants and with those at the margins to encourage “participation of the Christian in public life.”  

At a national gathering of Catholic Social Ministers organized by the Catholic Campaign for Human Development (CCHD), COPS/Metro's work with San Antonio Archbishop Gustavo García-Siller was featured prominently in plenary sessions and a workshop around local organizing for gun safety reform. 

During a panel discussion with the Archbishop, Josephine Lopez-Paul shared how COPS/Metro worked with the San Antonio Archdiocese in the aftermath of the massacre at Uvalde in 2022.  The Archbishop made an impassioned plea to infuse love into a "culture of death" through faithful participation in the political process around issues impacting life, including gun safety reforms. 

During the discussion, Archbishop García-Siller asserted that synodality could be renewed path for the Church to address the new realities people are living.  

"The Eucharist that brings solidarity, through synodality, might be the new way of being Church."

According to the Catholic Review, members in the audience were visibly moved.  COPS/Metro organizers and leaders also shared stories of local organizing efforts around gun safety including conversation campaigns leading to an initiative to restrict access to firearms for perpetrators of domestic violence in San Antonio.     

2023 Catholic Social Ministry Gathering A ‘Sign Of Faith, Hope And Love Coming Alive’, Our Sunday Visitor [pdf]
Groups Must Infuse Love Into a Culture of Gun Violence, Say Panelists, Today's Catholic

St. Leonard Catholic Church organized a "Human and Spiritual Development" Assembly in which seventy-five (75) parishioners attended and participated in small group conversations about the role of the church in their lives.