So Many Children Locked Up: A Reflection from Inside a Detention Center

It is important to slow down and art-it-out following an experience of any spiritual or emotional or physical intensity. I often zoom on with the next project, event, activity without slowing down. Art is my reminder of the necessity to slow down. I don't think it matters what the art is; or even what the end product looks like. It is the journey of doing the art itself which is the point of healing and wholeness. I often don't do art when my spirit needs me to do art. And yet, every time I do bracket out the time and dump my heart onto a journal page I am so glad I invested the time in doing art. Each mark on the journal page brings healing. Here: too many children (and moms) are being held behind locked walls in so-called detention centers (jail) for immigrants seeking asylum from violence in their homelands. It is very much jail for families, and it is appalling to see so many children (250-300) behind locked walls.


Simple mark-making with a mini stamp pad.
The background is a "reject" practice page done by a friend's mother.

A quick journaling; dumping out my experience of ministry inside a detention center.
Ver-Actuar-Azucar (see, discern, act) is an easy process for reflection.
Symbols: Peace sign & cross represent the two styles of earrings the women made.

Screened in. Behind bars. Women & children in a detention center.
Six tables with four chairs each for the women making jewelry.