A group of campaigning Catholic nuns set off from New Jersey in a bus Wednesday for a cross-country journey to raise support for proposed reforms of the US immigration system.
The nuns from the group Network left from Jersey City, across the Hudson River from Manhattan and looking over the water to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island, where some eight million immigrants were processed during the 19th and 20th centuries.
Organizers said they back a proposed legal overhaul that would open the door to citizenship for millions of currently illegal immigrants. The draft law took a big step earlier this month when a Senate panel gave bipartisan approval.
“We are going on the road for immigration reform,” Sister Simone Campbell told AFP. “Our immigration system is broken and we have a chance to make a difference…. An important piece of legislation has passed out of committee in the Senate and we want to make sure it goes all the way till law.”
The approximately 25-strong group, which did a similar road trip last year to campaign against government budget cuts targeting the poor, was to cross 15 states, going south to Florida, then west through Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California — all states where immigration is a major concern.
The nuns were planning 53 meetings in 40 cities along the way of a 10,400 kilometer (6,500 mile) journey in their bus, which was emblazoned with the words “Nuns on the bus” and the slogan “raise your hands, raise your voice.”
“We are a people of immigrants and that’s the story we want to tell,” Campbell told a small crowd coming to see them off. “We are a bigger and a better nation because of our immigrant heritage and the future is the same as the past.”
Nuns on bus drive for US immigration reform
