Miguel Blancarte Jr. with Ivonne Sambolin, the Director of Community Engagement at the Chicago Department of Public Health, at a Covid-19 testing site in Chicago s Humboldt Park neighborhood. Photo courtesy of Mr. Blancarte.
In 2020, Miguel Blancarte Jr. became the director of Covid-19 Response and Community Outreach at Esperanza Health Centers in Chicago, Ill. The organization’s five sites provide bilingual health services to primarily minority communities irrespective of immigration status or economic situation. Since the onset of the pandemic, Mr. Blancarte has been instrumental in organizing Esperanza’s efforts to aid the city’s residents.
Mr. Blancarte attended Cristo Rey Jesuit High School on the Lower West Side of Chicago, the founding school in the Cristo Rey Network of affiliated college preparatory institutions. The Cristo Rey Network created a corporate work study program that gives students experience in corporate environments. On five school days a month, student
(CNS photo/Adrees Latif, Reuters)
The last year has been one of loss. We have lost jobs and school and money. We have gone without hugs and handshakes, grandparents and parties. Most tragically, we have lost hundreds of thousands of lives many of us have lost some of our closest and most beloved companions on life’s journey all without access to the traditional rituals of mourning.
The season of Lent gives us space to reflect in a new way on the suffering that has resulted from the Covid-19 pandemic. The traditions of prayer and fasting and almsgiving help us to unite our own suffering with the suffering of Christ. But after a year in which we have already given up so much, one could be forgiven for asking: Do we really need to give up chocolate, too?
(CNS/Vatican Media. Composite by Alison Hamilton)
You know one thing Pope Francis needs more of? Unsolicited advice from American Catholics. Especially on subjects he cares deeply about. He has mentioned over the years that he is a huge movie buff (he loves “Babette’s Feast,” possibly the first film to make it into a post-synodal apostolic exhortation), with a special place in his heart for Italian directors Mario Camerini, Federico Fellini, Alessandro Manzoni, Roberto Rosselini and Luchino Visconti. This gave us the idea to ask
America’s staff and contributors to suggest a film Francis might add to his Netflix queue. (Although we are fully aware he doesn’t have a Netflix subscription. He reportedly doesn’t watch TV!)