The Oblate Missions in Tijuana

Our Lady of Lourdes is the sister parish to the Oblates Tijuana Mission.  During COVID-19, we are thinking of our sister parish and the many challenges facing them from factories closing, to increased food and clothing needs, to assisting migrants, to caring for the sick.  See this recent video from Father Jesse about how the Mission is supporting those in need.  Thank you to our Lourdes parishioners who support the Mission. 

There are several ways you can support the Mission. 

1) Pray for the Mission and the work being led by the Father Jesse and the youth leaders. 
2) Write a note of encouragement for a Tijuana parish family. You can submit your message through this FORM. We will translate your message and make sure it reaches a family. 
3) Make a donation.  You can donate through the Tijujana giving link in this form. Choose Tijuana Mission as the designated area . 
4) Give a Spiritual Bouquet. Offer a rosary, Mass, Holy Hour, prayer walk or special intention for a Tijuana family. We will collect these "flowers" of prayerful intentions over the next few weeks and send a "bouquet" of them all to our Tijuana friends.




We will continue to share updates from the Mission.  We recently heard from a youth leader.  He shared the following update with one of our Justice & Charity committee members.

"We are seeing increased needs for food and clothing in addition to the many families we already serve.  We are also visiting those who are sick and homebound to offer encouragement and pastoral care.  More than anything, we can use your prayers.  We are praying for you.  Please pray for us."

Fr. Jesse and the Oblates serve a parish community of 200,000.  The Mission provides pastoral care, food, shelter, healthcare, youth ministries, scholarships, elderly ministries, and support for children with disabilities.  Recently, Fr. Jesse and the youth ministry have been ministering to women, children, and young adults in the migrant caravan. 

See below for photographs of the work being done by Fr. Jesse and the Oblates.  If you would like to donate to one of Mission's needs, please click on the donate button above. 

If you'd like to learn more about their work with the migrant caravan, click here:  https://gopro.com/v/Roov98zJ6pMyo

May 6 2020

The situation with COVID here is serious and every day we have more and more people coming for help.  Although the situation is complicated here, thanks be to God,
we have been doing very well and been able to support about 50 families.

We're giving the highest priority to the elderly,  who can not work easily, primarily those who are older than 60 years old. We have been handing out about 50 food baskets each day. For others who don't meet that criteria there is a waiting list, and we attend to about 15 of those per day. As of now we have enough food baskets set aside to last until  June 2. 

We are continuing to support around 50 migrants from Central Latin America.
We're also continuing to support the orphanages that were visited during the last Mission trip.  We also have a group of youth that have been visiting families and asking if they need any assistance.

Before COVID we had families that we knew well and were supporting with their needs, but because of the pandemic there are needs everywhere. Although the situation is very grave for the people here, thanks be to God, everything is under  a little control here. We are doing as much as we can and I'd ask that you all pray for us, that God grants us patience, and care for our community in this complex situation.
Thank you so much!

-David


June 18, 2020

In Tijuana things are more calm now then before and a lot of people have already returned to work. The ones who have not have been the the elderly, diabetics and those with other conditions. Restaurants have reopened but the hospitals are still full. Fortunately they have built new clinics that specialize in treating pregnancies and other emergencies so that the hospitals can focus on COVID. We recieve a lot of people from our community who come for food baskets. We've handed out about 1800 food baskets for the community in the past two months.

Many people in our community have died from COVID and many others died because many of the public hospitals could not attend to them. For many the only way for them to get care is through the more expensive private hospitals, and this has lead to many passing because of a lack of medical attention or funds.

But on June 13, the government information office informed the community that May was the peak of cases and thanks be to God after that the case count has decreased. So things have gotten a lot more calm over the past few weeks.

-David 

Our parish completed a mission trip to Tijuana last Fall.   Jason Adkins, Executive Director of the Minnesota Catholic Conference, and his son Xavier participated in the trip.  Click the link below to read Jason's reflections on the Mission and our call as Catholics to live a life of encounter and missionary discipleship. 

Mission Trip Exhibits Joy of the Gospel - Jason Adkins
(Article in Catholic Spirit - November 20, 2019)

Meet Luis, Alejandra, and Dylan.  They are 3 of the youth leaders at the Mission running weekly youth group gatherings. They also help organize and run youth and parent SEARCH retreats, lead roofing projects, oversee fundraising and scholarshipos, and assemble and distribute rice and beans "dispensas" to those in need.  Other youth leaders are running program around mental health and counseling, contruction, migrant support, and visiting those who are ill and homebound.