In March 2020, it was a shock to me that even the richest country on the planet was being impacted by a pandemic and the economic crisis that followed. Back in those early days of the pandemic, like most other people, I thought it would just be a few weeks, especially here in the US with all of the financial resources available here. Instead here we are in September 2021, still just as unsure about what the Delta variant means for all of us in the weeks and months ahead of us.

For our Spanish-speaking families, the impact of the pandemic has evolved. In March 2020, most families had at least one person working in restaurants, unable to work from home to avoid exposure to the outside world, but with reduced hours, creating financial stress at the same time. Families worried about the virus for all of the same reasons most of us did, but with the extra worry of what would happen to their family if someone became sick since most of our families do not have access to health insurance. Now all of the families have been back to full-time work, the financial stress has been lessened. The memories of the economic crisis are fresh and the increasing hospital rates have many of the families worried about another wave of financial problems. Nearly ever single member that is of age has been vaccinated, but the parents worry for the safety of the children that aren’t old enough to receive the vaccine. The children are all returning to face to face school after a year and a half of virtual school.

But all of this is just part of the story. As Holy Week reminds us, God always has a happy ending for us. Through all of these months, Ascension has retained all of our Spanish-speaking members, except for one person that moved. We have celebrated a wedding, a quinceañera, with another wedding coming in September. Dozens of visitors have attended special events at Ascension. Our families are looking forward to BLAST, JOLT and children’s choirs beginning again. We are so happy to have tutoring resume again. WCTC moved their ESL classes to Pewaukee, so Ascension’s English classes are the most accessible classes in the area. Our immigrant members have dreams and goals of attending technical school or university, but they know they need to learn English first. We are so appreciative of everyone that gives of their time to help transform lives as tutors.

Edwin Aparicio
Spanish Language Minister
(Reprinted from the September 2021 newsletter)