The sun sets over a playground across the street from a group of apartments where many Somali people live in the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood of Minneapolis (Photo by Nicole Neri/Minnesota Reformer)

Our church stands one short block from where an ICE agent took the life of Renee Good. A few days later, the violence ICE is perpetrating in our city arrived, literally, on our doorstep: Armed masked men raided our neighbors’ homes, remaining at our corner for two long hours. As we prayed and cared for those around us, several of our pastors and staff were among those who were pepper-bombed.

Our city is under siege, and when we asked the children in our congregation how they are feeling, they told us, unsurprisingly, that they feel scared. One youth, the child of an immigrant, texted his grandmother in the middle of the night: “I’m scared every day i live in fear and I don’t know what to do if your awake please call me.”

How can we comfort our children? We feel scared too.

And so, in this climate of fear, we turn to that life-affirming work. Immigrant families are afraid to venture outside. We’ve had to cancel our children’s choir practice until we can confidently gather the children safely.

Yet a few children and their moms still rallied to go grocery shopping for immigrant families, delivering boxes to a local McDonald’s where many immigrants work. In distributing Happy Meals to the appreciative children, the assistant manager offered a lesson in how mutual care strengthens the bonds of community. “When you share,” he explained in his accented English, “we share.”

We wish that feeding one another during these terrible times would be enough. But our young people tell us it is not. As one of our youth said, “I want to make sure my friends are not stolen from their families.” Another child asked, “Could you make ICE disappear? They hurt people.”

Jesus understood what it meant to live under an occupying force — in his case, the Roman Empire. He understood the helplessness. He understood the stakes, and yet he persisted in showing us, before ultimately dying from the violence, that another way — a way of love — is possible.

So we will continue to deliver groceries. We will make arrangements so that, if the unfathomable happens, the children can stay with other families. And from the epicenter of this occupation, we send out the children’s plea: Please. Make the people who are hurting people disappear.