08/31/2026
"At Castleton United Methodist Church on the Northeast side, for example, about 25 congregants gathered after Sunday church services in their fellowship room to make signs. Then they walked up and down a city block while in prayer. Occasionally, cars driving past the group would honk or wave.
Susanne Ayers, a retired Spanish teacher at North Central High School, has visited people detained at Miami Correctional Facility. She said it's been "heartbreaking listening to their stories."
She teared up as she told congregants about the conditions inside the facility that some detainees have told her about, such as not having enough soap to wash their clothes.
"We listen to their stories," Ayers said. "They're just thrown in there. The food is terrible, and it's awful. ... So many of them were just going about life. In a car, stopped for no reason. Stopped because of the color of their skin. Some of them were nabbed at work."
The church has been doing vigils and prayer walks, as it calls them, over the past several years, including to pray for community members who have been victims of gun violence. The church hosted a vigil back in 2022, for example, when a three-year-old and a 22-year-old were killed nearby.
This time, they said it was not just community members here but from across the globe that drew them out to walk in sprinkling rain.
"It's been a mission of this church to be very conscious of what's been going on," said Mary Kleiman, a member of the church. "You're housing God's children in deplorable conditions. These are human beings. It just hurts."
via IndyStar
https://www.indystar.com/story/news/politics/2026/08/30/indiana-vigils-call-for-end-to-miami-ice-detention/91532365007/
