Praying With Our Feet For Immigrant Rights

In the early months of 2026, the streets of Washington, D.C., became a landscape of prophetic witness. The Maryknoll Office for Global Concerns joined hands with Faith in Action and a broad coalition of interfaith partners for the “Praying with Our Feet” campaign—a sustained mobilization of prayer and protest focused on our nation’s social policies.

As a Catholic social justice advocacy organization, we chose to cosponsor and participate in these actions because our faith leaves no room for neutrality when human dignity is at stake, including the dignity of migrants and refugees. To “pray with our feet” is to acknowledge that our spiritual lives are inseparable from our public commitment to the “least of these.”
The primary catalyst for this campaign was the FY2026 federal budget negotiations. The “Praying with Our Feet” cosponsoring organizations stood in firm opposition to proposed increases in funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP).

Based on the belief that a federal budget is a moral document, dozens of faith groups participated to raise a strong call for justice to Congress. When resources are diverted away from humanitarian aid, housing, and legal pathways for citizenship toward increased immigrant detention and militarized enforcement, we are failing in our duty to protect human dignity and the sanctity of the family. Our participation was an act of “holy resistance” against the criminalization of those seeking safety.

The campaign was defined by two major days of action at the U.S. Capitol Building.

On January 29, the campaign held an interfaith prayer service at a local Lutheran church in Washington, to ground their actions in faithful witness to peace and love. Following the prayer service, a group of more than one hundred people, including Christian ministers, Jewish rabbis, and Muslim imams, marched to the U.S. Capitol where around 50 of them occupied the lobby of one of the Senate buildings in an act of nonviolent civil disobedience to signal to Congress that people of faith will not remain silent while immigrant families are separated by overly aggressive detention and deportation policies.

On February 12, the momentum continued as a delegation of faith leaders from Minnesota came to Washington to lead a press conference and rally outside of the U.S. Capitol Building and meet privately with members of Congress. They expressed the depth of suffering that immigrants and citizens are experiencing in Minnesota due to the aggressive immigration enforcement by federal agents since last December. Faith leaders from other parts of the country and representatives of religious organizations in Washington, DC, joined in to highlight the national scope of this call for justice, showing that the demand for a compassionate immigration system resonates far beyond Minnesota.

The Maryknoll Office for Global Concerns joined this campaign to amplify our voice for the voiceless. We are strengthened by the diversity of our partners, which include the U.S. Federation of the Sisters of St. Joseph, Faith in Action, Sisters of Mercy of the Americas, the Ignatian Solidarity Network, Faithful America, Pax Christi USA, Muslim Public Affairs Council, National Council of Jewish Women, Church World Service, Sojourners, and Bend the Arc: A Jewish Partnership for Justice, United Church of Christ, Evangelical Lutheran Church of America and the InterFaith Council of Metropolitan Washington.

As we reflect on this season of advocacy, we are reminded of the words of Pope Francis: “A faith that does not trouble us is a troubled faith.” The Praying with Our Feet campaign troubled the status quo in Congress by asserting that the migrant is not a line item in a budget, but a sibling in Christ.

Though the budget battles continue, our feet remain ready to act. We invite all our supporters to continue the pressure by contacting their members of Congress to tell them we need a budget that reflects the values of welcome, protection, and integration of our immigrant neighbors.

FAITH IN ACTION: Tell Congress to ensure immigrant enforcement respects human dignity.