Our Stories

When 8-year-old Bernardo emigrated from Mexico to the US with his family in 1993, he quickly learned English and became the sole interpreter for his parents. As the youngest member of his family, he saw translating as his way to thank his parents for the sacrifices they made to give their children a better life. At almost 40, he’s still giving back wherever he sees a need in his community. And he married a partner, also from Mexico, with just as strong a sense of obligation, perhaps even more so!

This holiday season, we want to share with you a story about family—a family found and a family saved. It starts with a young woman named Meaghan from Ouray, CO, who married at 18 to escape the abusive household where she grew up. After graduating from a small Bible college in the Midwest, Meaghan and her husband moved to Telluride, where she had a successful career in the tourism industry for over 10 years. During that time, they welcomed a baby girl, but the marriage fell apart and they divorced. Following the divorce, Meaghan became involved in an abusive relationship, so her ex-husband moved with their daughter to Longmont.

If you have ever visited Sister Carmen Community Center (SCCC), chances are you’ve crossed paths with Lupita. She has been one of our most active and enthusiastic participants ever since she first walked through our doors over a decade ago. Although in recent years, she’s usually the one giving help rather than receiving it.

At the end of a very successful career in property management, Sue decided to give back by spending her final years of employment working for an affordable housing rental company. When money was tight for tenants, she often referred them to Sister Carmen Community Center (SCCC) for the food bank, thrift store, or financial assistance. She never imagined that one day she might need any of these resources herself. That was, until she retired.

Jackie’s story began in the St. Thomas U.S. Virgin Islands with the dream of a better life for her son. While St. Thomas may be paradise for vacationers, it’s a hard place for locals to eke out a living due to limited job prospects, a poor school system, expensive housing, and a general lack of the basic goods and services that we take for granted in the states.

You may remember the Jounou family: mother Hanifa (age 65), her sister, Aisha (57), Hanifa’s two daughters, Radi (35) and Bana (28), and her two sons, Hamid (33) and Yussef (27). (Hanifa’s husband died in 2009.) In 2013, the family fled war-torn Syria and spent six years in a refugee camp in Lebanon, where they devoted their time to helping settle other refugee families, before moving to the United States in 2019.