Working with the challenges of multiculturalism is one of the ways in which Medical Mission Sisters around the world try to be a healing presence to those in need today.

Sister Sarah Summers lived in Venezuela for 15 years, and in London for 6 years. During her term as Society Coordinator for the Medical Mission Sisters, she traveled to most of the nations where we are in mission. All of these experiences shaped her ministry at The Center for Multicultural Human Services in Falls Church, Virginia, where she has worked for the past 11 years.

At this community-based, nonprofit agency, Sister Sarah is part of a 60-person staff who speak 26 different languages. "My main work is as a bilingual counselor, trainer, and mediator, which is about responding to the mental health and social needs of immigrants and refugees," she explains. "What a challenge! Every day I awake asking our Gracious God to fill me with a presence of healing, so that I can help these persons experience some tranquility and well-being."

Sister Sarah works with several different groups:

• ethnic minority at-risk adolescents and their families
• high-achievement middle school students of ethnic minority backgrounds, who need helping in planning their education and careers.
• women who are victims of spousal abuse.
• parents and teens who need conflict management skills

"The Center for Multicultural Human Services also connects, networks, and partners with other public and private agencies in provision of services, as well as in justice coalitions on poverty, minority rights, and immigration laws," Sister Sarah explains. "We also encourage and support people as they begin to speak for themselves in these gatherings."

"In reflecting on my work, I sometimes feel that missionaries and refugees/ immigrants have a thread in common. We have both experienced displacement into cultures other than our own," she shares. "Our multicultural world is an image of the Creator."

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