Panchita Espitia was a formidable woman, not afraid of rattlesnakes underfoot on the Texas ranches of her youth, or of death itself. Her grandson, Bishop Ricardo Ramirez, learned this near the end of…

Beatrice Vio has cultivated a passion for fencing since she was five years old. At eleven, she contracted severe meningitis which took her to the brink of death. The doctors gave her an unimaginable…

Ellaraino experienced a common teenage reaction when she learned she’d have to leave Los Angeles to spend the summer in Louisiana with her great-grandmother, Silvia. Less common was…

After being drafted in 1969, Tom Geerdes served as an Army medic in the 11th Armored Calvary in Vietnam and Cambodia.  Like many veterans, he returned home a changed man.  At…