Altar acupuncture: A Minneapolis church brings well-being sessions to
its migrant ministry
[May 03, 2025]
By GIOVANNA DELL’ORTO
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Right after Sunday worship at St. Paul’s-San Pablo
Lutheran Church, Juan Carlos Toapanta lay in a lounge chair set up by
the altar, needles sticking out of his forehead, wrist and foot for an
hourlong acupuncture session.
“Just like the Lord’s light helps emotionally, the body’s pain is
treated as well,” said the Ecuadorian construction worker, who suffers
from sciatica and has worshipped at the Minneapolis church for about
five months. “Everything feels freed, emotionally.”
Founded by Swedish immigrants in the late 19th century, the church is
now a predominantly Latino congregation. Like most other churches in the
U.S. that serve migrants, it has expanded its humanitarian, financial,
legal and pastoral ministries during the Trump administration’s
immigration crackdown.
It has also added monthly well-being sessions — at no charge — with
acupuncture, Reiki and cupping therapy to ease the stress that
uncertainty and fear have sown among the migrant community — including
people in the U.S. illegally and U.S.-born citizens in mixed-status
families.
“We have to feel well to respond well, not with panic and fear, which
leads to nothing good,” said Lizete Vega, the church's family engagement
coordinator. “People here feel that they’re protected and can be cared
for spiritually, emotionally and physically.”
Mental health and faith ministry collaborations increase
Faith leaders have increasingly found themselves called to help their
congregations with mental health concerns, from chaplains in the U.S.
Navy to pastors in the rural heartland.
Some see the need to provide reassurance and well-being as a growing
part of their ministry to migrants, even as revised federal immigration
guidelines now provide more leeway for enforcement in or near houses of
worship.
“It was as if they were able to exhale a big breath,” the Rev. Hierald
Osorto said of the 30 congregants who signed up for the first well-being
session in March at St. Paul’s, where an outdoor mural features two
traditional Swedish Dala horses between the Spanish words “sanación”
(healing) and “resiliencia” (resilience).
After last Sunday’s worship, the altar table and Easter lilies were
moved to make room for seven acupuncture chairs, arranged in a circle
facing the central cross. Three massage tables were set up in front of
the pews for the Reiki treatment, where practitioners hold their hands
on or near the body’s energy centers.
“To see this space be quite literally a place of healing, in the place
where we talk about it right at the altar, it moved me to tears,” Osorto
said.
Rising anxiety and confusion affect migrants’ mental health and
well-being
Wellness practitioners and mental health clinicians say anxiety and
depression among those they serve in migrant communities have spread and
intensified this year.
Already, migrants often arrive with severe trauma from violence they
fled in their home countries as well as attacks along cartel-controlled
routes to and through the U.S. border.
Women in particular often suffer sexual violence on the journey. For
many, the fear that they or someone in their families might be deported
is revictimizing. That makes it imperative that “safe places” exist
where they can focus on wellness, said Noeline Maldonado, executive
director of The Healing Center, which helps domestic and sexual violence
victims in Brooklyn, New York.
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Marakah Mancini de León performs a Reiki treatment near a sign in
Spanish reading, “Christ is risen,” in the sanctuary of St.
Paul’s-San Pablo Lutheran Church, which recently added wellness
sessions as part of its migrant ministry, in Minneapolis, Sunday,
April 27, 2025. (AP Photo/Giovanna Dell’Orto)
 Sessions that promote grounding and
mindfulness are necessary to cope with the stress of both immediate
crises as well as long-term unpredictability as immigration policies
shift.
“Uncertainty is the biggest thing,” said Cheryl Aguilar, director of
Hope Center for Wellness in the Washington, D.C., area, which has
partnered with churches to provide mental health programs.
Being in community and cultivating hope is crucial because many
people are responding to fear with rising anxiety, traumatic
symptoms and isolation, all of which can have lasting consequences,
Aguilar added.
“It’s nonstop work, nonstop fear,” said Sarah Howell, a clinical
social worker in Houston with more than a decade of experience in
migration-related trauma. “Every issue seems bigger.”
Howell said many of her clients in Texas are realizing they can’t
live in a state of constant alarm, and the respite that wellness
programs can bring becomes essential.
Finding healing in houses of worship
“People feel hopeless, but they have to keep fighting,” said
Guadalupe Gonzalez, one of the bilingual Reiki practitioners whose
organization, Odigo Wellness, partnered with St. Paul's in
Minneapolis to offer the sessions.
She said she had some doubts about offering these healing practices
inside a church — a large space with light flooding in and people
moving through.
“But the sanctuary has a very nice, very positive energy,” Gonzalez
said. “As practitioners we feel a lot of emotions.”
Several congregants who attended last Sunday’s two-hour wellness
session said they felt both the energy and the connection between
these healing practices and faith.
Martha Dominguez came bouncing down the altar steps after an
acupuncture session. Grinning, she said she had never imagined a
church would offer these kinds of “benefits.”
“Yes, it helps so much,” said the Mexican immigrant. “It takes the
stress away from you.”
Limber Saliero, a roofer from Ecuador who has been worshipping at
St. Paul’s for more than a year, said he had never heard of
acupuncture but decided to try it.
“I felt like an energy that was flowing into me,” he said.
Vanessa Arcos tried acupuncture with her sister and her father,
while her mother got a Reiki treatment. The family started attending
the church the week they arrived in Minnesota from their home state
of Guerrero, Mexico, almost a decade ago.
Lying in the lounge chair next to a statue of the Virgin of
Guadalupe, Arcos said she overcame her fear of needles and found the
treatment relaxing for both muscles and mind.
“It felt very peaceful, very safe,” Arcos said. “It’s important to
do little things for yourself.”
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