In my world, I celebrate that rare and difficult emotion, empathy,  as the hallmark of a noble spirit, a pillar of social justice, the pathway to my highest human potential.

People often tell me I have changed, and often ask me why I have changed and how I have changed, and I answer them this way: if I have changed at all – this is something I am too close to see –  it is in the pursuit and understanding of empathy, the practice of standing in the shoes of another.

Empathy is the foundation of our very humanity, of what it means to be human, at least for me. Empathy is at the core of the refugee experience in America. We either stand in their shoes or we can’t or won’t, that is the choice all of us face in seeking our own idea of humanity in these  days of American agony.

I am descended from refugees, that experience is near to me, I can stand in their shoes and feel their bewilderment, isolation, loneliness and fear, being a refugee is the ultimate experience in disconnection, from everything one knows, feels and is comforted by. It is imperative for the refugee to feel safe and supported in order to survive.

In America today, to be a refugee is to be a refugee twice, once when torn from their homes, another when throw into the political cauldron the issue of immigration has become in our country. They come to flee fear and danger, and come here to feel afraid and in danger. Once again, their future and fate is uncertain. I believe my very soul depends on trying to help them.

The actor Kal Penn knows this, he put up a page online seeking funds to help the Syrian refugees, and raised $600,000 in a few days. I am new to this experience of doing good for refugees, but I also sense the great feeling there is for them, the empathy that exists for the refugee experience. But I too have been surprised at the support for American refugees, on my blog I have raised tens of thousands of dollars in a few months.

Tomorrow, I’m going to Albany with Maria to meet with Devota Nyiraneza of Rwanda, she walked more than 2,400 miles across Central Africa – it took her a year – barefoot and with her three-month old daughter strapped to her back to get to a U.N. refugee camp in America. Like so many other refugees, if proposed new immigration laws are passed, she and people like her would no longer be welcome in America. She spoke no English, had no money, or any marketable skill. She is a U.S. citizen now, working hard at two jobs, sending her children to college.

She mistakenly took out a $10,000 college loan, thinking it was a financial aid package, a mistake many young people in our country have also made. This happens often to new refugees in America, they have trouble understanding complex financial offerings and agreements.

For the past several weeks, I have been raising money to pay that loan off, the donations are still coming in small and very welcome amounts, I am not a Hollywood actor, I have no magic want to raise $600,000. But I am very close to the $10,000. Tomorrow, I will turn approximately $4,000 raised by the Army of Good over to RISSE, the refugee and immigrant center in Albany in Devota’s name. They will administer the loan payoff and make sure she is not  taken advantage of again.

I will also meet the daughter she carried across Africa on her back, a journey that took her nearly a year. She made this journey without shoes, and sometimes, she was walking on bare bones, dodging bullets and rapists – she was raped four times. In America, she has the skill of working hard and seeking a better life for her children, this used to be the foundation of the American dream. I pray it will be again.

I am meeting newly arrived refugees and immigrants – it took me a long time to break into this world – and trying to support their personal and cultural needs. I am raising money for scholarships for young and adult refugees to support their personal and artistic needs, and meeting with people like Devota to help with her loan, and Mawulidi who needs carving tools to resume his life’s work, and next week, with a woman who fled Africa after her husband died, and the law decreed her father-in-law could now own her and her children.

She barely escaped with her life.

We are raising money for Jorsein Mayo, a 13-year-old Thai refugee who needs help paying tuition for  summer and after school tutoring he desperately needs. He is falling behind. I want to tell the stories of these people and show them as the vulnerable and beautiful human beings they are, the true spirit of America.

I want to be able to look back on my life and be able to say I found my humanity in this difficult time, and did not flinch or run from the challenge of it. There is so much need.

You can help in this work by supporting the refugees. You can contribute directly to refugee organizations like RISSE, of course, or you can also help me in my work by donating to my refugee fund, Jon Katz, Post Office Box 205, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816, or through Paypal, I am [email protected]. Thanks for helping.