While many young people were stuck at home, Tiziana Friedman, 24, spent the first half of the COVID-19 pandemic working in an emergency room in Albuquerque, New Mexico. As a Jewish woman, she found the work fulfilling from a religious perspective, but, as a person of color, she was troubled by the way Black and brown people were treated at the hospital.
“I didn’t have a crisis of faith but a crisis of faith in humanity,” she said.
When a medical condition prevented her from returning to the emergency room, Friedman took it as an opportunity to pivot. She turned toward work with faith-based organizations.