News

The Arzola sisters: Volunteers extraordinaire

Sisters volunteer at St. Anne parish, participate in Aztec Dancers

Published: September 5, 2018   

Sisters Yemina Arzola (left), 27, Veronica Arzola, 21 and Claudia Arzola, 27, share laughs outside of their parish, St. Anne Church in North Little Rock.

Sisters Yemina Arzola (left), 27, Veronica Arzola, 21 and Claudia Arzola, 27, share laughs outside of their parish, St. Anne Church in North Little Rock.

Biggest life lesson you wish you learned earlier?

Veronica: “I would have liked to learn earlier to appreciate my faith more. Because there was a time when your faith is weakened and you don’t mind it as much as you do when you’re older.”

Coffee, tea or soda?

“Coffee, coffee,” Claudia and Yemina said after each other, with Claudia adding, “I just love coffee. My mom has been giving me coffee since I was three months old. I do coffee all day.”

The Arzola sisters, parishioners at St. Anne Church in North Little Rock, shine with God’s love in both word and deed.

“I like to help and I learn a lot about everybody,” said Yemina Arzola of why she volunteers at the parish.

Yemina, 27, and Veronica, 21, are catechists for first Communion and Claudia, 27, teaches children’s RCIA.

Claudia said she enjoys seeing “their faces of joy whenever they receive the sacraments and to be happy about learning every day.”

Both Yemina and Claudia are active in the Vincentian Lay Missioners, a Catholic movement following the charism of St. Vincent de Paul that encourages ministering in their community and deepening their faith. 

Claudia also works as a part-time secretary at St. Anne and has assisted as a translator to help the Hispanic community. The sisters, originally from Mexico, have four other siblings.

Yemina, who works at Chick-Fil-A, helped found the Aztec Dancers around 2005 with other relatives. All three sisters dance and teach younger members, performing for celebrations such as Our Lady of Guadalupe. 

“They say that Our Lady of Guadalupe on her feet you can see she’s kind of dancing,” Claudia said, explaining dancing “is another way of prayer.”

Veronica, who is attending Pulaski Technical College and plans on attending UAMS for a nursing degree, said she enjoys working with teens to encourage volunteering.

“Working as a community, teaching them it’s good to do appropriate things, not just partying and having fun, but also that involving in your community and your faith can also be as much fun as partying,” she said.

Click for the 15 Catholic young adults who inspire us, 2018 index 

Please read our Comments Policy before posting.