A snapshot of the immigration story in N.C.

Today, the medical diagnostic company, LabCorp, is Burlington's single largest employer. And the majority of people who work in the factories are a new generation of immigrants from Latin America — mostly illegal — who came in search of that dream.  

These immigrants are establishing new businesses, filling the local churches and schools. They are also increasingly running into trouble with the law.

These are the stories of people who live and work there— and wrestling with vast changes in their community. 

Father Bob Benko and the Blessed Sacrament Church.

FREE VIDEO N.C.: Meet Father Benko In Burlington N.C., Father Bob Benko serves not only as the spiritual leader of two distinct communities but also acts as a mediator. Dateline NBC

Most Sunday's Father Robert Benko's mass can be heard on audio speakers extending a couple of feet outside to the church parking lot, just beyond the people crowded in the church pews and kneeling or standing in the aisles.

Within the last decade, the church's growing congregation includes some new English-speaking members but by far the fastest growing segment are Latinos— mostly from Mexico.  They've come to Burlington to find work in the few textile factories left in town. And Father Benko serves not only as the spiritual leader of these two distinct communities but also acts as a mediator of sorts, in an effort to help bridge the cultural divide among both groups.

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