How It All Began
When Frontier Airlines began offering inexpensive direct flights from Denver to Ixtapa, Mexico, Dr. Jim and Molly Conahan embraced the opportunity to trade Colorado’s snow for sunshine and enjoy a bit of rest with their three children - Megan, Matt, and Brian.
On one particular trip in 1997, their daughter Megan, then a young teenager, made an observation that would forever change their family’s lives.
“Dad,” she said, “everyone at the market has white cataracts.”
Wanting to show their kids the joy of service, the Conahans decided to return later that year to host a simple glasses clinic. Not promising much, they were unsure if anyone would show up. But when they arrived, there was a long line waiting for them. Patient after patient came forward, many completely blind from cataracts.
Unbeknownst to Jim, Molly made a quiet promise to those they had to turn away:
“We will come back, and he will do your surgeries.”
They laugh now about the marital spat that followed that evening after the clinic. Dr. Jim, a board-certified ophthalmologist, tried to explain that you couldn’t simply “come down and do surgery” - you’d need permissions, instruments, supplies, and funding.
But Molly had already decided otherwise. She reminded him that God had already begun to open the doors, and that together they would find a way.
And they did.
A Family Mission
From that moment on, the Mission of Healing Eyes became a family calling. Dr. Jim led with his surgical skill, Molly coordinated logistics and served as his scrub tech, and their children each found a way to contribute. Their oldest, Megan, fluent in Spanish, became the team’s translator, while Matt, their middle son, brought laughter, energy, and a readiness to tackle anything. What began as one family’s “yes” to God has now grown into more than forty missions, restoring sight to thousands of people living in preventable blindness.
Now, their youngest son, Dr. Brian Conahan, a practicing anesthesiologist in Denver, Colorado, has rejoined the team to provide anesthesia care. Their nephew, Dr. David Massop, a retina surgeon and ophthalmologist in Des Moines, Iowa, has become a fellow surgeon on the team.
Over the years, other physicians - including Dr. Judd Martin of Scott Bluffs, Nebraska, Dr. John Kloor of Boulder, Colorado, Dr. Russ Bercham of Aurora, Colorado, and Dr. Jerry Popham of Denver, Colorado - have joined the mission, each offering their unique expertise and heart for service.
“Mother Teresa wanted to see the face of Jesus in the poor,” Dr. Jim reflects. “In our case, it’s in the blinded poor.”
Guided by Faith
Dr. Jim and Molly often describe the mission as a “loop of grace”:
“God gives, we receive, we give back, and God is glorified.”
For them, every surgery is an act of worship and every restored eye a reminder of divine mercy.
Inspired by Saint John Paul II’s words, “Your being increases to the degree you give it away,” and Mother Teresa’s conviction that “you can do something I can’t, I can do something you can’t, but together we can do something beautiful for God,” they continue to lead with gratitude, humility, and faith.
Now retired from full-time practice, Dr. Jim Conahan devotes much of his time to the Mission of Healing Eyes - expanding to longer and more frequent trips in partnership with Surgical Eye Expeditions (SEE) International and a devoted local medical team in Zihuatanejo.
Each trip blends skilled medicine and faith in action, restoring not only physical sight but dignity, hope, and joy.
At the heart of the mission’s ongoing success is optometrist Dr. María José Mejía, who performs patient screenings, schedules surgeries, and ensures continuity of care long after each U.S. team returns home. Alongside her, Xóchitl Palacios Salazar and Nadir Rendón Texta provide essential logistical and on-the-ground support, helping each mission run smoothly from setup to final follow-up.
Today, with more than forty missions completed and over 200 surgeries performed each year, the Mission of Healing Eyes continues to illuminate lives through faith, skill, and compassion.
“To see the fingerprint of God in all of this is just humbling,” says Dr. Jim. “We thought we came to heal others, but the mission has healed us.”
Today
Help Us Write the Next Chapter
What began with one family’s “yes” continues today through people like you. Your generosity turns possibility into sight, and sight into hope.