September 14, 2008 • 6:37 pm 0
Consider reading the US Catholic Bishops Statement, Economic Justice for All, published in 1986. Though over 20 years old, this document provides an excellent overview of Catholic theology engaged in economic theory and every day work life experience.
Filed under: Economic Policy, Market Place, Social Doctrine, Social Justice, Economic Policy, Marketplace, Spirituality
September 13, 2008 • 9:08 pm 1
I ask that you please consider reading the US Catholic Bishops’ Statement on Political Responsibility to help inform any reflective conversation.
Filed under: Church-State, Culture, Economic Policy, Market Place, Official Statements, Papal Teachings, Personal Reflections, Politics, Social Doctrine, Social Justice, Uncategorized, US Bishops
September 10, 2008 • 6:18 pm 0
Statement of Most Reverend John C. Wester
Bishop of Salt Lake City
Chairman, U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Migration
On
Worksite Enforcement Raids
September 10, 2008
On behalf of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), I call upon the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and President Bush to reexamine the use of worksite enforcement raids as an immigration enforcement tool. The humanitarian costs of these raids are immeasurable and unacceptable in a civilized society.
In the absence of comprehensive immigration reform, we have sought to work collaboratively with DHS to ensure that raids are carried out humanely. It seems to us that DHS has attempted to abide by several humanitarian considerations in executing some of the workplace raids.
However, we believe that DHS has not gone far enough to ensure that human rights protections are consistently applied in all enforcement actions.
For over a year now, DHS has targeted employers who hire unauthorized workers by using force to enter worksites and arrest immigrant workers. During the process of these raids, U.S.-citizen children have been separated from their parents for days, if not longer; immigrants arrested have not been afforded the rights of due process; and local communities, including legal permanent residents and U.S. citizens, have been disrupted and dislocated. The sweeping nature of these raids—which often involve hundreds of law enforcement personnel with weapons—strike fear in immigrant communities and make it difficult for those arrested to secure basic due process protections, including legal counsel.
We have witnessed first-hand the suffering of immigrant families and are gravely concerned about the collateral human consequences of immigration enforcement raids on the family unit. Many of our local parishes have helped respond to human needs generated by these enforcement actions, providing counseling and legal services to parents and children and basic needs assistance to immigrant communities.
Raids strike immigrant communities unexpectedly, leaving the affected immigrant families to cope in their aftermath. Husbands are separated from their wives, and children are separated from their parents. Many families never recover; others never reunite.
As our government confronts the challenges of immigration, let it not forget one of its core duties: protecting the family unit as the fundamental institution upon which society and government itself depends.
While we do not question the right and duty of our government to enforce the law, we do question whether worksite enforcement raids are the most effective and humane method for performing this duty, particularly as they are presently being implemented. In this regard, we ask DHS to immediately pledge to take the following actions to mitigate the human costs of these raids:
DHS should refrain from enforcement activity in certain areas that provide humanitarian relief—churches, hospitals, community health centers, schools, food banks, and other community-based organizations that provide charitable services;
Primary, not simply sole, caregivers should be released following an enforcement action to care for their children. A variety of release mechanisms, including parole in the public interest, release on recognizance, bail, and alternatives to detention should be utilized for this purpose:
DHS should facilitate access to meaningful legal representation for arrested individuals so that they are aware of their legal rights and options;
Enforcement actions should be conducted in a manner which preserves basic human dignity: immigrants who are working to survive and support their families should not be treated like criminals.
Mechanisms should be instituted to allow family members to remain together and to locate each other during and following an enforcement action. Non-profit and community groups should be engaged in this effort.
Absent the effective and immediate implementation of these safeguards, we believe that these enforcement raids should be abandoned.
Immigration enforcement raids demonstrate politically the ability of the government to enforce the law. They do little, however, to solve the broader challenge of illegal immigration. They also reveal, sadly, the failure of a seriously flawed immigration system, which, as we have consistently stated, requires comprehensive reform.
As they begin their general election campaigns, we urge the two presidential candidates to engage the issue of immigration in a humane, thoughtful, and courageous manner.
We urge our elected and appointed officials to turn away from enforcement-only methods and direct their energy toward the adoption of comprehensive immigration reform legislation.
Filed under: Migration, Social Doctrine, Social Justice
September 3, 2008 • 11:36 pm 0
Caritas President to Urge Better Cooperation
NEW YORK, SEPT. 3, 2008 ( Zenit.org ).- United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon invited the president of Caritatis Internationalis to attend a high-level meeting on how to better overcome the global scourge of poverty.
Cardinal Oscar Rodríguez Maradiaga will attend the Sept. 25 High-level Event on the Millennium Development Goals as a representative of civil society.
The development goals aim to significantly reduce global poverty, but progress on them is increasingly off schedule for the target year of 2015.
Caritas reported that at the halfway point in 2008, with current projections, targets will be missed in some countries by over 100 years.
“I welcome the U.N.’s initiative to put the Millennium Development Goals back on track,” Cardinal Rodríguez Maradiaga said. “The MDGs are a useful catalyst in ending the scandal of poverty but currently risk becoming victims of inaction. Failure to meet these targets in a world of such wealth is unthinkable, yet will happen unless we take the right steps now.”
The U.N. event will be a forum for world leaders to review progress, identify gaps, and commit to concrete efforts, resources and mechanisms.
According to the cardinal, action from the United Nations cannot come fast enough.
“Eleven million children die each year in poverty from preventable causes,” he said. “That’s 77 million children who will die over the next seven years from now to 2015 because of our failure to act today.”
Part of the problem, according to Cardinal Rodríguez Maradiaga, is lack of cooperation with faith-based organizations.
“We need to bridge the gap between those with the financial assets and those with the physical and human resources on the ground,” the prelate said. “Churches and faith-based organizations like Caritas are overlooked as a way to deliver development.
“A third of all children under five in developing countries are severely stunted because of hunger, and world leaders are committed to doing something about it. The Church runs over 60,000 schools for 5.8 million infants and 90,000 primary schools for 28 million pupils. They could help feed the hungry with the right support. That is the partnership needed to save lives.”
Filed under: Caritas, Social Justice
September 3, 2008 • 1:51 pm 0
ZE08090205 – 2008-09-02
Permalink: http://www.zenit.org/article-23534?l=english
Cardinal Says Economic Inequality a “Dramatic” Problem
DAR-ES-SALAAM, Tanzania, SEPT. 2, 2008 (Zenit.org).- The president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace announced the forthcoming publication by the Holy See of a document analyzing poverty in the context of globalization.
Cardinal Renato Martino revealed news of the publication during a 4-day congress on evangelization last week in Dar-Es-Salaam organized by the dicastery.
The theme of the conference was “Toward a New Evangelization of African Society in Accordance with the Social Doctrine of the Church.”
During the conference Cardinal Martino officially presented the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church, which was published in October 2004, to the Church in Africa.
The cardinal stated that “since the Second Vatican Council, the preferential option for the poor is one of the points that most characterizes the social doctrine of the Church,” reported Vatican Radio.
“Poverty and, above all, the growing inequality between areas, continents and countries, including within the latter, constitutes the most dramatic problem facing the world today,” he added.
The cardinal explained that the new document of the dicastery will attempt to offer concrete answers to the problem of poverty in keeping with the Church’s social doctrine.
Evangelical approach
“The intention is to point out an evangelical approach to combat poverty, to identify — both at the national and the international level — those responsible for combating poverty, to sensitize the Church to greater and more articulated attention to and awareness of the problems of poverty and of the poor of the world,” he said.
“It must not be forgotten that today extreme poverty has, above all, the face of women and children, especially in Africa,” the cardinal added.
Cardinal Martino said that the dynamism of evangelization “must drive the Church to privilege the poor, to direct our strength to the poor, to consider the renewal of society from the needs of the poor.”
In regard to globalization, the cardinal pointed out that “an indispensable act of charity” is the “determination that has as its end the organization and structure of society so that a neighbor does not have to live in misery.”
He said this determination must be all the greater if one takes into account that poverty “is a situation facing a great number of people, including whole populations, a situation that today has acquired the proportions of a real worldwide social issue.”
Filed under: Cor Unum, Economic Policy, Papal Teachings, Social Doctrine, Social Justice
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