| U.S., Mexican bishops join voices on
migration
By PATRICIA LEFEVERE
Washington
Despite four days of intense focusing on sex abuse and a possible
war in Iraq, the U. S. Catholic bishops approved an array of documents on
migration, on poverty, Hispanic affairs, domestic violence, education,
stewardship and liturgy, as well as a pro-life statement.
All of the documents and statements won approval from the
overwhelming majority of the 260 voting bishops attending the meeting at the
Hyatt Regency Hotel here.
For the first time in its history, the U.S. conference worked with
another episcopal body to produce a joint statement. The U.S. Bishops’
Committee on Migration collaborated with the Mexican Episcopal Commission for
the Pastoral Care for People on the Move. Bishop Carlos Talavera Ramirez of
Coatzacoalcos in the state of Vera Cruz, a member of the commission, attended
the U.S. bishops’ meeting while Auxiliary Bishop John Manz of Chicago
represented the U.S. bishops at the Mexican bishops’ gathering on
migration held concurrently in Mexico City.
In preparing their joint statement, the two bodies heard testimony
from academics, politicians, pastoral agents, bishops -- especially those on
either side of the border -- and migrants themselves. The original draft of the
joint pastoral letter, Strangers No Longer: Together on the Journey of
Hope, was drafted by the Mexican American Cultural Center in San Antonio.
The center brought long experience and expertise on cross-border issues and was
familiar with the regular links between the Texas and Mexico bishops, who
initiated the project. Fr. Anthony McGuire, director of pastoral care for the
bishops’ Migrant and Refugee Services, and Kevin Appleby, head of policy
for that group, revised the statement.
The document is “timely,” Washington’s Cardinal
Theodore McCarrick told NCR, coming on the eve of talks between
Washington and Mexico City set for January.
The bishops believe that the magnitude of migrants and the record
amount of cross-border investment during the past decade also contribute to its
significance. An estimated 800,000 to 1 million legal border crossings occur
each year between Mexico and the United States. Some 150,000 to 200,000
Mexicans enter as legal permanent residents, accounting for one-fifth of all
legal permanent residents admitted annually. Roughly two-thirds of the Mexicans
here are in the country as legal permanent residents or U.S. citizens. A
sizeable number of Americans also work and retire south of the border.
‘Diocese without
borders’
The dangers associated with migration have meant that as many as
300 people die each year attempting to cross the U.S. border. This summer, 167
migrants perished in Arizona. The tragedy underscores the need to “educate
our people to open their hearts to our brothers and sisters south of the
border,” said Phoenix Bishop Thomas O’Brien.
On Nov. 21, O’Brien and representatives of ministries in the
Arizona dioceses will partner with those in the Hermosillo archdiocese in
Nogales, Mexico, to create “a diocese without borders. We want to erase
the line that has been created by governments, the border that separates us, to
truly become one church body under God,” O’Brien said.
In the light of a common history and theology and of church
teaching on the rights of workers, families and migrants, the joint statement
affirms that people have a right to find work in their homeland and to migrate
when opportunities at home are insufficient to support their livelihood. It
further recognizes that nations have the right to control their borders, and
that refugees and asylum seekers need their dignity and human rights
protected.
Manz favors having Mexican seminarians and priests
“accompany” migrants to the United States just as European priests
and nuns did for new immigrants to this country in generations past.
Even in a weakened economy, “we still need these people for
jobs our people aren’t willing to do,” Manz said. Moreover, the
dollars immigrants remit to their families -- estimated at $8-9 billion
annually -- constitute Mexico’s third-highest revenue source after oil and
tourism.
McGuire hopes the document will “help get the word out that
we need a controlled kind of immigration that allows our economy to benefit
from Mexican workers’ labor and allows them to have a stable family
life.” Currently permanent residents can wait up to six years to obtain a
visa for family members. The U.S. cap on Mexican immigration forces many to
enter illegally to join loved ones. “This is an unacceptable choice”
-- one that “encourages undocumented migration,” the bishops of both
lands stated.
Immigration difficulties are but one concern of Hispanics who
account for 71 percent of the growth in the U.S. Catholic church since 1960.
Hispanics constitute 39 percent of U. S. Catholics and 13 percent of U.S.
seminarians. But the ratio of one Hispanic priest to 9,925 Hispanic faithful is
eight times greater for Hispanics than for the Catholic population in
general.
In an effort to address the “vital dimensions” of
Hispanic Christian life, the bishops adopted “Encuentro and Mission: A
Renewed Pastoral Framework for Hispanic Ministry.”
It continues the plan the bishops passed in 1987 and offers
pastoral leaders a structure for formation, service and advocacy,
community-building and collaboration, liturgy and prayer life among
Hispanics.
More than 150 dioceses and 4,000 local parishes and Catholic
agencies currently serve Hispanic Catholics. As Dallas Coadjutor Bishop Joseph
Galante saw it, the church must find ways to minister to “what in fact is
the predominant Catholic group.”
Poverty -- at home and abroad -- occupied members of the domestic
and international policy committees whose joint document, “A Place at the
Table: A Catholic Re-Commitment to Overcome Poverty and Respect the Dignity of
All God’s Children,” won approval from 241 of 245 bishops voting.
Addressing the roots of violence
Last November the bishops overwhelmingly approved the war against
Afghanistan because its Taliban regime was harboring terrorists. Boston’s
Cardinal Bernard Law and McCarrick led much of the debate. A year later
McCarrick, who conducted the poverty debate on behalf of the bishops’
domestic policy committee, which he chairs, noted that the nation cannot simply
consider military responses to terrorism.
Instead bishops must pursue “policies that address the roots
of violence and reduce poverty and suffering in our nation and world.”
McCarrick acknowledged that the United Nations, the leading industrial nations
and scores of nongovernmental organizations had all failed to meet goals set in
the early 1990s to eradicate absolute poverty early this decade. “In truth
the world has gotten poorer,” he told NCR. “We bishops have to
be more inventive about finding solutions.”
It’s “a moral scandal” that half the world lives on
less than $2 a day and cannot afford food and medicine, he said.
In Washington the bishops’ conference has lobbied Congress --
with some success -- for debt relief, development assistance and greater
spending on health care in Africa. In July, the Senate passed a bill to combat
HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, which contains significant debt relief
provisions. A similar aid bill is stalled in the House.
In their document, the bishops use the image of a table to
illustrate the urgency of including all people in economic, social and
political life.
They ask Catholics to share their wealth, trim their consumption
patterns and make their voices heard as public policies and priorities are
decided. It also promises Web-based resource materials for parishes, dioceses,
schools and Catholic agencies.
In another action, the bishops adopted “When I Call for Help:
A Pastoral Response to Domestic Violence.” The bishops approved the
original document 10 years ago and have revised it in the light of “so
much accurate government information” that was not in the original
pamphlet, said Bishop Edward Cullen of Altoona, Pa., who chairs the Women in
Society and in the Church committee.
“We have a better understanding of the dynamics in domestic
violence,” of why men batter and why women stay in abusive environments,
Cullen told NCR. The bottom line remains: “Violence against women
is never justified.” Although an estimated 4 million women are battered
every year, the number could be much higher as many do not report such abuse
for fear of losing their children, of having no job or money to support them,
or of being deported if they are here illegally.
Cullen, a social worker who directed Catholic Charities in the
Philadelphia archdiocese for 20 years, regretted that “none of this is
news to me.” He urged priests to preach about domestic violence and to
post information about it. “Women aged 35-49 can really get killed by
batterers,” he said.
“If someone comes for counseling or confession, who’s
drinking, and says he’s going to give up alcohol and thus his battering
will stop, I say: ‘No, you have a double dysfunction.’ ” The
person must work to overcome both “disabilities,” Cullen said.
To mark the 30th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade
ruling in January, the bishops adopted a brief statement, “A Matter of the
Heart.” They take comfort that fewer abortions are being performed each
year and fewer doctors are willing to be involved in abortion. They note that
over three decades thousands of pregnancy resource centers have opened to help
women facing troubling pregnancies.
Patricia Lefevere is an NCR special report
writer.
National Catholic Reporter, November 22,
2002
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