THE PAPAL MONARCHY IN CONFLICT WITH THE DEFENDERS OF THE PEOPLE OF GOD

The Zapatista rebellion against NAFTA January 1, 1994 hit me front and center during our recent visit to family in Chiapas, Mexico.  I was also reminded of the role of the local Catholic Church struggling to bring justice and peace to the area. History records that the Pope in Rome significantly challenged these efforts in Chiapas ever since the ‘conquista.’  This article is a glimpse at the struggles of Bishops Samuel Ruiz (1924 - 2011) and Bartolomé de Las Casas (1484 - 1566), both considered as spokes persons for the indigenous people. 

   The Vatican II document on the Church, Lumen Gentium presents the faithful with a dilemma.  In the first chapter it states that the people of God are inspired by the Holy Spirit (The Spirit dwells in the church and in the hearts of the faithful as in a temple.) yet in the second chapter it insists that the people of God must obey the pope. (…the sacred primacy of the Roman Pontiff and of his infallible teaching authority, this sacred Synod again proposes to be firmly believed by all the faithful. … the successor of Peter, the Vicar of Christ).

Plaque in the main Plaza de San Cristobal de las Casas, Chiapas

     Bartolomé de Las Casas, an early Bishop of Chiapas, was known as a defender of the indigenous people of America.  He was a secular priest and a landowner in Cuba. After a personal awakening he became an associate of the Dominican community in Hispanola that in 1511 condemned the Spanish ‘Conquista’ saying the ‘conquistadores’ had no legal right to subject the indigenous people to slavery and to take their land and treasure.  The response from the Church and Spain was swift and negative.  Las Casas joined the Dominicans in 1522.

   Las Casas challenged fellow Dominican friar Francisco de Vittoria who claimed that the Spanish had the right to wage war on the indigenous if they seemed to reject the Spanish quest for treasure and land.

   Popes of the ‘conquista’ refused to comprehend what Las Casas reported and failed to stop the violation of indigenous humanity in the Americas.  Following de Vittoria, they supported a theology of colonialism as a path to salvation for all.  From experience Las Casas saw it as hell itself for all.

Bishops Vera Lopez (left) and Ruiz (right)

    The controversial Bishop Samuel Ruiz García was appointed Bishop of the diocese of San Cristobal de Las Casas in 1959 by Pope John XXIII.  He was a delegate to Vatican II (1962 – 1965) and participated in the Latin American Bishops conference in Medellin, Columbia in 1968.  Vatican II emphasized peace through justice and the importance of recognizing the events of history as a determinant of understanding Faith (‘the signs of the times’).  Medellin proclaimed the ‘preferential option for the poor’.  The Vatican II – Medellin theology of Don Samuel was reminiscent of that of his predecessor Bartolomé de Las Casas the namesake of the diocese.

    Although the Medellin conference recognized the structural violence to the poor by the world economic system it rejected the option for violence in the quest for justice.  Bishop Ruiz was opposed to armed action.  He agreed with the Zapatista’s opposition to the neo-liberal trade agreement NAFTA and also their insistence on justice for the indigenous, but he opposed violence as a means.

   The colonial system of the 16^th century moved to free trade liberalism then to free trade neo-liberalism of the 20^th and 21^st centuries.  All of these systems weighted the scale in favor of the wealthy and powerful and were a catalyst for war.

     Since Don Samuel opposed the economic and political system that oppressed the poor; he generated powerful enemies including the Vatican.  Auxiliary Bishop Raul Vera Lopez, O.P. who was strong supporter and collaborator of Bishop Ruiz was considered to be Don Samuel’s successor and would continue his work when Ruiz retired.  However when Bishop Ruiz retired, Rome sent Vera Lopez to another diocese.

    The ‘low intensity war’ of the recent past has moved to a fragile tranquility with some armed violence but still without justice for the indigenous people.  The resistant Mayan communities in Chiapas continue dialogue with the world but have maintained their culture, languages, and in some cases, their autonomy. Pastor of St. Dominic’s Parish in San Cristobal de Las Casas, Fray Pablo Iribarren, O.P. wrote,

   My respect and admiration go out for the people of Tzotzil, especially those of San Juan Chamula.  Their history is a synthesis of the expression     resistance’, resistance to diverse external pressures in their existence as  a community – resistance to military conquest, resistance to religious and cultural imposition, resistance to structural changes social, political and religious.  (Pablo Iribarren, O.P. Mision Chamula, Chiapas, 2016, p. 8.)

   The importance of the indigenous people at the present time cannot be overstated.  The world needs their missionaries to teach us reverence and care for the environment.

THE CARAVAN By Miguel Perez

Walking day and night

Even in the morning light,

How frigid I find myself

Here in this caravan.

Now from such a long walk

We are often shaking

Anything can be endured

But least of all hunger.

Photos from Tucson Samaritans *

At night I am frightened

To see my uncle trembling

How could he not?

If we don’t die from the cold..

To enliven the group of walkers

I sing a song of valor

But wait til they see how harsh

It is to fight the heat.

We will walk, we will walk

We will do what we have to do

Even if at the middle of the journey

We die then of thirst.

So sad, these people

That back there come walking

They are not criminals

They come seeking ‘life.’

Let’s go and give them a hand

And let’s support these people

That hardly matter to anyone,

That are unwanted by the President.

There are those who speak about this

They call it an ‘invasion’

I see it with different eyes

I believe it is a ‘benediction.’

Photos from Tucson Samaritans *

From miles away you can see they are

Peaceful and of different ages

So don’t confuse them

With those threatening security.

Help these people.

It is not rocket science

I remind all of you

That this is a question of conscience.

Worn down by weariness

I move to my left and to my right

To see if they will have pity on me

And if they will let me ride the ‘bestia.’

I feel like a very small creature

I was brought here by my parents

Senor Trump, don’t separate us

Or, is it that you never had a mother?

What a tremendous deception!

I feel so stupid,

Hearing  over and over, the President,

Repeating  ‘fake news.’

Finally we arrive at our goal

At a shady spot under a mesquite tree

I hope and pray that the President

Doesn’t take my children away.

Photos from Tucson Samaritans *

December,  2018

* Photos generously provided by 'Tucson Samaritans' in Tucson, Arizona, http://www.tucsonsamaritans.org

One Year Anniversary of the Jericho Walk in Milwaukee

9:00 a.m. Thursday, April 25th

310 East Knapp Street

Milwaukee, Wisconsin

In April of 2018, then Sanctuary Coordinator, Shana Harvey, introduced the idea of a weekly Jericho Walk, patterned on the New York City Sanctuary Coalition’s weekly protest outside the detention center in New York City.

Members of diverse faith groups joined the weekly silent protests in front of the office of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).  They brought their banners and their walking shoes to stand against the separation of families on the border as well as in our communities in Wisconsin.

To celebrate the anniversary of one year of weekly protests, the New Sanctuary Movement and its coalition of faith groups will invite all faith

groups to join in the Jericho Walk on Thursday, April 25th at 9:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m.  

We will extend our walk as needed.  These past months the walk has extended from about the southern  end of the ICE building to the northern end. 

There will be free hot and cold drinks provided by food trucks from 9:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m.  Let’s make this the most robust Jericho Walk of the year.

The address of the ICE building, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, is 310 East Knapp Street, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

The Jericho Walks take place every Thursday morning, 9:00 a.m. at the ICE building.

The Working Catholic: Moralizing Bill Droel

     Name any social policy and there is sure to be a religious leader who has an opinion. The religious leader states his or her position in absolutes. For the religionist, the issue is a matter of high morality; no alternative position is acceptable. These religious leaders and the general public routinely fault the daily give-and-take in partisan politics for putting opportunism, gridlock, grandstanding, obstinacy and hypocrisy above moral principle.

The legislative process is a moral endeavor, says President John Kennedy (1917-1963) in Profiles in Courage (Harper Collins, 1956). An impatient public does not appreciate “the art of politics, the nature and necessity for compromise and balance,” he writes. The public is “too hasty in condemning all compromise as bad morals [when in fact] politics and legislation are not matters for inflexible principles or unattainable ideals.” Democracy is maintained by flawed people who are “engaged in the fine art of conciliating, balancing and interpreting the forces and factions of public opinion.”

Are principles then irrelevant to public life? Hardly. Though abiding principles do not come with specifics on each detailed proposal nor do they yield strategy or timing, principles give essential guidance. For an effective legislator, politics is a vocation about “compromises of issues, not of principles,” says Kennedy. A politician who “begins to compromise his [or her] principles on one issue after another,” he concludes, “has lost the very freedom of conscience which justifies his [or her] continuance in office.”

Profiles in Courage goes on to detail eight U.S. Senators who at a crucial moment put principles ahead of party loyalty and popularity. Yet even in those moments, Kennedy says, an assertion of high principle comes with calculation. Several examples in the book are about race relations, before and after the Civil War. An antebellum Southern senator decides that the principle of a United States is of higher value than the expectations of his constituents and his loyalty to his party. Introducing a pro-abolition bill, however, will be ineffective. Instead, he supports a mechanism that will delay war. He calculates that a decade’s worth of uneasy peace is worth the loss of his reputation. His principled stand, as it turns out, did not prevent the war but it bought time during which the North became stronger and the institution of slavery weaker. In other words a principled stand does not guarantee perfect outcomes; compromise is always in the mix.

There are many issues deserving attention from faith-inspired citizens: abortion, ecology, immigration, national defense, labor relations and more. With rare exception, religious leaders are advised not to take the shortcut of moralizing on these and other issues. Instead, here are alternative strategies:

1.)  Support conscientious legislators. Host a support group or forum in one’s parish where politicians can explore the meaning of their work. Send along compliments when matters are resolved in an acceptable way.

2.) Be a strong, persistent voice in the public square. Over and over explain one’s religious position, using as much natural law or common good language as possible. Never stop asserting the whys and hows of pro-life or pro-planet or pro-civil rights. No matter how basic the explanation may be, there are many, many citizens and politicians who simply do not know why a religious person might oppose abortion or support unions or oppose pollution.

3.) Organize votes. Moralizing (like throwing around the threat of excommunication) likely hardens the position of politicians. Putting voting-blocks together gets attention. Bishops and other Church employees should not endorse candidates nor wade too deeply into the specifics of a piece of legislation. But lay members of any denomination can do retail organizing. Supporting an alternative Democrat in a blue district is better than hollow preaching. Supporting an alternative Republican in a red district will shake things up.

There are grifters in politics for sure. Here in Illinois some go to jail. But there are thousands of moral politicians in municipal, state and federal bodies that approach their work as a vocation. Do they ever hear their job framed in spiritual terms in their congregation, their synagogue, their mosque? There are hundreds of politicians who are capable of putting a moral principle ahead of a special interest, ahead of a party leader’s expectation, ahead of expediency. Not at every hour, on every issue. Not in big moralizing, grandstanding circumstances. But within the deliberative process of democracy, many politicians know how to frame a principle in reasonable terms and at times come away with a moral victory.

Droel edits a newsletter on faith and work, INITIATIVES (PO Box 291102, Chicago, IL 60629)

The Working Catholic: Economic Ideologies by Bill Droel

The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin (www.kul.pl/21.html) just published The Catholic Social Ethic by St. John Paul II (1920-2005). This two-volume text of 500+ pages dates from the 1950s, when Fr. Karol Wojtyla was a young parish priest/teacher. Scholars have long known about the text. In fact, about 300 copies were circulated among students and others in the 1950s. Jonathan Luxmoore, an expert on Catholicism in Eastern Europe, reported on the text a dozen years ago. He recently summarized the new book for Catholic News Service (1/19/19) and for The Tablet of London (2/2/19).

Just as there are Biblical fundamentalists who selectively invoke one or another Scripture verse to support their preconceived opinion, so too there are some papal fundamentalists among Catholics. For example, a small but influential number of Catholics in the U.S. and elsewhere pull a phrase from John Paul II or from Pope Benedict XVI to claim that Catholicism is in harmony with unrestricted capitalism (also called neoliberalism). Similarly, a few Catholics pull out one another phrase to say that Catholicism gives unqualified approval to Marxism. This new book by John Paul II got caught up in this pick-and-choose controversy, causing the long delay in publication.

The Catholic Social Ethic, along with John Paul II’s other writing and talks, shows that he never was a big fan of free market capitalism. He repeatedly rejected “individualistic liberalism.” Nor of course did John Paul II ever mount a defense of communism. Yet through study and experience of the communist regime in Poland, he was well-versed in Marxist themes.

John Paul II, Luxmoore says, recognized that Marxism appealed to young workers because of injustices in their situations. To connect with young adults, Catholicism must have a sophisticated alternative to Marxism. It cannot merely condemn a mistaken ideology. Catholicism must furnish an approach to social justice and peace that fits the daily comings-and-goings of young adults. John Paul II, along with several other Polish theologians including Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski (1901-1981), set about crafting an accessible theology of work.

In contrast to materialistic capitalism, John Paul II popularized the principle of the priority of labor over capital. That is, the worker is the subject of work; not the investment of money. Yes, investments are part of production and service delivery. But the purpose of the enterprise is the worker. According to John Paul II, the word worker is inclusive--managers, owners on the scene, shop hands, janitors, truck drivers, clerks, all those who in some way fashion and distribute the service or the product.

In contrast to materialistic communism, John Paul II outlined a spirituality of work which integrates business, family life, civic involvement and more with fidelity to Jesus’ gospel.

Young adults are familiar with today’s materialisms and other empty ideologies: careerism, cost-benefit analysis, consumerism, conspiracy theories, extreme individualism in economics and culture, relativism (or what the White House calls alternative facts), and more.

Some Catholic leaders say they are interested in young adults. Maybe so. But does a young adult ever come upon ideas and experiences within Catholicism that suggest an alternative to the harshness of work, to the arbitrariness in society or to our vacuous culture? Would a young adult ever hear themes about work expressed in spiritual terms? John Paul II’s theology of work project is suggestive, but not enough. Other theologians and particularly interested young Catholics have to take the matter a few steps further: More sources, more reflections, more conversations and for sure more focused action for justice and peace within the workaday world.

At the moment, The Catholic Social Ethic is available in Polish. Perhaps a condensed English version can be published soon. Perhaps it could include a few pastoral comments and top out at let’s say 200 pages.

Droel is editor of John Paul II’s Gospel of Work (National Center for the Laity, PO Box 291102, Chicago, IL 60629; $7)