Linda Plitt Donaldson

This year, the census data show that despite reported economic growth, the poverty rate (14.8%) remains unchanged from 2013. Of the 46.7 million Americans who remain in poverty, 15 million are children (more than one in five). Poverty continues to have a disproportionate impact on people of color with African American and Latino poverty at 26.3% and 23.6% respectively. (It is important to remember that the federal poverty level for a family of four is $24,250, and very few of us know families of four who can live on $24,250 a year.).

Many of these families work. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that 10.5 million Americans are among the working poor. And most of the income from these families comes from low-wage work, e.g., cleaning, fast food, retail, home health care, and so on. It’s not just the wages of these jobs that keep working families in poverty. Many of these jobs offer no guarantee of minimum hours, expect 24/7 availability, have unpredictable schedules (e.g., less than a week’s notice about a shift), and have a growing reliance on ‘on call’ shifts. The scheduling issues associated with low-wage work make it very difficult for families with children to participate in the labor force because of the need to arrange regular child care. In addition, many low-wage workers have no paid sick days, and many of them work in conditions that actually make them sick. Workers are afraid of calling in sick or attending to child care emergencies for fear of being fired or having their hours reduced. Rashaun Rodgers works two jobs at $8/hour and struggles to support his family, including a 4-year old son.

His story is similar to the families profiled in the new book by authors Kathryn J. Edin and H. Luke Shaefer, $2.00 a Day: Living on Almost Nothing in America. Edin and Shaefer introduce us to families who are poor, who have a deep desire to work, and who complete hundreds of job applications and accept low-wage jobs under terrible conditions. Yet they often lose these jobs because of the precarious conditions in which they live and the lack of understanding and accommodation by employers. Rae McCormick, a two-time cashier of the month, was fired because she had no means of getting to work after the family members with whom she shared a car drained her tank and did not tell her it was empty. Such stories told by Edin and Shaefer give evidence to the “economy of exclusion” noted by Pope Francis. The authors also document how the combined absence of a true safety net and of sufficient job opportunities has created the conditions for many families in America to be just surviving on $2 a day.

Since the beginning of modern Catholic social teaching with Rerum Novarum, Catholics have cared deeply about the dignity of work and the rights of workers. Pope John Paul II wrote an entire encyclical on work called Laborem Excercens, declaring work the center of the “social question” and noting that work is a “fundamental dimension of human existence.” Work is how we participate in God’s creation, in addition to providing for our families and giving us the means to participate in various spheres of life (family, community political, and economic). Pope Francis observes that work “expresses the dignity of being created in the image of God” and that “work is sacred.” He also acknowledges that dignity through work is “‘under threat by a cult of money which leaves many people without work.” Maximizing profit contributes to the unpredictable schedules and anemic benefits tied to low wage work.

The Community Advocates Public Policy Institute offers some examples of policy solutions that bring meaningful work opportunities to people who are poor. People who are poor want to work. They are hard workers. They need opportunities to work in jobs with wages where they can support their families. They need opportunities to work in jobs that offer predictable schedules, predictable hours, and health benefits. They need work that reflects their dignity.

– Linda Plitt Donaldson is an associate professor at The Catholic University of America National Catholic School of Social Service.

Many hands go up. “Nice!” says Brazinski. “No homework on Wednesday, other than to see the Pope.”

Brazinski is taking advantage of this class on the Monday morning before the papal visit to lecture on the Holy Father’s life and his teachings.

Outside his Caldwell Hall classroom is the Campus Ministry garden featuring a small statue of St. Francis of Assisi. Referring to that, Brazinski asks his students why Pope Francis took on the name of this saint when he began his papacy.

“St. Francis is the patron of animals and the environment and he dedicated himself to the poor,” says one student.

“Bingo!” responds Brazinski as he reminds students of the often-told story of the dramatic moment so many centuries ago when St. Francis renounced his inheritance and dedicated his life to the poor and the environment. “When Pope Francis chose his name that gave us the first idea that these would be the themes of his papacy,” he says.

Brazinski tells the students what it was like on campus on March 13, 2013, when it was announced that Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio of Argentina was elected to be the 266th pope.

“Students chanted ‘Habemus Papam!’ and I can still remember the bells ringing across campus.”

The lecture focuses on Pope Francis’s early life as a boy, as a chemical technician (who also had a job as a nightclub bouncer), as a scholar, and as a young priest. Brazinski’s PowerPoint details important milestones in the Popes’s life. And the class ends with a lively discussion of Laudato Si’, the Pope’s encyclical on the environment. The students have read selected excerpts from the encyclical in which Pope Francis appeals to ‘‘every person living on this planet” to play a role in “caring for our common home.”

Pope Francis’s visit to Catholic University has provided a unique teaching moment for faculty and staff. In addition to the pope’s teachings being worked into curriculum in anticipation of the Holy Father’s visit, Catholic University’s Office of Campus Ministry initiated a series of events with the theme “Walking with Francis: Joy of the Gospel.”

CUA students, alumni, faculty, and staff have taken the pledge to walk in solidarity with the Holy Father through prayer, learning, and service. More than 500 members of the CUA community took part in the Serve with Francis Day on Sept. 13.There were special Masses in Spanish to help students learn the assembly responses for a Spanish Mass. Learning events included a screening of the Salt + Light documentary “The Francis Effect,” a pope trivia night, a panel discussion titled “Follow Francis’s Footsteps: The Pope’s Guide to Modern Life,” and a lecture on “Junipero Serra: An Apostle of California.

“I am so excited for the Mass. It will bring happiness to so many souls,” says Rory Martinez, a student in Brazinski’s course. “Spanish is my first language. My grandmother is from Mexico and she always told me about seeing Pope John Paul II. I got my faith from her. Celebrating the Mass in Spanish will feel like home. And after today’s class I will be going into the Mass with great knowledge,” says the theology major from New Mexico.

“Pope Francis’s visit to our campus provides a great opportunity for our students and community,” says Brazinski. “In the months leading to his adventus, he has inspired us to serve, pray, and learn. From our numerous service days to our Fitness for Francis at the Kane Fitness Center, CUA has been awaiting the Holy Father and has enhanced its programming to honor his mission. His visit has truly provided a unique and invigorating opportunity for our University.”

“The visit of Pope Francis will be one of the most memorable events in the lives of Catholic University students, who hopefully will remember not only the event, but also the Pope’s message: his invitation to ‘walk’ as a person of faith throughout the rest of their lives,” says Rev. John T. Ford, professor of theology and religious studies, who delivered the lecture on Blessed Junípero Serra. The soon-to-be saint will be canonized by Pope Francis during the papal Mass.

Linda Plitt Donaldson

The Society of Jesus — or the Jesuit order, in which Pope Francis was initially formed as a priest — includes a number of transformative experiences that offer a spiritual and concrete experience of walking with Jesus that can inform, free, and embolden one’s efforts to help build God’s kingdom on earth. Among these are the Spiritual Exercises, which are offered in various formats to lay and religious women and men in a variety of formats (eight days, 30 days, eight months) with the help of a guide or spiritual director. In addition to participating in the spiritual exercises as part of his formation, Pope Francis has directed these exercises for other Jesuits and clergy desiring to grow closer to Jesus.

Walking with Jesus through the Spiritual Exercises is a potentially transformative experience that profoundly deepens a desire “to know Jesus intimately, to be able to love Him more intensely, and so to follow Him more closely” (Spiritual Exercises, no. 113). Through the exercises, one is contemplating Jesus’s birth, life, ministry, suffering and death, and resurrection. Contemplation, in this sense, means placing yourself in the story with Jesus. Using your imagination and senses (sight, smell, touch, taste), you walk with Jesus through His life. But you are not just walking with Jesus; you are talking with Jesus, and you are listening. In this process, you are developing a greater intimacy with Him and cultivating an ability to hear His voice in your heart, to discern God’s voice in your heart.

Cultivating this ability to hear God’s voice leads to an interior freedom to know and courageously respond to God’s call in your life. The role of a spiritual director is critical to this process because so many things get in the way of our ability to hear and respond to God’s desire for us. St. Ignatius referred to these as disordered attachments that push God from the center of our lives and become the source of our identity. Examples of disordered attachments include a desire for power, wealth, and status. When money, power, and position become the source of our identity, we forget that the truth of our identity is that we are God’s beloved. Prayer, a good spiritual director, and a supportive faith community can help us discern God’s call so we may respond generously and fearlessly to it.

Pope Francis is applying the gifts he has been given by grace that have been cultivated in his Jesuit training, and further refined through his life experience to his papacy. He is responding generously, authentically, and courageously to God’s call. He is walking with Jesus. If you walk with Jesus, expect Him to show you His wounds, to invite you to touch them, to have your heart broken by them. Pope Francis is showing the world the wounds of Christ — that is, the conditions of people who are poor, suffering, exploited, marginalized, and oppressed. He is standing with them. He is inviting us to join him, to walk with him and Jesus to “bring good news to the poor. . . . to proclaim liberty to captives . . .  to let the oppressed go free” (Luke, 4:18). Are you ready to join him?

—   Linda Plitt Donaldson is an associate professor in The Catholic University of America National Catholic School of Social Service.

In the introduction to the show, host Cheridan Sanders questions why many students lose their faith during their college years while others deepen their faith. “What makes the difference?” she asks.

Her answer to that question unfolds in an in-depth exploration of student life at Catholic University and its unique Campus Ministry that helps students encounter Christ through prayer, community, and service. In interviews with students, faculty, and staff, the documentary highlights the University’s emphasis on both the intellectual and social aspects of the Catholic faith. It also brings to light the Franciscan character of CUA’s Campus Ministry, which is led by Father Jude DeAngelo, O.F.M. Conv. and his staff that includes several other Conventual Franciscan friars.

The show also explores the strong connection Catholic University has with the Pope and the other leaders of the Catholic Church.

“Right across the street from us is the headquarters of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops,” explains Victor Nakas, associate vice president for public affairs. “That’s significant because it fosters the ties that we have with the bishops conference and ultimately with the Vatican.”

Nakas points out that Catholic University is the only university in the United States that has been visited by two popes and soon will host a third when Pope Francis comes to the campus in September. He says that these visits and others by international Church leaders provide “unique opportunities to our students … to see the leaders of the Church, to interact with them.” He also notes that CUA faculty members serve as consultants to the bishops conference and to the Vatican. “They bring a perspective back to the students that I think richly informs the education that they’re receiving.”

Salt + Light host Sanders wraps up the show by answering the question she posed at the beginning.

“That’s the crucial difference,” she says. “CUA is all about creating opportunities for students to encounter Christ in every aspect of the university experience, be it in community, their studies, with their peers, or simply in quiet contemplation of the Eucharist. And it seems it’s a very big difference, indeed.”

“Pope Francis in his message at the World Day of Peace this year called human trafficking an open wound upon the body of Christ,” said CUA President John Garvey, who welcomed attendees to the University’s campus on July 9 at the start of the two-day conference titled “Answering Pope Francis’s Call: An American Catholic Response to Modern-Day Slavery.”

The conference was cosponsored by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB); Catholic Charities, D.C.; Catholic Charities, USA; and Catholic University’s National Catholic School of Social Service (NCSSS).

“Human beings made in the image and likeness of God are reduced to objects because there is a demand for it,” said Garvey, who noted that forced slavery is a multi-billion-dollar industry.

“The scourge of modern-day slavery is closer to us than we might want to admit. Unlike slavery of the 19th Century, the modern-day culture of enslavement ignores slaves all together.” The Church, Garvey said, is uniquely equipped to bring this problem to light and to address it.

Bishop Eusebio Elizondo (right) chats with conference participants.

In an opening address, Most Rev. Eusebio L. Elizondo, auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of Seattle, also quoted from the Pope’s World Peace Day message. He said the Holy Father is making an urgent appeal to anyone who witnesses human slavery “not to become accomplices to this evil, not to turn away from the suffering of our brothers and sisters, our fellow human beings, who are deprived of their freedom and dignity.”

The bishop noted efforts under way to combat modern-day slavery, such as current legislation in Congress; the Amistad movement, a national education campaign launched by USCCB’s Migration and Refugee Services; and USCCB’s SHEPHERD program, which provides a toolkit for Catholic parishes to identify situations of human trafficking.

Bishop Elizondo also offered particular gratitude to women religious who he says have been committed to the struggle against slavery long before the problem began to make news. “Their long-standing efforts to provide love and support to survivors of human trafficking and a commitment to advocate on behalf of its victims are an example that brings glory to the Church and should be one that we all strive to imitate.”

Many women religious were in attendance, as well as Catholic Charities staff, other Catholic social service agencies, and community members from parishes across the nation. A large number of attendees were social workers, including many NCSSS alumni. Also represented were nurses, lawyers, and community activists.

Nearly 20 more speakers — scholars, law and policy experts, social workers, and leaders of social service agencies — addressed a wide range of topics including identifying potential victims, navigating social services, understanding the legal framework, building a toolkit for a parish community, and exploring current trends.

Two keynote speakers shared their personal stories of survival and advocacy.

Tina Frundt told her story of being trafficked from the age of 9 until her 20s. It started with foster families selling her. “When you are raped and abused for so long and no one believes you, you become angry. Abuse was my normal, it’s all I knew,” she said.

Even after she was adopted at age 12, she was always waiting for “the other shoe to drop.” That’s how, a few years later, a trafficker sensed her vulnerability, gained her trust, and eventually kidnapped her and forced her into prostitution.

A Catholic service agency in Washington, D.C., helped Frundt escape. “They didn’t judge ever, not one time, and told me I would do amazing things. The impact of not being judged is pretty spectacular,” said Frundt.

Today, she trains organizations and law enforcement officials on the issue of human trafficking. In 2008, she founded Courtney’s House, a Washington, D.C.-based organization that assists victims and survivors of sex trafficking and sexual exploitation, and has helped more than 500 victims escape trafficking and start a new life. Through Courtney’s House, Fundt works with local parishes to identify those at risk in their congregations.

Starting at age 11, Gerardo Reyes-Chávez, the second speaker, worked as a peasant farmer in Zacatecas, Mexico, and later in the fields of Florida picking oranges, tomatoes, and watermelons. He told attendees of inhumane and sometimes violent working conditions hidden in the swamps of Imokalee, Fla.

Today, he is a leader in the Coalition of Immokalee Workers in Florida. He has investigated several modern-day slavery operations by going undercover to work on tomato farms and interview workers who have escaped brutal operations, such as being locked in the back of trucks overnight. He has mobilized the Immokalee community around national actions for the Campaign for Fair Food, and he has negotiated with major food chains.

“This was a conference that was all about rolling up our sleeves and addressing the problem,” said William Rainford, dean of NCSSS. “The attendees are people on the front lines in their communities who are effecting change. There was an amazing sharing of information and a profound commitment to answering the Holy Father’s call to eliminate the atrocity of human trafficking.

“The conference was just the beginning of a strong Catholic partnership aimed at advocacy, prevention, and rescue — with the goal of eradicating human trafficking in our lifetime.”

Linda Plitt Donaldson

The election and subsequent spiritual leadership of Pope Francis has inspired hundreds of millions of people across the globe. Nearing 20 million followers as of April 2015, he is the second most followed world leader on Twitter and is considered the most influential world leader, as evidenced by nearly 10,000 and 8,000 average daily retweets of his Spanish and English postings, respectively.

For someone who has worked on issues of poverty and homelessness for at least 22 years, Pope Francis offers a deeply inspiring vision for the Church and for the world. Large percentages of Catholics and non-Catholics (including those with no religious affiliation) admire the Pope and his message for humanity. Many people have asked me to what I attribute Pope Francis’s popularity. For me, it is his authentic and radical commitment to living (and thereby teaching) the gospel values rooted in the life and teachings of Jesus Christ, a way of living reflected in the life of St. Francis of Assisi, whom Pope Francis described as “the man of poverty, the man of peace, the man who loves and protects creation,” qualities that led Pope Francis to select the name Francis.

Pope Francis is focusing the world’s attention on the basics of living the Truth: the inherent dignity of all people, the urgency of transforming social conditions so all can thrive (common good), the importance of solidarity among all peoples (knowing deeply that our own well-being is bound to the well-being of others), the need for families and communities to be supported in a way that they can address their own needs (subsidiarity), and the moral obligation to ensure that people who are poor, vulnerable, and suffering are central to our concern, for that is the ultimate measure of a just society. Catholics will recognize these fundamental aspects of living the Truth as core principles of Catholic social teaching.

And social workers will see echoes of these principles in our professional Code of Ethics, whose core values are service, social justice, dignity of the human person, the importance of human relationships, integrity, and competence. Schools of social work located in Catholic universities are often considered the academy’s institutional expression of the Church’s dual mission of service and justice. Pope Francis is focusing the vision of the Church and the world on this mission, our responsibility to one another through service and justice, which makes manifest our deep and abiding love for God. In this blog, I am excited to anticipate his visit by amplifying many of the themes of social transformation the Pope is calling for.

– Linda Plitt Donaldson is an associate professor at The Catholic University of America National Catholic School of Social Service.

Chad Pecknold

By now everyone should have read, or at least read about, Laudato Si’, the Pope’s latest encyclical on “Our Common Home.” I think we see here some important themes that have already come up on the Holy Father’s Latin American mission, and are likely to resurface when he visits us this September. Five stand out:

1. Pope Francis likes to invoke personal images. The encyclical wasn’t officially on the environment or climate change, but on “our common home.” This powerfully evocative image of the home recalls Pope Benedict’s frequent proclamation that nature is something prior to us, a gift which has been given by God, and which we can’t simply manipulate or abuse. The image of the home makes this theme more personal, but it achieves the same end. Whenever you hear Francis talk about “our common home” you should be hearing a challenge to relativism. Francis speaks less to climate change skepticism than to common-good skepticism. I expect we’ll hear this theme again in September, especially when he addresses a politically divided Congress.

2. The theme of conversion is also prominent in Laudato Si’. Fundamentally, Pope Francis believes that it is the turn away from God that causes all our self-destructive habits, and what we most need is to return to God. He first calls us to an existential/metaphysical conversion to recognize our common home as a gift of the Creator, then he calls for conversion to God as Father, conversion to Christ and his saints who show us how to participate in the harmony between God and creation, and conversion in and through the Most Holy Eucharist, which unites the created world to the heavenly home, and forms us to think about the universal destination of goods. Listen for these calls for conversion this fall.

3. In Evangelii Gaudium, the Holy Father stressed (perhaps subtweeting American Conservative senior editor Rod Dreher!) the need for Catholics to follow “the missionary option.” This is the message which is also being enacted by Pope Francis’s mission to the Americas: Every Catholic is sent into the world to preach good news to the poor, not only the materially poor, but also the spiritually destitute, those who are lost without God.

4. A “culture of encounter” is often how Francis translates mission. For the Holy Father, “dialogue” is tied to mission. We can see this in the way he always has an eye on God as Father, and Mary as our Mother — for he consistently proclaims that all people have God as their Father, and then invokes Mary as the Mother we all need. This is the spiritual context for encounter, a word which should always be heard as an invitation to participate in Mary’s Yes to God, and as a call to be enfolded into the saving arms of Holy Mother Church.

5. This Holy Father is a master of gestures. Everyone saw, and immediately understood, his look of disapproval when Bolivian President Evo Morales gave him a hammer and sickle crucifix. These are the small, powerful, even prophetic gestures the Pope is now known for, but we should be careful to interpret them well.

Together, Laudato Si’ and the Latin American mission give us some clues for what to expect from the Holy Father’s mission to the people of the United States of America…

– Chad Pecknold is an associate professor of systematic theology at The Catholic University of America School of Theology and Religious Studies. 

Catholic University students and faculty listen to presentations by Monsignor Martin Schlag and Andreas Widmer about economic justice.

In preparation for Pope Francis’s visit to Washington, D.C., and The Catholic University of America in September, the students and faculty have begun an important conversation about justice in our society. On Wednesday, May 13, two experts launched this discussion at an event titled, “Teaching Catholicism to Capitalists.”

Monsignor Martin Schlag, of the Santa Croce University in Rome and consultor to the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, shed light on Pope Francis’s “Evangelii Gaudium” from an Anglo-American perspective. His talk provided insights into the Pope’s understanding of capitalism from his experiences in South America where capitalism is marred by classism and cronyism.

Andreas Widmer, director of entrepreneurship at CUA’s School of Business and Economics, presented the newly released findings from a survey titled “Faithful Measure: Gauging Awareness of the Catholic Church’s Social Doctrine.” This new data shows that Catholics and non-Catholics alike misunderstand key tenets of Catholic social doctrine. Most Catholics think they understand terms such as social justice, solidarity, and property rights, but when they are asked to identify their definitions, they do little better than non-Catholics.

> More

The event was titled “Ending Extreme Poverty Now: Working Together with the Poor.” It included a welcome from Special Assistant to the President and Executive Director of the White House Office of Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships Melissa Rogers, and keynote addresses by Archbishop Bernardito Auza, apostolic nuncio and permanent observer of the Holy See to the United Nations, and Alex Thier, assistant Administrator, Bureau for Policy, Planning and Learning, U.S. Agency for International Development. A musical reflection was performed by Sara Groves, singer/songwriter and recording artist nominated for 7 Dove Awards.

A panel discussion followed that included:

Anne St. Amant, IPR undergraduate fellow, The Catholic University of America;
Dr. Stephen Colecchi, director, Office of International Justice and Peace, United States Conference of Catholic Bishops;
Rev. Aniedi Okure, director, Africa Faith & Justice Network;
Kathy Brown, senior director for mission and Catholic identity, Catholic Charities USA; regional coordinator, Caritas North America, Caritas Internationalis;
Michele Broemmelsiek, vice president for overseas operations, Catholic Relief Services.
J. Mark Brinkmoeller, director of the Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, U.S. Agency for International Development, gave the closing remarks.

> More