Transformation of the Latin American Religious Map

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Our Holy Week, Every Day

 

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Abundant Life Versus the “Culture of Death”

For over five decades, our North American society has upheld legislation that defends the heinous crime of abortion. This legislation comes with the appearance and excuse - among other things - of protecting a woman’s right to make decisions about her own body and of supporting poor women so that they do not seek abortions in the darkness of illegality, with all the serious risks that this entails for their health and life. Yet this legislation forgets and tramples over, yes, the rights of the unborn, adding us – thereby – to the “culture of death” that, in so many ways, imposes itself on all of humanity.

We live in this historical and socio-cultural juncture of postmodernity. After two world wars, pessimistic accounts of “deconstruction” and “no-future” have appeared and the easy and fast, transitory, temporary, disposable, and ephemeral have prevailed. This is a historical and social moment in which individual freedoms and rights appear to take precedence over the common good and in which the truth has become “what is useful to me,” with the consequent predominance of subjectivism and sentiment, where each person assembles “a la carte,” his own manual of “truths” and constructs his own life project.

This is a world of permissiveness and moral laxity, of appearances, and where the unbridled search for happiness is confused with momentary and physical pleasure as an end, regardless of the means to achieve it. This is a hedonistic and pansexualist society in which sexuality, also “light,” is lived without love, without exclusivity, without commitments, reduced to genitality, and the frenzy of orgasms. This is a society and culture without convictions and without meaning, that has traded the transcendent value of life in exchange for all that be enjoyed here and now amidst the easy and immediate.

Issues such as abortion, divorce, euthanasia, etc., have gained resonance and power. In this “light” world and culture, a world of relativism and half-truths, and under the pretext of respect for plurality and differences, the truth is diluted or hidden. Feminist movements are acquiring rising power in all areas of our life in society, here and throughout the rest of the world. It is in this postmodern and “light” socio-cultural context that I will dare in these lines to give some opinions on the issue of abortion, at a time when our society is talking about the possible repeal, by the Supreme Court, of the federal law on abortion, to leave the legal decisions in this regard in the hands of each State of the American Union.

I write from the point of view of the Christian humanism that I profess because I understand that these teachings have universal validity insofar as the tendencies toward life, peace, justice, and truth are the intrinsic and inborn heritage of every human being whether or not we affirm the existence of the God of Christians and the consequent truths, values, and principles of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

An ethical-moral reflection on abortion cannot and should not be approached or appropriated exclusively by the humanistic and theological vision of Christianity. This appropriation or attribution of the discourse on the defense of life in abortion impoverishes and reduces the scope that the issue has for all humanity, because the appreciation, respect, and defense of the gift of life is the heritage of all humanity, insofar as that life is a value, inscribed in nature and in the heart of every human being and valid for every man and woman of any race, people, creed, ideology, etc.

The following reflections, great principles to consider on the subject of abortion and consigned here as concisely as possible, are only to foster an initial understanding that in no way exhausts the abundant and complex moral, ethical, legal, religious, psychological, political, and social controversies related to this topic:

• Christian and Catholic Moral Theology has always affirmed that the existence of the human person begins “from its conception. That is to say, from the moment in which the human sperm cell penetrates the human egg and fertilizes it, the moment in which the set of biological phenomena that lead to syngamy (union of the male and female pronuclei) begins, where the genome of the human being itself, the one that is unalterable, is definitively organized. In the union of the ovum with the sperm, the human nature of the new being is established and at that same moment, the genetic sex is also established.” (Dr. Rafael Pineda, Comentarios sobre los proyectos consensuados de fertilización asistida, translated from Spanish)

• All this means that Christian humanism maintains, at the same time, that human life is a biological process in permanent development: from conception to biological death, and that said process constitutes a personal identity, a human being. Therefore, “from the first moment of his existence, the human being must see his personal rights recognized, among which is the inviolable right of every innocent being to life.” (From the Instrucción Donum Vitae 1,1 en el Catecismo de la Iglesia Católica 2270, translated from Spanish)

• For Catholic moral theology, the "direct and voluntary" elimination of an innocent human being is always gravely immoral. “Direct abortion, that is, abortion willed as an end or as a means, always constitutes a grave moral disorder, since it is the deliberate killing of an innocent human being” (John Paul II - Encyclical Evangelium Vitae of March 25, 1995 - N. 62). If the embryo is a person – who, like all human beings, is constantly developing from conception until death – then abortion is, bluntly, murder and the worst of crimes if we consider that parents and relatives (beings called to protect the life of the murdered innocent) lend themselves to take the life of an innocent and defenseless human being.

• Abortion is a crime. However, it is not only the woman who is involved in abortion. The woman who undergoes an abortion is the product of a social structure (family and legal) that influences and conditions her. Along with her, others are equally or more guilty (the father, the family, society...). The degree of culpability (whether the woman who should have been a mother acts with more or less malice) will depend on her degree of awareness, knowledge, etc. But, at the same time, nothing justifies the death of a human being, much less an innocent and defenseless one in the womb.

• Medical science serves life and never death. This is its first vocation, its reason for being.

• Naturally, the vast majority of human beings are born in a situation that – medically – can be considered “normal.”

• Any form of life is preferable – however precarious it may seem – to any form of death, however sophisticated it may be.

• The experience of parents and entire families who have accepted the existence of a child born sick affirms – also – the child’s value within the family and society and, furthermore, the moral value that accepting evil, suffering, and pain says about human existence. All this sounds contrary to a hedonistic and postmodern society in which pain and suffering are avoided in the unbridled pursuit of solely pleasure, regardless of the means to achieve it.

• If medicine fulfills its vocation and mission—that of promoting life and improving the quality of life of human beings—no one can decide to eliminate the life of a human being who—in the future—could experience an improved quality of life due to advances in medicine.

• The application of a greater evil (that of killing the child) does not solve the traumas and consequences left behind by a moral and physical evil such as rape. On the contrary, common sense allows us to understand that abortion adds greater evils and traumas to the woman who was raped and her life. 

• The same society that encourages abortion also abandons the woman undergoing an abortion to her own fate. Also, this same society, instead of punishing the rapist, punishes the woman who was raped and doubles her experience of evil by converting her, through abortion, into the murderer of an unborn child and adding "the physical and psychological complications that abortion already has in itself." (Cf. Dr. Cameron, Paul in Aciprensa).

• When we discuss abortion, we speak, first of all, of innocent people whose life is taken from them in the womb. But, we are also talking about the entire social, academic, scientific, medical, cultural, religious, political, legal, cultural, and family structure that directly affects the occurrence of all abortions.

• The woman’s body is the “lodging” that—during pregnancy— houses the body and the personal and distinct identity of the child: another being who is morally, psychologically, and legally independent, unique, and different than the mother. That the mother grants herself or is given the right to attack the child and kill him because he is lodged in her body is comparable to—for example—a homeowner believing he has the right to kill anyone who lives in his house.

What should be done, given the controversy and the political and public debate in our society about abortion? Let us return to valuing life as the sacred gift on which all other individual, group, and social values are based because political-social peace, social justice, and the progress and development in justice and the freedom of peoples are not built on death and cemeteries. Let’s work comprehensively, through all our actions, words, and attitudes, toward a “culture of life” and against a “culture of death.” Let’s not use legal devices to calm the twists of our consciences.

The clandestine practice or the decriminalization-legalization of abortion is hardly coherent in societies incapable of social justice, freedom, respect for human rights, equity, solidarity, and peace; that is, in societies where the “culture of death” is fostered. It is hypocritical to throw up our hands in horror at the murder of the innocent unborn, if, at the same time, we are not moved by the hunger and by the so many forms of injustice, violence, and death that surround us and also threaten the gift of life, and whose victims are the so many millions of our brothers here and beyond our borders. 

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A passage towards a better world - Easter 2022

 

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The Good Friday of Every Day

 

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EASTER: Everyone CROSSES OVER, every day ...

Easter Sunday is an essential Christian holy day. Easter is a liturgical season lasting approximately six weeks, starting at the most significant Sunday of the Catholic liturgical year, when we celebrate Christians’ greatest confession of faith – proclaiming Christ risen and alive in the life of Christians and in the ecclesial community – and lasting until the solemnity of Pentecost.

Although it is the most significant annual holy day for Catholic Christians, the celebration of Easter has a universal message, i.e., a valid message for all men and women of good will, from any location, race, religious creed, political ideology, socio-educational level, social position, etc.

The Spanish word for Easter, PASCUA, comes from a Hebrew word meaning "CROSSING OVER". Easter was already celebrated by the men and women of the Old Testament when they commemorated the "crossing" of the Red Sea (cf. Ex 12-15), through which they were freed from the oppression to which they had been subjected for several centuries by the Egyptians. Later, the men and women of the Old Testament, converted now to Christianity, continued celebrating Easter, but with a new essence and meaning: the triumph and "transition" of life over death, the victory and "triumph" of good over sin in the person of Jesus Christ. When Jesus Christ was crucified (cf. Ac 5:30), the first Christians who witnessed his Resurrection and confessed and proclaimed him as Living God (Mt 28:6) in their midst; these same first disciples made the transition from the old to the new (2 Cor 5:17), from selfishness to love , from those who are capable of recognizing themselves as brothers of the same God and Father (Gal 4:6), from sadness to joy (Jn 20:1- 18), from disbelief to peace (Jn 20:27), from cowardice to courage, from life alone to an existence where we can share bread with others (Lk 24:13-35), from the oppression of a life lived according to the law to a life lived in service and freely and generously given toward others (Mt 16:25), especially to those most in need (Mt 25:31ss).

This was understood, lived and theologized, at the time, by men like Paul of Tarsus or John the Apostle when they wrote that Easter consists of the renewal of the mind (Rm 12:2) or in the "crossing over" from death to life, if we love one another (1 Jn 3:14ss).

It is enough to see and hear the news that the media and social networks give us to make us aware of all the deep problems and  serious crises and conflicts now facing mankind in all the institutions that make up society and in all its facets.

These are conflicts that touch and involve the individual, the family, society, international relations, etc. Problems, conflicts and crises that manifest themselves in the loss of the value and meaning of life, in the solitude of many, in the use of psycho-addictive substances , in the breaking down of values, in the impermanence of family structures (divorces, de facto unions, infidelities, lack of commitment in marital couples, job instability, lack of social security for the family in many countries, intergenerational conflicts between parents and children, etc.); in administrative corruption; in lack of public services; unemployment; the loss of prestige, leadership and credibility of the religious institutions governing moral and social values; the lack of social opportunities for a personal and family life of dignity; the loss in the  quality of education; the pursuit of personal and social fulfillment through hedonistic and pansexualist pleasure; by recognizing selfishness and materialism as supreme values and through abusive and confrontational power; in scandalous forms of social inequality; injustices; a thousand forms of violence and death; drug trafficking; arms races; exploitation, and irreversible damage to ecosystems; internal and international war conflicts; famines; epidemics and pandemics; moral relativism according to which nothing is worth anything or everything is equal; and, a total lack of the existential meaning of transcendence.

This list of personal, family, social, national and world ills represents the manifestations of a greater evil: the evil that lives within man, in the very heart of the human being (cf. Mk 7:21ss). The crisis of structures is first and foremost a crisis of men and women. The rotten fruits of our human coexistence and our societies are the product of bad trees, with diseased sap. Because "the tree is known by its fruits ... " (Mt 7:15ss).

The first and deepest causes of our personal and social discomfort must be sought in the gaps, deficiencies and losses within the human spirit. While we have made significant advances in science, in technology, in the capacity to telecommunicate amongst ourselves, in the globalization of markets and in the accumulation of great capital and lifestyles full of luxury and comfort, we have diminished the importance of the great principles and values ​​that define the essential, intrinsic, innate spirit of the human being, that is, everything that makes us truly "human" and not inhuman.

EASTER has a message and a call for all to change and renew from within, to improve everything within us. EASTER is an auspicious time to pause on our journey and to start again. In Pauline terminology, we may cross over from the old man to the new man (cf. Col 3:10).

Today, the greatest emergency facing society and humanity demands of every human being an "Easter" experience, that is, an experience of "crossing over" inhumane, sub-human, or less humane circumstances and conditions to reach those that are more humane and worthy of people.

The desire for everyone, around the planet, to build  better societies and a better world in which we achieve the happiness we relentlessly seek, challenges us all to a daily and ongoing Easter experience: that of being better human beings, better families, better professionals, better citizens in order to build the apocalyptic utopia of "a new heaven in a new land" (cf. Rev 21:1-8).

Thus, the celebration of Christian EASTER is not merely a Catholic liturgical celebration, but also a birthright of all humanity, a call to all and a daily task while we are living: to be men and women, new and renewed, capable of transforming ourselves, our personal lives, and through those, our institutions and social structures to be more just, more solidary, and more humane.

HAPPY EASTER!

 

Easter: New and Abundant Life for All

DURING this time of year, the Catholic world prepares for the celebration of the most important holy day of the liturgical year: Easter—the Resurrection of Jesus Christ.

This essay will explore two aspects of this feast, two very important meanings that this holy day has for all of humanity, for the Christian world, and for our North American society.

First, the confession of faith in the Resurrection of Christ has a historical basis or reflection in the transformation of life experienced by the first Christians; these men and women recognized and proclaimed to each other and to non-Christians that they had become new men and women, with a transformed mentality. They were now able to understand the whole life project of Jesus of Nazareth; and now they could live out its principles and put them into practice, fueled by a new vision of God, of the world, and of the “other,” their neighbor.

Some of the disciples who had accompanied Jesus in his travels and ministry—his first witnesses, his intimates, but who clumsily did not understand him, and instead denied and abandoned him—now were sent into the world. Two thousand years ago they began their mission proclaiming that Christ was alive, that he lived in them because he had radically changed, renewed, and transformed their lives. Now they were living out, in its fullness, the commandment to love; they recognized that all men are brothers, children of the same Father in heaven—just as Jesus had taught and shown them.

How much we all need this each and every day: this personal renewal and this transformation in order to become better human beings, to transform ourselves—to move forward. This is precisely what the word Easter means in Hebrew: "to step," to step over and let go of resentments, fears, small and big hatreds, this focus on differences, intolerance, discrimination, quarrels, divisions, and all forms of violence and death. We all need to move forward toward new ways of understanding and living life--new, renewed and transformed ways of relating to each other. This makes coexistence possible, a coexistence that, even if it is not always fraternal, is at least humane and civilized!

For all of us, the first meaning of the Christian Easter is new life. And how much does this message of Easter not apply, with so much urgency and necessity, to our American society, in the here and now?

We are surrounded and distressed by a thousand forms of violence and death in our homes, our streets and our schools. We are overwhelmed by unemployment and dread of the future, fear of diseases and political uncertainty; then there is the use of drugs by so many people, especially the young, and the destruction addiction wreaks in so many families; plus, there is the loss or distortion of traditional values because of the primacy of having over being, the pursuit of pleasure and power at all costs—regardless of the means—as the ultimate goal of human existence, etc. 

This reality threatens to suffocate the potential of human life and harms and hardens the coexistence of all of us in contemporary society. The situation clamors—with great urgency—for a transformation, a change, a metanoia, a new life. It clamors for people whose lives are transformed as well as the reconstruction and renewal of institutions so that they become more just, more supportive, and more humane.

Second—and inseparable from the power of Easter to transform lives—the confession of the Resurrection of Jesus signifies a triumph of life over death, a step away from failure and toward victory. Thus, Easter also stands for an "abundance of life" as the ultimate destiny of human kind, of every man and woman who comes into the world.

Today’s many ills, as mentioned, that afflict and distress individuals and society at large, call us to a daily task; we have a calling to progress from the bad to the good, from the inhuman to the human and humane, from the mediocre to our best selves, from lies and errors to the truth and honesty, from the twisted and confused to a clear conscience. We can make such progress through our words and in our actions, building up—through that step forward, that transformation, that novelty in our lives—the room for abundant life.

Let us embrace abundant life, so that, in our nation, it can manifest itself in the realms of law and politics, in economics, and in the quality of inter-communal and interpersonal relations, in the world of art and sciences, in the exercise of our professions and in all our daily tasks, and so too in the world of entertainment, recreation and sports, in our religious practice, etc.

Our society—proud of and enriched by so many material achievements—is the stage for so many accomplishments and the reason for so much hope for so many who have come here or dream of doing so. Yet, at the same time, within and without or borders, there are so many who are suffering the pain of unfulfilled dreams, unfulfilled longings, and dashed hopes; the pain of a thousand injuries inflicted by unjust and inhuman ways of life. All of this demands from us that we embrace a new life—and invite others to do the same—to embrace Easter’s promise of an abundant life, the prosperous, full and happy life for which we all yearn.

Let it be Easter then every day. Let all our days witness our passage from the old to the new, and from scarcity, and petty and precarious ways of life, to a truly abundant life!

Receive, Give Thanks, Give…

Thanksgiving is a holiday that is celebrated around the world, in places as diverse as Canada, the Caribbean, and Liberia. As a national holiday in the United States, it is celebrated annually on the fourth Thursday of November.

The historical origins of this holiday involve "giving thanks" to the Divine for a bountiful harvest and the blessings of the year that is ending. The holiday’s origins also include English traditions dating back to the Protestant Reformation that emerged as a reaction to the large number of religious holidays in the Catholic calendar.

In the United States, the Thanksgiving tradition dates back to 1621, to Plymouth in today’s state of Massachusetts, where members of the Wampanoag tribe helped 102 pilgrim colonists by giving them seeds and teaching them how to fish. Over time, this celebration has become one of our most anticipated and joyous holidays.

Historical evidence suggests that, in other present-day American places like Texas, Virginia, and Florida, similar ceremonies of "thanksgiving" were celebrated, some by Spanish explorers, even before that first Thanksgiving in Plymouth in 1621.

The common thread, of course, is gratitude – the emotion that is aroused when we recognize and appreciate in everything that is, in everything we have, and in everything that surrounds us, the goodness of life. Gratitude is the recognition and appreciation of all that is given by and received from a loving and transcendent presence that we call God, or from those who are dearest and closest to us, or from so many who anonymously contribute to the greater good.

For this reason, we can say that gratitude is an essential, original, and spontaneous emotion, corresponding to the grace and benevolence of God and of life; it is gratitude that encourages and gives us strength to continue living, trusting, loving, and sharing.

Gratitude is an emotion inherent in human nature that produces in us the joy of living, waiting, and sharing "without cost, what we have received without cost" (Mt 10:7-15).

THANKSGIVING DAY is, therefore, a deeply human celebration that gives us the opportunity – together with those most beloved to us – to acknowledge how much we have to be thankful for and how much we can give on a personal, family, social, and national level.

The historical achievements of this Nation, earned through the labor and perseverance of its inhabitants, have made the United States the most prosperous country on earth. Today, we enjoy a very good quality of life compared to many other countries. This opportunity for prosperity has made the United States a safe haven, a beacon of light or land of promise to which so many men and women came and continue to arrive in search of a better life and who, with their cultural wealth and labor, enhance the present and future of this Nation.

The greatness of this Nation depends on, and will always depend on, our common purpose to care for and give thanks for the inheritance that we received from those who preceded us on this soil; while we must work to create the legacy we will leave to future generations, hoping that those who are born here and those who come here will continue to find reasons to give thanks, to love, to share, and to wait... Our greatness today compels us to care for our values, nature, institutions, and the current social infrastructure so that future generations may also experience gratitude.

Recognizing that we have so much to give thanks for, we are compelled - at the same time - to give, to share, to serve, to be supportive so that those most in need in our society and in the world have the opportunity to give thanks. Thus, gratitude becomes a permanent celebration and, above all, an everyday, common, and national attitude.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

Christmas and the Sacred Family

Christmas is an annual occurrence based on a historical and saving event: the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ, which Christians commemorate liturgically using the same name. In a materialistic society like ours, Christmas has been converted into a season for buying and selling, for spending and consuming, for show-off and waste. And in this enormous consumer traffic, the message that we remember as Christians, the significance of which we celebrate on this occasion is manipulated, glossed over or lost, or even forgotten.

The significance that Christmas has for the world in general and for Christians in particular is enormous. What we are celebrating is the birth of JESUS OF NAZARETH, who is for all peoples a model of Humanity and Divinity: since Jesus is both divine and profoundly human.

When we confess Jesus as God who has become human, we are confessing at the same time the final and definitive destiny to which all humanity is called: incarnating divinity in history, and in daily living humanizing the divine life. At Christmas time, therefore, we celebrate the joyful and hopeful certainty that in the birth of Jesus, God has shown that he wants to live with us always, revealing in himself the Way, the Truth and the Life to which we have been called.

The historical fact of Christmas occurs in the context of a family. Among the many aspects that give meaning to the commemoration of the first Christmas, the value that God accorded the family in the birth of Jesus takes on special meaning among us.

We are experiencing in our times a profound human crisis in all aspects. The serious problems that are evident in this crisis reveal a more profound and definitive crisis in the very heart of human beings: a de-humanization that is contrary to all that is meant or implied in the message of Christmas. Yet, at the same time, the serious social problems that emerge from the heart of people have their origin in a profound crisis in the family.

There is an extensive list of great conflicts which today threaten the family model proposed on that first Christmas Eve and presented in the proclamation of the Catholic Church in the Western world:

• The generational gap between parents and children in a world that is rapidly changing.
• The breakups, divorces and rapid and easy annulments in “express” fashion.
• Unfaithfulness in a pan-sexual society where such is proposed and stimulated.
• The lack of commitment in a hedonistic society that delights in levity, changes of fashion, meaninglessness, easy come-and-go, throw-aways, appearances that are purely superficial.
• The world of academia and labor that separates, alienates and disintegrates families.
• “Machismo” and feminism.
• The pretended scientific manipulation of God’s designs concerning creation and family life.
• Abortion.
• Promiscuous use of tobacco, alcohol, and drugs.
• The senselessness of life in a society that quickly destroys the will to live, when the end of life is reduced to something merely material and historical, masking the transcendent vision of men, of the world and of history, etc….

In a world that pleads for the plurality of ideas and life style as well as respect for individual liberty and human rights, the Truth — under that pretext — should not be denied, confused or diluted in the midst of the rash of individual, small and almost always selfish pocket versions of truth. It is the Church’s responsibility, on the basis of the Good News contained in the gospel for every man and woman of good will, to proclaim every day and, especially at Christmas time, that every person has the right to be born and “to grow in grace and wisdom” in the bosom of a family constituted by a father, a mother and children: a family model in which are replicated and lived out the relationships defined as parental love, and filial and fraternal love, that we recognize and venerate in the very heart of the Holy Trinity: Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

The troubling statistics that cry out to us concerning the millions of boys and girls that seek to “grow” and “mature” in “homes” that are dysfunctional, with a single parent, or “substitute” homes, with grandparents and other relatives or in government institutions that try to “replace” inexistent families, sound an alarm that warns us of something that is occurring in our communities as well as an urgent challenge for us to give value to living out the model of Christian family suggested in the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Today, as never before, there is a nostalgia for Nazareth.

• Nostalgia for homes where parents and children live together in harmony.
• Nostalgia for homes like the example of Nazareth: where the parents love and fulfill God’s will, loving and nourishing the the life of their children.
• Homes in which the children fulfill God’s will, obeying their parents.
• Homes that tend toward the construction of a world of fraternal relationships lived out first at home in family relationships.
• Homes in which love and respect prevail over the circumstances of life that are always difficult and always changing.
• Homes with parents that are dedicated to the care of their children, and where the children are attentive and devoted to their parents.
• Homes that are true domestic churches, initiating the experience of the church and seedbeds of permanent evangelization.
• Homes in which parents and children grow in their humanity, cooperating with the creative work of God through their daily tasks.
• Families that are true homes, that is to say, where the home fires burn with love that is able to warm and illuminate a world so often cold and in darkness.

I join with you in these days in which as Christians we live with the memory of the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ. I join in the joy of the world because “to us is born a son, a child has been given to us” that bears the name “Emanuel, meaning God is with us” and I encourage you to extend into all our homes, our family groups, our communities, the great, good, sacred and eternal lessons which we can learn and apply in the life of our family, illustrated in the home of the Sacred Family of Nazareth, on this Christmas and always.

Advent: The Hoping for Hope

With the Advent Season begins another year in the liturgical life of Catholics. Adviento is a latin word which means “to wait for what is coming, expectation of something that is waited for, something expected which will come and shape the present.”

What would human life be without hope? We would sink in a sea of uncertainty, of suffering, of pain and of evil without something to encourage us to continue trusting, trying, working, projecting, loving, believing and hoping . . . 

We, Christians, are essentially and fundamentally men and women of hope. In other words, men and women who live in a permanent advent: waiting that the birth of God comes at Christmas; waiting for the daily encounter with God through his creation, through our brothers and sisters (especially the poorest in society), through liturgy, through the sacraments; through the many signs and circumstances by which God comes near to us and meets us each day. Christians live waiting for God’s promises to be fulfilled; that God’s Kingdom overcomes the kingdoms of the world; that God’s mercy overcomes the lack of love; and that God’s power triumphs over the mean power of man.

But the fulfillment of this hope –as the Advent Psalm says--  for  “justice to flourish and peace to be abundant” it requires that we Christians construct, with our acts and our words, with our announcements and denunciations, and with our behaviors, attitudes, and works, a time and space in which Christian hope is possible; in other words a time and space in which God’s Kingdom becomes evident through us.

In this way, the hope we are waiting for takes us out of a passive attitude of resignation, and brings us to construct the hoping attitude we are wishing for  --the new heaven and the new earth we wish for! Even more so, Christians know that the daily wish for happiness becomes true only in the real hope: which is Christ and his life in us.  Christian hope is not a hope that can be reduced to ephemeral and temporary satisfactions; but one that pushes all our present lives towards a full and total future in God.

Advent, this liturgical time, just before the anticipation of Christmas is  –more than just a liturgical time--  a life attitude and a personal and communitarian commitment of the believers and those from the Church who believe in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Also the belief in a world in which the divine starts, shows, and stays in the most humane and every day aspects of our present history.

Liturgy, in this time of Advent, speaks to us of a hope which does not die in the day to day; a hope that lightens up each moment of our lives; a hope that is infinite and without conditions; a hope which has no limits and is eternal; a hope that opens up for us the beyond of our limited intra-history; and a hope which overcomes all forms of evil, pain and death.

Circumstances today, more than ever, urge us to live in the spirit of Advent. All around us there are manifestations of crisis: crisis of the human spirit; crisis of goals which humanity dreamed of; crisis of trust and confidence in men and institutions; crisis of trust in governments, regimes, political and economic models; lack of trust between peoples and nations; lack of trust and belief in spiritual leaders.  There is disillusion and mistrust because there is a hunger and a thousand forms of inequity, injustice, violence and death.  There is a collective feeling that our present has no future.  There is uncertainty, a loss of the sense of life and much anguish. We live in difficult times for all spheres of life. Nevertheless, Catholic liturgy, in this time of Advent, once more invites us to the wait for Hope, the commitment and construction of better times . . . 

The hope that the election of Pope Francis gives us, is a renewed enthusiasm for a better future for our Christian communities, the Church and for society. The Bishop of Rome with his words, gestures and act of faith, encourage us, move us and motivate us to work with renewed enthusiasm for the building of the Kingdom.

I wish for all of us that this Advent 2013 fills us with hope; fills us with an always renewed strength to make possible our hope: which is that the Gospel of Jesus Christ be among us. That the Gospel be lived and announced by us for the construction of a better world;  a world which is more just, more humane and more according to God’s wish.

The Hispanic Presence in the United States

The term “Hispanic” was coined by the federal government in the census of the year 1970 and refers to persons born in a Spanish-speaking country in the Americas or those who have their ancestral origins in Spain or in Spanish-speaking territories. The term Hispanic is an ambiguous but necessary term referring to linguistic races or groups of people.

September 15 was chosen because on that date five Latin American nations celebrate their independence: Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua; and also because Mexico and Chile celebrate their independence on the 16th and the 18th of September, respectively.

The Hispanic presence in the United States and their cultural and social legacy go back to times prior to the foundation of the settlement in Plymouth in the year 1620. On that date, Santa Fe was celebrating its first decade and Saint Augustíne, in Florida, was celebrating the 55th anniversary of its founding. The Hispanic settlements extended into the Southwestern territory of the United States, along the coast of the Gulf of Mexico and in Florida. 10% of the Hispanics currently resident in the United States relate their ancestral roots to those dates, occurrences and settlements.

The Puerto Rican population in this nation merits special mention. Puerto Ricans did not migrate to the United States. They were absorbed during the American expansion toward the end of the Nineteenth Century and later received American citizenship in 1917. Later on, the economic depression and two world wars forced many Puerto Ricans to leave the island in search of better opportunities in the United States. The current status of Puerto Rico as a free Associated State still is cause for some confusion both within and beyond the Puerto Rican community and results in indefinition concerning the status and nationality of the Puerto Ricans, who are viewed by Anglo North Americans as Hispanics, whereas they are often perceived by other Hispanics as simply North Americans.

The Cubans are also an exception to the migratory rule. Most Cubans reached the United States as political exiles following the implantation of the Communist regime of Fidel Castro in the island. Currently, more than two million Cubans reside in the United States. Among the Hispanic communities, they stand out since many of them have superior education and a greater capacity for economic productivity. The city of Miami has been enormously influenced and transformed by the Cuban presence. Their contribution has been felt in the political, cultural and academic environment of the United States.

Today, Hispanics constitute the largest minority in the North American nation (above both the Afro-Americans and the native Americans) and they contribute to the enormous social and cultural diversity of the United States through their cultural heritage in the fields of the arts, foods, music, etc., as well as their invaluable participation in the economic life as essential elements in the work force and in the general progress.

In 1950, the Hispanic presence in the United States was less than four million residents. By July 1, 2009, the population with Hispanic origins present in the United States, according to the National Bureau of Census had risen to 48.4 million; making up 16% of the total population, in addition to the four million Hispanic residents on the island of Puerto Rico. Nearly 50% of the Hispanics in the United States have their origin in Mexico. The remaining 50% come from different countries of the American continent, such as: El Salvador, the Dominican Republic and Colombia. 36% of the Hispanics in the United States live in California. Several states have a Hispanic population greater than a million. These are: Texas, Illinois, Florida and New York. In other words, after Mexico, with its 111 million inhabitants, the Hispanics resident in the United States amount to, in number, the second largest Hispanic nation in the American continent.

In the political field, there are 9.7 million voters of Hispanic origin, and in the United States Congress there are two Hispanic Senators and 34 Representatives. Among the fifty states of the American Union there is one Hispanic governor in the state of New Mexico and the number of Hispanic mayors of North American cities is greater than twenty. In addition, 1.1 million Hispanics are veterans of the armed forces, one of the nine life-long justices of the Supreme Court is of Spanish origin and three ministers of the current federal government are also of Hispanic origin.

All this statistical data gives us a panoramic idea of the growth, in both quality and quantity, of the presence of Hispanic communities within the territory of the United States. One of the reasons for the rapid growth of the Hispanic community is the massive immigration that has occurred over the last two decades. Another factor is the rate of birth of the Hispanics, much higher than that of the average North American.

The rapid growth in numbers speaks for itself concerning the magnitude and importance, especially in recent times, of the phenomenon of the Hispanic presence and its effect on the United States. The weight of these numbers should be reason enough to modify the state of things within the North American society as regards the current Hispanic communities. However, the situation of the Hispanic population in the United States, in general terms, has worsened. The national debate concerning migratory laws brings to light the prejudice, discrimination, ill treatment and racism that are latent, and not always discrete or tacit.

In this panoramic view of the Hispanic presence, the Catholic Church in the United States has played an important role since the 1950s with the phenomena of migrations in general, and of the Hispanic migration to the United States in particular, as the greatest challenge to its task of evangelism, as well as pastoral and missionary responsibility, due to which was founded the first office to serve immigrants of Hispanic origin in the Archdiocese of San Antonio, Texas. At the beginning of the 1970s, the Episcopal Conference established a national office to respond to the needs of Hispanic Catholics. In the year 1970, Msgr Patricio Flores, of San Antonio, Texas, was named the first Hispanic bishop in modern times. From that occasion to the present time, the number of bishops of Hispanic origin has risen to 43. Currently, Msgr Jose Gomez, coadjutant archbishop of Los Ángeles, is the Hispanic prelate of highest rank in the church in the United States since the Archdiocese of Los Angeles is the largest Archbishopric in the country.

The Catholic Church has sought to meet the challenge of its responsibility as “Mother” that shelters and accompanies Spanish-speaking immigrants through the difficult process of uprooting and adaptation implied in all migrations. Valiant efforts have been made by the Catholic Church, as forerunner and pioneer, in the heart of the Hispanic communities, to integrate them and help them to feel that they are an important part of the Catholic Church in the United States, inviting them into fellowship. Evidence of these efforts is seen in the convocations to the three large national consultations. The first, carried out in 1972, under the name of the First National Hispanic Pastoral Encounter. The second, in 1977, was called the Second National Encounter and the third, in 1985, entitled the Third National Encounter. The Church has organized and sponsored other historical Hispanic consultations and celebrations, such as the one carried out in the celebration of the year 2000, a year of Jubilee. Throughout the country, the Spanish-speaking world has offices dedicated to Hispanic ministry in over a hundred dioceses. There are also regional offices, pastoral institutes, language schools, etc. And we should not fail to mention the fact that today, in all the important Episcopal offices of the country, a pastor (parish or bishop) is requested to not ignore the Hispanic presence and to learn to speak the language of Cervantes in order to insert himself, preside and carry out pastoral gestures and tasks to accompany and nourish this new and rich Hispanic presence within the heart of the Catholic Church and in the North American society. In this way, priests of Irish or Italian origin, as well as those with other ethnic roots, working in the United States, have given us an example with their learning of Spanish in order to attend the Spanish-speaking Catholic immigrants.

For decades, the Catholic Church —sacrament of God's mercy revealed in Christ for the world— has struggled, shoulder to shoulder, together with the rural peasants of this nation, to reclaim their civil rights; it has become the voice of those who have no voice for undocumented immigrants and has expended great efforts to educate the children of immigrants in the parish schools. In the urban centers (especially in the ghettos) that have suffered long periods of decadence and desolation, and where all hope has been abandoned, only the church has remained with its temples, priests, schools and social services.

The Church in Spain in the past has sent more than 1,500 priests of Spanish origin to do missionary work in various dioceses in the country and every year the number of Hispanic priests increases, integrated into the clergy of the Catholic Church in the United States to attend more effectively to the pastoral needs of the Hispanic community. In addition, the number of vocations to the priesthood and religious orders among Hispanics born in this nation is slowly growing, which means that the seminaries today are training a significant number of Hispanic candidates for the priesthood. Last year the Catholic Church in the United States ordained over 150 priests of Hispanic origin.

Today, the Catholic Church in the United States faces a new reality: multi-culturalism, generating a new profile, presenting new and enormous pastoral challenges and demanding new and audacious answers for the evangelistic task in the variety of cultures. Until a few decades ago, the Catholic Church in this nation was of white European origin. Today, 40% of the Catholics in the United States are of Hispanic origin, and within a very few years, the Hispanic Catholic community will represent half of Catholicism in the country. This means that the face of the church on North American soil has changed and will continue to change, due to the strong migratory waves from Latin America, as well as from Africa and Asia. To respond in the most adequate way to these changes and challenges an office has been created that is dedicated to investigate the cultural diversity of the Church, under the oversight of the Episcopal Conference of the United States.

With the passing of time and the accelerated growth of the migratory phenomenon, especially Hispanic, to the United States, the Church is being renewed, and is seeking and discovering new answers to serve the world of immigrants and these new communities that are anchored in the heart of the Church. Among the many answers that the Church is formulating, proposing and developing we find, for example, the creation of universities for Spanish-speaking persons, such as the Mexican American Catholic College, in San Antonio, Texas and other educational centers at the superior level, established especially to serve the Spanish-speaking world. In addition, other ecclesial initiatives are emerging like pastoral centers, leadership schools, Bible study centers, etc. Publishing houses are increasingly preparing bi-lingual or Spanish publications and, in the teaching field, curricula are being created for Catholic schools or programs of religious education for Hispanics. The number of apostolic Hispanic movements is growing, as well as new organizations and associations with Hispanic characteristics.

One of these new organizations, founded by Archbishop Jose Gomez, is the Catholic Association of Latino Leaders (CALL). It was established to bring together professionals of Hispanic origin in the United States. The Church has developed a huge task among the poor, immigrants, marginalized and —due to the pressure to urgently attend to their material and social needs— has pastorally forgotten or abandoned the growing and robust presence of professionals of Hispanic origin in the United States: lawyers, physicians, accountants, professors, business men, etc. who are not identified or brought together by the Church, its pastors and its pastoral programs. Msgr Jose Gomez saw the need to reach this professional community that can contribute their talents and experience to change the tone of the public debate on Hispanic matters in the United States, for which CALL was born to be an association of professionals at the service of the Catholic Church with its teachings, in conjunction with the college of bishops in the United States and those in authority, in complete loyalty to the Holy See and to Peter's successor.

As with all historical development, this new migratory process of the Hispanic world toward the United States faces challenges within the same community or Hispanic communities, and on the outside innumerable difficulties among current events. Integration —which is not assimilation— of the Hispanic community in society, with the North American culture and with the Catholic Church in the United States faces great challenges, both inside and out, and presents both lights and shadows. The lights are seen in the warm openness of some sectors of society and of the Church in the United States toward Hispanics and the great contribution that the work of this Hispanic community has done and is doing for the progress and development of the nation. The shadows, on the other hand, have to do with xenophobic attitudes and rejection by some segments of the population that seek to explain the current social and economic crisis as if caused by the immigration policies, and in the difficulty of integrating with what is properly North American experienced by some Hispanic groups. In the midst of these difficulties, the Church can play a very important role if it lives, preaches and gives testimony to its characteristic of catholicity, that is, its universality as the foundation and destiny of humanity: treating all as equals in the dignity of being children of God called to live in evangelical fraternity.
The Hispanic community, in large measure, is responsible in the process of involvement suffered by the Hispanic migratory phenomenon at this time in the heart of North American society. We have not learned to use the tools of the North American social and governmental system for our legitimate benefit. Due to the lack of Hispanic unity and leadership for the greatest and most noble causes, we have not organized structures that effectively support the highest aspirations of the great Hispanic majorities. We have not learned to form coalitions with other groups that exercise power in the nation. The lesson left to us by the recent past is obvious: if we want to enter into the national debate as equals, we need to modify the strategy followed until now. Hispanic leadership in the political arena, with honorable exceptions, has given us very little of the arts, the public service, generosity, and concern for the common good, and therefore has little evidence to exhibit.

We urgently need a migratory reformation. There are millions of Hispanic brothers living in infrahuman conditions and in the shadows, exploited, persecuted and fearful. All of which contradicts the most elementary Christian principles and values upon which the North American nation and society were founded.

The Hispanic and Catholic presence in the United States is an injection of new energy, youth, vitality, enthusiasm, and faith. The parish temples in the neighborhoods with a Hispanic profile are filled with the attendance of the faithful, and the celebration of their faith and of the sacraments by them is extraordinary. While in the neighborhoods and the cities which lack the presence of immigrants, the communities of faith are growing old and religious practice tends to disappear, in the sectors having a Hispanic population, the vitality of the Church is growing beyond measure. Hispanics have brought to the United States an unusual religious fervor. The Catholic faith of the Hispanics, with all the baggage of popular religion and marked by the stereotype of the early evangelization in the American continent, is benefitting the United States today while enriching and renewing the Catholic Church in this nation.

The Resurrection as a Celebration of Hope

Every Sunday, but especially during the Easter Season, and very especially on the Sunday following the Easter Vigil (Holy Saturday), Roman Catholic Liturgy commemorates and celebrates the confession of faith that sustains and makes sense of the Christian religion and of the life of every believer, and of the Church community as a whole: namely, that Christ is Risen, that His news, His message, His life’s project and the much-heralded and witnessed coming of the Kingdom of God live on in the new life of Christians in the Church and in the building of a better world – a world in which it is our mission to live bent on complying with the will of the Father of Jesus Christ, our Father, and which consists of loving each other even as God loves us.

At the core and in the essence of the teachings of Jesus – through His words and deeds, through His prophetic aspiration and through the perception of His works as seen by his compatriots and contemporaries and as witnessed in the New Testament – is the establishment of the Kingdom of God, much-heralded by the Prophets and awaited by the people of the Old Testament. But contrary to the warrior/military and politically expansionist traits attributed to this Messiah, the profile of this Messenger, this Envoy come to establish the Kingdom of God, is that of a Jesus who presented the Sovereignty of God on Earth through the love of all those who recognize themselves as the children of the Father and, as such, build their world in a peace that sows justice, peace as the sum of God’s blessings for Man, asserted in abounding truth, compassion, mercy, solidarity, bread, health, forgiveness, freedom, good news and renewed opportunities for life, and not just any life, but abounding life.

The Resurrection, that fundamental confession of faith of the first Christians, was born of a transformation of their lives through the Crucified Lord. Arising from this transformation, they know and confess themselves to be "new men". And in this new life they now raise their voices to God the “Father” and find the Living Crucified Christ upon “breaking bread” and this brings them together as brothers and sisters in small communities of faith and hope, in which they possess the knowledge that they have passed from death to life, a new life in which they now effectively love one another so that not one among them suffers want.

Christian Easter is, then, a celebration of life over death. It is the triumph of love and forgiveness over hatred and it is, for this reason, the opening of a new life, a new world in which peaceful coexistence and reconciliation and goodness are made possible through the new mandate of love, which is the summary of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, who invites Man to partake of a new lifestyle, which consists not of selfishly saving and tending to one’s own life, but of spending one’s life on others, as a condition for happiness and for the eternal life that we all seek and for which we yearn for as long as we are on this earthly pilgrimage.

The most superficial analysis of our current national and international reality provides a sharp contrast to the principles of the New Testament, which is the Gospel of the Kingdom of God as lived and heralded by Jesus and practiced by the communities arising from the ministry of the Apostles. The categories of our society of today are far from those presented and suggested by the Carpenter of Nazareth as the most human means of building the new Heaven on the new Earth.

Today, in the United States of America, we are living in times of deep crisis, of great and grave uncertainty regarding the immediate future: We do not live in peace due to the armed conflicts on which erratic government policies have embarked us. We fail to know whether our senior citizens will be able to enjoy the rights and benefits of their work during retirement or whether current medical services will be able to continue in the form of the most universal and efficient coverage possible for the North American population. Nor do we know if today’s children and youth will have access to an education, or to a proper education, and so on. And all of this is taking place in the midst of an evident recession – one that is undeclared officially but one that is apparent on an everyday basis in both labor and commerce – and also amid an intense, extensive and costly presidential race, characterized by the emergence of new models of candidates and new sectors of the voting population that are being thrown into the ever manipulated, ever self-interested and ever biased mix made of this, and of all information emerging from the Social Communications Media.

But the situation is neither better nor more hope-inspiring in the rest of the world: We have advanced in technical-scientific manipulation but have reverted in the task of humanizing Man and communities. This is manifest in ills that affect today’s world: famine, forced displacements, huge migratory waves, vast inequalities between the few people and nations with squandered wealth to spare and the enormous masses that have nothing, rampant administrative corruption in government systems and multinational corporations alike, the lack of elemental human and social opportunities for the greatest part of the population and for the most diverse of reasons, as well as the lack of access to such basic needs as housing, health, education and work.

From our Christian viewpoint of Man, the world and their history, this disheartening outlook finds its roots in sin, which is manifest in the injustice, unbridled greed and hedonism of a culture that gives priority to knowledge of the world over knowledge of the Kingdom of God, a culture that turns its back on God and where the selfish whims of Man take privilege over the creative, paternal and merciful will of God.

But it is precisely within this inhuman and unjust reality that we Christians must ask ourselves about the legacy of Jesus of Nazareth in the life of his followers and about the presence of the values of the Scriptures in the world, about the ferment of the masses and the effectiveness of the evangelizing task of the Church. In the light of the Gospel, far from intimidating us, this world should challenge us, as of the Easter of Christ, to build upon Easter worldwide – to go from darkness into day, from indifference to love, from intolerance of differences to reconciliation born of brotherly dialog, from attachment to the temporal to yearning for the eternal, from the corrupt and corruptible to the new and transcendental, from a thousand kinds of death to the bounty of life that God offers us in the Resurrected Christ.

Today, then, more than ever, the celebration of the Resurrection of Christ takes on significance as a challenge to all Christians, to all men and women of goodwill, to build the new world that we all yearn for and the new Earth that we also all aspire to as the best living space and time possible for future generations, a world built on the criteria of the Kingdom of God.