Poverty | OC Catholic

EPISODE#47
CATHEDRAL SQUARE: FR CHRISTOPHER SMITH IS HONORED BY CONCERN AMERICA

The Very Rev. Christopher Smith, rector and episcopal vicar to Christ Cathedral, was recently honored by Concern America for his 30 years of service to the organization.

As you know, he is also the host of the Cathedral Square radio show and podcast.

On today’s special episode, we present to you a very special presentation featuring John Straw (the Executive Director) and several others honoring Fr. Christopher.

You’ll also enjoy some musical musings and – perhaps a few surprises as well!

Be sure to share this podcast.

Originally broadcast on 1/2/21

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EPISODE#216
OC CATHOLIC RADIO: GUEST IS JOAN PATTEN. WHAT IS AN APOSTOLIC OBLATE?

Host Rick Howick is delighted to welcome a new guest to today’s broadcast. Her name is Joan Patten.

Joan works for the Diocese of Orange in the vocations office as a delegate for consecrated life. She acts as a liaison between the bishop and the religious communities. Joan has a wonderful laugh and a great sense of humor. You are sure to be captivated by this dynamic conversation!

Tune in and SHARE this podcast.

Originally broadcast on 12/5/20

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FOR PREGNANT WOMEN FACING POVERTY, PRO-LIFE GROUPS OFFER RESOURCES FOR SUCCESS

New York City, N.Y., Jul 14, 2019 / 03:26 am (CNA) – Poor women are the most likely population to obtain an abortion.

While it may seem logical that a woman who is already struggling financially is one of the most likely candidates for an abortion, the trend is relatively recent, reports the New York Times.

According to a July 9 article, data from the Guttmacher Institute, a pro-choice research organization, shows that 50% of women who obtained an abortion in 2014 were considered low-income, compared to 1994, when only one-fourth of women who got an abortion that year were living in poverty.

The reasons for this are many, according to the New York Times. More people overall live at or below the poverty line now than did 25 years ago. There are many financial resources available for poor women who are seeking abortions, and hotlines to help them access these resources.

The article ended with the story of a poor woman who, finding herself unexpectedly pregnant, decided to get an abortion in order to get through college.

But there are also abundant resources available for poor, pregnant women who want to carry their pregnancies to term and parent their children, and they should be included in stories such as these, pro-life advocates told CNA.

“The New York Times is so disingenuous to pretend that there are no services for women, no help for women, no hope for women, and basically their message is – you might as well have an abortion,” Kristi Hamrick, a spokesperson for Students for Life of America (SFLA), told CNA.

“It’s a defeatist message and it’s an anti-feminist message, because we should be about empowering women. We should be about protecting their rights against pregnancy discrimination. We should be about making sure that if you want an education, you can get one,” she added. “So I find it fascinating that these so-called champions of women aren’t willing to champion pregnant women.”

SFLA is a pro-life group that works specifically with pregnant and parenting students on campus to ensure that their rights are protected and that they have access to the resources they need.

“It’s really part of the work we’re doing every day, letting women know that there is help for them, there is support for them, and that defeatist messages from the abortion industry – that’s a marketing pitch, but that’s not the truth,” Hamrick said.

One of the main things that SFLA’s “Pregnant on Campus” initiative does is work with schools to ensure that the rights of pregnant women are protected, and that the campus is creating a welcoming environment for them.

For example, Hamrick said, SFLA works with students to ensure that their Title IX protections aren’t violated. Title IX protects pregnant students from being discriminated against based on accommodations needed for their pregnancies, making it illegal to take away scholarships, housing or placement in schools for pregnant students.

Hamrick recalled one case in which a pregnant woman missed finals because she was giving birth, and her school threatened to pull her financial aid and her place at the school.

“So SFLA got involved, we got her financial package reinstated, and frankly communicated with the school that you can’t do that. That is discrimination against women,” she said. The student was allowed to continue at the school, and her financial aid was reinstated.

Besides working to fight pregnancy discrimination, the group also works with schools to create welcoming environments for pregnant and parenting students by adding things such as short-term handicapped parking, nursing stations, and access to daycare programs on campuses.

Hamrick sent CNA an internal document used by SFLA of a list of more than 20 resources available to pregnant women in need, which includes resources such as counseling, food stamps, shelter, church groups, abortion pill reversals, adoption programs and more.

When it comes to scholarships, Hamrick said they work locally with women to determine what they are eligible for in their region and from their school. The website scholarshipsforwomen.com also lists more than 19 scholarships and grants available to pregnant women of various qualifications.

Marisol Health, a service of Catholic Charities in Denver, is another pro-life service that exists to help pregnant women in need.

In 2017, Marisol Health provided care to 821 clients, 70% of whom had incomes under $30,000; 45% had no income or incomes less than $15,000 a year. Of patients that year, 45 percent had Medicaid and 32 percent were uninsured.

“You are unique, capable and strong. You deserve to be listened to and cared for in a way that’s confidential and empowering,” Marisol’s website states on its homepage.

Senite Sahlezghi, the program director of Marisol Health in Lafayette, Colorado, told CNA that they seek to serve the whole person in their services.

“The whole person… is not only a physical body, but we all have a multilayered context to our lives as well and so I think it’s just been really beautiful that Marisol Health is this comprehensive OB/GYN clinic with wraparound supportive services to meet the urgent and ongoing needs of women and families,” Sahlezghi said.

Sahlezghi said the first thing Marisol does when a woman in need seeks their help is to listen to them fully.

“A lot of our families and women that come to us are in crisis situations,” she said, “which means that they’re coming through our doors with a lot of circumstances that are overwhelming to them.”

The first step is to welcome these women and families in, offer them a cup of tea or a glass of water, and listen to their story and how they are doing, in order to better understand what help they most need, Sahlezghi said.

Through a partnership with Bella Natural Women’s Care, Marisol is able to offer women free pregnancy testing, free ultrasounds, STD testing and treatment, counseling, fertility awareness education, and other OB/GYN services.

But beyond services, they also provide women with accompaniment throughout their pregnancy and afterward, Sahlezghi said.

“When you’re in an unexpected pregnancy or crisis situation, it is unbelievable how profound the feeling of loneliness can be and what decisions and consequences come from it,” she said. “Our main goal is to really be their village and to let them know that they’re not alone.”

Besides OB/GYN services, Marisol Health is able to connect women with a variety of services, including housing, food and financial assistance through Catholic Charities. Marisol Homes provides housing for both pregnant women and homeless women with children. Through a partnership with Gabriel services, Marisol also connects women with parenting classes, education classes and other support.

Marisol also offers support groups for postpartum women, mentoring programs for fathers, and counseling and support for post-abortive women. They provide these services to women in need without discrimination, including to women who are undocumented and may have difficulty finding care elsewhere, Sahlezghi added.

“That doesn’t even begin to describe the scope of the continuum of care that Catholic Charities offers,” Sahlezghi added. “Mother Theresa said, ‘Find them, love them,’ and I think that the continuum of care really allows us to try and strive after that idiom well.”

Although it has only been open for three years, Marisol Health has already helped more than 1,330 women through unexpected pregnancies.

“We want to make sure that women know that this is available to them and that their life isn’t over because they’re pregnant,” Sahlezghi said.

POVERTY, VIOLENCE HINDER PROGRESS FOR MANY WOMEN, GIRLS, SAYS NUNCIO

UNITED NATIONS (CNS) — Conditions in many parts of the world force women and girls to bear the burden of carrying out everyday chores for their families and communities, keeping many of them from getting even a basic education, the Vatican’s U.N. nuncio said Oct. 6.

Females are often the victims of sexual and other violence, which prevents them from improving life for themselves and their families, said Archbishop Bernardito Auza, the Vatican’s permanent observer to the United Nations. Migrant women and girls are particularly vulnerable to these situations, he added.

He addressed the issue of women’s advancement during a session at the United Nations of the Third Committee, which focuses on social, humanitarian and cultural issues.

“Young women in rural areas are disproportionately involved in unpaid domestic work and especially bear the greatest burden when access to clean water and sanitation is not readily available,” Archbishop Auza said. “They are forced to spend considerable time and effort collecting water for the community, and in doing so, their access to basic education is often thwarted, not to mention that, in many isolated places, they are also exposed to risks of violence.”

Failure to achieve “that basic human right” of universal access to safe drinkable water “can undermine other human rights, as it is a prerequisite for their realization,” he said.

Pope Francis in his encyclical “Laudato Si'” points to “the abandonment and neglect … experienced by some rural populations which lack access to essential services,” Archbishop Auza said, quoting the document. In many areas, the pope noted, “some workers are reduced to conditions of servitude, without rights or even the hope of a more dignified life.”

Women and girls often bear “the heaviest burden from these deprivations,” the archbishop said.

Regarding education, “significant progress has been made toward parity between boys and girls from families of relative wealth or decent economic standing,” the archbishop said, but women and girls who live in poverty lack schooling, literacy skills and opportunities for adult education.

Adolescent girls “are at the greatest risk of exclusion from education due to social and economic hardships,” Archbishop Auza said. “Whenever young women and girls do not have access to education, they are hindered from becoming dignified agents of their own development.”

To change this reality, the “basic material needs of every school-age girl living in rural areas must be addressed,” Archbishop Auza said. One initiative that has “proven efficient,” he said, is providing school meals to reduce girls’ absenteeism.

Such efforts should be encouraged “to guarantee access to education to each and every girl,” he added.

A current partnership between local farmers, including women, and the World Food Program of the United Nations to provide “homegrown school meals” in 37 countries is “a hopeful example,” Archbishop Auza said. The effort “attends to the needs of girls and boys, fosters education and increases market access for women, all at the same time,” he said.

Based in Rome, the World Food Program is the world’s largest humanitarian organization addressing hunger and promoting food security. It provides food aid to an average of 80 million people in 76 countries each year.

Addressing the violence women and girls face, Archbishop Auza again quoted Pope Francis in saying that eliminating violence is impossible “until exclusion and inequality in society and between peoples are reversed.”

“Through poverty and exclusion, adolescent girls, especially those in rural areas, also experience heightened vulnerability to sexual exploitation, child marriage and other unacceptable forms of violence,” the archbishop said. “The horrifying prevalence of violence against women, thus, remains a salient and sad example of the deep connection between economic exclusion and violence.”

Archbishop Auza also discussed the current global migration crisis and its effect on migrant women and girls in particular, reminding the global community it has a responsibility “to welcome, to protect, to promote and to integrate” migrants and refugees.

“Millions of women and girls are fleeing violent conflicts or extreme poverty only to find themselves exploited by traffickers and manipulators along perilous routes and even in host communities,” the archbishop said.

The Vatican’s U.N. delegation, he said, “strongly supports the international community in its efforts to raise awareness and take concrete steps to prevent the abhorrent phenomenon of violence perpetrated against migrant women and girls.”

“Women often heroically defend and protect their families, sacrificing much to achieve a better life for themselves and their children,” Archbishop Auza said. “They deserve to be assisted and supported in order to realize their legitimate aspirations to a better life for themselves and for their loved ones.”

He said the Vatican “remains strongly committed” to endeavors aimed “at truly protecting women’s dignity, while promoting their integral development and advancement within the family and society.”

EXTREME POVERTY IS A REALITY, NOT A FACELESS STATISTIC, POPE SAYS

ROME (CNS) — The key to ending extreme poverty and hunger is to recognize that behind every statistic, there is the face of a person who is suffering, Pope Francis said.

“Poverty has a face! It has the face of a child; it has the face of a family; it has the face of people, young and old. It has the face of widespread unemployment and lack of opportunity. It has the face of forced migrations, and of empty or destroyed homes,” the pope said June 13 during a visit to the Rome headquarters of the U.N.’s World Food Program.

Advanced communications, while informing the world of the tragedy of poverty, has also resulted in a desensitized culture that has turned the real suffering of people into statistics, the pope told WFP executive board members.

The world is gradually “growing immune to other people’s tragedies, seeing them as something ‘natural,’” he said. “Without faces and stories, human lives become statistics and we run the risk of bureaucratizing the sufferings of others.”

According to the WFP website, the organization provides food assistance to an estimated 80 million people in 82 countries.

Arriving at the headquarters, the pope greeted employees and took a moment to pray in front of a plaque commemorating those who died in the line of duty. The pope praised their sacrifice, saying that far from a “cold and anonymous institution,” the WFP is “an effective means for the international community” to carry out the work of feeding the hungry.

“The credibility of an institution is not based on its declarations, but on the work accomplished by its members,” he said.

While noting the potential of an “interconnected world marked by instant communications,” the pope also lamented a situation in which extreme poverty is considered “natural” and the tragic circumstances of the hungry “turn into one more news story.”

If the people behind the statistics are not recognized, he said, the world “can yield to the temptation of discussing ‘hunger,’ ‘food,’ and ‘violence’ as concepts without reference to the real people knocking on our doors today.”

“We are bombarded by so many images that we see pain, but do not touch it; we hear weeping, but do not comfort it; we see thirst but do not satisfy it,” he said. “While the headlines may change, the pain, the hunger and the thirst remain; they do not go away.”

Pope Francis told the members of the WFP executive board that the first step in fighting poverty is to “de-naturalize” it and shed light on the causes of poverty due to “a selfish and wrong distribution of resources” as well as the abuse and exploitation of the earth.

“We have made the fruits of the earth — a gift to humanity — commodities for a few, thus engendering exclusion. The consumerism in which our societies are immersed has made us grow accustomed to excess and to the daily waste of food,” he said.

The pope also brought attention to the resources and priority given to the production and purchase of weapons at the same time that efforts to distribute food supplies to hungry people suffering in war zones are used as a “weapon of war.”

“We thus find ourselves faced with a strange paradox. Whereas forms of aid and development projects are obstructed by complicated and incomprehensible political decisions, skewed ideological visions and impenetrable customs barriers, weaponry is not,” he said.

Praising the World Food Program’s dedication to eradicating world hunger, the pope affirmed the church’s commitment and cooperation to defend and protect the dignity of those who suffer.

“’I was hungry and you gave me food; I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink.’ These words embody one of the axioms of Christianity. Independent of creeds and convictions, they can serve as a golden rule for our peoples,” the pope said.

After delivering his address, Pope Francis greeted WFP employees, telling them he preferred to speak off the cuff rather than reading his prepared remarks because “speeches are a bit boring.”

Thanking the employees for their “hidden work behind the scenes” in eradicating poverty, the pope called on them to never forget the lives of the program’s employees who died while serving others.

“They were able to do that not only because of the courage they had (and) the faith they had in their work, but also because they were sustained by your work. Thank you so much and I ask you to pray for me so that I, too, can be able to do something against hunger,” he said.

PAPAL ENVOY OPENS EUCHARISTIC CONGRESS BY DECLARING WAR ON POVERTY

CEBU, Philippines (CNS) — The 51st International Eucharistic Congress kicked off with Pope Francis’ representative, Cardinal Charles Bo of Yangon, Myanmar, declaring war on poverty.

“The Eucharist calls for … a third world war against poverty,” said Cardinal Bo, “a third world war against the cruelty of dogs getting fed with sumptuous, organic food, while poor children scramble for scraps from the table.”

Tens of thousands of people waited at least an hour under a punishing sun to attend the Jan. 24 opening Mass led by Cardinal Bo at the Plaza Independencia in Cebu. He opened his homily with a plea for the crowd to “be patient with the heat.”

“Soon it will be all right. The moon is too hot in Cebu,” the cardinal quipped, as the sun was just minutes from setting.

For a couple of hours, until the seats were opened up to the public, Lermalyn Otida, an office worker from Cebu, stood outside of the fenced-off area that enclosed seating for delegates.

“You see the people around still coming over, they don’t mind if it’s very hot,” Otida told Catholic News Service afterward. “They don’t mind if no seats (are) available. They don’t mind if (it’s) too much traffic. No. That’s faith. It’s the faith that comes up in everyone.”

With greetings in the Visaya dialect and the national language of Tagalog, Cardinal Bo told the faithful that Pope Francis loved them “very much.”

He called Filipinos the “beacon of Catholicism” to the world, saying that having a Philippine presence in any country means there will be Catholicism. Close to 10 million Filipinos live and work outside the Philippines, with most practicing their Catholic faith, often in countries that do not have majority Christian populations.

Cardinal Bo remarked on the Philippine church and its people being “the only church in the world that welcomed” priests from his country, which he said was a “suffering church” for more than five decades under military rule.

“You have shared the bread of hospitality, the bread of knowledge, the bread of your love.”

Cardinal Bo said the Eucharist strips the faithful of their social status, as people of all walks of life take Communion.

“The Eucharist calls us to justice. No other religion elevates justice to this level. No other religion elevates the poor to this level,” he said. He called it the major challenge in a world that “kills children in the womb” and “spends more on arms than on food.”

The cardinal emphasized that the mystery of the Eucharist is twofold: presence and mission. The Eucharist is the true presence of Jesus, while it was the mission of the faithful to share that presence with others.

“From eucharistic celebration to eucharistic commitment: mission,” he said.

Cardinal Bo said being devoted to eucharistic adoration was good and so was being devoted to Santo Nino, the child Jesus, a strong devotion in Cebu.

“Christ is calling us to be disciples, to carry his cross,” he said. “The Mass of the devotee ends in an hour, but the Mass of the disciple is unending. The Eucharist of the devotee is confined to the clean altars of the church. The Eucharist of the disciple continues with the streets as altar.”

Once the sun had fully set and Mass ended, fireworks exploded in one section of the sky above the plaza.

After the Mass, Sacred Heart Sister Yasuko Taguchi of Sapporo, Japan, a delegate from her country, put her hand on her heart and told CNS, “We are so, so, so overcome by this wonderful opening Mass.”

She said she was struck by the cardinal’s homily, the music and “everything.”

Sister Taguchi said it reminded her that when Christ died, he “left himself as a legacy for reconciliation and love and sharing and caring for one another. He is not here, but he is here. He is risen in us. … This (Mass) brought us such a realization, that he is here present among us … this was possible only in the Philippines.”

Diane Abigail Canate, 17, a college student from the neighboring island province of Leyte, called Cardinal Bo’s message “inspiring.”

“He said that Filipinos have really strong faith in God by what we witness today,” she told CNS.

Cebu Archbishop Jose Palma welcomed Cardinal Bo at the start of the opening Mass with a reference to the Congress’ theme.

He said, “Indeed it is perhaps symbolic that we open this 51st International Eucharistic Congress here at Plaza Independencia as we proclaim true independence by acknowledging our total dependence on Christ, recognizing that Christ crucified and risen is truly in us, our hope of glory.”

REFOCUS ON POVERTY, OBAMA SAYS AT GEORGETOWN SUMMIT

WASHINGTON (CNS) — President Barack Obama, a late addition to a Catholic-evangelical summit at Georgetown University on overcoming poverty, said events like those in Ferguson, Missouri, and in Baltimore demonstrate a need to “refocus attention on poverty.”

Obama, speaking May 12, said, “We have been stuck, I think for a long time, in a debate that creates a couple of straw men.” The stereotype of people on the left is of people who want to “pour money” to alleviate social problems, he added, while the stereotype of people on the right is that of “coldhearted free-market capitalist types who read Ayn Rand and think everybody’s mooching.”

Government resources “can create a difference,” Obama asserted. “We can do something about these issues. It would be a mistake to say every effort we’ve made has failed.”

The War on Poverty that began 50 years ago cut U.S. poverty rates by 40 percent, Obama said; the biggest beneficiaries were senior citizens, and the number of U.S. poor seems stuck in the 45 million range.

“We have bested poverty when we’ve decided to do something about it,” Obama said, although the open question is “do we have the political will, the common will, to do something about it?”

Obama noted that he grew up without his father in the household, often a telling indicator as to whether young men — and young black men in particular — will succeed in life. “I know I had the capacity to break that cycle, and I think because of that my daughters are better off,” he said.

The president touted the My Brother’s Keeper initiative he unveiled last year, which seeks to expand opportunities for young black and Hispanic men.

Obama said when he gives a commencement speech at historically black Spelman College, he is more likely to deliver a message of responsibility to the male graduates in the audience than he would to the female graduates of Barnard College because of the importance of stressing responsibility to young black men whenever possible.

By the same token, if a black high schooler asks for advice on how to love his absentee father who’s moved to another state to avoid having to pay court-ordered child support, “I’m not going to have a conversation with him about macroeconomics,” Obama said to applause.

Obama’s participation in the poverty summit was only made public May 8, four days before his appearance, which set off a scramble to accommodate the president’s schedule.

“The best anti-poverty program is a job,” Obama said, but noted also that the share of income earned by the lowest 90 percent of American workers has declined over the past 40 years. The “elites,” he added, have segregated themselves from the rest of society by sending their children to private schools — more than half of all public school students in the country today are from low-income families — and going to private clubs.

By isolating themselves, America’s rich can get an “anti-government” mentality that includes cutting aid to the poor with whom they no longer come in contact, the president said: “‘We’re spending all this money and we’re getting these poor outcomes.’ We’re using this logic as an excuse.”

Government spending reflects a nation’s priorities. “We can have a reinforcement of the values and character we want, but it will cost us some money,” Obama said, listing such items as education, rural broadband and infrastructure, as examples of spending that invests in skills that lead to jobs that can sustain families.

Where that money will come from is often under dispute. Obama said he wanted to place a 15 percent tax on hedge fund carryovers, adding that the nation’s top 25 hedge fund managers make more money than all of the nation’s kindergarten teachers combined. But when he suggested the tax, “I was called Hitler — like Hitler invading Poland. That’s what one hedge fund manager said,” the president recalled.

“If we can’t ask for society’s lottery winners for that modest contribution, then really this conversation is all for show,” Obama said to further applause.

He acknowledged disagreement with Catholic and evangelical leaders on “reproductive issues and same-sex marriage,” but that should not serve as a barrier, he said, to working together to reduce poverty.

Attention must be paid to the plight of the poor, Obama added. “Nobody has said that better than Pope Francis, who has been transformative through his sincerity and insistence that this is vital to who we are,” he said. “I look forward to hosting him” when the pope comes to Washington as part of a larger U.S. visit in September.

It was Obama’s fourth visit to Georgetown as president. The previous visits took place in 2009, 2011 and 2013.

Obama spoke at Healy Hall, the oldest building on campus. On the same steps where the first president, George Washington, addressed two of his nephews who were among Georgetown’s first students, current Georgetown students waited in line for student tickets more than three hours before the 44th president spoke.

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