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PDF version10 dioceses quit bishops’ antipoverty campaign
Jul. 07, 2010
At Dolores Mission Parish in Los Angeles, children walk home from school in safety accompanied by volunteers from Comunidad en Movimiento. The group has been a grant recipient of the Catholic Campaign for Human Development. (CNS/CCHD/Peter Howard)
Analysis
WASHINGTON -- At least 10 U.S. bishops have decided within the past year to suspend or drop their annual collection for the Catholic Campaign for Human Development in their dioceses, and another is withholding funds at least for now.
Bishop Bernard Hebda of Gaylord, Mich., said in June that he has decided to delay sending the diocese’s annual donation to the campaign until a review of its grant practices is completed. The U.S. bishops’ subcommittee on the campaign is currently reviewing funding practices and gave a preliminary report to the bishops’ Administrative Committee in March.
Several of the bishops who have decided to suspend or drop the collection cited concerns about some grant recipients. Some recipients have had to return grants when church officials learned they were directly involved in some activity not in accord with Catholic moral and social teaching. Grant recipients are required to certify that they do not engage in any such activities.
John Carr, executive director of the U.S. bishops’ Department of Justice, Peace and Human Development, which includes the campaign, said, “There’s a serious review and renewal of CCHD under way, and our hope is that it will strengthen CCHD, keep faith with its foundations, and respond to some of the concerns.”
He told NCR he hopes the renewal “will maintain the fundamentals of CCHD, but see how it can work better.”
Some bishops who have dropped out of the collection said they did so only because of significantly increased local needs that their own parish and diocesan social service agencies face as the nation continues to suffer from high unemployment, foreclosures and other continuing effects of the recession.
Dioceses that have already stopped participating in the Catholic Campaign for Human Development collection or announced plans to do stop doing so are: Allentown, Altoona-Johnstown, Greensburg and Harrisburg, Pa.; Green Bay and Madison, Wis.; Lincoln, Neb.; Birmingham, Ala.; St. Augustine, Fla.; and Tulsa, Okla.
All four Pennsylvania dioceses are shifting the collection to a purely local one for Catholic Charities or other social services in the wake of a 2009 state budget crisis that left state social spending slashed, forcing Catholic Charities and other private nonprofits to try to pick up the slack on their own.
The formula for the Catholic Campaign for Human Development collection is that one-fourth of it stays in the diocese to be administered locally, while three-fourths goes to the national office. All grants given from the national portion must also be approved by the local bishop where the recipient organization is located.
NCR: February 3-16, 2012
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The campaign was established by the U.S. bishops in 1970 as a domestic antipoverty program. It is funded by an annual parish collection, taken up in most dioceses on Christ the King Sunday in November.
When Bishop Lawrence E. Brandt of Greensburg announced his decision to drop out April 22, he cited concern that some grantees fail to follow church teachings. The other three bishops focused only on the increased local needs.
Allentown diocesan spokesman Matthew T. Kerr told NCR that the new bishop, Bishop John O. Barres, decided in reviewing diocesan collections and finances that starting this year he would switch the campaign collection to “a local collection” that will help meet social service needs within the diocese. He said he did not hear of any concern by the bishop about the nature of campaign’s grants.
Harrisburg diocesan spokesman Joseph A. Aponick said the combination of increased demand for social services and the state cuts in funding hit diocesan agencies hard.
He added that concern about some Catholic Campaign for Human Development grants “certainly was talked about, but the primary concern was to better serve local needs.”
Peter A. Biasucci, assistant executive director of Harrisburg diocesan Catholic Charities, told NCR that while a diocesan committee is still working on funding criteria and other details, the basic plan is to leave 10 percent of each parish’s collection in the parish and send 90 percent to the diocese.
Altoona-Johnstown diocesan spokesman Tony DeGol also cited last year’s state budget crisis and the toll it took on Catholic Charities as the reason Bishop Joseph V. Adamec was switching the recipient of this fall’s collection from the Catholic Campaign for Human Development to Catholic Charities. He said the decision was made last fall but could not be implemented immediately because envelopes for the 2009 special collection, already in parishioners’ hands, designated the campaign as the recipient.
In any discussions of the change that he was party to, concern about grants “was not a factor,” DeGol said.
In Green Bay, however, such a concern was expressed when the diocese announced in February that it would not include the campaign in its annual Lenten collection, The World’s Poor. The collection has traditionally been divided three ways: Peter’s Pence, Catholic Relief Services and the Catholic Campaign for Human Development.
The Compass, the Green Bay diocesan newspaper, quoted Fr. John Doerfler, vicar general, saying, “There have been some questions about programs that have received funding from CCHD. That, along with the enormous post-earthquake needs in Haiti, we decided this is an appropriate time to give additional support to Catholic Relief Services while we analyze the situation with CCHD.”
St. Augustine’s Bishop Victor Galeone criticized campaign policies in an announcement last November that he was replacing the campaign collection that month with a “Diocesan Schools and Social Action Appeal.”
Bishop Robert J. Baker of Birmingham simply informed Catholics that the collection would go to the church in Latin America. He asked people to cross the campaign name off their collection envelopes and write in “Church in Latin America.”
Beginning this year, Baker is replacing the annual collection for the Catholic Campaign for Human Development with a locally oriented Beacons of Hope collection "to save our center-city schools." (See related story: Why one bishop dropped out of CCHD.
LifeSiteNews, an Internet news service focusing on pro-life and family issues, has reported that the bishops of Lincoln, Madison and Tulsa specifically cited concern over grant recipients in their decision not to take up the collection.
In the past there have been other occasional diocesan dropouts from the collection. Joliet, Ill., for example, once dropped out for a couple of years to concentrate on local programs. About a decade after the campaign started the then-bishop of Allentown stopped the collection in his diocese because the bishops’ original stated campaign goal of $50 million had been met. Allentown did not rejoin the campaign until after it got a new bishop several years later.
This is the first time, however, that a significant number of dioceses -- 5 percent of the 195 dioceses and eparchies in the United States -- have left the campaign in a single time frame.
For many years critics of the Catholic Campaign for Human Development have sought to discredit it by claiming some of its funding supports Marxist or communist-oriented groups, or organizations that back abortion, artificial birth control or other practices that go against Catholic moral or social teaching.
Since last fall such criticisms reached a new peak as Texas-based Bellarmine Veritas Ministry released a series of reports alleging abortion and same-sex-marriage advocacy by some grant recipients.
A new coalition formed last year, called Reform CCHD Now -- led chiefly by the Bellarmine group, the American Life League and politically conservative Catholic layman Deal Hudson’s Catholic Advocate. The group’s Web site (www.reformcchdnow.com) carries investigative reports and critiques of the campaign by its members and posts various news reports and commentary on the controversy. The coalition urges Catholics to boycott the campaign collection.
Last October Bishop Roger P. Morin of Biloxi, Miss., chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ subcommittee for the campaign, wrote to the bishops that it found Bellarmine reports on three grant recipients to be accurate. He said one had already been defunded as a result of campaign oversight.
Morin said the other two -- both immigrant worker rights organizations in San Francisco -- had recently put out voter guides that took a stand in opposition to church teaching by supporting legalization of same-sex marriage and, in one case, opposing parental notification before a minor could have an abortion. “As soon as these facts were confirmed, and in consultation with the local archdiocese, the groups were also defunded,” he said.
In other cases, the campaign found the investigative reports had condemned a grantee on grounds of guilt by association: The grantee was not directly engaged in any activities contrary to Catholic teaching, but it had entered into a number of coalitions with other community-organizing groups, and one or another of those other groups had started or joined a campaign promoting a position contrary to Catholic teaching. In some cases, when the grantee learned of the coalition partner’s stance, it left the coalition or issued a disclaimer dissociating itself from that position.
One of the sharper episcopal criticisms of the campaign came in November from Bishop Victor Galeone of St. Augustine, Fla., who cited three reasons for abandoning the campaign:
- Over the years it has at times given grants to “certain organizations hostile to key Catholic positions.”
- “Catholic organizations or groups cannot receive CCHD funds since their guidelines exclude all ‘organizations controlled by governmental, educational or ecclesiastical bodies’ ” -- meaning that inner-city Catholic schools are among organizations excluded from funding.
- “No funds [are] earmarked to address the greatest cause of poverty in our country today -- single motherhood.”
The Catholic Campaign for Human Development offers two kinds of grants: community organizing and economic development. Its criteria for grants, which include that all activities must be in accord with Catholic moral and social teaching, can be found on its Web site, www.usccb.org/cchd/grants.
Under the Catholic social principle of promoting meaningful participation of the poor in economic life, community-organizing grants require not only that the majority of those benefiting from a group’s efforts are the poor, but that “people living in poverty must have the dominant voice in the organization. At least 50 percent of those who plan, implement and make policy, hire and fire staff (e.g., the board of directors, etc.) should be persons who are involuntarily poor.”
For economic development grants, the criteria say the majority of those who would benefit must be poor and “at least one-third of those who plan, implement and make policy for the applicant organization (usually the board of directors) are low-income.”
That concern for vesting the poor themselves with majority or substantial decision-making is why projects controlled by government, ecclesiastical and educational bodies are not eligible for funding.
Morin noted in his October letter, however, that while not controlled by the church, the 250 campaign-funded groups the previous year involved “683 Catholic priests, 776 Catholic parishes, 18 Catholic Charities agencies, 31 religious communities.”
“CCHD is deeply integrated into the life of the Catholic community,” he said.
[Jerry Filteau is NCR Washington correspondent.]
I mail my monthly
I mail my monthly contribution to CCHD directly in order to make sure it doesn't get diluted or hijacked at the diocesan level. The address is:
Catholic Campaign for Human Development
USCCB
3211 Fourth Street, N.E.
Washington, DC 20077-5298
Thank you for the address.
Thank you for the address. You won't be the only one making direct contributions.
Finally...Bishops doing
Finally...Bishops doing something I can fully copy...I'm going to drop my church contributions because I have serious reservations about how the dioceses spend my contributions.
Do not stop giving money to
Do not stop giving money to your parish!
If your parish is like mine, we also help the poor who come to our door for assistance with food, emergency housing, prescription drugs, etc. Also, your contributions help to keep the parish running; and support the sacramental life of the Church. The staff who minister in your parish also deserved to get paid.
It would be far better if there were a concerted, grassroots campaign to communicate with the Diocese when objections arise. This avenue will be more time consuming but if your objections are such that you are considering withholding contributions to the parish, then it is your responsibility to roll your sleeves up and get started.
"Do not stop giving money to
"Do not stop giving money to your parish!"
Sorry. Tithing = Enabling.
Instead, work with progressive parishioners and a sympathetic attorney/cpa to set up separate parish account(s) --- not touchable by your local bishop --- to meet parish expenses (utilities, staff salaries, etc.) and help the poor.
This is no time to subsidize ecclesiastical dysfunction at the local and Vatican levels.
Stop enabling.
(I've given directly to the CCHD for several years.)
Catholics should have been
Catholics should have been dropping those contributions to their dioceses a long time ago. The waste, fraud, and abuse under American bishops is extensive.
The bishops had best be setting aside much of their diocesan wealth because they're going to need it to pay the judgments against them coming in the future.
how about that priest in
how about that priest in Connecticut indicted for embezling over a million dollars recently . . .
Just b/cause you can defund
Just b/cause you can defund the church, does that make it right? Shame on you.
"Shame on you." Truly
"Shame on you."
Truly shameful people continue to enable dysfunctional behaviors in their families, whether family of origin or the parish. One way to support continued ecclesial dysfunction is to continue dropping one's shekels in the weekly collection basket.
Tithing = Enabling.
Stop enabling.
Oh, Oh...seems like too many
Oh, Oh...seems like too many folks took my comment too seriously. It's the faulty logic of the Bishops that I was pointing out with sarcasm. Like the cliche, "What's good for the goose is good for the gander."
Right now, we give directly to charities of our choice; some of which also receive funding from the Bishop's Appeal. Sometimes the Bishop's Appeal cuts a charity's funding if they receive too much directly.
About 6% of our parish donations go to the Diocese; really not enough to be concerned about. Recently the Boston Archdiocese announced it is trying out having parishes pass along 18% of what they receive. No exceptions.
If implemented, I suspect that will dramatically change how people contribute to their parish. In Boston over the past few years, diocesean operations have been gutted with the most recent being the sale of the diocesean hospitals.
As we look at diocesean operations more closely, what do we find? IMO that no matter what the Bishops are robbing Paul to pay Peter and keep themselves living in their traditional princely manner.
I hope it never comes to actually following the Bishops in logic here...but there is little reformation visible and less financial accountability as time moves on.
Isn't it interesting that
Isn't it interesting that Jesus did not differentiate whether the poor were sinners or not, but instructed his followers to help all the poor. Also, isn't it interesting that a good portion of the reasons for denying funding to help the poor involve the church's invasion of people's sexual privacy, that is, sexual orientation, or the reproductive organs of women? As well, I'm sure it also involves denying women status as equals in the church. So, the congregations who are contributing to the poor through these programs have to participate in the oppression of women and the denying of help to the poor. What happened to the teachings of Jesus? What is He thinking of this action on the part of the bishops? How disgusted must He be with the adulteration of His teachings?
Right on! Jesus would hardly
Right on! Jesus would hardly recognize the church he founded!
Jesus didn't found the
Jesus didn't found the Catholic church. Roman Emporer Constantine did about 300 AD. Check your history.
Is there a group on the
Is there a group on the planet more obsessed with the sexual life of itself and the rest of humanity than the Roman Catholic hierarchy?
Jesus said to the woman taken
Jesus said to the woman taken in adultery, "neither do I condemn you, go and sin no more." There is a difference between funding for the sinner and funding the sin. Do you really think that money that supports abortion makes them cheaper or lines the pockets of those who perform them. I agree that we should love the sinner but hate the sin just as Jesus did. I would rather give to local charities where I know that my contribution is indeed funding the poor be they saint or sinner.
Amen and very well said. I
Amen and very well said. I totally agree.
Judgment is mine sayeth...It is not the popes nor is it George Bush's, nor for that matter any member of the Bush family or the Cheney family(his vicious bisexual wife or their equally vicious daughter liz) all of who have put us and our tax dollars into the killing business for oil, oil company and other corporate profits.
The reason they do these things is because they can, and because both popes(JPII and B16) support them and their agenda of, not only, death for profits agenda (American/Calvinistic hegemony) but also the view that every one who is not them and does not support their Reagan-Friedman Trickle-down economic agenda is a "welfare queen. I have been working almost nonstop since I was ten years old, but to them I'm still some kind of male "welfare queen", iow, someone to be hated because I care more about people than their Calvinistic worship of business, mammon, the Golden Idol. Their preference is that America becomes another Third-world poverty stricken Latin American country where the pope and his Republican friends and their BIG corporations rule over everyone's lives; from their bank accounts to their bedrooms, and keep everyone in economic slavery.
And btw, what about this endless obsession with sex, by these celibate old men. Do they not realize that their obsession with sex and their severe and abusive oppression of it in some Catholic homes is exactly what contributes to pedophilia. Also it may be another factor that pushes border-line homosexuals over the edge and into that which hey hate so much. It also may be a factor in causing other forms of sexual aberrations and gender-confused adults including sexual hate towards woman and sexual killing. IOW, their sick and hateful attitudes toward sex creates the same in children. Also the pope and his hierarchs ought it to know that their objectification and dehumanization of women as baby making machines is what creates other objectifications and dehumanizations of women (and males, all human beings including themselves); but especially women as sexual objects, and women as objects of hate and predation. As they objectify people in one realm that sets up parallel objectification paradigms which are spread out into other realms of human life.
It doesn't take a Psychologist, Sociologist or Psychiatrist to understand those social/group dynamics. But they escape the hierarchs because they view themselves and everyone else as sinners and defective humans who have to be controlled and stopped/punished/imprisoned/put to death when it actually is they who created this bad guy/good guy paradigm and their sick protocols for dealing with people. The evil actually exists in their minds and they put it on to every one else. IOW, just because they are totally obsessed with sex does not mean that I am. Or to put it another way, just because they are so terribly obsessed with sex they make the assumption, the logical fallacy, that everyone else is the same as them.
Sooo, WHY are we not obsessed with sex as they are and as they think we are? AND that dear friends is another reason for married Catholic clergy, as our friends the Protestant clergyman do. And now, back to why we are not so obsessed with sex as they so often are. I'm so glad you asked. It's simple. We have, and have had, normal healthy sexual relationships with normal healthy women. So sex becomes JUST ANOTHER normal part of normal human life.
As to why they don't follow Jesus' teachings, it's because the hierarchs are cafeteria Catholics, Moral Relativists. They pick and choose which of Jesus' teachings they will follow and which they will not; all of which changes from time to time and from country to country. Jesus forbade us from merging church and state when He said: "Render unto Caesar.... The Vatican has beedn ignoring that warning since the time of the Emperor Constantine.
None of this has anything to do with Pro-life and Family Values, in fact quite the opposite. St. Reagan began their attack on working families because American corporations hate to pay wages for our labors. They want the us to become a country like China. or the Latin countries where BIG Businesses and BIG Fundie Religions hate democracy no matter what they say. In a democracy "we the people" run the country by our vote, that puts US in control, NOT them. It's really all about power, money and control!!! They hate that we are in control. They are the cognoscenti, they are totally convinved they know better than us what is better for us than we do. This mess has been going on since Constantine, got far worse during the Vatican's alignment(Reichskonkordat of 1933) with Hitler, the Nazis and the Fascist all of whom wanted to take over the world and who hated Jews, trade unionists, Communists, etc. Pastor Niemollers poem sums it up very well. It all flared up once again under that vicious Catholic Joe McCarthy and his hate for Communism(Fatima) and people who did not exactly fit his idea of how everyone is supposed to think.
E.G.---Clarence Thomas, the Right Wing Rethug SCOTUS and the Rethug party are doing everything they can to end diversity aka Affirmative Action. Thomas said it detracts from the greatness of his personal achievement. He refuses to accept that he made those achievements because he benefited from Affirmative Action. He is totally convinced he got where he did because he is a superior person; a member of the cognoscenti like Scalia who got where he did because the Mafia did so much to protect Italian-Americans from the viciousness of the English and the Irish.
Sorry for my verbosity. Your post was right on the button.
All the best to you and yours.
bob
I was deeply concerned when I
I was deeply concerned when I heard they were being defunded because of 'guilt by association"--that they were simply part of coalitions which espoused beliefs non consistent with Catholic teaching. Yikes--that is a pretty dangerous slippery slope in a time when we are trying to hard to step out of our silos and reach out to other faith communities and organizations. Indeed, I believe that those coalitions have the greatest potential for doing good.
•“No funds [are] earmarked to
•“No funds [are] earmarked to address the greatest cause of poverty in our country today -- single motherhood.”
hmmmmmm....would that be single motherhood or lousy fatherhood? or, some combination, or something else. hmmmmmmmmmm....what's the science of it anyhow? what do we know here in 2010?
or the children of otherwise
or the children of otherwise pederast priests like Marcial Maciel DelGollado?
Why would you call
Why would you call lifeSiteNews a "news service"?
Gee, this is the same reason
Gee, this is the same reason I gave when I stopped giving to my parish and diocese - I am very concerned about some of the recipients of my money, and how it will be used.
For example, I am very against having my donations used to help hide pedophile priests, to pay for their legal defense or to pay for the legal shenanigans to repress the rights of the abused!
I am also against having my donations used by clergy to visit politicians who are despicable and who work directly in opposition to the teachings of Jesus Christ. An example was when then Cardinal Bevillaqua spent his parishioners' money to make a trip from Philadelphia to Downingtown to visit with George W. Bush during his campaign for his second term!
As long as the church continues these kinds of practices, I will not be contributing to its coffers!
Are these Bishops not, to
Are these Bishops not, to quote Cardinal Levada speaking of taking a supposedly contrary position from the USCCB, "breaking unity?" How can "unity" mean allowing differences in adherence @ the episcopal level but only mean "uniformity" at other levels of this monarchical/hierarchical institution? Doesn't the annual CCHD campaign result from a policy decision of the USCCB? How can it be that a diocese can simply and unilaterally participate - or not - in a mutually decided-upon action? Is this what's meant as "catholic identity?" Aren't unilaterally-acting bishops "acting in open opposition" (Cardinal Rode) to decisions of their own episcopal conference? God help us!
No, you miss the point. When
No, you miss the point. When Catholic health care professionals, whose business is the healing and care of the sick, act against the advice (is that the word?) of the bishops, they are breaking unity. But when bishops act against their own colleagues, they are simply exercising their episcopal authority.
I'm sure that makes everything perfectly clear. Doesn't it? (???)
As for Cardinal Rode, I certainly hope that when he flies to this country, he doesn't forget to pack his capa magna. I am sure that the Sisters he will be investigating will greatly appreciate his wearing it. And I hope we see lots of pictures of him parading about in it.
Mr Clifford One great
Mr Clifford One great service this site provides is to let us know when the failed 1960s movements see their monuments toppled.
You mean the One, Holy,
You mean the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church?
Universal?
Jesus said tear down this temple and in three days he would resurrect.
Let me know when your toppling's done, and those old boys trip over their cappa magna's for the final time, swallowed by their own most orthodox tomes.
I'll be praying in Church hand in hand in Mexico, watching the emerging of Mary's mighty Magnificat . . .
When Jesus fed the five
When Jesus fed the five thousand did they first have to submit to a doctrinal examination on church teaching? Then, and only then, would they be fed? Just askin' .......
Using the bishops' own
Using the bishops' own criteria that money should go only to organizations that engage in activity in accord with Catholic moral and social teaching, then we must all immediately stop contributions that fund all diocese in this country.
The bishops' many years of conspiring against the people of God, by shifting pedophiles from church to church and from diocese to diocese is against Catholic moral teaching, in addition to being a criminal conspiracy. None of them have been held responsible for their acts in the U.S.
STOP SENDING THEM YOUR MONEY!! Give directly to the underlying charities that can use the funds. We no longer have need of these conspiratorial, homophobic, sexist middlemen, in fancy robes, who live in grand homes with servants, to tell us where to give our money.
Jesus had no use for pharases. We should no longer tolerate their modern-day cousins.
Pharisees, not pharases...
Pharisees, not pharases... slip of the keyboard.
yes, Ken, I can't stand it
yes, Ken, I can't stand it when that happens, watching a comment in process of submission and screaming in despair at all the typos I do
with no chance of revision, deletion, editting
kind of like life.
Thank God for the Sacrament of Confession, anyway, and abundant and merciful and forgiving and compassionate Love!
Amen.
Amen.
I will have to think of what
I will have to think of what I am going to do when my Bishop ask for donations to his charity drive next year. I have donated money to the Bishops charity drive for many many years. If Deal Hudson is involved,I will have nothing to do with the new group. The USCCB should change their title to ,conservative republican catholic bishops conference.
I imagine that the government should begin to question the tax brake that all Church grouips get. The example of Jesus seems to be leaving the current conservative catholic church led by the USCCB.
When I look at who is leading
When I look at who is leading the anti-CHD campaign, it motivates me to contribute directly to CHD myself. To heck with interfering bishops!
I agree completely. The
I agree completely. The bishops' excuse of wanting to "fund locally" is simply cover for the fact that they are (yet again) being shoved around by the usual rightwing pressure groups. What a joke.
Victor Galeone and Lawrence
Victor Galeone and Lawrence Brandt--did not know contributions come with "strings attached"? Robert Baker--seems you are a little conflicted--inner-city schools (are these already marked for closure?) and sending funds to Latin America? I doubt if you'll receive as a financial accounting sheet as you would with Campaign for Human Development with a Latin American appeal. Roger Morin--two recipients out of how many are you questioning? Obviously, it seems to me, the "seamless-garment" approach is a history lesson for you. I suggest you look it up. With these excuses offered by the "leaders" of the church, Dorothy Day's Catholic Worker movement and hospice is more in keeping with the approach I (and upon my reading of Scripture, Jesus) would recommend.
Nothing makes me want to
Nothing makes me want to support abortion more than anti-abortion fools like these. Over the last 20 years (5 with a CHD community organizing project in one of the poorest rural dioceses on the border) I have gone from being an annual Right to Life marcher to literally changing my mind. I know intellectually this is morally wrong, but I can't stand to agree with these people. Hope one of you reads this and thinks about your tactics. The CHD will either be funded by the bishops, or President Obama - organizer extraordinaire- and our great, growing government that you hate will take up the slack! Isn't that your worst fear?
This story makes me think
This story makes me think that the bishops ought to rewrite Matthew 25: 34-46.
"... Come, you who are blessed by my Father. Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and after you checked to see where I was spending my time and energy and you approved, you gave me food; I was thirsty and you researched my activities and you were satisfied that I was OK then gave me drink; a stranger, and once I consented to all your doctrines and dogmas to your satisfaction, you welcomed me; naked, and you made me promise to agree with everything you say and then you clothed me, ill and you questioned my every activity and then, if I met with your approval, you cared for me. Then the righteous will answer him and say, "Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? When did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? When did we see you ill or in prison, and visit you." And the king will say to them in reply, "Amen I say to you, whatever you do for the people who support me, agree with me and do all that you have told them to do, you did it for me ..." The reader can supply the second part of the passage.
Well why does the article
Well why does the article make you think that Bev? There's no suggestion that the same amount of funds are not going to charity, just to different ones.
And part of the reason for the change is that some of the money given to the Church for charitable needs appears to have gone to groups that are against teachings of the Church.
Don't you think that there's an implicit understanding that when you give charitably to the Church, your funds won't go to groups undermining Church teachings?
The funds are still being used for charitable purposes, just not going to organisations that are against Church teachings. That seems to be an entirely prudent and responsible thing to do.
Thank you Chris for
Thank you Chris for introducing a shred of common sense and challenging the hoary liberal nonsense that the Church should support its enemies with the money its members give in the belief tha they are supporting the Church and its mission to feed the hungry and do other corporal and spiritual works of mercy. Do these people think the Church should just shovel out money to those who are out to destroy it? They so righteously trumpet that their precious money will not go to pedophile protectors etc., but they care little that my money or yours goes to purposes we disapprove of. The liberals are so easily culled by the Alinskyites that I blush for those feckless manipulated fools.
In my estimation the most
In my estimation the most difficult precept of Christianity and the highest standard is not "Love one another," but "Love your enemy. Do good to those who would persecute you."
I don't see how this is
I don't see how this is essentially any different than paying taxes for hoary conservative notions of 'preemptive' war and our bloated military industrial complex.
The fact is Saul Alinsky
The fact is Saul Alinsky fooled our rather uncircumspect bishops into taking up this collection which he and his minions then used in their perverted crusade to destroy the Church. They also used it for a list of other despicable endeavors too many to mention here. Don't know about you, my friend, but I don't, by a long shot, think it's good for the Church to allow itself to be used (no abused) in such a manner. In fact I feel rather ashamed of it. It simply is not acceptable, regardless of how the military may be misusing or abusing their power. The Church can, and must, pursue the spiritual and corporal works of mercy without providing funds, or any other support, to those who wish to destroy it. And, incidentally, it's a bit schizophrenic to condemn the bishops for facilitating sexual perversion among their clergy, while approving or their support for organizations that promote sexual perversion. It's also schizophrenic for the bishops to issue statements declaring abortion "THE human rights issue of our day" while funding groups that publicly promote it.
Don't be surprised friends.
Don't be surprised friends. This is the wave of the future. It seems we have a better principle "Charity begins at home." Only problem is I can't remember where it is in the Scriptures!
Maybe more significant though is the new emphasis (really Post-Reformation "new")on "identity," clear "markers" and a "defensive attitude" so we can protect our Church which is a put-upon "minority" in danger of falling under the attacks of Secularism and other religions. See John Allen's, "Seven Days the Shook the Vatican")
Worry about very indirect, possible connections to abortion, guilt by association, and fears of Marxism, socialism, and gays must be taken very seriously lest "pure Catholicism" get tainted by helping the poor and the marginalized.
"Catholic organizations or
"Catholic organizations or groups cannot receive CCHD funds since their guidelines exclude all ‘organizations controlled by governmental, educational or ecclesiastical bodies’ ” -- meaning that inner-city Catholic schools are among organizations excluded from funding."
Yes, we should help our non-Catholic neighbours. But should we turn away poor Catholics to do so? I don't think so. We've entered a truly surreal place when Catholic fundraising cannot help needy Catholics.
I don't understand how an
I don't understand how an Alabama bishop is giving diocesan funds to Latin America when the bishop's own state is one of the poorest in the nation and the need is just as great there.
Funds funneled through Latin American bishops is laughable. It's comparable to burning it in the fireplace.
whitey cat-Have you actually
whitey cat-Have you actually read the gospel story of the feeding of the 5000? Jesus fed these people because they had spent all day listening to his teaching. As he himself said man lives on more than bread alone. I think you are taking the gospel story out of context.
Hello - surely the 'greatest
Hello - surely the 'greatest cause of poverty' (in any country) is egoism and greed leading to the living of a lifestyle that cannot be sustained for all, not single motherhood. It takes a great deal of self-discipline (and self-awareness) to live simply, seeing the other as equally worthy as Jesus did, as we are called to do.
And how did these women become mothers? Why not target the impregnators instead of standing on two back legs waving 'The Rules' around after the horse has bolted. And some poor innocent child has to pay the price.........................................and (probably)keep the cycle going.
Where is love? The real stuff, not that fraudulent muck lauded too often.
I'm intrigued - what is 'pure
I'm intrigued - what is 'pure Catholicism'? - a dictatorial code that decides who's in and who's out? Seems I'ved missed something in the sayings of Jesus who questioned the littleness of codes that diminished human beings- to wit the Sabbath was made for humans, not humans for the Sabbath.
The article mentions: the
The article mentions:
the U.S. bishops’ Department of Justice, Peace and Human Development
there still is such a thing?
What are they doing about our wars, poverty, weapons, immigration and the rest?
The article further indicates:
For many years critics of the Catholic Campaign for Human Development have sought to discredit it by claiming some of its funding supports Marxist or communist-oriented groups
There still are such groups?
Where can I send my check?
Wouldn't that be, like, you know, the really Roman Catholic Church?
Isn't that what "Catholics" like Al Haig and Jeanne Kirkpatrick called our nuns in El Salvador, and base communities in Nicaragua, and indigenous parishes rubbed out in Guatemala?
These working for Justice, Peace and Human Development, following the Gospel mandates and papal pronouncements, and not the dictates of the RNC?
'Marxist or
'Marxist or communist-oriented groups' = anything even vaguely to the left of the far right?
The bishops and the Vatican
The bishops and the Vatican are against any form of fascism/communism which denies God because that by extension denies them access. Any form of fascism which hides behind God is just ever so Divine. See South America.
Is now the right time to say
Is now the right time to say to the Bishops that hey dont have our permission as lay people to decide these things for us.
How much peronal money are they putting up after all?
Is now the right time to say
Is now the right time to say to the Bishops that hey dont have our permission as lay people to decide these things for us.
How much personal money are they putting up after all?
Seems to me that many diocese
Seems to me that many diocese would have more money and be much more successful at serving the poor had the bishops used better judgment in dealing with the pedophile issue. Again, the poorest and most vulnerable in our society bear the burden of the bishops "good old boy" mentality.
Bravo, Bev. I am a member of
Bravo, Bev. I am a member of the Saginaw,Michigan diocese. For years our bishop, Kenneth Untener, asked that all meetings in the diocese begin with the question, "How will this help the poor?" I and many others believe Bishop Untener was a prophet for our times. How much better the church would be served if all bishops took this approach.
Ken who? No one remembers him
Ken who?
No one remembers him anywhere except tidy little aging liberal circles. He'll be a name in a very old Annuario Pontificio.
There are a lot of us tidy
There are a lot of us tidy little aging liberal circles who remember him well and revere his example of what a real Christian bishop should be.
This sounds meanspirited to
This sounds meanspirited to me.
For as long as I can
For as long as I can remember, our diocese has never announced the Catholic Campaign for Human Development to parishes, or explicitly collected on its behalf. So I contribute directly to CCHD as do others commenting here. There could be quite a few other dioceses that sin by omission, as it were. This might make an informative follow-up, and it could be extended to all national-level fundraising.
Should the headline have
Should the headline have been:
"Right Wing Nuts Scare Ten Wimpy Bishops" or
"Ten Right Wing Nutty Bishops Cut Funding for Poor During Reccesion"?
J.Basil - show a little
J.Basil - show a little respect. Bishop Untener was a class act and treated others with kindness and dignity, which is something this church could certainly use at this time.
It is good for these bishops
It is good for these bishops to self-identify their extremism so that we know who they are and can avoid them/disregard them accordingly.
Peter's Pence!!! That's a
Peter's Pence!!! That's a 'group' I'd like to review to examine and make sure that it's not 'hostile to key Catholic positions'!!
Chuck from Minneapolis
Some of these funds probably
Some of these funds probably land in the wine cellars of Roman cardinals.
The Catholic Campaign for
The Catholic Campaign for Human Development (CCHD) does not provide "Direct Services" such as feeding, clothing and housing the poor. It funds secular "Social Change" organizations that empower the poor or oppressed to organize and fight for government, union change through networking and community organization.
Many of you talk about feeding, clothing and housing the poor. That is not what CCHD is meant to do. It was set up to organize the poor and help them get out of poverty. CCHD supports community organizers to achieve that goal.
Unfortunately CCHD cannot or will not check how these organizations use the money they are given. Some of the money is used for abortion and other purposes that violate our Catholic faith.
In addition, Cardinal Paul Josef Cordes of the Vatican issued a general caution on November 10, 2008. Catholic charities must not become "indistinguishable from secular organizations such as UNICEF, the Red Cross, and others."
Just to help clarify, we
Just to help clarify, we would like everyone to know that the Chicago CCHD will be awarding grants to 21 different groups and organizations representing a wide variety of projects in four different categories: Access to Justice, Community and Economic Development, Human Development, as well as Life and Family Initiatives.
The 2010 Chicago CCHD grantees are: Abstinence & Chastity Initiative, Aid for Women, Catholic Family Library & Learning Center, Centro de Trabajadores Unidos, Chicago Legal Clinic, Chicago Workers Collaborative, Emmaus Ministries, Family Wellness Domestic Violence Program, Illinois Coalition for Justice, Mission of Our Lady of Angels, Mothers Opposed to Violence Everywhere, West Suburban Organizing Project, Polish Initiative of Chicago, Pro-Life Action League, The Womens Centers of Chicago, Restaurant Opportunities Center, St. Toribio Romo Immigrant Center, Womens Sewing Cooperative, Working Hands Legal Clinic, The Village TJW Inc., Zacchaeus House
To see more about the Chicago CCHD please visit www.archchicago.org/cchd.
Rey J. Flores, Director - Catholic Campaign for Human Development for the Archdiocese of Chicago
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