Did the cross compromise the human dignity of Christ? While we defend the dignity of Christ’s divine nature, how do we defend his human dignity? Much of our Christian theology of the cross has traditionally emphasized the divine role in what we know as the Paschal Mystery and this may have caused us some confusion in how we define the cross with respect to our own human dignity. If we read the Passion narrative from the perspective of the social interaction between Christ and the governing authorities who condemned him we realize that at no point did Christ surrender his human dignity. Jesus did not command the Chief Priest to arrest him, nor did Jesus command Pilate to crucify him. We believe Jesus to be a perfect representation of God’s love towards humanity. In the Passion narrative his example is to claim his human dignity with tenacity. Thus, the history of the Cross became a witness to the close relationship between Jesus’ human dignity and that of the entire human community. It illustrates further that human dignity can only be expressed in the service of the common good and in solidarity with all creation.

The cross expressed the human dignity of Jesus in the midst of a great social injustice. The cross was imposed on Jesus not by God but by a social system that feared the political challenge of true dignity and freedom empowered by God’s love. God’s response to this social injustice was to raise Jesus from the dead. In so doing, God elevated Jesus’ human dignity and affirmed the dignity of our common humanity. Through the Cross we are inspired to live as free agents who share in the dignity of Christ because we know that our dignity is affirmed by God and the power of sin in our social structures cannot take that away from us.  

Rights flow from dignity. However a common perception identifies rights in very individualistic terms: these rights are mine and they protect me from the oppressive forces of the social community. This individualistic approach to human rights conflicts with the dignity of the human person as we have just come to understand it. This misinterpretation is particularly common in the American context.

There is a reason why we as Americans have a harder time defining human rights outside of this individualistic interpretation. It is grounded in the design of our nation’s Constitution and in the articles that we call the Bill of Rights. The American constitution was a legal and philosophical revolution in the world of 1788 that started the world down a path of constitutionally guaranteed rights for its citizens. The American framers focused on the protection of civil and political rights. These are called “negative” rights meaning they are rights that prohibit a nation from acting against its citizenry; including infringement of free speech or freedom of religion. These rights tend to be civil and political.

Since then many other nations have developed constitutional laws of their own, also integrating “positive” rights. These rights are basic services that one can expect from government such as health care or education. This other layers of rights tend to be social and economic. In January of 1944 President Franklin Delano Roosevelt described this development in rights theory as a “second Bill of Rights” in what turned out to be his last State of the Union address:

We have come to a clear realization of the fact, however, that true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. “Necessitous men are not free men.” People who are hungry, people who are (and) out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.

In our day these economic truths have become accepted as self-evident. We have accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all — regardless of station, or race or creed.

While Roosevelt’s vision for a second Bill of Rights is still not part of the American Constitution, the international community did embrace this vision over 60 years ago with the UDHR. Articles 22 to 27 of the UDHR promote these social and economic rights. Human Rights, understood in this way, demonstrate a balance of the individual in relationship to the community. Yes, we all have individual rights that befit our own God given dignity. But we also have duties and responsibilities to our neighbors which the “positive” rights protect. The dignity of Christ as witnessed in his life and death and which God affirmed in the resurrection converge in this way with the rights and responsibilities that we celebrate with the UDHR. 

There remains, however, the challenge to explain the 2000 year gap between the revelation of our dignity in Jesus’ acceptance of the Cross and the clarity of that dignity achieved in the UDHR. This is where a melioristic approach to history becomes helpful. Meliorism implies that the world tends to become better and that humans can aid that betterment. Because of the power of the cross I chose to believe that there is meaning in suffering that took place 2000 years ago on Calvary and that there continues to be meaning with the ongoing social suffering that we see in our world. Through these moments where we witness great social suffering I tend to see moments of social grace and wisdom that can improve the condition of humanity if we, the human community, can act on it.  For myself there is great historical and religious significance with the fact that the UDHR and the United Nations was born out of the cross that was the Second World War and the Great Depression.

When the crucified Christ was raised the apostolic commitment of the early church chose to live in the freedom and dignity that Christ offered. In the aftermath of World War II God raised the human community to a new level of global awareness and universal dignity, should we not also live in the freedom and dignity that was divinely inspired to our forbearers. A melioristic approach is consistent with Christian eschatology which believes that we are actively living as followers of Christ on earth and with Christ we are working towards the emergence of the Kingdom of God. The power of sin is still alive and active in our society. My hope is that incrementally we, in relationship with God, Christ, and in solidarity with our human community, can grow towards this new creation based on Justice, Peace and the Integrity of Creation. This is a long term project, but one that is grounded in the dignity of Christ and now measured by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Catholic teaching has a long and rich tradition in defending the right to migrate. Based on the life and teachings of Jesus, the Church’s teaching has provided the basis for the development of basic principles regarding the right to migrate for those attempting to exercise their God-given human rights. Catholic teaching also states that the root causes of migration–poverty, injustice, religious intolerance, armed conflicts–must be addressed so that migrants can remain in their homeland and support their families.

In modern times, this teaching has developed extensively in response to the worldwide phenomenon of migration. Pope Pius XII reaffirms the Church’s commitment to caring for pilgrims, aliens, exiles, and migrants of every kind in his apostolic constitution Exsul Familia, affirming that all peoples have the right to conditions worthy of human life and, if these conditions are not present, the right to migrate. “Then–according to the teachings of [the encyclical] Rerum Novarum–the right of the family to a [life worthy of human dignity] is recognized. When this happens, migration attains its natural scope as experience often shows.”

While recognizing the right of the sovereign state to control its borders, Exsul Familia also establishes that this right is not absolute, stating that the needs of immigrants must be measured against the needs of the receiving countries:

Since land everywhere offers the possibility of supporting a large number of people, the sovereignty of the State, although it must be respected, cannot be exaggerated to the point that access to this land is, for inadequate or unjustified reasons, denied to needy and decent people from other nations, provided of course, that the public wealth, considered very carefully, does not forbid this.

In his landmark encyclical Pacem in Terris, Blessed Pope John XXIII expands the right to migrate as well as the right to not have to migrate: “Every human being has the right to freedom of movement and of residence within the confines of his own country; and, when there are just reasons for it, the right to emigrate to other countries and take up residence there.” Pope John XXIII placed limits on immigration, however, when there are “just reasons for it.” Nevertheless, he stressed the obligation of sovereign states to promote the universal good where possible, including an obligation to accommodate migration flows. For more powerful nations, a stronger obligation exists.

The Church also has recognized the plight of refugees and asylum seekers who flee persecution. In his encyclical letter Sollicitudo Rei Socialis, Pope John Paul II refers to the world’s refugee crisis as “the festering of a wound.” In his 1990 Lenten message, Pope John Paul II lists the rights of refugees, including the right to be reunited with their families and the right to a dignified occupation and just wage. The right to asylum must never be denied when people’s lives are truly threatened in their homeland.

Pope John Paul II also addresses the more controversial topic of undocumented migration and the undocumented migrant. In his 1995 message for World Migration Day, he notes that such migrants are used by developed nations as a source of labor. Ultimately, the pope says, elimination of global underdevelopment is the antidote to illegal immigration. Ecclesia in America, which focuses on the Church in North and South America, reiterates the rights of migrants and their families and the respect for human dignity “even in cases of non-legal immigration.”

Both of our episcopal conferences have echoed the rich tradition of church teachings with regard to migration. Five principles emerge from such teachings, which guide the Church’s view on migration issues.

I. Persons have the right to find opportunities in their homeland.
All persons have the right to find in their own countries the economic, political, and social opportunities to live in dignity and achieve a full life through the use of their God-given gifts. In this context, work that provides a just, living wage is a basic human need.

II. Persons have the right to migrate to support themselves and their families.
The Church recognizes that all the goods of the earth belong to all people. When persons cannot find employment in their country of origin to support themselves and their families, they have a right to find work elsewhere in order to survive. Sovereign nations should provide ways to accommodate this right.

III. Sovereign nations have the right to control their borders.
The Church recognizes the right of sovereign nations to control their territories but rejects such control when it is exerted merely for the purpose of acquiring additional wealth. More powerful economic nations, which have the ability to protect and feed their residents, have a stronger obligation to accommodate migration flows.

IV. Refugees and asylum seekers should be afforded protection.
Those who flee wars and persecution should be protected by the global community. This requires, at a minimum, that migrants have a right to claim refugee status without incarceration and to have their claims fully considered by a competent authority.

V. The human dignity and human rights of undocumented migrants should be respected.
Regardless of their legal status, migrants, like all persons, possess inherent human dignity that should be respected. Often they are subject to punitive laws and harsh treatment from enforcement officers from both receiving and transit countries. Government policies that respect the basic human rights of the undocumented are necessary.

The Church recognizes the right of a sovereign state to control its borders in furtherance of the common good. It also recognizes the right of human persons to migrate so that they can realize their God-given rights. These teachings complement each other. While the sovereign state may impose reasonable limits on immigration, the common good is not served when the basic human rights of the individual are violated. In the current condition of the world, in which global poverty and persecution are rampant, the presumption is that persons must migrate in order to support and protect themselves and that nations who are able to receive them should do so whenever possible. It is through this lens that we assess the current migration reality between the United States and Mexico.

by Hugo Esparza-Perez, CP

You have to question whether or not the U.S.A benefits by having  Twelve Million (plus) people from flourishing in society. I would say that it does not. Yet, this is the reality of millions of undocumented people in this country. While everyday tasks become harder for these people, the human and social detriment of  these communities continues to dwarf the entire country.  Hence, our democratic process and the pursuit of happiness are hindered for all. How is this so, some may ask. One of the main arguments that people on the different sides of the issue like to use is the economic impact of this group. Unfortunately, none of these sides ever talk openly of the human impact of undocumented people in the Country. Undocumented people are either portrayed as criminals or as lazy, by the opposition, and while by their sympathizers, they are pigeon-holed into the old racist narrative of merit. –here thus the talents and achievements of undocumented young men and women become the only reason for their much needed legalization. We all know, however, that equality and justice should come for both the over-achiever and for the non-over-achiever. This confronts us with a harsh reality, for when citizenship or human worth is based on the generation of income, we all lose.

For these reasons, undocumented youth throughout the country are coming together. Just as in the early sixties college students from Greensboro, N.C. decided to counter the racist backlash of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1954 Brown v. Board of Education ruling to desegregate schools, undocumented youth, with the motto of “unashamed, unafraid and undocumented”, are rising up in Chicago and throughout the country. Inspired by U.S. American ideals, these young men and women, together with their allies, seek to become agents of change in the discussion and legislation of undocumented migration and to work for a more perfect Union, where democracy is a reality outside the voting booth, where justice is for all and where we can be measured by the way we treat the least amongst us.

My work with a local Chicago Group, Immigrant Youth Justice League (IYJL), came through my volunteering with a workers’ center here in Chicago (Arise Chicago). IYJL in collaboration with other likeminded local national organizations is currently organizing high school and college students from the Chicago area and will be taking its demands to Washington on March 21. IYJL  and its allies will join the  Members of the Ecumenical Days of Advocacy, which include us Passionists in their rally and actions. If you would like to read more about IYJL’s work please follow the links above.

[Picture by Shepard Fairey  http://obeygiant.com/]

• Zephaniah 3:14-18a -The prophet composes a hymn of hope for Jerusalem and the temple where “the Lord is in your midst.”
• Philippians 4:4-7 – Rejoice in the Lord always … The Lord is near. Present your needs to God. Then God’s own peace, beyond your comprehension, will stand guard over your hearts and minds.
• Luke 3:10-18 – John the Baptist preached reform within people’s daily round of duties and announced the one who would baptize with the Holy Spirit.

Thoughts for your consideration: by Fr. Sebastian MacDonald, CP

On December 10^th, there was a celebration of Human Rights Day.  This should be a reason for rejoicing, in the spirit of this Sunday’s joy (Gaudete Sunday) that the Messiah’s coming is near at hand.  For the emergence of human rights as a distinctly recognizable feature of human existence has been a long time coming.

But wouldn’t you know that, just as it emerges out of the dust bin of history, it encounters the danger of another immersion into forgetfulness. The concept of human rights seems to be taken for granted and people pick and choose which rights they wish to defend and which ones they wish to violate. Some promote economic rights while others defend only political rights. Some skip over human rights and prioritize the rights of animals and trees. This process of “dumbing down” universal rights to subjective preferences reduces its significance to the point of asking: why get wrought up over rights when they are as commonplace as dirt?

Perhaps we do better to follow the route laid out by John the Baptist in Luke’s gospel account today, as John engaged in his preaching ministry by the river Jordan.  He chose not to proclaim rights, but obligations.  The word “should” in this account betrays his approach: the crowds ask him: “what should we do?”  And he replied that whoever can should share with another who has nothing.  Likewise, with those lacking food.  And the tax collectors’ question about their “should”, is followed by the soldiers’ similar query.

What’s interesting about this account is that John’s listeners, instead of being “turned off” by John’s list of “shoulds”, “were filled with expectation” because he sounded just like what the Christ ought to be proclaiming: meeting human needs.  For as this account concludes, it points to the “good news”, in John’s remark about a coming baptism with the Holy Spirit and fire, to cleanse, purify and fill the barn.

In other words, the obligations the Baptist laid on his hearers were the foundation of the rights they had every reason to expect at the hands of the Messiah: spiritual rights to freedom from sin, human rights to freedom from foreign occupation.  The roots of the U.S. Bill of Rights and the U.N. Declaration of Human Rights lay hidden here.

So on this Gaudete (rejoicing) Sunday let us make our own the upbeat expectations of the crowds, the tax collectors, and the soldiers that the obligations they acknowledge trigger a sense of the rights to be cherished.  This joy reflects that of the prophet Zephaniah who sees the Lord removing judgment from his people, by turning away the enemies who trampled their rights.  And it unites us with the Philippian Christians in their joy that “the peace of God that surpasses all understanding” will endow their hearts and minds—another basic entitlement as Christians.

Human rights are fundamental freedoms coming into their own, once the obligations facing us are satisfied.  When the primordial obligation owed God is met, freedom of a religious kind is born.  For freedom of religion is humankind’s basic freedom, underlying all the rest.  The opportunity to approach God endows the human person with a dignity unsurpassed by any other quality the human person might come by, whether that be the faculty of reason or freedom.  People argue over rights vs. entitlements vs. privileges vs. merits vs. benefits vs. gifts.  But, on a scale of 1 to 10, the ability to approach God through religious practices rates a 10, ahead of any other human endowment.  That is why the very first sentence in the very first of the 27 Amendments to the U.S. Constitution (the first 10 of which are called The Bill of Rights) reads: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…”  And for this reason we rejoice on this Sunday as, with the people around John the Baptist, we await one mightier than he, who is coming as the center of our religious faith, and the origin of our rights.

Khalil Gibran’s  ‘Prophet’, when asked to speak about pain, says: “Pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding. Even as the stone of the fruit must break so that its heart may stand in the sun, so must you know pain” Awakening to the terrible reality of human suffering breaks open our heart. Then love and action in the service of justice becomes possible. 
 
Appreciating and trying to live our first vow as Passionists to keep alive the Memoria Passionis should offer a clue as to how that shell may be broken. It should also give us some tools for critical reflection on our contemporary experience
 
Paul of the Cross began his great work in a world in transition. The Peace of Westphalia in 1648, less than 50 years before his birth, marked the waning of the political influence of papacy and empire, the two major medieval powers. “Enlightenment” ideas began to make themselves felt. The church would no longer set the agenda; religious communities,   dislodged from the center, would find themselves ‘at the edge’. In this world Paul found the drawing force of his life in contemplating the Crucified God. From here came his passion for life. The Crucified One led Paul to the ones he saw as the poorest, those who did not know God’s love and had no hope. Paul saw the name of Jesus on their foreheads.   
 
We are called to continue the great work in a world still rocked by massive change. At the start of the 3rd millennium, “to see reality in our time is to see the world as crucifixion.” 
 
Our world is marked by a virulent form of economic globalisation that leads to massive imbalances in the economic order. This affects body, soul and spirit. Access to the basic necessities for living is controlled by a powerful minority. The North, especially the US, and multinationals control and direct the lives of the majority of people in a way that was unknown in the past. 
 
Our minds have been colonised by the dominant values of individualism, consumerism and success. But the Cross reminds us that “success is not a name for God” (M. Buber) Living joyfully our relatedness as brothers and sisters is the antidote to individualism. Solidarity is the word chosen to describe a new way of being together as Passionists in mission for the life of the world. New realities call for new responses in faith.
 
The addiction to consume can heal when it learns “I am more than what I have” and longs to know that I am loved beyond all doubt. The addiction to success, and to its servants – domination, violence and ruthlessness, can only be healed in the compassion and mercy flowing from the Cross for the victim of such acts.
 
Early in its life the United Nations General Assembly proclaimed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, December 10, 1948 as an emphatic “NO” to the horrors of the 2nd World War. “Recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world…All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood”.(art 1) But Jesus had already announced this from his Cross!
 
Do we have anything to say to our world and to our brothers and sisters today and is it likely to be able to be heard?
 
A world in the throes of enormous change, roiled by violence and new expressions of xenophobia; the demonising of the ‘other’ expressed in the ‘war or terror’, urgently calls us to reflect on the demands of Justice at the heart of any Spirituality of the Passion if it dares speak to the questions of today’s women and men.  
 
Our self understanding as Passionists has been slowly undergoing a shift over our lifetimes. It finds clear expression in the Constitutions and the General Chapters of the past 30 years. The 2000 General Chapter says: “Life, born from the cross, was the key for understanding all of the Chapter’s work under the dual aspect of ‘memory’ and ‘prophecy’. As memory, it drew our eyes to the cross from which new life flows, and as prophecy it asked us to look at the tasks of the new millennium with the eyes of Jesus Crucified”
 
Memory and prophecy constitute the two eyes of Passionist being – one looks to Jesus of the Cross where love first touched us; the other looks to the present, where His reconciling love becomes a reality here and now. 
 
This binocular approach to our living the Passion requires us to be centered – standing with Jesus in his Passion-moment; and also sent to the edge – to stand with and keep faith with our sisters and brothers as they seek meaning and hope in their crucifixions.  To be Passionist today requires that we are passionate about Life in each of its stages and in all of its dimensions – a commitment to care for, to promote and protect life from womb to tomb and in every part of the biosphere.
 
The foundation of Passionist identity is the realisation that we have flared forth from the burning heart of God. We are the same matter threaded through every atom, molecule and particle that constitutes our universe. Our life-force comes not from duty, obligation or responsibility, but astonishment and love.  
 
Paul of the Cross, in another time and place, was astonished at the overwhelming work of God’s love that is Jesus’ Passion. As for Jesus, so for Paul; as for Paul, so for each one of us! To be drawn into the heart of our Passionist charism is to be called to live the Passion of the Christ as passion for life in its every dimension and part. 
 
As for Jesus, as for Paul, so for us! Passion for Life calls us to move from the centre to the edge there to find Christ in the suffering earth, in his suffering brothers and sisters, young, old, poor, migrant, displaced, gay, indigenous, misunderstood. Paul, with insight strengthened from gazing on the face of the Crucified, when he turned to look outward he saw the name of Jesus written on the foreheads of the poor.
 
The outflow of our contemplation of the Passion of Jesus will always call us to stand with the marginalized and the crucified ones who, without fully understanding it, thirst for life. Our contemplation of the Crucified One will always lead us to look to the edge and notice who is left discarded by the way. Sometimes this will involve ‘breaking the silence’.
 
We are called to live today in such a way as to make present of Christ’s death as liberation for the people who are crucified today by hunger, injustice and the absence of hope. We are to be ‘Memory-makers’ that the Crucified/Risen one is hope for the poor and for all of creation.
 
“Jesus will be in agony till the end of time’ said Leon Bloy. As we face the agony of the world today, it suggests to me that this is the Passionist moment. In a world marked more and more by the inequalities of possession, our approach to justice must be more than mere resourcefulness.
 
We must offer the justice of right relationship. What is needed in this polarized, fearful and ‘crusading’ world filled with a sense of its own resourcefulness and with a toolkit of solutions, is a ‘crucified mind’ formed beneath the Cross.
 
Such a sense of justice is indeed countercultural – one that embraces our own various experiences of being emptied of ego, of solutions and moved to the sideline of significance. Similar experiences shaped Paul of the Cross, brought him out of the army and away from the Crusades and brought him to be embraced by and then to proclaim the life-giving paradox of the powerlessness of the crucified God.

“These metal barbed wired fences

were turned into a holy place

of prayer and memory”

As we advocated in this public way to transform our Country’s Swords into Plowshares I experienced overwhelming feelings and memories. As I walked in procession with thousands of others holding the victims and victimizers in my heart, the presence of Christ Crucified kept reminding me that the past is still present for the people of Central and South American where, unfortunately, our Country has had a military presence. This reminded me what Sister Dianna Ortiz, a survivor of torture by the U.S. backed Guatemalan Government, said in an interview. An act of violence keeps having repercussions across generations. She explained this as the backdrop of her own story as a victim of State sanctioned torture. Her words brought to mind many of my Salvadorian childhood friends whose past was kept in silence by mom and dad, because it involved heinous acts of terror too hard to put into words. Unfortunately, this silence became protection for the young but also limited knowledge of self as survivors of war.

“An act of violence keeps having repercussions across generations.”

The bloodshed and horror endured by past generations has continued to victimize many of these people, even thousands of miles away from their own war, devastated land. Gangs like Mara Salvatrucha, which became one of the most violent gangs in California and now across the Continent, was founded by young Salvadorian men, who fought along with the paramilitaries or the guerrillas during and before the Civil War (1980-1992). The segregated neighborhoods of Los Angeles became the breeding ground through which the violence exported by the U.S. came back home. The new comers from Central America, who were seeking refuge after experiencing the horrors of war, were confronted by the local cycles of poverty and social disenfranchisement in their new home.    The Clinton Administration in the mid 90’s, as it toughened-up immigration policies, enabled the exportation of this gang. Thousands of Salvadorian young men, who had committed crimes where deported back to El Salvador, many of  whom had come to the U.S. as infants. The Clinton Administration ignored the fact that El Salvador had just signed a peace treaty, which ended the same civil war that the U.S. had participated in.  Ignored too was the obvious systematic inadequacy of El Salvador to be able to contain, much less reform, these young men. As a result, we have a group of young-men, children of violence and poverty, manifesting what they know best, atrocious acts of self-destruction.

“No more one-minutes of silence,

only lives working for the struggle!”

While the consequences of an act of violence cannot be contained or measured, one’s actions can. “No more one-minutes of silence, only lives working for the struggle!” This was the call that Afro-Indigenous Organizers from Colombia made as they denounced paramilitaries and systematic governmental abuses, and announced the commitment of hundreds of Colombians working against these injustices. In many ways, this call is the synthesis of my pilgrimage to the School of the America’s. The movement created by a few committed people has awakened the conscience of many and it has had international attention. During the closing of the vigil it was announced that Fr. Roy Bourgeois, MM was nominated for the 2010 Nobel Peace Price.  The best part of it all is the number of young people who are being involved advocating for this issue. Whether or not the U.S. Government will close down the SAO/WHINSEC or whether or not the new administration will adopt new policies to deal with the interests of the Country, the Vigil did not harm the commitment of countless people to dedicate themselves to current and future processes of social structural change through non-violence.

Sr. Mary Ann Strain, CP is a co-director of Passionists International. She attended last weeks UN meetings on Human Trafficking. Her article follows the quote from Pope Benedict XVI.

…In [some] cases international tourism has a negative educational impact both for the tourist and the local populace. The latter are often exposed to immoral or even perverted forms of conduct, as in the case of so-called sex tourism, to which many human beings are sacrificed even at a tender age. It is sad to note that this activity often takes place with the support of local governments, with silence from those in the tourists’ countries of origin, and with the complicity of many of the tour operators. -Pope Benedict XVI, Caritas in Veritate, #61

U.N. Event on Human Trafficking

The United Nations hosted a special event at its New York Headquarters last week for the victims and survivors of human trafficking, with Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon issuing a broad-based call to action for States to tackle the root causes and ensure swift justice against the perpetrators.

“Our fight against human trafficking is guided by three Ps: prevention, protection and prosecution,” he said in an opening address at the event at which four survivors bore living witness with accounts of their own horrific plight, including a girl who was abducted at age 14 by Ugandan rebels and kept as a sex slave for eight years.

“We must also empower victims. They need support systems, information and education. They need viable ways to earn a living. They also need criminal justice systems to pursue traffickers, and subject them to serious penalties. Conviction rates in most countries are microscopic compared to the scope of the problem. But when States help victims, the victims can help States break up trafficking networks.”

Mr. Ban cited a litany of abhorrent practices, including debt bondage, forced labor, torture, organ removal, sexual exploitation and slavery-like conditions. “Human trafficking injures, traumatizes and kills individuals. It devastates families and threatens global security,” he declared of a worldwide industry that generates billions of dollars in profit at the expense of millions of victims.

“Human trafficking touches on many issues, from health and human rights to development and peace and security. Our response must be equally broad, and must tackle this challenge at its roots,” he added, noting that the global economic crisis is making the problem worse as jobs and food get scarcer and rising social exclusion makes minorities and women especially vulnerable

Survivors of human trafficking who addressed the event included Charlotte Awino, abducted at age 14 by Lord’s Resistance Army rebels in Uganda and kept as a sex slave for eight years; Buddhi Gurung from Nepal, trafficked for labor to Iraq to work on a United States military base; Kika Cerpa from Venezuela, forced into prostitution by a man she thought of as her boyfriend; and Rachel Lloyd, an activist who survived commercial sexual exploitation as a teenager and started a New York organization to aid girls victimized by sex traffickers.

Horrifying Statistics

Today in the world, there are more slaves than when slavery was legal. There are an estimated 27 million victims of human trafficking that live in every major city across the world. Contemplating this, we see a picture of suffering on a magnitude too staggering to comprehend.

• Human trafficking is a $10 billion+ growth industry with conservative estimates ranging from 700,000 to 2 million people – primarily women and children – trafficked into prostitution and slavery annually.
• Human trafficking is the third largest criminal business worldwide, after trafficking in drugs and weapons.
• For traffickers it has been a high profit, low risk enterprise. Laws against trafficking in persons do not exist or are not enforced in many countries.
• The most common form of human trafficking (79%) is sexual exploitation. The victims of sexual exploitation are predominantly women and girls.
• In 30% of the countries that provide information on the gender of traffickers, women make up the largest proportion of traffickers. In some parts of the world, women trafficking women is the norm.
• Worldwide, almost 20% of all trafficking victims are children. However, in some parts of Africa and the Mekong region, children are the majority (up to 100% in parts of West Africa).

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay, whose office organized the Giving Voice to the Victims and Survivors of Human Trafficking Special Event, stressed that persisting economic disparities, conflict and discrimination, particularly against women and migrants, continue to push those least able to protect themselves into dangerous situations from which they cannot escape.

How Can we End Human Trafficking?

The demand for prostitution is the main driver of the business of human trafficking. The best way to stop the demand for prostitution is to make the act of paying for sex illegal. Comparing the experience of the Netherlands and Germany where trafficking is criminalized but prostitution has been legalized with Sweden where there are strong penalties against pimps, brothel owners and traffickers and those who buy sex acts, but no penalties for women who are sold proves the point.

Proponents of legalized prostitution argue that legalization makes it possible to manage prostitution. They say that legalization will stop pimps and organized crime figures from controlling women through abuse and violence, reduce trafficking by stopping the buying and selling of women and children on the black market, curtail underage prostitution and reduce HIV/AIDS transmission by requiring prostitutes to undergo regular medical examinations.

The experience of Germany and the Netherlands argues against these claims. Here is how legalized prostitution has worked in these countries.

• Buyers continue to perpetrate violence against prostituted women and girls. In one study, 85% of prostituted women in the Netherlands reported having been raped in prostitution. Buyers can rate the performance of prostituted women and girls on-line. Women and girls who resist unsafe sex or perverted sex acts are punished by owners and pimps who still supply women and girls to “legitimate” brothels.
• In 1960, 95% of prostituted people in the Netherlands were Dutch; currently 80% are immigrants from poor countries.
• At least 70% of prostituted people in the Netherlands are undocumented.
• Child Right reports that between 1996 and 2001, the number of prostituted children in the Netherlands has increased from 4000 to 15,000. One-third are immigrants.
• Over the last decade the sex industry in the Netherlands has grown by 25%.
• Legalization has not reduced transmission of HIV/AIDS because most prostituted people remain undocumented and are therefore not tested and more significantly there are no laws requiring medical screening for buyers.

In contrast, there has been a decline in sex trafficking into Sweden. There, in addition to directing strong penalties against pimps, brothel owners and buyers, Sweden:

• Works to dismantle social attitudes that underlie the prevailing systemic inequality between women and men.
• Funds services for those who have been trafficked
• Has initiated an intensive public service campaign against the demand for trafficking

What Can Passionists do?

Passionists and other religious can use their positions of leadership in the Church to help stop the demand for human trafficking by:

• Preaching against buying sex, frequenting “gentlemen’s clubs,” patronizing porn sites on the Internet, etc.
• Promoting the passage of anti-trafficking laws that follow the Swedish model of punishing those who buy sex.
• Participate in awareness-raising groups that make known the situation of human trafficking in your country or region.
• Pray daily for an end to human trafficking.
• Speak out against the sexualization and commoditization of women and children in the media and on the Internet.

For more information please visit the following sites:

• Intercommunity Peace and Justice Center: Human Trafficking Resources
• United Nations Office on Drugs and Crimes: Global Report on Trafficking 

USCCB – (Office of Media Relations) Bishops Welcome Obama Executive Order Banning Torture.

Passionist spirituality is centered on the suffering and passion of Jesus. While we strongly acknowledge God’s great love for our humanity through reconciling Jesus to us in the Resurrection it also acknowledges the social injustice of society in torturing the Just Man and putting him on the Cross. Passionist spirituality also leads us in relating the unjust suffering of Christ with the ongoing unjust suffering of humanity. Jesus’ Passion continues in our world and we chose to make a stand in solidarity with all who suffer the great loss of their human dignity. This includes not only the victims but also the perpetrators who are forced and trained to do these inhuman actions.

The staff of the Passionist Justice, Peace and the Integrity of Creation Office welcome this executive order. Below the video is a link to Amnesty International where you can send an email thank you to President Obama for this action.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=XM5FKawx1No

Amnesty International Action Center Link thanking President Obama for signing this Executive Order.

Peace,

John

BBC NEWS | Europe | Pope laments global instability.

Lamenting all the violence that exists in our world but particularly in Africa and the Middle East the Pope has rightfully identified “self-interest” as one of the most harmful causes that has led to many of these current tragedies. The United States, for its part, has also been culpable of exerting a foreign policy based on self-interest, specifically economic self-interest.

In a couple of days the Pope will issue a message on World Day of Peace which is January 1st. I invite you take time to read this message and perhaps you can use it as a reflective document for the Christmas season. In it the Pope highlights five areas of concern:

1. Campaigns that promote the extermination millions of unborn because of the demographic situation.
2. The spread of pandemic diseases especially of AIDS and the lack of accessibility of medicines that can treat these diseases
3. The ongoing growth of child poverty and the lack of services that promote education, healthcare and opportunities for children and families.
4. Promoting disarmament and using those funds to increase development.
5. A global policy to address the current global food crisis.

After the Pope mentions these issues he goes on to say:

One of the most important ways of building peace is through a form of globalization directed towards the interests of the whole human family. In order to govern globalization, however, there needs to be a strong sense of global solidarity between rich and poor countries, as well as within individual countries, including affluent ones. A “common code of ethics” is also needed, consisting of norms based not upon mere consensus, but rooted in the natural law inscribed by the Creator on the conscience of every human being (cf. Rom 2:14-15). Does not every one of us sense deep within his or her conscience a call to make a personal contribution to the common good and to peace in society? Globalization eliminates certain barriers, but is still able to build new ones; it brings peoples together, but spatial and temporal proximity does not of itself create the conditions for true communion and authentic peace. Effective means to redress the marginalization of the world’s poor through globalization will only be found if people everywhere feel personally outraged by the injustices in the world and by the concomitant violations of human rights. The Church, which is the “sign and instrument of communion with God and of the unity of the entire human race” will continue to offer her contribution so that injustices and misunderstandings may be resolved, leading to a world of greater peace and solidarity.

This again leads us to celebrate, as members of a Catholic religious community, our commitment to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. I invite you to examine our reflection on the declaration in one of my earlier posts or if you like, visit our email archives and read our reflection on Passionist Spirituality and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Peace,

John

“He who learns must suffer. And even in our sleep pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart, and in our own despiar, against our will, comes wisdom to us by the awful grace of God.”

Over 60 years ago a catastrophic event shook our global society to the core. The Great Depression and World War II brought unimaginable suffering. Our world experienced economic and military violence. We experienced the horrors of genocide, torture, and the vast ugliness that is absolute war. This event came to a close with a taste of the devastation from the Atomic Bomb.

60 years ago the global human community came together to make sense of this tragic event and gleam from this intense suffering the wisdom that could move us forward so that we would not make these same mistakes again. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was that wisdom that came to us.

The task remains for us to make this Universal Declaration come alive in us and in our world. Genocide and torture are still a reality for us. Economic disparity and the slavery of human trafficking are very much alive today. The threat of nuclear weapons and now the reality of climate change threaten to destroy both our society and our environment.

December 10th is the 60th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration. Let us take this time to remember the social injustices that we now exist today and reflect on each of the 30 articles so that we to may understand and appreciate the wisdom that are Grandparents experienced.

Peace,

www.youtube.com/watch?v=hTlrSYbCbHE