News Notes from the LCWR Office for Social Mission
LCWR January Newsletter Available
The January 2020 edition of the LCWR newsletter is available online. You can access it HERE. You might be particularly interested in the following articles:
- LCWR and SHARE for the Roses in December 40th Anniversary Celebration, p. 6
- LCWR Sign Ons and Letters, p. 6
- LCWR Endorses the Refugee Protection Act of 2019, p. 7
- LCWR Demands Justice for Children Who Died in US Custody, p. 7
- UN COP25 Climate Talks Close to Mixed Reviews, p. 8
- Pope Francis Releases World Day of Peace Message, p. 8
- Catholics Observe National Migration Week January 5-11, p. 9
- News from the UN, p. 9
EAD 2020 to Explore the Intersection of Climate Change and Economic Injustice
The theme for Ecumenical Advocacy Days (EAD), April 24-27, 2020, will be Imagine! God’s Earth and People Restored. Around the world, the most marginalized communities disproportionately affected by hunger, poverty, and the structural history of colonialism and racism are experiencing the impacts of the climate crisis most profoundly. Women and children in these communities suffer the most.
Earth and its people are groaning and calling for a hope-filled response to the crises of today. Temperatures are rising dramatically and dangerously everywhere, disrupting ecological systems and every type of human activity. The generations of tomorrow depend on what happens today.
EAD 2020 will explore the intersection of climate change and economic injustice in order to galvanize advocacy on behalf of policies and programs necessary to chip away at the systems of oppression that keep people in poverty and push all life on Earth to the brink of destruction. More information and registration materials are available HERE.
National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month Toolkit Available
January is the National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month and February 8 is the feast of St. Bakhita the patron saint of Sudan herself a survivor of kidnapping and slavery. We honor her heroism and humanity and pray to her to intercede on behalf of all those caught in the web of human trafficking.
USCCB’s office of Migration and Refugee Services has prepared a toolkit for use throughout the month of January and on the feast of St. Bakhita. The kit contains human trafficking talking points, sample letters to the editor, community engagement ideas, social media, prayer intercessions, and more!
2020 Appropriations Includes Global Fragility Act
Just before adjourning for the holidays Congress passed and the president signed the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2020 (p. 1321), which includes the Global Fragility Act. The act:
- Focuses U.S. foreign assistance on preventing violence and conflict in fragile countries;
- Saves U.S. taxpayers money by preventing the outbreak of conflict rather than the costlier approach of containing it;
- Increases transparency and accountability by mandating biennial reports to Congress and the American people;
- Strengthens research to identify the foreign assistance programs and diplomatic approaches that are most effective at preventing violence and conflict;
- Dedicates $1.15 billion over the next five years for conflict prevention and peacebuilding in countries at risk of violence and conflict.
Passing this legislation took determination and collaboration from congressional leaders on both sides of the aisle including the Global Fragility Act’s lead sponsors, Senators Chris Coons (D-DE) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC) as well as Representatives Eliot Engel (D-NY) and Michael McCaul (R-TX), the Chairman and Ranking Member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. Other original co-sponsors of the legislation include Senators Jeff Merkley (D-OR), Marco Rubio (R-FL), and Todd Young (R-IN) and Representatives Bill Keating (D-MA), Francis Rooney (R-FL), Adam Smith (D-WA) and Ann Wagner (R-MO). A bipartisan group of 26 senators and 20 representatives co-sponsored the bill, and their support was key to the Global Fragility Act’s success.
Become an Immigration Court Watcher
Public access to judicial proceedings is key to ensuring democracy’s system of checks and balances. Court observers serve to document obstacles to due process experienced by migrants and violations of their constitutional and human rights in this nation’s immigration courts. Those who participate in this process can witness first-hand the impact the system has on migrants, one of the most marginalized populations in US society.
For three years, the El Paso-based HOPE Border Institute has monitored immigration courts on the US-Mexico border in an attempt to hold judges and the US government accountable. They maintain that, the need for the public to pay attention in our nation’s immigration courts has never been greater and have recently produced the US Immigration Court Observation Manual to help individuals, local advocates, and faith groups to carry out this critical work in local communities across the country. They have also produced Webinar: A Guide to Immigration Court Observations.
Innovation Law Lab also announced the launch of an Immigration CourtWatch app, which enables court observers to record and upload information on the conduct of immigration judges. The Innovation Law Lab, based in Portland, Oregon with projects around the country and in Mexico, is a nonprofit organization that harnesses technology, lawyers, and activists to advance immigrant justice.
US Shelters for Asylum Seekers Declare: “There is Room at the Inn”
In December, representatives of 31 US border shelters who have collectively provided temporary shelter to welcome over 320,000 asylum seekers in 2019 met in Laredo, TX to demand an end to the misleadingly named “Migrant Protection Protocol (MPP).” In a two-day meeting those who have been sheltering asylum seekers shared testimonies of the difficult decisions families make to leave their homes and seek safety for themselves and their children at the border. They also discussed the extraordinary work of people of goodwill along the border who have volunteered their time and donated resources for asylum-seeking families because they are motivated by an understanding of our common humanity. And they clearly rejected the message that their capacity to help is overwhelmed: “Collectively, we are here to let the US government know that there is room in our inns.”
In a strongly worded statement, the group took the US government to task, for denying them the right to welcome families seeking safety and instead returning asylum-seekers to Mexico, where they face homelessness and danger from human traffickers and cartels.
As border shelters, we are ready to provide places of safety and welcome to asylum seekers. We know that when the US government returns families to Mexico to await court dates, the very process of return identifies them as targets for organized crime and heightens their risk of trafficking. US officials remove asylum-seekers’ shoelaces purportedly so that they don’t harm themselves while in detention. But when they are sent back to Mexico, the cartels identify families with missing shoelaces as easy prey for kidnapping and trafficking. These unintended ties between US border policy and cartel violence harm families and strengthen organized crime. According to Human Rights First, there are 636 publicly reported cases of violent attacks against asylum seekers returned under MPP, and the vast majority of such attacks are not reported. We know from our firsthand experience that we can avoid feeding such violence by allowing families to seek asylum from within the US, instead of returning them to Mexico.
We, the representatives of 31 shelters are ready and eager to welcome asylum-seeking families. We oppose US government practice and policy that instead subject them to suffering and call on the US Administration and Congress to immediately end MPP.
UN Human Development Report 2019 Tackles Inequality
The street demonstrations sweeping across the world today signal that, despite unprecedented progress against poverty, hunger, and disease, many societies are not working as they should. The connecting thread, argues a new report from the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), is inequality.
“Different triggers are bringing people onto the streets -- the cost of a train ticket, the price of petrol, demands for political freedoms, the pursuit of fairness and justice. This is the new face of inequality, and as this Human Development Report sets out, inequality is not beyond solutions,” says UNDP Administrator, Achim Steiner.
The 2019 Human Development Report (HDR), entitled “Beyond Income, Beyond Averages, beyond today: inequalities in human development in the 21st Century,” says that just as the gap in basic living standards is narrowing for millions of people, the necessities to thrive have evolved.
A new generation of inequalities is opening up, around education, and around technology and climate change - - two seismic shifts that, unchecked, could trigger a ‘new great divergence’ in society of the kind not seen since the Industrial Revolution, according to the report.
In countries with very high human development, for example, subscriptions to fixed broadband are growing 15 times faster and the proportion of adults with tertiary education is growing more than six times faster than in countries with low human development.
“What used to be ‘nice-to-haves’, like going to university or access to broadband, are increasingly important for success, but left only with the basics, people find the rungs knocked out of their ladder to the future,” argues UNDP’s Pedro Conceição, Director of the HDR Office, which pioneers a more holistic way to measure countries’ progress beyond economic growth alone.
The report analyzes inequality in three steps: beyond income, beyond averages, and beyond today. But the problem of inequality is not beyond solutions, it says, proposing a battery of policy options to tackle it.
“This Human Development Report sets out how systemic inequalities are deeply damaging our society and why,” said Steiner. “Inequality is not just about how much someone earns compared to their neighbor. It is about the unequal distribution of wealth and power: the entrenched social and political norms that are bringing people onto the streets today, and the triggers that will do so in the future unless something changes. Recognizing the real face of inequality is a first step; what happens next is a choice that each leader must make.”
Read more HERE.