PAX CHRISTI USA

REFLECTION: Sweatshops – where corporate greed and human misery meet

Posted on May 13, 2013 | 1 Comment

by Tony Magliano

Corporate greed and human misery often meet in the workplace. And nowhere else is that more true than in sweatshops.

Taking advantage of extremely poor workers in the developing world, many wealthy companies – like Wal-Mart – from economically developed nations, demand that employees labor at a fast pace, for long hours, in deplorable conditions, with no benefits – all for the sake of corporate profit.

And worse yet, workers often experience serious injury and death.

Thus was the case when the illegally constructed Rana Plaza building in Bangladesh, collapsed on April 24, killing over 716 sweatshop workers.

This dilapidated building housed five factories that produced garments for the United States, Canada and Europe.

With hundreds of additional workers still missing, this disaster is the worst in the history of the garment industry, according to Charles Kernaghan, director of the Institute for Global Labor and Human Rights (IGLHR) http://www.globallabourrights.org/.

According to the IGLHR, a sweatshop employee named Jannat, who worked for New Wave Style, said she and other workers refused to enter the building after they discovered large cracks in the factory walls. But “managers at the factories threatened us saying they would withhold our [month’s] wages if we did not agree to work.”

The owner of the Rana Plaza factory building “along with gang members holding sticks were standing in front of the main entrance gate threatening that they would beat us with sticks and break our bones if we didn’t work that morning. We were frightened and had no choice but to go in to work,” said Jannat.

After working for one hour the power went off. “As soon as the generator was switched on the building started to vibrate and shake … there was a huge bang.”

The building then collapsed, trapping Jannat. Fortunately, she was rescued. But many others were not so fortunate.

Had strong legislation protecting workers’ basic rights been in place in industrialized nations – especially in the United States – this tragedy would have been avoided.

Corporations benefit greatly from intellectual property and copyright laws. It’s long overdue that workers laboring in miserable conditions receive the same legal protection.

Let’s work together to ensure they get it!

Please email and call (Capitol switchboard: 202-224-3121) your two U.S. senators and House representative urging them to reintroduce and actively support the “Decent Working Conditions and Fair Competition Act,” which according to Kernaghan, would provide transparent corporate disclosure – enabling labor rights organizations to inspect factories producing products for wealthy retailers.

If reintroduced and passed by Congress, this bill would also prohibit the import, export or sale of products that violate the International Labor Organization’s standards – which prohibit child labor, and guarantee workers’ rights to safe working conditions, to collective bargaining and protection against forced labor.

Please also consider giving a donation to help Bangladeshi victims and their families http://www.globallabourrights.org/.

Lamenting over the Bangladesh factory tragedy, Pope Francis passionately condemned the injustice of their $50 a month salary saying, “This was the payment of these people who have died.” This is known as “slave labor!”

And he added, “Not paying fairly, not giving a job because you are only looking at balance sheets, only looking at how to make a profit. That goes against God!”

Let’s build an economic system that does not go against God.

Passing the “Decent Working Conditions and Fair Competition Act” would be a giant step in that direction.

Tony Magliano is an internationally syndicated social justice and peace columnist. Please contact your diocesan newspaper and request that they carry Tony’s column. Tony is also available to speak at conferences and other events on social justice and peace issues and can be reached at tmag@zoominternet.net.

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Posted in Bread for the Journey, Catholic Social Teaching, Human Rights, Labor Justice, Magliano, Peacemakers, Poverty, Reflection

Tagged Bangladesh, Charles Kernaghan, Institute for Global Labour and Human Rights, Tony Magliano, Wal Mart

MOTHER’S DAY: The original Mother’s Day Proclamation

Posted on May 12, 2013 | 2 Comments

As many of you undoubtedly already know, Mother’s Day began as a protest against the carnage of war by mothers who had lost sons to the violence of war. On this day, Pax Christi USA would like to thank and recognize all of the women of our movement who have sought to raise a new generation of sons and daughters rooted in the works of peace. Your commitment to teach and model peace is a witness to all of us, and the seed of hope for a future without war. Our mothers have labored to instill in us the “peace of Christ,” Pax Christi, in the midst of a culture that tries to teach and justify and glorify violence. To all mothers in our movement, we say thank you, and Happy Mother’s Day!

by Julia Ward Howe, 1870

Arise then…women of this day!
Arise, all women who have hearts!
Whether your baptism be of water or of tears!
Say firmly:
“We will not have questions answered by irrelevant agencies,
Our husbands will not come to us, reeking with carnage,
For caresses and applause.
Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn
All that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience.
We, the women of one country,
Will be too tender of those of another country
To allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs.”

From the bosom of a devastated Earth a voice goes up with
Our own. It says: “Disarm! Disarm!
The sword of murder is not the balance of justice.”
Blood does not wipe out dishonor,
Nor violence indicate possession.
As men have often forsaken the plough and the anvil
At the summons of war,
Let women now leave all that may be left of home
For a great and earnest day of counsel.
Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead.
Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means
Whereby the great human family can live in peace…
Each bearing after his own time the sacred impress, not of Caesar,
But of God -
In the name of womanhood and humanity, I earnestly ask
That a general congress of women without limit of nationality,
May be appointed and held at someplace deemed most convenient
And the earliest period consistent with its objects,
To promote the alliance of the different nationalities,
The amicable settlement of international questions,
The great and general interests of peace.

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Posted in Bread for the Journey, Mother's Day, Peacemakers, Reflection

Tagged 1870, Julia Ward Howe, Mother's Day Proclamation, Peace

TEACHER OF PEACE: Nominations sought for 2013 Pax Christi USA Teacher of Peace

Posted on May 11, 2013 | Leave a comment

TODAY IS THE LAST DAY! SEND YOUR NOMINATIONS IN BY EMAIL! DEADLINE IS MIDNIGHT TONIGHT!

Email nominations to c.crosby@mac.com.

Each year, Pax Christi USA honors an outstanding peacemaker with the Teacher of Peace Award, in the tradition of Sr. Thea Bowman, Cesar Chávez, Dorothy Day, and Pope Paul VI. This award recognizes women and men whose lives and work exemplify the theme of Pope Paul VI’s World Day of Peace message, “To reach peace, teach peace.”

All nominations must be postmarked by May 11, 2013 to be considered.

Eligibility criteria for nominations for the Teacher of Peace Award are:

A living person
A Catholic individual or group
A United States resident
Widely recognized for their contributions to Catholic peace with justice activities
A person who demonstrates an intentional and sustained effort to challenge & transform racist & sexist attitudes & actions that continue to separate & oppress God’s people
Officers of Pax Christi USA should be considered ineligible until at least three years have elapsed since leaving office

Past recipients of this award include: Dan Berrigan, SJ; Fr. Roy Bourgeois, MM; Sr. Joan Chittister, OSB; Msgr. Ray East; Bishop Thomas Gumbleton; Kathy Kelly; Helen Prejean, CSJ; Martin Sheen; and Ruben Garcia.

To download a PDF of the Pax Christi USA Teacher of Peace Nomination Form, click here.

To download the form in Microsoft Word, click here.

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Posted in Teacher of Peace

Tagged Dan Berrigan, Dorothy Day, Helen Prejean, Pax Christi USA Teacher of Peace, Teacher of Peace

REFLECTION: First disciples create a model for dealing with contention in the church

Posted on May 10, 2013 | Leave a comment

by Bishop Thomas Gumbleton
Pax Christi USA Teacher of Peace

Sometimes things are happening in the world around us that provide a very good context to listen to the Scriptures, as we’re doing this morning during this liturgy. What’s going on, you may have heard about, is controversy within our church. This past week, there was a demonstration [in Detroit] of people who call themselves Fortunate Families. They were demonstrating in front of the archbishop’s office because they’re families who have committed gay members within them, or lesbian members.

They refuse to say, “I can’t go to holy Communion because I accept my child into my home,” so they’re demonstrating. This evening, there’s going to be a Mass at Marygrove, and it’s sponsored by Dignity, a Catholic organization of gay and lesbian people. We’ve been notified that there’s going to be a group there demonstrating, protesting. They call themselves the Cardinal Newman Society. They feel Dignity — this group — ought not to be able to celebrate Eucharist.

This is a very difficult struggle going on in our church — trying to come to grips with church teaching regarding homosexuality and perhaps a need for some new understandings on our part. But if you were listening, that’s nothing new that there would be this kind of dissention going on in the church. It was there right at the very beginning. When you listen to the Acts of the Apostles this morning, Luke has kind of glossed things over so it really doesn’t seem as difficult as it was, but this is a struggle that went on for probably 30 or 40 years. Luke was writing in the late 80s, but the struggle started right at the beginning, practically, 30 or 40 years before.…

To read this entire article, click here.

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Posted in Ambassadors of Peace, Bread for the Journey, Gumbleton, Nonviolence, Reflection, Scripture, Sharing Wisdom, Teach Peace, Teacher of Peace

Tagged Bishop Thomas Gumbleton, NCR, the peace pulpit

REFLECTION: Response on the 50th Anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s “Letter from the Birmingham Jail”

Posted on May 10, 2013 | Leave a comment

by Archbishop Joseph E. Kurtz, D.D.

Peace be with you! It is an honor to join my remarks with those of Rev. Jim Wallis and U.S. Representative John Lewis on this august occasion and to join with Rev. Bernice King, daughter of Dr. King, whose presence honors this two-day event.

Letters deserve a response, and in fact, some demand one. Such is the letter that we gather to remember. Fifty years ago in this city of Birmingham, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. sent a letter, actually a reply to one that he had received from religious leaders at the time. Making use of the edges of newspapers and stubs of pencils available to him in the jail, Reverend King set out what has become a classic letter, quoting from Socrates to St. Paul and St. Augustine to St. Thomas Aquinas. This letter, which is rich in foundations of scripture and human philosophy, direct, and prophetic, gave a rationale for strong action as well as marching orders for the steps we must follow to lift us, as the letter states, “from the quicksand of racial injustice to the solid rock of human dignity.” Rightly, he uncovered the words of St. Thomas Aquinas that the unjust law is “the human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law” and so is, as Dr. King says, “out of harmony with the moral law.”

Though at that time I was only 16 and taking my seminary entrance examination in my home state of Pennsylvania, I can look back to his response to religious leaders of that day, who had cautioned him against action that they claimed was “unwise and untimely.” We now see clearly his response as true wisdom, whose time had long since come.

Such a letter deserves a response …

Click here to read the entire response.

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Posted in Bread for the Journey, Human Rights, Peacemakers, Racism, Reflection

Tagged Archbishop Joseph E Kurtz, Archdiocese of Louisville, Letter from the Birmingham Jail, MLK

TEACHER OF PEACE: Happy 92nd Birthday Dan Berrigan!

Posted on May 9, 2013 | 16 Comments

Today is Dan Berrigan’s 92nd birthday! If you’re not familiar with Dan, here’s the Wikipedia page article on him with links to more. Dan is one of the truly extraordinary prophets of our time, an author, activist and poet, and a Pax Christi USA Teacher of Peace.

All of us at Pax Christi USA wish Dan a very Happy Birthday!

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Posted in Bread for the Journey, Teach Peace, Teacher of Peace

Tagged 92nd birthday, Dan Berrigan

ON THE LINE: May edition features breaking news on Transformation Now Plowshares, new pope reflection, and more

Posted on May 9, 2013 | Leave a comment

Compiled by Johnny Zokovitch

Each month, “On The Line” features news items and announcements from around the nation featuring Pax Christi members, local groups, regions and partners. These are gleaned from articles in local newspapers, websites, magazines, and elsewhere.

JURY FINDS TRANSFORM NOW PLOWSHARES GUILTY: (from the AP story) “An 83-year-old nun and two fellow protesters were convicted Wednesday of interfering with national security when they broke into a nuclear weapons facility in Tennessee and defaced a uranium processing plant. It took a jury about 2 ½ hours to find the three protesters guilty of a charge of sabotaging the plant and second charge of damaging federal property in July the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge in July. Defense attorneys said in closing arguments that federal prosecutors had overreached in the charges because of the embarrassment caused by the break-in. ‘The shortcomings in security at one of the most dangerous places on the planet have embarrassed a lot of people,’ said Francis Lloyd, who represented Sister Megan Rice of Washington, D.C. ‘You’re looking at three scapegoats behind me.’… Read more here: http://news.yahoo.com/jury-finds-3-guilty-weapons-plant-break-222543688.html

Sr. Megan Rice of the Transformation Now Plowshares.

Sr. Megan Rice of the Transform Now Plowshares.

PAX CHRISTI MASSACHUSETTS STATEMENT ON THE BOSTON MARATHON BOMBING: Chaos, destruction and death visited Boston on Marathon Monday, bearing witness to the perverse power of violence to shatter families, annihilate hope, end dreams, and engender great fear in our hearts. We members of Pax Christi Massachusetts, the Catholic peace organization built on the foundation of gospel nonviolence, and deeply committed to the Way of Peace of Jesus, wish to express our profound sorrow at what has come to pass in our beloved city of Boston. We mourn with the victims and families, and claim kinship with all who will carry their suffering far into the future. We pray for the healing of bodies and spirit and cling to the hope that in this city of great diversity, we remain united in a spirit of compassion and clear thinking… Read the entire statement here: http://paxchristiusa.org/2013/04/22/statement-statement-from-pax-christi-massachusetts-on-the-marathon-bombings/

FORMER PCUSA BISHOP PRESIDENT WALTER SULLIVAN FEATURED IN HUFFINGTON POST ARTICLE: (From the Huffington Post, written by PCUSA Ambassador of Peace Fr. John Dear, S.J.) In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus teaches that if our righteousness does not surpass that of the religious authorities, we will not enter the reign of God. It’s a shocking instruction. He seems to have learned early on that power corrupts, and not just politicians, but professional religious people, too. If professional religious authorities do not break out of the trappings of power, authority, money, and cultic privilege, if they do not embody the Beatitudes and struggle for justice and peace, they will not enter the reign of God. I think he means, not just in the next life, but here and now, in this life, where the reign of God is at hand. We see this play out everywhere today, where our religious leaders go along with the culture of violence and war, and remain silent in the face of warmaking, nuclear weapons, poverty, and violence. They fear rocking the boat, so they do nothing, protect their money, stay close to their benefactors, accept whatever the military tells them, and reject the way of the cross. Or if they speak, they only denounce abortion, claiming to be pro-life, even though they actively support U.S. warmaking and nuclear weapons. In doing so, they come across to the faithful as radically pro-death. They remain clueless to the prophetic vocation which Jesus calls us all to live in the Sermon on the Mount. The exceptions, of course, make the rule, and one great exception was my friend Walter Sullivan, bishop of Richmond, former president of Pax Christi USA, who died on December 11, 2012… Read more here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-dear/walter-sullivan-the-good_b_3186832.html

Pax Christi Houston members join Mothers Demand Action for gun safety.

PAX CHRISTI METRO NEW YORK’S EASTER REFLECTION: “Easter is a time for hope, for renewal, and new life. Nature is at one with the Resurrection of Jesus, as the first buds on the trees appear, tiny creatures cling to their mothers, and the seas calm from the harsh winds of winter. It is a time of celebration, a time of growth, and a time of change. The recent installation of Jorge Mario Bergoglio as Pope Francis I has given us a very special reason to celebrate, to hope, to renew, to grow, and yes, even to change, as individuals, as a community, and as a Church…” Read the entire reflection here: http://www.nypaxchristi.org/reflection.html

Images of Fr. Bill Bichsel, beloved figure of Pax Christi Pacific Northwest members, are showing up in unusual places!

PCI CO-PRESIDENT ASKS NEW POPE – BE A SHEPHERD OF PEACE: (from US Catholic by Marie Dennis) “In his resignation statement, Benedict XVI, now the bishop emeritus of Rome, pointed to the great challenge these times present to the papal ministry, speaking in particular about ‘today’s world, subject to so many rapid changes and shaken by questions of deep relevance for the life of faith.’ Few challenges will be greater for Pope Francis than the challenge of peace—to turn the hearts, minds, and energies of 1 billion Catholics around the world to fulfilling Jesus’ resurrection promise, ‘Peace I leave with you.’ Exactly 50 years ago, Pope John XXIII’s great encyclical Pacem in Terris (Peace on Earth) ended with a prayer that Christ would ‘inflame the desires of all … to break through the barriers which divide them, to strengthen the bonds of mutual love, to learn to understand one another, and to pardon those who have done them wrong.’” … Read the rest of the article here: http://paxchristiusa.org/2013/04/18/reflection-be-a-shepherd-of-peace/

PAX CHRISTI TEXAS LEADER DELIVERS SPEECH ON PACEM IN TERRIS: (David Atwood of PC-Texas gave the following talk at the Catholic Library Association Conference.) “It is an honor to address you today on the important subject of Pacem in Terris, the encyclical written by Pope John XXIII that was published in 1963, 50 years ago. I think we would all agree that we need more peace on earth – both in our own nation and throughout the world. The recent murder of 20 school children in Connecticut as well as the thousands of murders each year in the U.S. are indicative of the problems we have in this country. The recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the current conflicts in the Middle East and Africa, are indicative of the need for peace in the world… Read the entire speech at: http://paxchristiusa.org/2013/04/14/reflection-pacem-in-terris-its-importance-in-current-time/

Upcoming or Ongoing Events:

June 14-16 – Pax Christi USA National Conference in Atlanta, GA: http://paxchristiusa.org/programs/national-conference-2013/

Quicklinks:

A special supplement by Pax Christi Metro DC-Baltimore member Scott Wright on “Pacem in Terris” is now included in the Just Peacemaking module from JustFaith Ministries … Tom Cornell delivered the homily at Pax Christi Hudson Valley’s Mass for Peace at St. Augustine Church in Highland, N.Y. on March 16 … Pax Christi members in Upstate New York helped to start a “groceries for guns” program at their parish … Jerry Bettice of PC-Memphis presented a PowerPoint reflection on “The Legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr: The Dream Fulfilled” at the April meeting and at the Young Adults group at St. Patrick Church … Pax Christi members in Maryland were involved in the effort to repeal the death penalty … Pax Christi Illinois member Tom Cordaro wrote this prayer following the Boston Marathon bombing … The Washington Post ran an article on the Transform Now Plowshares prior to their May trial … The Maryknoll Office for Global Concerns, a PCUSA partner, has named Gerry Lee their new director … Pax Christi Tampa Bay member Mary Ann Holtz has published “Ten Action Steps for Individuals and Families Responding to the Current Global Crises of Energy, Environment and Economy” … Pax Christi Southwest Florida is participating in “Hands Across the Sand” to raise awareness of global climate change … Pax Christi UK has made a YouTube video called “Give Peace a Budget: 7 Ways to Spend $1.7 Trillion” … Pax Christi Metro New York’s latest edition of Kerux is now available on the website … Pax Christi Birmingham member Shelley Douglass asks if we will be open to the promptings of the Spirit this Pentecost? … Pax Christi Pacific Northwest member Nick Mele reports on his visit to Fukushima, Japan … Pax Christi International’s May 2013 newsletter is online … See more local and regional updates in the Spring 2013 edition of The Peace Current …