Monday in the Octave of Easter
“It is always possible to begin anew, because there is a new life that God can awaken in us in spite of all our failures,”
Pope Francis, Easter Vigil
CHAPTER 5
A BETTER KIND OF POLITICS
Social and Political Charity
The politics we need
178. In the face of many petty forms of politics focused on immediate interests, I would repeat that “true statecraft is manifest when, in difficult times, we uphold high principles and think of the long-term common good. Political powers do not find it easy to assume this duty in the work of nation-building”,[162] much less in forging a common project for the human family, now and in the future. Thinking of those who will come after us does not serve electoral purposes, yet it is what authentic justice demands. As the Bishops of Portugal have taught, the earth “is lent to each generation, to be handed on to the generation that follows”.[163]
When will we as a diocese look in the mirror at “the face of many petty forms of” clericalism “focused on immediate interests”?
For years children in our Catholic schools have been featured generously in our UCA brochures, yet when the disbursement of those monies occurs they only receive petty amounts. Under the current politics of clericalism in our diocese, the burden of Catholic school education is laid on the backs of the 4 parishes that operate schools, the teachers who teach in those schools and the parents who pay tuition. There are other ways of practicing stewardship besides the UCA that provides for and unites the entire diocesan family, “now and in the future.”
Thinking of those who come after us does not maintain the power of the religious hierarchy in the Diocese of Amarillo, “yet it is what authentic justice demands” , according to Fratelli Tutti.
Catholic Bicycle 