Welcome to Tuesday. Several Latin American countries, suffering from the pandemic and economic turmoil, have erupted in social conflict, with Catholics, inspired by Pope Francis' teachings, taking part in the protests. Despite opposite stances on abortion, some U.S. bishops hope to work with President-elect Joe Biden, a Catholic, to find common ground.
The COVID-19 pandemic has had disastrous impacts across Latin America, with more than 400,000 deaths and 11.3 million cases of infection recorded by the beginning of November.
In a region struck by abysmal social inequalities, the coronavirus has also brought severe economic consequences. According to the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, at least 47 million jobs were lost in the second quarter of 2020.
In countries that had already been suffering with economic turmoil, the level of social conflict has dramatically risen over the past few months. Catholics have been taking part in the events, often inspired by Pope Francis' teachings against unregulated capitalism.
In Guatemala, the sudden recent approval of the 2021 federal budget, widely seen as inadequate to meet people's needs, spurred strong reactions among the opposition and led to a mass protest. A group of demonstrators ended up entering the Congress building and setting fire to it.
You can read more of the story here.
Catholic President-elect Joe Biden's stance on abortion causes confusion, said Los Angeles Archbishop José Gomez at the end of last week's bishops' conference meeting, as he announced the formation of a working group to examine what this would mean for the bishops' conference.
Biden's support for legal abortion is well known, as is Catholic teaching against it. Some bishops are concerned that, by choosing to focus on the disagreements rather than areas of shared cause, the posture of the bishops' conference toward the second Catholic president in U.S. history could damage possible collaboration on a range of issues where they believe there is common ground.
"There are some voices that urge the conference to move toward a more confrontational stance toward Biden and the new administration," San Diego Bishop Robert McElroy told NCR following the bishops' meeting. "I think that's really contrary to the tradition of our conference and is going to be counterproductive if a move is made in that direction."
You can read more of the story here.
More background:
More headlines
- "Defund the police" is part of a long abolitionist tradition in the United States that resonates because two truths have exposed the barbarism endemic to American capitalism, writes Dwayne David Paul, director of the Collaborative Center for Justice — that police violence will never slow down and our government cannot work together to create social safety nets.
- At Global Sisters Report, a Q&A with Sr. Miriam Duggan, who ministers to hundreds of youth in Kenya, where she delivers programs on rehabilitation and character formation.
Final thoughts
In case you missed it, Pope Francis defended his record on naming women to positions of authority at the Vatican, saying in a new book that women do not need to be priests to serve as leaders in the global Catholic Church. The pope noted that women often serve in leadership positions, running Catholic schools or hospital systems, or heading up diocesan departments. "Perhaps because of clericalism, which is a corruption of the priesthood, many people wrongly believe that Church leadership is exclusively male," Francis states. "To say they aren't truly leaders because they aren't priests is clericalist and disrespectful."
Until Wednesday,
Stephanie Yeagle
NCR Production/Online Editor
[email protected]
Twitter: @ncrSLY
