Christians learn how to work jointly for justice

By MAUREEN MCGUINNESS- | Comments: 0 | Leave a comment

Mary Gonzales describes herself as a grandmother, a typist and a tortilla maker. She is also director of Chicago's Metropolitan Alliance of Congregations, which recently secured $1 billion from Chicago's banks to build homes for 13,000 inner city residents.

"My professional training is as a skilled typist," she said. "I came out of severe poverty, but my life has been extremely energizing, exciting and fun."

Ms. Gonzales, a member of the Gamaliel Foundation, was one of the trainers at the Workshop on Faith-Based Community Organizing held recently at Christian Brothers Academy in Albany. The workshop drew 150 people from 57 churches and organizations, including 12 Catholic parishes, the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet, Catholic Charities, and the diocesan Commission for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs.

The event was sponsored by the Capital Region Ecumenical Organization (CREO), the Interdenominational Ministers Conference and ARISE (A Regional Initiative Supporting Empowerment).

United front

The workshop was designed to help religious organizations work together to become effective vehicles for social change.

"This is about making democracy what it should be," said Gregory Galluzzo, executive director of the Gamaliel Foundation. It's about "letting ordinary citizens have a say."

Throughout U.S. history, religious groups have played a significant role in social change, Mr. Galluzzo said. For example, the Catholic Church was involved in the union movement and African American churches were involved in the civil rights movement. In recent times, however, mainline Protestant groups and the Catholic Church have been sidelined in their efforts to evoke social change.

Faith-based effort

Hazel Roper of the American Baptist Church said during the opening prayer and welcome, that there is a great need for faith-based community development in a world that has become thoroughly secular and individualistic.

"At the heart of every faith tradition is the call to make the world better for all," she said. "We need to build strong communities of care. This will have a domino effect. Our challenge is to create safe places for all people."

According to Ms. Gonzales, in order to create these strong communities and evoke change, faith communities need to become powerful agitators.

Many faith traditions encourage meekness, mildness and humility, she said. Historically, those traits were advocated so that members would not question the authority of church leadership. However, she said, the Bible mentions power many more times than it does meekness.

Power of faith

Power, she said, is the ability to act. Power -- combined with values and faith -- can lead to great change.

"As a child, I was taught that Jesus was meek and mild," she said. "But how could He do what He did being meek and mild?" Other great religious figures have possessed power, Ms. Gonzales said, citing Moses, St. Paul, Martin Luther King Jr. and Mother Teresa.

When some workshop participants said that power is not good and challenged her claim that it's needed to make change, she responded: "Power is a good thing. It is the ability to act and comes from organized people and organized money."

Securing funds to build 13,000 homes took power, said Ms. Gonzales. Without the organization of religious congregations in Chicago and the funding provided by the banks, the project could not happen.

Passion for cause

In order to succeed, people must be passionate about their cause, and passion often comes from anger.

"We're taught to suppress our anger. We must acknowledge our anger. That's where passion comes from," she said. "You can have all of the values in the world and all of the faith, but without passion nothing will be achieved."

Often, religious people pray that God will solve the world's problems, or they themselves treat the symptoms of the problems. For example, church groups may collect food to help feed the hungry or pray that God will help the hungry.

According to Ms. Gonzales, people should learn to listen to what God says to answer the prayers. "We pray that God will take care of it," she said. "Stop saying, 'I believe in these values' and then not doing anything about them. God is sending us a lot of things, but we're frightened to act."

Reaction

Those in attendance were positive about the workshop:

* Deacon Charles Hall of St. John the Evangelist and St. Joseph's in Rensselaer was pleased with the workshop. "It's very inspiring," he said. "She has a lot of power, and it fills you up. We all have faith in a loving God, one that calls us to serve one another. We need to come together around that."

* Al Turo, director of Catholic Charities for Montgomery County, said, "I'm very intrigued. It's given me a different perspective on faith and who Jesus calls us to be."

* Barbara Morgan, of First Church of Albany, said: "I've been working in outreach for ten years in Arbor Hill. I've watched the poverty. We need to band together for change. They're common issues. They're not issues that fall along denominational lines."

* Rebecca Chaires, a member of the Harvest Church in Clifton Park, secretary for the Schenectady chapter of the NAACP and an abstinence educator for Catholic Charities' Community Maternity Services sees value in collaboration. "We need to come together and work together," she said. "We should not be dependent just on our own denomination. I think the people who are here are compassionate people wanting to help. They genuinely care about people. It would make it a lot easier if we all work together."

(For more information on the Gamaliel Foundation or the Metropolitan Alliance of Congregations, visit their website at www.newcities.org.)

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