From United States Conference of Catholic Bishops:

WASHINGTON—The challenges of living one’s faith in the public square and protecting the lives and dignity of the poor and vulnerable are the focus of the 2012 Catholic Social Ministry Gathering, which will be February 12-15, at the Washington Marriott Wardman Park Hotel.

“Faithful Citizenship: Protecting Human Life and Dignity, Promoting the Common Good,” is the theme of this year’s gathering, and speakers and workshops will explore the social ministry implications of Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship, the call to political and civic responsibility published by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) and reissued ahead of the 2012 elections.

The assembled Catholic social ministry leaders will also visit representatives of Congress to present proposals and concerns about policies affecting the most vulnerable people in the United States and around the world. The Catholic Social Ministry Gathering is sponsored by USCCB and 14 Catholic partner organizations including Catholic Relief Services (CRS), Catholic Charities USA, Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities, Catholic Labor Network, Conference of Major Superiors of Men, National Catholic Rural Life Conference, National Catholic Partnership on Disability and the National Council of Catholic Women.

Among the plenary speakers are Carolyn Woo, the new president and CEO of CRS; Arturo Chavez, president of the Mexican American Catholic College (MACC); John Carr, executive director of Justice, Peace and Human Development for USCCB; as well as Mark Shields and David Brooks from the PBS News Hour.

For more information on the gathering, visit: http://www.catholicsocialministrygathering.org/.

For more information on Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship, visit: www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/faithful-citizenship/index.cfm



http://www.usccb.org/news/2012/12-016.cfm
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MEDIA CONTACT:
Don Clemmer
O: 202-541-3206
M: 260-580-1137
DClemmer@usccb.org

From an archived edition of Shared Visions:

As a volunteer, you spend a great deal of time and energy grappling with how to communicate with the people with whom you work. How well you are able to do this often determines your whole impression of how your volunteer experience is going. So take some time now and give yourself a chance to reflect on what your experience of communicating in your workplace has meant to you.

* Often, the volunteer experience is the first time a volunteer has ever had a full-time job. If this is the case for you, ask yourself: How has your experience of communicating with people at your volunteer workplace differed from your previous work experiences? Did that difference reveal itself gracefully, or was it a rude awakening? (If this wasn’t the case for you, ask yourself: How has this colored your experience differently than that of others?)

* Whether you are a teacher, a counselor, or a house manager, your words may very well carry more authority and responsibility than you have been used to having. How does that feel – good, bad, awkward, liberating? How does that shape your relationships with others?

* Depending on your experience, you may have already had some communication problems at work: a new language, a difficult dialect, people talking too fast or slow. How have these problems changed the way you communicate? What insights into your own personal growth can you take from this struggle?

* Is there anything in the way co-workers, clients or students speak to you that you feel discounts your value, perhaps because of your age or because you are ‘just a volunteer?’ Or, on the contrary, do your co-workers or clients express their appreciation, e.g., because you are a volunteer? What are some ways you can respond to their discounts or approvals?

Conclusion: If you had a particularly strong reaction to any of the above questions, consider sharing your responses with fellow volunteers or a trusted co-worker and ask for thoughts and suggestions of how they see you communicating in your workplace. How are they doing with their own communication?



http://www.pallotticenter.org/newsletters/sharedvision/vol15no2.pdf
Shared Visions, Volume 15: Number 2

Brief Description:
Ever wonder how your housemate made that delicious homemade bread? Too embarrassed to ask your fellow volunteers for that pasta recipe again? Want to introduce your family and friends to a taste of a foreign country? Create a cookbook!

Activity:
Gather your fellow community members around and distribute a number of index cards to each person. Have each person write down the recipe for his/her mouth-watering delightful specialty dishes. Be sure to include traditional cultural meals from the region where you are volunteering!

Collect the recipes and assemble in a cookbook format of your choice. Some possible cookbook formats include:

Individual pages: each community member designs his/her own page with recipes, pictures, quotes, etc.

Category pages: divide recipes into categories (main meals, appetizers, etc.) and assemble.

Photo pages: community members take photos of each dish and write the recipes on the back of the photos.


This is a fun way to remember your volunteer experience, and once you return home you can make your favorite dishes for family and friends as they look at your pictures and albums. Or cook these delicious meals for yourself as comfort food to remember your experience!

From America Magazine:

From April 20, 1968

The prophet speaks to men for God. Men are never sure that they wish to hear what God says to them. They sense that God's message will not be altogether comfortable. So men strive to ignore the prophet, or to silence him. Failing all else, they kill him. It is then, strangely, that the prophetic voice rings out most clearly, with greatest force. It is then, when the hour seems too late and all appears lost, that the prophet may be heard, God's message may be received, and men may take a decisive step toward a better way of life.

We mourn that the prophet must die in order to be heard. We are ashamed that his last and most eloquent word must be the shedding of his blood. What must not happen is that even this last word go finally unheard. The prophet must not have died in vain.

A prophet speaks in three ways. He reads the future. He denounces the sins of men and warns of God's punishments. He promises, with confidence, in God's name, a brighter tomorrow.

As we listen now to the moving words Martin Luther King uttered, close to tears, on the night before he died, we are willing to believe that this man, in some sort, peered into the misty future and half glimpsed his death. Humbly and simply he said: "I want to live"—as if he knew he would not. No matter, he said, gently brushing aside his intimation of death, "I want to do God's will." This good man spoke exactly as did another, on the night before He died.

Martin Luther King denounced one sin, one wickedness, of men. The evil he denounced was the sin of our time, the sin of the respectable, of the good, the sin that has been laundered and tricked out as relatively innocent, quite understandable, and—after some token penance—best forgotten rather than repented. It is that black sin against the black man that has been whitewashed, aptly enough, by the white man. This prophet warned that America would pay for its sin. We are so paying, and will pay for a long time to come.

But above all else, Martin Luther King was a prophet of hope and not of doom. "I have a dream," he cried again and again in his most eloquent hour; and, on the night before he died: "I have seen the Promised Land. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord." As he believed in the ultimate might of nonviolence, so did he strongly believe in the ultimate triumph of racial justice in these United States. He would not have it otherwise than that one day the black American and the white American would face one another not as sworn enemies but as blood brothers, would face one another and clasp the other's hand in equal dignity and opportunity, with mutual respect, with unfeigned love.

There is only one question, a question for every man, woman and child in this country: Will this prophet be heard in death as he was not heard in life? Will the martyr accomplish by his blood what he could not achieve by his words? Will we make the dream of Martin Luther King come true?

http://www.americamagazine.org/content/article.cfm?article_id=13214

From Catholic Relief Services:

You Are Putting Haitians Back on Track

By Robyn Fieser


Nearly 2 years have passed since a devastating earthquake shook the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince and surrounding areas. Scenes of destruction dominated the news for weeks. Although the cameras have long gone, the work of Catholic Relief Services and our Haitian Church partners continues to help tens of thousands get back on their feet, thanks to your support.

The humanitarian response, beginning just hours after the earthquake, remains challenging and complex. Activities have transitioned from handing out emergency food and medical supplies to providing long-term programming that grows local leadership, and helps Haitian communities drive their own recovery and development.

Today, CRS is helping many of the 2 million Haitians left homeless by the earthquake move from camps into homes. Your support has made the rebuilding of their communities—shelter, clean water, sanitation, demolition, rubble removal and house repairs—possible. Through our flagship Community Resettlement and Recovery program, CRS and our partners have built more than 10,600 transitional shelters. The modest but sturdy quake- and storm-resistant houses are home to some 55,000 people.

To help residents of one camp find safe living conditions, CRS provided rental subsidies for a year. Residents took part in a 6-week course to learn everything from financial management to conflict resolution. Afterward, each family made a plan to cope with future challenges and to take back control of their lives. To encourage their progress, CRS is providing basic 6-month health insurance and educational support.

Building Jobs to Boost Incomes

Key to helping Haitians get back on track is job creation and other income-generating activities. Through CRS' innovative Rubble to Reconstruction program, Haitians are creating businesses using the rubble left by the quake. Program entrepreneurs and their employees use hand-cranked crushers to grind debris from damaged homes into a concrete mixture for new construction.

CRS buys the sand and gravel from these entrepreneurs to use in the foundations of the transitional shelters and latrines we build, and workers earn a living and learn to run a thriving business. As the program has matured, the entrepreneurs have added workers to mix cement and make cement blocks for sale on the local market.

To revive small businesses, CRS provides grants and business training to hundreds of entrepreneurs who either lost their business during the earthquake or envision a new one. In a few neighborhoods, your support is helping entrepreneurs set up recycling centers that pay community members for their recyclable plastic items.

You're also helping poor people form community savings groups. Too poor to access credit from traditional sources, group members, usually women, receive training and opportunity to build savings. Members can then borrow from their groups' savings to pay for health care or educational expenses.

Outside the country's urban centers, recovery depends on increased agricultural activity. About two-thirds of Haitians are subsistence farmers. However, after the earthquake, many families in rural areas shouldered the added responsibility of supporting others who had lost their homes. As a result, farmers are unable to regularly farm and grow enough food to cover their needs.

Using U.S. government funds, CRS continues its pre-quake focus on helping families in Haiti's southern peninsula improve their agricultural productivity and protect natural resources. And, to help grow Haiti's struggling mango and coffee industry, CRS is working with more than 5,000 farmers to improve production and farming practices, and create links to more lucrative markets.

Thanks to your generosity and continued support, CRS is resettling more than 10,000 families in Port-au-Prince. By enabling families to move home safely and earn a living again, CRS is helping to reduce the number of displaced people living in camps.

Our next challenge: to continue to help Haitian families regain control of their lives and lift themselves out of poverty.


Robyn Fieser is CRS' regional information officer for Latin America and the Caribbean. She is based in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.

http://crs.org/haiti/you-are-putting-haitians-back-on-track/

An activity for current volunteers from the St. Vincent Pallotti Center's Volunteer Community Activities Resource Library:


Description: The purpose of this exercise is to provide participants with an opportunity to understand the intricacies of privilege in American society.


Activity:    Since this is a powerful exercise and should be thoroughly processed, please plan on spending at least one hour for this exercise.  You can spend more or less time depending on the number of statements you make to participants.

Be Still: A Silent Retreat
Friday – Sunday, January 20-22

Cenacle Retreat and Conference Center

Renew your spirit and reflect in the presence of God at this quiet retreat away from everyday life. You'll have the chance to meet with a spiritual director, discover new ways to pray, celebrate Mass, read, journal, and rejuvenate! All in their 20s and 30s are welcome!

Visit http://charisministries.org/Be_Still_Jan_2012 for info.

For the Least Social Justice Retreats
Saturday, February 25 at St. Ignatius Prep 5th Floor Chapel
and
Saturday, March 10 at Simpson Living Learning Center - Multi Purpose Room

One of Charis’ most popular retreats - join us for one of these day long retreats that focus on Catholic Social Teaching and the Gospel call to lead lives rooted in social justice. A great team of young adults will share their experiences and lead small group reflections. Join us to relax, reflect, pray, and celebrate Mass and Reconciliation. For more info or to register, visit http://www.charisministries.org/!


Are you seeking a volunteer opportunity?

Want to get involved with Charis Ministries and help inspire other young adults to grow in their faith? Do you enjoy writing and reflecting on the gospel? Charis Ministries is currently looking for young adults interested in volunteering to write spiritual reflections for the Lenten Season. If you are interested or need more information, please contact Stephanie Scherra, at stephanie@charisministries.org or at 773-508-2843.



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Charis Ministries is a Jesuit ministry to those in their 20s & 30s. A ministry of the Chicago-Detroit Provinces of the Society of Jesus, Charis offers retreats, service, leadership, and speaker opportunities that bring the gifts of Ignatian Spirituality to the lives of young adults.

From Catholic Volunteer Network:

Martin Luther King Day of Service

Chicago-area alumni of Catholic Volunteer Network programs are invited to come together in honor of this year's Martin Luther King, Jr. Day of Service.

We will serve dinner to the guests at Franciscan Outreach Association's Marquard Center, and then enjoy a simple meal together and a time of reflection with Mark Laboe, Vice President of University Ministries at DePaul University and former director of Amate House.

Date: Monday, January 16, 2012

Time: 4:30pm – 9:00pm

Location: Francscian Outreach Association

Marquard Center
1645 W. LeMoyne St.
Chicago, IL 60622

Registration: Please visit https://www.catholicvolunteernetwork.org/volunteers/alumniserve.php for additional details and registration. (Registration deadline is January 9, 2012)


Those not in the Chicago area may be interested in our other upcoming alumni events:

Upcoming Alumni Events - Save the Date:

Los Angeles Alumni Day of Service – March 17, 2012

Washington, D.C. Alumni Day of Service – April 14, 2012

More details coming soon!


Questions? Please contact Katie Mulembe at kmulembe@catholicvolunteernetwork.org or 301-270-0900 ext. 14.