Archive for the ‘social justice’ Category:
Isn’t it Time We Made the World Fair?
That’s the slogan for this year’s World Fair Trade Day and it’s tomorrow, May 10th..
Why does it matter?
Because Fair Trade means fair pay and working conditions for farmers and producers. Fair Trade products are made in safe and healthy working conditions, where farmers and producers receive a fair price and have a voice in how their workplace is run.
Fair Trade supports communities. By working through cooperative structures, Fair Trade artisans and small farmers are able to invest Fair Trade earnings in their communities, improving housing, healthcare, and schools. And Fair Trade is better for the environment as it supports sustainable practices that minimize our environmental footprint.
But ultimately Fair Trade means what you buy matters. By choosing Fair Trade products, you are not only accessing high quality products, you are making a difference in the lives of the people who grow the food you eat and the goods you use.
How can you help?
- PRAY
-Stay informed and learn more.
-Buy fair trade products whenever possible and join the community of concerned Catholics determined to build a better world, one purchase at a time.
-Donate through Catholic Relief Services Fair Trade Fund where 100% of your tax-deductible contributions are used to benefit Fair Trade farmers and artisans. Through the Fair Trade Fund, CRS makes targeted, high-impact Development Grants to help artisans and farmers overseas succeed in the U.S. Fair Trade market, and Market-Building Grants that have unique potential to help grow the market for Fair Trade products here in the United States.
Subscribe to the comments for this postHarvest of Hope
gift from our oldest son for our 23rd wedding anniversary (this past Monday the 6th).
Fairtrade chocolate that lives up to its heavenly name! Yes those are 100 gram bars —yes there were ten.
Divine is the fairtrade chocolate company co-owned by the cocoa farmers cooperative Kuapa Kokoo in Ghana, who not only receive a fair price for their cocoa but also share in the company’s profit.
It almost seems un fair to have so much delicious chocolate . . . almost.
Thought Provoking Reading
I have been reading these two books lately and they have me completely enthralled.
Happy Are You Poor and Prayer Primer
I started reading Happy Are You Poor a few years ago but put it down—I don’t know why, maybe I wasn’t ready for it but it certainly is speaking to me now. It’s pretty much piercing my heart to be exact. To quote Fr. Dubay, “The message is austere, but at the same time it bears tidings of great joy.”
Yes indeed.
I plan to post more of my thoughts on both of these books over the next few weeks.
If you have read either of them (and I bet several of you have), I’d be happy to hear your thoughts.
Right now though I’m burning hamburgers on the stove cooking dinner.
Simplicity - Knowing and Respecting Our Stuff
by Meg Lund
An important aspect of simplicity is one which has yet eluded me in way too many cases, and that is taking good care of that which I have. Respect for the gifts that God gave us is reflected in keeping things clean, orderly and in good repair. Since all things that we have are only ours “on loan” from God, we can look at it as if we have borrowed these things from a great king, who will one day want account of them.
In so many ways, our modern day culture destroys our ability and even desire to foster this virtue. The main reason, I believe, is because we are no longer in control of the things we have. We didn’t make them and could never make them with the resources we have at home, so we are unable to fix or maintain them. We have no idea of the effort that has gone into making them, so we lack appreciation for the “work of human hands.” We don’t pay the price that things are really worth, thereby exploiting people and the environment, and giving us a false sense that stuff is “cheap.” Because stuff is apparently cheap, we have way too much of everything, making it impossible for us to properly respect all that we have.
Knowing our Stuff
Before our modern Culture of Death, we, or someone in our neighborhood, used to make everything that we owned. We appreciated the labor that went into it, and that alone would give us a greater respect for the object. Take a handmade sweater for example - this would take countless hours to fashion, from the tending of the sheep, to the shearing, to the washing of the wool, to the carding, spinning and final knitting of the sweater. If a hole were to appear, we would quickly get some of that same yarn, and mend it before all of our long, hard work was unraveled. We would also see to it that it was never stained, or thrown in a heap, and we would use it until it was worn thin, at which time we would recycle it into something else (if nothing else, insulation for the attic, or even compost for the garden). We would be willing to pay a fair price for this sweater, since we would certainly appreciate the hours of hard labor that went into it.
Nowadays, no one understands or pays the true cost of the items being produced, used and thrown away. When things are made at some foreign sweatshop, the buyers do not see the injustice to the people who make them. When things are made in a factory with chemicals and pollution, no one is figuring the long term damage to the environment and the health of the workers. No one counts the cost of health hazards to users of the product or to the entire earth when the item is thrown away, and continues to leach plastic and chemical molecules into the ecosystem. The only full solution to this is to return to making the things that we have as local communities from local, natural materials in a natural process so that we can properly maintain and repair items and appreciate their true value, while at the same time naturally limiting the amount of stuff and being able to properly monitor that the true cost of everything is paid.
Respecting Our Stuff, Respecting Each Other
God commands us to respect each other’s stuff in two out of the 10 Commandments.. Thou shall not steal and Thou shall not covet they neighbor’s goods. To respect a person’s stuff is to respect a person. We feel invaded when our stuff has been stolen or damaged by another.
Modern day children teach us a lesson about how much we are harming them and all of mankind by teaching them to disrespect stuff. They are often destructive (like “Sid” in “Toy Story”) and seem greedy and selfish, despite having so much. When they smash their toys, they are hurting themselves, and when they do the same to others’ toys, they are hurting others. Kids innately understand that to disrespect another’s goods is to disrespect another. They are protecting their self esteem when they protect their stuff. This is why even a young child will get defensive and angry when another comes and snatches away something that they have, and they show their disapproval by snatching it back shouting, “It’s MINE!” As teenagers, these behaviors often manifest themselves as vandalism and theft, which are acts of violence and aggression. They are disrespect for life.
Too Much Stuff
Now, zoom forward to the 20th century from biblical times and see where we’ve come. Sometimes, we’re GLAD when a toy breaks, because it gives us an excuse to throw it away!!!! We’re so overwhelmed with stuff, that we can’t possibly respect it all, and we really just want it out of our face because our inner conscience is telling us that we must respect it, but our logical side is saying, “I can’t possibly give all of these things proper respect!” Perhaps this is why we have so much mental illness that revolves around stuff in our times… people hoard, collect garbage (this is actually a symptom of schizophrenia), and just can’t seem to get themselves out from under their stuff.
The Solution
The path to the solution to this problem would include, of course, greatly reducing the amount of stuff that we and our kids have, and then teaching everyone to take good care of the stuff that they do have, and to show respect for the stuff that others have. That includes making sure to ask before using, and taking great care not to damage it while in use, and, if it does get damaged, to make reparation for it in some way. But we can only go so far with this while living in Babylon…
The FULL solution will come when we all understand that the greatest goods that we have are those that are given by God to all of mankind, in the bounty of nature that is so little recognized and appreciated. This is our riches, because we are the children of an extremely wealthy Father, who can make things like snowflakes and bunnies and stars out of nothing. All He asks is that we be good stewards of His bounty, that we make sure not to ruin it for future generations and not to hoard it. If our self esteem is connected to our wealth, then we will feel incredibly rich and important when we recognize that all of this has been given to us by our Father who loves us, and humbled when we realize how poorly we’ve been taking care of it. But our merciful Father will show us how to be proper stewards once more, and as we get over our selfishness and greed, for both things and knowledge, we will find the loaves multiplied once again, or manna from heaven, and an abundance for all.
(Originally posted at home-n-stead.com - reprinted here with permission from the author.)
Is Wal*Mart good for America?
Yes I’m still harping on that.
We watched this program a few nights ago after I found the DVD at our library (but it’s available on the PBS website in its entirety).
VERY interesting. It brings up all kinds of issues worth discussing. I recommend it.
A Catholic Framework for Economic Life
A Catholic Framework for Economic Life
A Statement of the U.S. Catholic Bishops
November 1996
As followers of Jesus Christ and participants in a powerful economy, Catholics in the United
States are called to work for greater economic justice in the face of persistent poverty, growing
income-gaps, and increasing discussion of economic issues in the US and around the world. We
urge Catholics to use the following ethical framework for economic life as principles for
reflection, criteria for judgment and directions for action. These principles are drawn directly
from Catholic teaching on economic life.
1. The economy exists for the person, not the person for the economy.
2. All economic life should be shaped by moral principles. Economic choices and institutions must be judged by how they protect or undermine the life and dignity of the human person, support the family and serve the common good.
3. A fundamental moral measure of any economy is how the poor and vulnerable are faring.
4. All people have a right to life and to secure the basic necessities of life (e.g., food, clothing,
shelter, education, health care, safe environment, economic security.)
5. All people have the right to economic initiative, to productive work, to just wages and
benefits, to decent working conditions as well as to organize and join unions or other
associations.
6. All people, to the extent they are able, have a corresponding duty to work, a responsibility to
provide the needs of their families and an obligation to contribute to the broader society.
7. In economic life, free markets have both clear advantages and limits; government has essential
responsibilities and limitations; voluntary groups have irreplaceable roles, but cannot substitute
for the proper working of the market and the just policies of the state.
8. Society has a moral obligation, including governmental action where necessary, to assure
opportunity, meet basic human needs, and pursue justice in economic life.
9. Workers, owners, managers, stockholders and consumers are moral agents in economic life.
By our choices, initiative, creativity and investment, we enhance or diminish economic
opportunity, community life and social justice.
10. The global economy has moral dimensions and human consequences. Decisions on
investment, trade, aid and development should protect human life and promote human rights,
especially for those most in need wherever they might live on this globe.
According to Pope John Paul II, the Catholic tradition calls for a “society of work,
enterprise and participation” which “is not directed against the market, but demands that the
market be appropriately controlled by the forces of society and by the state to assure that the
basic needs of the whole society are satisfied.” (Centesimus Annus, 35). All of economic life
should recognize the fact that we all are God’s children and members of one human family,
called to exercise a clear priority for “the least among us.”
The sources for this framework include the Catechism of the Catholic Church, recent
papal encyclicals, the pastoral letter Economic Justice for All, and other statements of the U.S.
Catholic bishops. They reflect the Church’s teaching on the dignity, rights, and duties of the
human person; the option for the poor; the common good; subsidiarity and solidarity.
Afternoon Tea
The Wal-Mart issue has sparked a good bit of conversation in my Yahoo group and we’ve gone down several different rabbit trails in the process. It’s certainly interesting and obviously not everyone agrees, though as always it is an amicable discussion.
Truly I do understand this is a much bigger issue but for my family the Wal-Mart thing has been a catalyst to looking at it more closely.
I know that the whole —big-box stores harm to local communities/harm to developing nations— problem is complex and how someone deals with that will look different depending on individual circumstances. I also know that our family really doesn’t need to shop at those stores, we have other options. But I also I know others might not have those options so I do think it’s an individual matter of conscience.
When I wrote that I thought Catholics “may have a moral obligation not to” shop at Wal-Mart I honestly meant that in the context of individual circumstances (thus my use of the word may). I don’t think it’s inherently wrong to shop at these stores but it may be wrong for individuals who can choose otherwise. But again I say may because it’s something you have to discern yourself.
Certainly there’s nothing wrong with wanting to get a good price for something but this is where I had to stop and ask myself if I was too used to getting things cheap. I think I was. I had stopped thinking about what was fair and all that it took to make an item –all the people and resources involved– and was just thinking about getting what I wanted at a low price. I had become a consumer.
That’s what we’re really focusing on changing here right now. Wal-Mart isn’t the only store we are going to be avoiding. As much as possible our goal is to support local businesses and avoid all the big box stores.
On a related note, here are a few links I’ve been purusing lately:
http://www.thesimpledollar.com
http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/channel/human-footprint
