Category Archives: Solidarity

Une solidarité planetaire

Published by Henri Madelin
This article was posted in Solidarity.
Solidarity - image: Nicola Corboy (cc: by-nc-nd)

Solidarity - image: Nicola Corboy (cc: by-nc-nd)

“J’assumerai jusqu’au bout et en totalité les lourdes responsabilités que vous m’avez confiéees». Dans cette lourde corbeille de devoirs, se trouve aussi le désir de réaliser ce qui a été décidé au G20 de Cannes, qui s’est tenu sous présidence française les 3 et 4 novembre dernier. Mais à cette rencontre des 20 pays censés être les plus influents de la terre, la crise de l’Euro a accaparé les esprits et les discussions, ce qui n’a guère permis de faire progresser les dossiers les plus complexes qui sont souvent les plus marqués par l’urgence. En ces temps devenus difficiles, le chacun pour soi a rapidement repris le dessus. Il s’agit maintenant de sauver seulement la possibilité d’imposer une nouvelle taxe sur les transcations financières mondiales. Il faut faire participer la finance à la réparation des dégats qu’elle a provoqués», déclare le chef de l’Etat dans ses voeux télévisés du 31 décembre dernier. Continue reading →

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Europäische Solidarität – nicht zum Nulltarif

Published by Guest Author
This article was posted in Solidarity.
Solidarity - image: Wikimedia

Solidarity - image: Wikimedia

Artikel von Friedhelm Hengsbach, Nell-Breuning Institut

Die Europäische Union steht Kopf – nicht aus voller Begeisterung, mit der die Fans des Frauenfußballs derzeit in die Stadien der Weltmeisterschaft strömen. Vielmehr aus Sorge, Unruhe und Ratlosigkeit. Zahlreiche Menschen zweifeln daran, dass der real existierende Kapitalismus Recht hat, nur weil er in der Systemkonkurrenz siegreich war, und dass die finanzwirtschaftlichen und politischen Eliten in der Lage sind, mit der Finanzkrise fertig zu werden und die Verschuldungskrise europäischer Staaten zu bewältigen. Continue reading →

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De la détention à la vulnérabilité

Published by Elaine Rudolphi
This article was posted in European Consciousness, Solidarity.
image: JRS Belgium

image: JRS Belgium

Le JRS-Belgium vient de publier “De la détention à la vulnérabilité” (PDF).

Ce rapport présente les résultats spécifiques à la Belgique de la recherche européenne DEVAS (Detention of Vulnerable Asylum Seekers) dont l’objectif était d’identifier les facteurs qui accentuent ou atténuent la vulnérabilité des demandeurs d’asiles et migrants irréguliers dans les centres de détention. Cette recherche a eu lieu dans 21 pays de l’Union Européenne.

La spécificité de cette recherche est qu’elle a pris comme point de départ l’expérience des personnes détenues. Continue reading →

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CALL Network: Second General Assembly in Bucharest

Published by Hervé Pierre Guillot
This article was posted in European Consciousness, Solidarity.
CALL network - image: KEK

CALL network - image: KEK

From 11th to 13th May 2011, the ecumenical CALL Network (Church Action on Labour and Life) held its second General Assembly in Bucharest under the hospitality of AIDRom, the Ecumenical Association of Churches in Romania, which focuses on social and economic issues, serving those in need in Romanian society. It was an opportunity to take stock of the work carried out by the network since last year, to visit three social works where AIDRom is involved, to hear representatives from the churches, the State and from civil society give us their vision of the state of the Romanian society today, and to attend a workshop on “empowering people”. The General Assembly finished by issuing a Communiqué encouraging Churches to engage more actively in promoting solidarity in Europe. Continue reading →

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“Caritas Europa” in the World of Today

Published by Frank Turner
This article was posted in European Consciousness, Solidarity.

Caritas Europa - image: Caritas Europa

Caritas Europa - image: Caritas Europa

A talk by Frank Turner at the Caritas Europa meeting

I am honoured to be invited to join you today. To introduce myself: throughout my years as a Jesuit priest, I’ve worked in the area of faith and justice. I was a university teacher of ‘political theology’ – that discipline that takes politics, not only as the object of theological reflection, but as a source of theological reflection. But for the last thirteen years I have worked mainly in international affairs. I know Caritas Europa and CIDSE through my work here in Brussels, where the Jesuit European Office works on political affairs of the EU. I have also been on the Board of Trustees for CAFOD since 1998: and one Africa-related advocacy project of our office receives funding from CAFOD and SCIAF – and soon, we hope, from Misereor. So Caritas is important to me! Continue reading →

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Le Frère et l’Etranger

Published by Henri Madelin
This article was posted in Solidarity.
Friend and Stranger - image: Robbert van der Steeg (cc: by-sa)

Friend and Stranger - image: Robbert van der Steeg (cc: by-sa)

Liberté, égalité fraternité. Cette devise, issue des luttes et des espoirs de la révolution de 1789, est inscrite en lettres d’or au frontispice de nos bâtiments publics. Elle indique trois exigences du vivre ensemble qui ne peuvent être disjointes. La noblesse de la tâche politique est de leur donner corps dans la grisaille du quotidien et au milieu de circonstances toujours changeantes. Nous avons la chance de jouir de libertés personnelles et constitutionnelles dans une démocratie organisée. Le “privé”, si chéri et meurtri dans nos sociétés, a besoin de la protection du “public” pour pouvoir jouir d’un espace personnel. Quand les pouvoirs publics ne protègent plus les libertés fondamentales, c’est le périmètre de l’existence personnelle et des relations mutuelles qui se rétrécit dramatiquement. De plus, une égalité – diversifiée et non pas standardisée – entre hommes et femmes, entre races différentes, entre démunis et plus fortunés, n’est jamais donnée au départ; elle déplace chacun des positions qu’il occupe car elle ne peut se construire pas à pas qu’en visant l’égalité des chances pour chacun. Continue reading →

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The Crisis and Poverty

Published by Frank Turner
This article was posted in Solidarity.
Financial crisis

Financial crisis - image (by): alles-schlumpf

For this reflection I draw on two international reflection seminars among Jesuits and our colleagues, organised by the Jesuit European Office in Brussels, as well as certain external resources that were prominent in our minds as we met, such as Pope Benedict’s encyclical Caritas in Veritate. I have no competence to discuss the specific situation of Luxembourg, and my remarks will be general. The attempt to reflect on the crisis in relation to poverty entails a clear approach and perspective, for example relating this crisis – however briefly – to that of climate change (which threatens first and foremost the world’s poor) and to the ethical evaluation of the world economic order as such. Continue reading →

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Church Action on Labour and Life

Published by Hervé Pierre Guillot
This article was posted in Solidarity.

Labour - image: Jer Kunz

Labour - image: Jer Kunz

Church Action on Labour and Life (CALL): An Ecumenical Initiative to Promote Social  Europe

CALL. This resounding acronym stands for Church Action on Labour and Life. It is the name of a recently launched network that spans the whole of Europe (not only the EU, but also the Europe of the Council of Europe), whose aim is to “promote a Christian perspective in the debates on Europe’s economic and social policies”. Continue reading →

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Witnesses to Hope

Published by Frank Turner
This article was posted in Solidarity.

Alumni meeting

Alumni meeting - image: Frank Turner

Intervention at the 7th World congress of Jesuit Alumni/ae

Jesuit Alumni/ae, for a better Africa: What have we done? What are we doing? What must we do?

I thank the organisers for their imagination in inviting me to this rich experience. I was surprised, as well as pleased by the invitation, for three reasons. Surprised, first, since I am not a Jesuit alumnus. My only previous connection with the Jesuits was that my father had been a parishioner of the Jesuits: but he had been dead nine years when I entered the Society.  Secondly, I don’t know much about schools. I taught for one year when I was ‘in formation’, as we say, but with a notable lack of competence. Universities are much easier! Thirdly, though, I am especially pleased. Allow me to say that insofar as I am ‘converted’ to Christianity, however imperfectly, it is largely due to Africa: an  experience of fifteen months in my early twenties with Barclays bank in Ghana began to open my eyes, and to change my life: that, though, would be another story. Continue reading →

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Faith(s), Spirituality, Global challenges

Published by Frank Turner
This article was posted in Solidarity.

Frei Betto

Frei Betto - image: Frank Turner

Frei Betto (Carlos Alberto Libanio Christo OP) is a well-known writer and social activist, an adviser to the President of Brazil on the `Zero Hunger´ programme.
He began his presentation to the Ignatian meeting by considering `inner ecology`, the practice of compassionate self-awareness: ´caress your heart`; ask if your sense of humour is intoxicated with anger and arrogance, whether your gestures are aggressive and `poisoned`; consider whether you seek tolerance and forgiveness without sacrificing justice and respect for life, whether you treat everyone as an equal, whether they be ´devoured by misery` or lost in some illusion of their special nobility. Continue reading →

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