Five Things to Remember on Jan. 8

 

1.      For National Migration Week, January 6-12, USCCB’s Migration and Refugee Services has launched a postcard campaign that calls on Congress to pass just and compassionate immigration reform. You can send an electronic postcard to the local representative and senator from the Justice for Immigrants Website, http://www.justiceforimmigrants.org/index.shtml.

2.      January is Poverty Awareness Month. Today in America, over forty-six million people live in poverty. That’s over ten percent of all families and more than 1 in 5 children. Close to 23 million are unemployed or underemployed; our economy still cannot produce enough decent jobs. This is a scandal and a serious moral failure, but there is hope.  For over forty years, the Catholic Campaign for Human Development has been empowering families and communities to fight poverty and create economic opportunity because as Pope Benedict XVI said in Deus Caritas Est, “love for widows and orphans, prisoners, and the sick and needy of every kind, is as essential to [the Church] as the ministry of the sacraments and preaching of the Gospel. The Church cannot neglect the service of charity any more than she can neglect the Sacraments and the Word.”

3.      Ambassador Thomas Melady makes a strong case that Americans must take child poverty seriously in his guest blog on the USCCB media blog yesterday.

4.      Catholic Schools in the inner cities and urban areas remain a significant presence: four decades ago 46.5 percent were located in urban and inner city areas, today 42.3 percent of the schools are still in the urban/inner city locales.  During the same period of time, suburban schools increased from 25 percent to 36.5 percent. Source: “The Annual Statistical Report on Schools, Enrollment and Staffing; United States Catholic Elementary and Secondary Schools 2011-2012 published by National Catholic Educational Association.

5.      God loves you.