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About The Georgia bulletin (Atlanta) 1963-current | View Entire Issue (March 12, 1987)
Supplement to The Georgia Bulletin, March 12, 1!)87 A supplement to Catholic newspapers, published with grant assistance from Cath olic Church Extension Society, by the No tional Catholic News Service, 1312 Massa chusetts Ave. N.W., Washington, D.C. 20005. All contents copyright ® 1987 by NC News Service. Bearing a message of concern By Katharine Bird NC News Service I n groups of twos and threes they fanned out street by street, neighborhood by neighborhood, in sum mer 1986, knocking on the doors of 25,000 Hispanic homes in the cities, slums and farm com munities of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. The 451 visitors — most ly lay Hispanics, including many youths — brought their people a message of concern from the Catholic Church. The home visits were the open ing round in a five-year pastoral plan initiated by Los Angeles Archbishop Roger Mahony to con tact every Hispanic family in the archdiocese. An estimated 2 million Hispanic Catholics live in the archdiocese; many, though baptized, have no tie to their local parish; some are alienated Catholics. Lourdes Gonzalez-Rubio, mar ried 38 years and mother of six, trained home visitors in an area that includes many farm workers and migrants. A native of Ecuador, she is director of the evangeliza tion program for the archdiocese’s Santa Barbara region. In an interview at archdiocesan headquarters in a section of Los Angeles peopled by the homeless and the hopeless, she told of visiting a large poor family. “When we knocked on the door and said we came from the Catholic Church bringing a message from the archbishop, the man looked at me with an open mouth.” “You mean he knows about me?” he said. “The archbishop doesn't know you personally but he cares about you,” she replied. Though often hesitant or suspicious at the beginning, the majority were “delighted to be visited,” Mrs. Gonzalez-Rubio said. “For most it was the first time anyone knocked on their door in the name of the church. ” On occasion, the home visitors unearth people’s most wrenching worries. She told of a woman say ing, “I don’t want my husband to hear. We have a son going on drugs and don’t know what to do.” Home visitors are trained to res pond by offering a return visit or providing the name of a trained parishioner to contact. Mrs. Gonzalez-Rubio considers her efforts part of the church’s evangelization work. “We are all called to be evangelists,” to be present as brothers and sisters sharing in people’s problems and joys. Being an evangelist means addressing the whole person “both material and spiritual,” she said. “The Lord doesn’t want us oppressed or abused.” □ □ □ At Holy Cross parish, I spoke with Delfina Cuellar, 27, a single mother who worked for four years as an auto mechanic. She is among 30 home visitors who talk ed with 800 families in this problem-ridden section of Los Angeles. Unemployment runs 70 percent to 80 percent and for many it is a “survival existence,” said the pastor, Father William Jansen, a Comboni Missionary priest. Hous ing is expensive and crowded; the crime rate is high. Men scrape together rent money by selling Popsicles or oranges on the freeways; women work in gar ment factories, paid by the number of pieces completed. Asked why she became a home visitor, Ms. Cuellar said, “I like to help people, to share my faith and the love that I understand Jesus gave me.” For her, evangelization means “letting people know what they have in their church. It means opening people’s eyes and hearts to God in the world.” Many Hispanics in the parish area are undocumented, living in fear of deportation. Often they distrust authority figures and outsiders. The home visits are an instance where “the poor evangelize the poor,” Father Jansen said. It’s not “someone from outside” but one of their own who explains God’s word. Along with distributing a flyer about the parish’s wide range of services, including drug- and alcohol-abuse counseling and some legal aid, the home visitors obtain ed information about people’s situation — their work and hous ing, their religious and sacramental needs. People were encouraged to contact the parish. Many did. The home visits were only a beginning, Father Jansen em phasized. Many home visitors now lead small communities — made up for the most part of people visited during the summer effort — that meet weekly at home for prayer and reflection, and to discuss how religion relates to their life. “Religion isn’t indepen dent of life,” he added. Ms. Cuellar meets with nine adults on Friday nights. At the end of a year’s training, they will be invited to become leaders of other small parish groups. (Ms. Bird is associate editor of Faith Today.) What does it mean to be an evangelist? Katharine Bird discovers some answers when she travels to Los Angeles, one stop on Pope John Paul ll's visit to the United States this September. There, she interviews leaders and participants in a home visitation program designed to reach every Hispanic family in the archdiocese with a message of core and con cern from the Catholic Church.
