The Environmental Activism of a Filipino Catholic Faith Community: Re-Imagining Ecological Care for the Flourishing of All

Extensive open-pit mining activities in the Philippines since the 1970s up to the present confront the meaning of the “Church of the Poor”, a description that the Catholic Church in the Philippines uses to visualize its prophetic mission. Alongside mining, many more environmentally destructive industries are present in the poorest areas in the country, even though the Philippines is disaster-prone and one of the world’s most vulnerable countries to the devastating effects of the climate crisis. The environmental degradation has prompted many Filipino Catholic organizations and communities to act together through various campaigns to address the problem. The article examines a case of a faith-based community that rose to the challenge to address various environmental issues their community was and continues to experience. The community’s environmental activism presents a viable model for a re-imagined ecological care towards the “flourishing of all” as a response to Pamela McCarroll’s call to action to continue conversations on the many ways practical theology can move beyond anthropocentrism while focusing on social justice.

Religion

This chapter discusses the impact of religion on welfare state development in Europe, North America, and the Antipodes. In one perspective, religion is seen as a cultural force: the tenets of the Christian doctrines have strongly influenced the notions of social justice on which modern social policies were built. Varying ethical principles gave rise to different institutional forms of distribution, redistribution, and social protection and to different demands for social security, which ultimately translated into distinctive economic and social outcomes. In another view, religion is seen as a political force: the social and political movements of organized religion, particularly Christian democracy and Catholic organizations, have shaped programmes of social reform and influenced social policy formation and outcomes.Both perspectives have major shortcoming and this chapter therefore promotes a re-specification of the link between religion and the welfare state to refine and improve upon the existing views. The new approach highlights the interplay between socio-economic (class) and religious (state–church) cleavages on the one hand, and electoral systems (majoritarian or proportional) on the other. In majoritarian systems, pro-welfare state political coalitions are less likely to emerge than in proportional systems. This explains the huge contrast between the Anglo-Saxon lean welfare states and the more generous welfare states in Europe. However, taking into account the difference in cleavage structures and the party systems between Nordic and continental Europe, the new approach also explains why the former developed more universal and generous welfare systems than the latter.

Care and educational activity of the Salesians in Prague in years of People's Poland

The Society of Saint Francis de Sales was founded by St. John Bosco. The guiding principle of the activities of the Salesians was to take care of abandoned and neglected youth. St. John Bosco (b. 1815, d. 1888), who had the good of young people at heart, launched his works in Turin and gave an example of how to make friendly contacts with young people who were waiting for understanding, spiritual support or the warmth of the family. Henceforth, he funded the Oratory, a place that was a substitute for a family home, where love for God and people was sown and deepened. In the Oratory created by John Bosco, his charges, usually vagrants, street children, people with prison experiences, met with understanding, spiritual values, kindness, help, in an atmosphere conducive to overcoming various types of mental crises, as well as material support. Don Bosco also ensured that they would receive education, mainly vocational one. Although he had no formal pedagogical education, St. John Bosco intuitively sensed the needs and expectations of young people. A distinctive characteristic of the educational method developed by St. John Bosco was its preventive system (pre-emptive, anticipatory). Its three pillars are reason, religion and educational love. In 1898 the Salesians came to Poland to Oświęcim where their Motherhouse still exists. After Poland had regained her independence and undergone structural changes, the parish of the Sacred Heart of Jesus was established in Warsaw's Praga district in 1919 and a few years later the Salesians officially took over the basilica, opening an oratory for abandoned, loitering youths in its basement. Praga was a working-class district populated mainly by poor and unemployed people, living in cramped flats with numerous offspring. In pursuit of earnings parents often did not have the time and skills to take care of their own children, hence there was a high crime rate in this district. The Salesians managed to create an educational community and appointed Fr. Ludwik Rupala, a strict follower of the instructions of St. John Bosco and one of the most outstanding educators with many years of teaching practice, to the position of the head of the Oratory. Rupala was in charge of the Oratory from 1934 until the outbreak of World War II. During the war, the Oratory could not function officially and it was only after 1945 that work with youth was resumed, but in a revised format. This change was dictated by the then prevailing communism in which religion was not tolerated, therefore the functions of the Oratory were taken over by altar boys. The authorities tried to make tutelage more difficult for the Salesians, who, in their eyes, were treated as followers of religion, an opium for the people. The scientific, socialist worldview was the leading theme in Polish schools, where there was no room for either religion or Catholic organizations that successfully functioned in the pre-war Polish education. Despite admonition from the church hierarchy regarding the removal of all religious elements from schools, the state authorities have not changed their position on this issue since 1947. Irrespectively of the position of the authorities, the Salesians unofficially continued their educational and pastoral work among the Praga children and youths, organizing summer holidays, providing shelter, developing interests, promoting culture, creating a healthy educational environment, cultivating Christian traditions by putting on Nativity plays and the Passion of the Lord, receiving the Eucharist. And the reluctance of the residents of both the district and the citizens of the country towards the new system has integrated them, as more and more young people clung to the Praga Oratory which was providing home warmth, religious education, entertainment, education and relaxation.

The Mediation Effect of Lay Participation on the Relationship Between Transformational Leadership and Pastoral Effectiveness: Evidence from Saint Antonio Parish, Motael, Dili

Pastoral effectiveness is an important factor in the success of pastoral activities in Catholic organizations, particularly at the parish level. Pastoral effectiveness can be influenced by transformational leadership and by lay participation. The aims of this research are (1) to examine and analyse the influence of transformational leadership and lay participation on pastoral effectiveness in Saint Antonio Parish, Motael, Dili, (2) examine the influence of transformational leadership on lay participation; and (3) to examine how lay participation mediates the relations between transformational leadership and pastoral effectiveness in this same parish. This research used questionnaires to collect data, with a total of 378 samples, and SMART-PLS 3.1 was used to analyze the data. The results of the research show that transformational leadership and lay participation indeed have a significant and positive influence on pastoral effectiveness. Transformational leadership also has significant impact on lay participation, while lay participation plays a significant role on the relationship between transformational leadership and pastoral effectiveness. This research could enrich the inferential studies on transformational leadership, lay participation and pastoral effectiveness in Catholic Church context which is still lacking. It also contributes to the improvement of pastoral effectiveness, especially within Saint Antonio Parish, Motael, Dili, and in the archdiocese of Dili in general by adopting transformational leadership and lay participation.

Knowledge Sharing in Catholic Organizations

This study examines knowledge sharing in Catholic organizations. The authors adopt Schein's organizational culture theory that facilitates, or inhibits, knowledge sharing in organizations. Thus, they address the phenomenon at the three levels: the artifacts, the norms and values, and the underlying assumptions. Considering the chosen settings, they study the contributions of individuals having taken vows, the organizational rituals, the significance, and the sense of community perceived by the organizational members. Data were gathered using a survey and were analyzed by using a fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis. The study provides the causal configurations of conditions that lead to tacit, explicit, and total knowledge sharing. They also offer the causal configurations of conditions that lead to the absence of each kind of knowledge sharing. Given that the qualitative results cannot be generalized, the study can still be replicated in organizations without restrictions.

Radio Education in the Andes During the Second Half of the 20th Century

In 1947, a Colombian priest, Padre José Joaquín Salcedo Guarín, established a small radio station in Sutatenza, Boyacá to provide basic literacy education for poor peasants. Over the course of the 1950s and 1960s, Salcedo’s pioneering example gave rise to hundreds of similar initiatives across the Andes. Amid widespread illiteracy, entrenched poverty, and a mountainous terrain that limited access to state institutions and the mainstream media, radio was seen as a technology of immense promise that could increase education levels and stimulate development. The escuelas radiofónicas (radio schools) were an innovative form of distance learning designed to be followed in groups within the home or in a community building. In other parts of the world, radio education was largely delivered by secular agencies, but in the profoundly Catholic Andean region they had a strongly religious character, being operated by priests and funded by international Catholic organizations. Although hailed by many for their transformative impact on rural communities, others criticized their “developmentalist” assumptions and tendency to spread anticommunism. Initially focused on basic numeracy and literacy, radio schools later included programs on agricultural techniques, health, family relationships, music, and spiritual guidance, which were accompanied by newspapers, pamphlets, and readers. Peasant leaders and so-called auxiliaries were recruited and trained to promote radio school attendance and reinforce new ideas and practices. As the tenets of liberation theology filtered out through the Latin American clergy in the 1970s and 1980s, radio education acquired a more activist tone and moved away from didacticism toward community participation, often having a cultural and political impact far beyond that intended in the 1960s. Cultural and economic changes of the late 20th century brought an end to many such radio schools, but a number persist and radio continues to be vitally important among rural Andean populations.

Миграционный кризис в Европе и христианское милосердие: история одного прихода

В статье на примере Италии анализируется социальная работа католических организаций, адресованная беженцам и иммигрантам. Работа написана с использованием полевого материала автора, собранного в одном из католических приходов Болоньи. Цель статьи – проанализировать отношение к миграционной ситуации в Европе ее крупнейшей конфессии – Римско-католической церкви – и изучить формы социального служения католических организаций среди беженцев и иммигрантов. Актуальность темы определяется тем, что задача адаптации беженцев и иммигрантов и их интеграции в принимающее общество остро стоит в настоящее время во многих европейских странах. Государства ищут приемлемые для себя пути этой интеграции. Законы, регулирующие иммиграцию и определяющие статус беженца и иммигранта, часто становятся предметом жарких политических споров. От светского дискурса о миграционном кризисе и мигрантах, зачастую подчеркивающего прежде всего права той или иной стороны, отличается дискурс религиозный. Позиция христианских организаций Европы заключается прежде всего в сострадании к беженцам и мигрантам и стремлении улучшить их долю. Миграционный кризис в Европе сделал европейские христианские организации более заметными и способствовал деприватизации религии в сильно секуляризованном обществе. Христианские организации, и в частности приходы и благотворительные структуры Римско-католической церкви стали важными акторами в выстраивании отношений с мигрантами и их интеграции в европейское общество. Ключевые слова: Миграция, Европа, Италия, Римско-католическая церковь, социальное служение. The article, using Italy as an example, analyzes the social work of Catholic organizations, addressed to refugees and immigrants. It is based on the author's field material, collected in one of the Catholic parishes of Bologna. The goal of the article is to analyze the attitudes to the migration situation in Europe from the part of its largest denomination – the Roman Catholic Church – and to study forms of social service of Catholic organizations among refugees and immigrants. The significance of the topic is determined by the fact that now many European states face the challenge of adaptation of refugees and immigrants and their integration into the host society. They are looking for acceptable ways of this integration. The laws that regulate immigration and stipulate the status of a refugee and an immigrant often provoke heated political debates. The secular discourse about the migration crisis, which usually emphasizes the rights of one of the sides, differs from the religious discourse. The position of Christian organizations of Europe consists first of all in the compassion to refugees and migrants and in the hope to possibly improve their fate. The migration crisis in Europe made European Christian organizations more visible and contributed to deprivatization of religion in a highly secular society. Christian organizations in general and Roman Catholic parishes and charity structures in particular became important actors in building relations with migrants and integrating them into the European society. Key Words Migration, Europe, Italy, Roman Catholic Church, social service.

ALL’INDOMANI DEI PATTI LATERANENSI (1929) – LE REAZIONI DEI CATTOLICI ITALIANI

After an overview of the Italian Catholics expectations towards the solution of the Questione Romana, this study carries out a review of the reactions to the signing of the Patti Lateranensi from the clergy and laity. We will see the endorsements of many, who saw in the event the end of years of contrasts between Church and State, both the achievement of an agreement with the fascist regime. At the same time, not the reservations and disappointments were lacking, even though they were minority of exponents of the dissolved Partito Popolare, which saw in those arrangements an undue support to the political establishment; others predicted changes in the programs of the Catholic organizations, directing them to form culturally and spiritually especially the élite members of the laity. After Mussolini’s speeches in the Camera dei deputati and in the Senato, on the procedures for the ratification of the Patti, the claim of the State’s superiority over the Church were viewed with concern. The tensions were loosened, inaugurating a consensus cooperation, but not free of momentary friction. However, the regime’s attempt to configure its own religion had to fade away in the face of the persistence of convictions and long-established cultic practices.

From Conservative Moral Management to Survival: Conclusions

The conclusion brings together the main findings of the book. It argues that as a whole the book has shown that the value system the Daughters of Charity promoted through their moral management was rather conservative and attached to medieval mentalities. The chapter points out that although most religious companies operate on the principles of moral management, the Daughters of Charity were unique in their systematic and holistic implementation. This is one very important reason for the survival of the Company well into the 21st century. Louise de Marillac was canonized in 1934, and the Company employs today more than 14 000 sisters in 94 countries. It is one of the most important Catholic organizations in France.