Cardinal Felipe Arizmendi, Bishop Emeritus of San Cristóbal de Las Casas and responsible for the Doctrine of the Faith at the Mexican Episcopal Conference (CEM), offers Exaudi readers his weekly article.

FACTS

Our leaders have presented statistics to demonstrate that their government and party have managed to reduce poverty rates. How wonderful that would be! Certainly, social programs have helped many people, and that is now a constitutional right, regardless of the party in power; however, there is no shortage of wealthy individuals who also receive them, which raises doubts about whether the objective is to reduce poverty or to win votes in elections. Every senior citizen receives money every two months, even if they are not poor. All you have to do is be over 60, whether you are poor or rich, and you have your bimonthly financial support guaranteed! Is that helping the poor, or buying consciences for a political party? And it also depends on the method they use to measure poverty, because it is multifactorial. That there are still thousands of poor people is undeniable. We only need to step outside our comfort zone, and we will see how many people are barely surviving.

It is true that the general conditions in our towns have improved, but this is not solely the achievement of the previous and current administrations. Years ago, in Chiapas, particularly in the jungle, many towns lacked electricity, and now they do; there were no schools, and now there are; there are even high schools and some universities; there are more health clinics and hospitals, although sometimes they lack essential equipment. Around the year 2000, I had to travel in very fragile small planes to distant places because of the lack of roads; today there are highways everywhere, although not always in good condition during the rainy season. Women in general, especially Indigenous women, did not have access to education or politics; today all that has changed; they not only receive basic education from kindergarten through high school, but many also attend preparatory school and pursue various specializations at the university. Today they hold political positions at the local, municipal, state, and federal levels. It is undeniable that many aspects have improved, but I repeat that this is not only due to this government and its party, but also to governments and parties of previous six-year terms.

In my small town, the living conditions of most people have improved, not only because of government social programs, but also because of their work, their labor organizations, and especially the remittances their families send them from the United States. Now, Donald Trump’s arbitrary policies have severely impacted the economic situation of many families.

LIGHTNING

Pope Leo XIV says in his recent exhortation Dilexi te (I loved you):

“A concrete commitment to the poor must also be accompanied by a change in mentality that can influence cultural transformation. Indeed, the illusion of happiness derived from a comfortable life leads many people to have a vision of existence based on the accumulation of wealth and social success at all costs, which must also be achieved at the expense of others and by benefiting from unjust social ideals and political and economic systems that favor the strongest. Thus, in a world where the poor are increasingly numerous, paradoxically, we also see the growth of certain elites of the wealthy, who live in a very comfortable and luxurious bubble, almost in another world from ordinary people. This means that a culture that discards others without even noticing and indifferently tolerates millions of people dying of hunger or surviving in conditions unworthy of human beings still persists—sometimes well disguised. A few years ago, the photograph of a child lying lifeless on a Mediterranean beach caused a great stir, and, unfortunately, apart from some momentary emotion, similar events have are becoming increasingly irrelevant, being reduced to marginal news”  (11). 

“We must not lower our guard against poverty. We are particularly concerned about the dire conditions in which so many people find themselves due to a lack of food and water. Every day, several thousand people die from causes related to malnutrition. In wealthy countries, the figures regarding the number of people living in poverty are no less worrying. In Europe, there are increasingly more families who cannot make ends meet. In general, it is perceived that the various manifestations of poverty have increased. It is no longer a single, homogeneous condition, but rather translates into multiple forms of economic and social impoverishment, reflecting the phenomenon of growing inequalities, even in generally affluent contexts. Let us remember that ‘women who suffer exclusion, mistreatment, and violence are doubly poor, because they frequently have fewer opportunities to defend their rights. However, even among them, we constantly find the most admirable acts of everyday heroism in defending and caring for the vulnerable members of their families.’ While significant changes are being observed in some countries, ‘the organization of societies throughout the world It is still far from clearly reflecting that women have exactly the same dignity and identical rights as men. Something is stated with words, but decisions and reality shout another message’, especially if we think about the poorest women”  (12).

ACTIONS

Without expecting everything from the government, let each of us continue working to improve the conditions of our families and our communities. The development of our nation depends on all of us, organizing ourselves to advance in the economy and in all other aspects of life.