As every year, between September 15 and October 15, around the date October 12, known as the day of the race or the discovery of America; or – better – as the meeting of two worlds: the European and the American, in the United States of America we celebrate HISPANIC HERITAGE MONTH. A celebration that began in 1968 with a week of Hispanic heritage, with Lyndon Johnson as president, and which was later extended for a month and approved as law on August 17, 1988, during the government of Ronald Reagan.
HISPANIC HERITAGE MONTH is an annual celebration in which the Hispanic American community is thanked for its cultural and material contributions to the progress and development of this great Nation and, at the same time, it is a magnificent opportunity for the Hispanic community residing in the United States of America, beyond parades, parties and folklore, to rethink our presence in this country, renew our first dreams and illusions upon arriving in this Nation and to embark on new paths that – here and now – lead us to better present achievements, for the common good and for the well-being and future of our next generations.
Over the last three decades, on various occasions and through various means, I have shared my concerns about the challenges facing the Hispanic community in the United States and the struggles it would have to endure to achieve full integration into this North American society and to have its contributions – of all kinds – to the life of this Nation recognized and justly valued.
This HISPANIC HERITAGE MONTH 2024 takes on special relevance for our Hispanic community, as we are in an election year. The latest national population censuses place the Hispanic community as the majority minority, with more than 63 million people of Hispanic origin residing in the United States, of which, nearly 40% were born here, and with – approximately – some 36 million Hispanics eligible to exercise the right to vote and with some 11 million Hispanics who remain undocumented.
The numbers show the importance of the Hispanic community in North American life, but also the importance that issues that concern Hispanics have in this country. Therefore, the immigration issue has special significance and weight in the electoral context and debate in which we find ourselves.
The ancient Greeks understood the exercise of politics as a daily task of all citizens, always seeking the good of the entire “polis” (city), the common good. Very close to this conception of politics, and in the face of populism (F.T. chapter 5), political corruption, corruption in the administration of public affairs, politicking and the pursuit of petty individual, sectarian and partisan interests, Pope Francis, throughout his Petrine teaching, has been exhorting us to exercise – from the commandment of love and universal brotherhood that spring from the recognition of the other as a brother and of all as children of the same Creator and Father – the “best politics”.
A “better politics” that has as its foundations – especially in the Encyclical Letter Fratelli Tutti, of October 3, 2020, social friendship, to think and create a better world (chapter 3). A world possible only through universal love that promotes moral good, freedom and equality, solidarity and the rights of individuals and peoples, with a heart without borders, open to the entire world (chapter 4), in dialogue with all (chapter 6), with political love and in politics, always in search of the truth (chapter 7) to achieve peace.
Faced with these calls from Pope Francis, which reveal and reflect the deepest longings of the heart of man, of every man, we can ask ourselves: What and how good and favorable for the Nation are the candidates and their electoral proposals? Are our partisan affiliations conscious, well-formed and informed, reasoned and reasonable? What are the true and deep reasons that motivate our political affiliations? Does our Hispanic community in the United States have honest, well-formed and informed political leaders? Do we and our Hispanic political leaders repeat – in the United States – the political vices of our nations of origin? Does each of us, with our political actions, strive for the unity of the Hispanic community in the United States or do we build small ghettos and outdated and petty nationalisms that divide and destroy political power and Hispanic strength in this nation?
The Hispanic community – with its problems – can no longer allow itself to be served by Democrats and Republicans only during election times. Democrats cannot take for granted the vote that the Hispanic community has traditionally given them, and Republicans, for their part, cannot seek the Hispanic vote while scorning the value and contribution of immigrants to the progress of this Nation. Immigration reform cannot be an issue only for election times or the card with which the politicians of the moment seek the votes of our Hispanic community.
After many decades in which immigrants have been mocked with the issue of immigration reform, the short-sighted and petty obstacles that the legislators of the moment, from both traditional parties, place on immigration reform and on the legal documentation of millions, can no longer be the reason and excuse for labor exploitation, persecution and the violation of the human dignity of immigrants.
There is an urgent need for a new conception of “Hispanicness” and “Hispanicity” in this nation. A new conception that integrates us, without the loss of our Hispanic and Latin American identity, with full guarantees and human and citizen rights to the life and progress of this nation. A new conception of Hispanicity that allows us to contribute and enrich ourselves with the best of our culture, values and traditions and to enrich ourselves – at the same time – with the new culture, language and values that we find here.
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops advocates for all these Hispanic issues and urgent needs in its NATIONAL PASTORAL PLAN FOR HISPANIC/LATINO MINISTRY. Plan that invites us all to evangelize, to be formed in the faith, to accompany families and all those who are in the ecclesial and social peripheries, to form young people as leaders of our communities, to actively participate in initiatives that promote immigration reform, to build a culturally diverse society and Church, to form ourselves in issues of the social doctrine of the Church and social justice, etc. (Cf. Parts IV and V).
I invite everyone to learn about this PASTORAL PLAN in their parishes and to actively participate in it. I invite you all to live this HISPANIC HERITAGE MONTH as an opportunity to celebrate and reflect on our being and our political and electoral work, here and now, as Hispanics/Latinos in the United States.
Mario J. Paredes is executive director of SOMOS Community Care, a social care network of more than 2,500 professionals who care for more than 1 million Medicaid patients in New York City.
