“If one member of Christ’s body suffers, all suffer. If one member is honored, all rejoice.” (1Corinthians 12:12-26)
“We are one human
family whatever our national, racial, ethnic, economic, and ideological
differences. We are our brothers’ and sisters’ keepers, wherever they may be.
Loving our neighbor has global dimensions in a shrinking world. At the core of
the virtue of solidarity is the pursuit of justice and peace. Pope Paul VI
taught that ‘if you want peace, work for justice.’ The Gospel calls us to be
peacemakers. Our love for all our sisters and brothers demands that we promote
peace in a world surrounded by violence and conflict.” (USCCB)
The present
notion of “America First” can be seen as a violation of the virtue of
solidarity, just as the notion of “taking care of number one” is. We are not individuals
living isolated from others, no matter how removed they may be. The “me first”
concept, whether as an individual or as a nation, rejects the call of Scripture
to become our brother’s and sister’s keeper, or helper in need.
This virtue of
solidarity requires of us a conscious effort to recognize how my actions and my
decisions affect others, even those who live across the globe. The work for
justice for all is not only our calling but it is also a way of working for
justice for each of us. As Martin Luther King said in 1963: “Injustice
anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an
inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of
destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.”
Understanding how our economy in the United States affects developing countries
across the world is part of our call to solidarity. From the person in my
neighborhood or parish who lacks enough food for today, the person of color in
the next town over who feels the bite of racism, the persons who feel alienated
from others because of a different belief system, to the person struggling
under brutal living conditions from oppressive governments in a far part of the
world; these all are my brothers and sisters and when they suffer I suffer
also. When they rejoice, I rejoice.
“Developing countries, where the most
important reserves of the biosphere are found, continue to fuel the development
of richer countries at the cost of their own present and future. The land of
the southern poor is rich and mostly unpolluted, yet access to ownership of
goods and resources for meeting vital needs is inhibited by a system of
commercial relations and ownership which is structurally perverse…As the United
States bishops have said, greater attention must be given to ‘the needs of the
poor, the weak and the vulnerable, in a debate often dominated by more powerful
interests.’ We need to strengthen the conviction that we are one single family.
There is no frontiers or barriers, political or social, behind which we can
hide, still less is there room for the globalization of indifference.” (Pope
Francis, ‘Lautato Si’.)
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