Hispanic Catholics ignored
By ARTHUR JONES
NCR Staff Washington
Despite the fact that by 2020 Hispanics will surpass blacks as the
nations leading minority and may also surpass whites as the dominant
ethnic group within the Catholic church, Hispanic Catholics are still
second-class citizens in most Catholic parishes, and racism is still strong,
according to a 1999 study.
Worse yet, according to a 1999 study, Hispanic Catholics are twice
as likely to worship in separate and unequal settings as in
equal settings. Hispanic parishioners frequently are required to
rent the church they belong to. In quite a few dioceses, a
relative minority of Euro-American Catholics who predate the Hispanics still
control the central functions of the parish, and the Hispanics, in effect,
constitute a parish within a parish. In fact, this relationship is
explicit: The Hispanics keep their Mass collections in a separate fund and use
monies to pay rent to the church for use of its sanctuary and
parish hall.
Disturbing too, are the statistics in this soon-to-be-released
U.S. bishops Hispanic Affairs committees study, Hispanic
Ministry at the Turn of the New Millennium. Those statistics deal with
dioceses with the most rapid increase in their Hispanic Catholic
population.
Charlotte, N.C., heads the list, up 84.3 percent in six years,
1990-96. And while the impact of the 22,735 new Hispanics may seem small,
so was the Catholic population absorbing them, 97,000.
A starker indication of the silent giant of shifting Hispanic
Catholics is in Atlanta, Ga., the third fastest growing diocese, after
Reno-LasVegas. The Atlanta Catholic population nearly doubled in a decade: from
158,00 in 1989 to 311,000 in 1999 while the general Atlanta population
increased by only 25 percent (4 million to 5 million).
Though the registered Hispanic Catholic presence in Atlanta
increased by 60,000 (80.1 percent, 1990-96), Atlanta likely has at least
another 300,000 anonymous new Catholics out there it can barely
touch. (The Millennium study says a conservative
estimate is that 67 percent of all Hispanics are Catholic. That means 300,000
of Atlantas Hispanic new arrivals are Catholic.)
However, says Gonzalo Saldana, Hispanic ministries director for
the Atlanta archdiocese, possibly only 15 percent of those newcomer Catholics
are known to the church.
The archdiocese does not have the resources to tap the new
Catholic arrivals among the more than 450,000 Hispanics who have arrived in the
past decade. A high percentage of them are undocumented, getting what The
Atlanta Journal-Constitution calls the big wink because the Georgia
economy is now so dependent on them. The archdiocese does train Hispanic
ministry catechists, said Saldana, but it has to rely on the parishes to do the
evangelization outreach.
Nationally, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, there were 23.3
million Hispanics in the United States in 1990, and that constituted 9 percent
of the population. The number has grown to 31.7 million or 11.6 percent of the
population today.
Other Millennium study findings include that:
- Nationwide even parishes with a significant Hispanic presence
do not offer culturally sensitive programs to Hispanics. Less than
a third of them have youth ministry, programs for adults preparing to join the
church, lay leadership training and parish renewal or cursillo retreat programs
in Spanish;
- Hispanic Mass attendance is much higher than commonly
believed;
- Hispanic men do not appear to be significantly less likely
than Hispanic women to participate in church activities;
- Christian base communities no longer are, if they ever were,
the quintessential expression of the Hispanic small group faith experience, and
in many dioceses, base communities have come and gone;
- The dominant small group faith experience for Hispanics today
is the charismatic movement;
- Significantly fewer priests and sisters receive continuing
education in Spanish language and Hispanic devotions and sacramental life than
at the start of the decade.
Hispanic religious vocations are low, with only 511 Hispanic
seminarians nationwide, and only one Hispanic priest per 10,000 Hispanics,
compared to one priest for every 1,200 Catholics in the general population.
Only 18 percent of U.S. dioceses offer English as a Second Language to Hispanic
seminarians; only 31 percent require non-Hispanic seminarians to study
Spanish.
In reporting findings of the Hispanic Affairs Secretariats
national mail and telephone surveys, a plus side, down side
comparison states that while 43 percent of dioceses do have lay leadership
institutes or programs for Hispanics, most Hispanic programs reach only adults
-- Spanish-speaking and English-speaking. Hispanic youth are not well
served.
While more dioceses do support Spanish outreach, theyre no
match for the proselytizing of Hispanic Catholics by Protestant groups, which
has increased dramatically.
Nor, apparently, is the diocesan structure for Hispanic support
consistent. While 44 Hispanic ministry offices have been created or upgraded,
10 were dismantled or downgraded. Hispanic ministry budgets are higher than
previously, Hispanic ministry staffs have doubled, the directors are better
educated and more professional, but collaboration between Hispanic ministry and
other diocesan departments is limited, and there is little sustained Hispanic
pastoral planning.
Contacted by NCR, study director Stewart James Lawrence of
Puentes, Inc., which researches partnership building in Latino communities
nationwide, said one key issue is that the next census will probably show that
newcomer Hispanics are 50 to 55 percent of the Hispanic population while
programs are being geared more to established Hispanic/Latino communities
settled for two and three generations.
Another factor no one wants to talk about, said
Lawrence, a recently baptized Catholic who is a member of Washingtons
Sagrado Corazón Parish, is that newcomer Hispanics feel social
discrimination and feel locked out by existing Hispanic and Latino
entrenched populations.
Its very hard for the newer Hispanics to find any
foothold in these Catholic parishes. Central Americans in Long Island, N.Y.,
switch to Protestant churches because they feel shut out by an earlier
generation of Latinos, even in Hispanic oriented parishes. But nobody likes to
talk about that stuff.
Its a fear among quite a few people in dioceses where
the [Hispanic] population is overwhelmingly foreign born, such as Arlington,
Va., and many out west, he said.
The essence of the study, said Lawrence, is that the problem
of participation is a problem of leadership. If you dont foster, or allow
the fostering of a dynamic of leadership within the Hispanic Catholic
community, if you dont foster a dialogue between that leadership and the
existing leadership in parishes and dioceses, youre not going to have the
vibrant multicultural or bicultural church that all these documents have been
proclaiming for the past 25 years.
The biggest weakness, he said, is that in most dioceses there is
not a collaborative Hispanic ministry being implemented from the get-go.
Its an inherent problem. Collaborative ministry is a prophetic vision.
Weve not been there before. The church articulates it but doesnt
follow through.
In the studys summary, Lawrence writes that if he finds
major shortcoming in the progress of Hispanic ministry since 1985, it is
not because he is unaware of the tremendous progress: 21 Hispanic bishops and
Hispanic ministry offices in 150 dioceses.
There can be no doubt, on paper at least, writes
Lawrence, of the churchs and the bishops historic commitment
to Hispanics.
But what about Hispanic Catholics being charged to use the parish
sanctuary and church hall. Dont the bishops know its going on?
Sure they do, said Ronaldo Cruz, who directs the
bishops Hispanic Affairs Secretariat. Thats part of the task
of education. People have to be informed of the disparities. Its part of
why we have Encuentro 2000.
The U.S. bishops are currently sponsoring Encuentro 2000 in July,
the fourth nationwide Hispanic gathering since 1972. This time it is
nationwide, but different from past meetings in that instead of a huge
gathering, the focus is on parish-level groups at which Catholics are
encouraged to tell their multicultural stories in order to understand
others.
The Millennium study, said Cruz, is the Hispanic
Affairs committees more scientific alternative to the
customary encuentro (encounter) consultation process.
Like Encuentro 2000, he said, the study is the beginning of a
process. Asked if critics would remark that Hispanic Affairs is always a
beginning process, Cruz replied, Thats true, and part of the
reason for that is because we have such constant incredible change going
on.
The U.S. bishops Hispanic Affairs committee will release the
study in March.
Program Priorities for Hispanic Ministry /Table
28 |
Programs: More Hispanic formation and lay
leadership programs Hispanic language and cultural education for priests and
diocesan personnel More Hispanice priests and pastoral workers assigned to
Hispanics Youth Ministry Base Communities and RENEW Evangelization and
outreach to newcomers and lapsed Catholics Media programs Improved
guidance for charismatic renewal and cursillos Vocational retreats and
discernment Popular religiosity Community organizing/social
justice Legalization and other social services
|
Percentages: 59
47
26
23 21
19 7
7 6 6 4 4 |
Respondents were free to list more than one
area. |
Hispanic Reality at a glance /Table 29 |
Total Population of US
Hispanics Percent of US Population Percent of US Population under
25 Hispanic Percent of US Population in 2010 Black Percent of US
Population under 25 Hispanic Population, Native-Born (1980) Hispanic
Population, Native-Born (1990) Catholic Growth since 1960 Due to
Hispanics Catholics who are Hispanic Hispanics who are Catholic
(1994) Hispanics who are Catholic (1998) Number of Hispanic
Parishes Hispanic Percent of US Parishes Number of Hispanic
Priests Hispanic Percent of US Priests Catholics per US
Priest Hispanic Catholics per Hispanic Priest Number of Hispanic
Seminarians Hispanic Percent of US Seminarians |
23-30
Million 11.3% 14% 13.8% 12.6% 80% 64% 71% 30% 71% 67% 3,509 17.9% 2,005 3.8% 1,230 9,925 511 11.1%
|
National Catholic Reporter, February 11,
2000
|