On the one-year anniversary of the Jan. 12, 2010 earthquake that
devastated Haiti's capital, three committee chairmen at the U.S.
bishops' conference have outlined concrete steps to help the troubled
island nation's recovery efforts.
The three bishops –Bishop Howard J. Hubbard of Albany, Archbishop
Jose H. Gomez of Los Angeles, and Archbishop Thomas G. Wenski of Miami–
made their proposals as they marked the first anniversary of the
earthquake that killed 250,00 Haitians and left much of Port-au-Prince
in ruins.
A million residents of Port-au-Prince remain homeless, with many
still living in emergency tent housing.
Catholic Relief Services told
CNA on Jan. 11
that the recovery was proceeding slowly due to a lack of infrastructure
in the dangerously overcrowded city, which is still filled with rubble
from collapsed buildings.
Bishop Hubbard, chairman of the U.S. bishops' Committee on
International Justice and Peace, acknowledged the slow pace of progress
in Haiti. He noted that recovery was “particularly challenging” for a
country that has long faced “grinding poverty and its effects” in
addition to the natural disaster and a subsequent ongoing cholera
epidemic.
Foreign aid, he said, needed to target Haiti's long-term needs and
help the country to develop its own capacities. To this end, he urged
the U.S. Congress to reintroduce legislation similar to last year's
“Haiti Empowerment, Assistance, and Rebuilding (HEAR) Act.”
A bill of this kind, he said, “would provide a framework to guide
long-term, comprehensive assistance to Haiti.”
Although an estimated
3,000 non-governmental organizations are currently working to help
Haiti, some critics have noted their lack of coordination with one
another, and their focus on immediate relief rather than sustained
redevelopment.
Archbishop Gomez, head of the bishops' committee on migration,
detailed several policies by which he said the United States could help
Haitians.
He urged the U.S. government to speed up the process for
allowing the 55,000 Haitians it had approved for traveling to the U.S.
to be reunited with their families who are already there.
He also asked the government to consider reassigning Haitian
immigrants who arrived after the earthquake with the “Temporary
Protected Status” that would prevent them from being forced to leave.
Many Haitians depend upon money sent back to the country by their
relatives abroad.
Archbishop Gomez also urged the Obama administration to reconsider
its plans to start deporting criminals from Haiti back to their native
country rather than keeping them incarcerated in the U.S.
He warned that
such deportations could “further de-stabilize” Haiti and its capital
city, where gang violence has become epidemic and jail facilities in
some places no longer exist.
The chairman of the U.S. bishops' Haiti Advisory Group, Archbishop
Thomas G. Wenski, gave advice to Haiti's own government as well as its
international partners, urging them to recognize and facilitate the
Catholic Church's central role in the recovery efforts.
“The Church remains the one functioning network in Haiti that is able
to get things done,” he observed. “The Haitian government and the
international community ignore the Church to the detriment of the
overall goal of helping Haitians help themselves.”
Archbishop Timothy Dolan, President of the United States Conference
of Catholic Bishops, also wrote to his Haitian counterpart –Archbishop
Louis Kebreau of Cap Hatien, president of the Bishops' Conference of
Haiti– to express his condolences and support to the Haitian Church on
the anniversary of the earthquake.
Archbishop Dolan prayed that God's “unfailing presence” would
strengthen the “bonds of communion and solidarity that have bound us
together in the wake of this tragedy,” allowing Haitians and others “to
work towards a new Haiti where peace and justice and the love of God
shall reign.”
The U.S. bishops are also inviting Catholics to pray a special novena
to Our Lady of Guadalupe for the people of Haiti. The novena starts on
the evening of the anniversary, January 12, and culminates with the
celebration of Mass the weekend of January 22-23.
The novena can be found online at: http://www.usccb.org/haiti/one-year-later.shtml
SIC: CNA/USA