cla-annual-report

FROM THE CHAIRMAN

My Dear Sisters and Brothers in Christ, As a bishop, I am inspired when I see lay Catholics learning the gospel message of Jesus, discerning how it applies to the world around them, and then sharing their faith with their families, friends, neighbors, and even people in faraway lands. Catholics in dioceses throughout the United States empower this kind of ministry by supporting the annual collection that funds the US bishops’ Church in Latin America program. This program supports growth in spirituality and works of pastoral and social outreach, understanding that they are irrevocably intertwined. Jesus said that the greatest commandment after loving God was to love our neighbor—whom he defined as anyone in need. Grants from the Church in Latin America program equip Catholics throughout Central and South America as well as the islands of the Caribbean with the tools to carry out evangelization, pastoral care, social ministry, and vocational work in communities where faith is strong, but where many people earn barely enough to feed their families. In the following pages you will read about a few of the 252 grants totaling $6.2 million that your gifts to the collection made possible. One of many social action projects that you sponsored is a celebration of the World Day for the Poor in the Archdiocese of Sao Salvador de Bahia, Brazil. The day’s activities included a Eucharistic procession through city streets and a festival, where homeless and vulnerable people who live on the streets received medical care and haircuts while enjoying music and good food. In Honduras, leaders of all the parishes in one diocese are receiving intensive theological and practical training in Catholic social ministry, learning both the doctrine and the skills necessary to put that doctrine into action. And in Haiti,