Since there will not be class Weds., Thurs., Friday of this week, the following is the assignment:
Go to the LINKS below. Go to the "Compendium of the Social Doctrine" link.
Find Section III, part c, articles 41-44.
Read these articles closely.
Read the first chapter of Enrique's Journey.
Write a reflection on the connection between the two pieces of writing.
How does one inform the other and vice versa?
Make your entry as meaningful and intelligent as your first postings.
They were excellent!
See you on Monday.
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21 comments:
I believe that the most powerful notion in this section of the Compendium to the Social Doctrine of the Catholic Church is the assertion that “we are all really responsible for everyone” (43). Amidst all of the theological verbiage in this document, these simple words hold deep importance. The responsibility that we, as Catholics and Christians, have for our fellow humans, cannot be shed or rescinded. In the early stages of Enrique’s journey, both responsibility and irresponsibility for the wellbeing of others are thoroughly illustrated. The small town in Mexico whose Mayor clothes and feeds Enrique and whose citizens offer what small amounts of money that they can, stands as a shinning example of how our responsibility for each other ought to be manifest in daily life. On the other hand, the judicial and municipal police, who beat and rob Enrique several times, evidence the ever-present human nature to place one’s own desires above their responsibilities to others. Their position of power, supposed trust within their communities, and Christianity (inferred since South America is overwhelmingly Christian) makes the actions of the police even more egregious — to whom much is given much is expected in return.
Another enlightening of the portion of the Compendium to the Social Doctrine of the Catholic Church explains the call for Catholics to “obtain social changes” and bring “the appropriate remedies to institutions and living conditions…so that they conform to the norms of justice and advance the good rather than hinder it” (42). The need for large-scale societal change is quite apparent in Sonia Nazario’s depiction of the lives of the immigrants in their home country. The abject poverty, inadequate schooling, and familial discord described as rampant in Honduras provide perhaps the loudest cry for social change. Without a change in the structures which subject so many people to these horrid conditions, their situations will be replayed for generations. All Catholics — those in power or those without it, those with great financial means and those with little, those living in these situations, near them, or thousands of miles away — share this responsibility for the care and protection of their neighbors.
There are two important themes in the first chapter of Enrique's Journey. The first is the tremendous amount of love it takes for Lourdes to give her children up in the hopes that she can provide a better life for them. Even though Ms. Nazario disapproves of the practice of mothers leaving their children, she paints a vivid picture of Lourdes' experience. Her (Lourdes') extremely difficult decision is a different sort of "dying to self" than the Christian idea of "putting on the new man". Yet Lourdes' decision to move to the United States and begin a new life, truly out of love for her family, bears an uncanny resemblance to the Compendium's insistence on "living life for others".
The other section in the Compendium that I would like to dwell on was in article 44. The Compendium states: "Man thanks his divine benefactor for all these things, he uses them and enjoys them in a spirit of poverty and freedom. Thus he is brought to a true possession of the world, as having nothing yet possessing everything..." Granted, this is a translation, but "poverty" is a very interesting word to use in this circumstance. Surely the document is not referring to the abject poverty that Enrique and his family face in Honduras. I believe that in this circumstance, the Fathers are speaking about a life solely focused on God and others. A life that eschews unnecessary spending provides for the opportunity to come into a closer relationship with our brothers and sisters, and I wonder if any of us, myself included (or the institutional Church for that matter) could stand up to this kind of an audit. But it also makes one wonder if all of the presents that Lourdes sends her children are really the equivalent of her being there for her children. To be fair, the majority of what she is sending them is money for the necessities, but at some point I feel as though she is sending gifts with the hope that they appease the children.
Jesus outlined the foundation of Christianity in the golden rule: love thy neighbor as thyself. However, as Article 43 affirms, Christians must serve all humanity because we all share human dignity and are created in the image and likeness of God (imago dei) and therefore, hold the responsibility of working for others: “It is not possible to love one’s neighbor as one’s self and to persevere in this conduct without the firm and constant determination to work for the good of all people and of each person, because we are all really responsible for everyone.” Although they possess very modest financial means and thus, encounter more difficult challenges than individuals with more wealth, Maria and Marco willingly welcome Enrique after Lourdes leaves for the United States while Aunt Rosa similarly embraces Belky. More significantly, even after Enrique leaves his grandmother after they fought and she welcomed into her house six other family members, including Marco’s newborn son Victor, Maria accepts her grandson back into her home. Additionally, Aunt Gloria welcomes her niece, Enrique’s girlfriend, Maria Isabel, into her apartment and acts as a maternal figure. Ultimately, these compassionate Hondurans demonstrate that, regardless of our circumstances, our responsibility to labor for the betterment of our human family remains unchanging and ongoing.
Article 41 notes that “[p]ersonal and social life, as well as human action in the world, is always threatened by sin.” Displaying their flaws as humans, Lourdes and Enrique submit to temptation, satisfying their vices and addictions and derailing not only their lives, but their loved ones as well. After experiencing rejection from his mother moving to the United States, from his grandmother forcing him from her home, and from his beloved Uncle Marco’s violent and unexpected death, Enrique feels overcome with despair and stops attending liturgy. In order to temporarily escape the realities of his cruel life, he develops an addiction to sniffing glue. This surrender prompts his grandmother to banish her grandson from her house to their outdoor garage and his girlfriend to distance herself from him, in an “off and on relationship.” More severely, he begins to smoke marijuana, accruing a hefty debt to his dealer. After his dealer threatens to kill his cousin because he cannot pay his debt, Enrique breaks into his Uncle Carlos’ and Aunt Rosa’s house, ransacking their valuables in order to cover his debt. Moreover, Lourdes, holding a steady job at a fish-processing factory but feeling lonely, becomes pregnant due to her affair with Santos. One year after his daughter is born, Santos abandons Lourdes, wastes their savings at a bar with a 15-year old girl, putting Lourdes in financial stress: “She can’t buy milk or diapers or take her daughter to the doctor when she gets sick. Sometimes they live on emergency welfare” (15). Thus, the selfishness of Enrique and Lourdes, while understandable and human, propels their already demanding lives in a downward spiral into misery and desperation.
Human beings are weakest when we feel hopeless, often causing us to give into temptation. As a human family, we are responsible for each other, which ultimately involves eradicating the conditions that pushed Enrique and Lourdes to despair: we possess the “…obligation of bringing the appropriate remedies to institutions and living conditions when they are inducements to sin, so that they conform to the norms of justice…” (Article 42). Enrique’s story reminds us that we must fundamentally work to transform the societal structures that keep so many people in poverty and to uplift them from despair. We must continue to give charitably to those who need it because societal transformation remains ongoing and unachievable in the immediate future. Ultimately, Enrique’s story provides the real-life examples of humanity’s responsibility to work for the betterment of everyone and to eliminate the conditions that drive people to despair and of sin’s destructive consequences on us and our loved ones.
Bereft of the maternal bond at a young and impressionable age, Enrique is left with a feeling of loneliness, but also a feeling of strong desire. A decade after his mother’s immigration and many years passed Lourde’s promised return, Enrique is without a stable home in a very unstable environment in Tegucigalpa, a place I cannot fully understand. The Compendium challenges Catholics to be truly responsible for everyone else (43). We are responsible, like the family members and neighbors who clothe, feed, and house him, but we are also responsible for the criminals and distorted officers of justice who beat Enrique. Social change and personal development is always challenged by sin, as the Compendium notes in section 41, and both central characters highlight the triumph and failure of society. The environment where Enrique grows up breeds sin from corrupt policeman, familial abandonment, and inadequate essentials.
These social ills push Lourdes to make a dramatic, but all to common, step to release herself from Honduras, but in the process leaving Enrique behind and committing both legal and spiritual sins. Responsibility for this situation is left both to this family, and all the other families, but also to us. The situation does not go away from building a big wall or skipping over articles like Sonia Nazrio’s in the newspaper. The essential conflict has been set up in this initial chapter, and it should be interesting to read and think keeping the Catholic perspective in mind.
It has been the effort of man to define himself as a being compelled by meaning and purpose to a conclusive end known and ultimately expected. Without meaning, his life has no intrinsic value, so he must apply it constantly to the minutia of his existence in order to obtain order before chaos, in order to establish life as a means to an end. He goes further and employs his love of determinants. The end, specific and unambiguous, is inevitable, the culmination of his existence.
Although comforting as a force predictable as time itself, his simple system of metaphysics negates an inherent quality of his nature, choice. Human freedom is the frightening attribute that reduces destiny to the responsibility of man himself. Where the determinists ascribes responsibility to a force beyond control, and falls behind inevitability as that which guides his existence, the other decides to control his destiny and make it as a derivation of his freedom. Ayn Rand in her novella "Anthem" summarized this responsibility:
"I wished to know the meaning of things. I am the meaning.
I wished to find a warrant for being. I need no warrant for
being, and no word of sanction upon my being. I am the
warrant and the sanction."
Thus, existence itself commands the obligation of man to control his destiny, to guide himself toward an end uncertain and yet the ultimate product of choice.
The "Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Catholic Church" applies the concept of freedom to the ethic of social justice. Man may achieve salvation, destiny in Christ, by freely choosing to obey a moral standard individually developed yet socially applied. His moral duty is to conform himself to Christ as “the necessary prerequisite for a real transformation of his relationships with others.” The Compendium shows unity between brothers as derived from individual unity with Christ and moves forward: “…all men are in fact called to one and the same destiny, which is divine…” Moral obligation towards another is inseparable from salvation with Christ and choice remains its source, its sanction.
Ideally, man may reach the secular conclusion that solidarity with his brother is a source of meaning and order within the greater chaos. Man, however, seems more inclined towards individualism, selfishness, and animosity. He is at once the arbiter of his self-destruction, best exemplified by his xenophobia, his fear of the unknown soul, the reminder of a humanity that reaches far beyond his own consciousness. An issue that rises and falls with man’s paranoia of the stranger is that of immigration in the Americas, the issue of people with nothing but the will to move forward in a destitute existence towards a better life. Illegal immigration into the United States, especially, is the constant reminder of the suffering experienced by people of the generally unknown lands to the south, lands foreign to the sensibilities of Americans who have the potential to aid their brothers. The prime example of this issue is the story of Enrique, a 17 year old Honduran, impoverished and ostracized by his own family, with only the desire to see his mother twelve years after she pursued the “better life” America purportedly offered.
"Enrique’s Journey," presents a family living near Tegucigalpa, the Honduran capital. Enrique, a small child whose parents have already divorced, lives a somewhat contented life with his mother until she leaves for the United States. He suffers the loss as a child would, confused and lost, while his mother suffers the desperation of acclimating herself to the reality of living illegally in the United States, with little money and overall success. Enrique responds to his loss by becoming reclusive and at times belligerent. The one relative who showed real compassion towards him is killed, and Enrique’s well-being worsens. His other relatives are unable to understand his loss, and punish him for misdeeds and mistakes, distancing themselves from him upon discovering his use of drugs. Twelve years of living in this fashion help Enrique resolve to see his mother again and he embarks on the dangerous journey through Guatemala and Mexico in hopes of reaching the United States.
Enrique’s story presents the life of a boy abandoned by his family and faced with the hostility of a journey through unknown countries. His overall mood is that he has been rejected by everyone near to him, the people who should have been there for him in his time of need. He and his mother encounter the animosity of people who have no necessity for brutality, and they succeed in evoking the xenophobic paranoia in people who prefer the ignorance of determinism and nihilism to the true enlightenment that accompanies the realization of human freedom of choice. The Compendium describes righteous action, responsibility and solidarity. "Enrique’s Journey" generally describes the opposite, the decrepit nature of mankind and the futility of freedom before the oppressive tendencies of those unequal to its obligation. The story shows man’s inclination to remain selfish before his duty to his friend in need, his indifference to social justice and his simultaneous proclamation of faith. Hope is not completely lost, though. The Compendium describes the universal destiny to which all mankind is called. If man can awaken from his tendency toward maliciousness, his love of attrition, he can still find salvation, the destiny of union of mind and conscience with brother and Christ.
When we meet Lourdes and her family, we meet an unmarried 24 year old mother of a seven and a five year old. Nazario writes that "[s]he can barely afford food for [them].... They have a bleak future. He and Belky are not likely to finish grade school.... Her husband is gone. A good job is out of the question" (4). She looks for hope (the active, Christian hope that Lewis wrote about) in the United States, and ultimately decides to leave her family in order to try to support them financially. In chapter one, Nazario chronicles the difficulties that both Enrique and Lourdes have after their separation. Lourdes, in an attempt to gain citizenship and bring her children to her, spends thousands of dollars on phony deals with supposed immigration counselors and lawyers. Enrique looks to drugs to fill the void of his mother's absence. The one person he found that he felt loved him, his uncle, was killed. He risks death to find his mother in the United States.
We see that both Lourdes and Enrique fall on difficult circumstances after their separation. They each struggle with their internal conversions, and attempt to work out of their love for one another in order to improve their lives. In our reflection on their circumstances, we should recognize "...the obligation of bringing the appropriate remedies to institutions and living conditions when they are an inducement to sin, so that they conform to the norms of justice and advance the good rather than hinder it" (42). Only after struggling through our personal journeys of conversion can we, Lourdes, and Enrique begin to realize the "newness of life" which comes with the victory of Christ's love in our hearts (Rom 6:4).
you are what you eat.
what they said.
the book gets you to thinking though: is life one big test? We're all threatened by sin, and yet, at the same time, we all feel a little threatened by the opposite. Oliver makes a good point. Are we really just tricking ourselves this whole time? Because is there really anything else than loving God and caring for His creation. I guess each "meaning" in life is striving in part for such a world in which that can happen?
It's all for a better life... but one could even argue, coming to America may provide better food, shelter, etc., but acts as that certain threat of sin in our lives. Obviously I am not cursing my amazing blesings, juust sayin.
these blogs are goood, but most of us pretty much have the same opinion sooo....
this obviously goes back to the immigration issues and such. yup, we all have a duty to each and every other being in this world, and I can't speak for everyone else, but reflecting on these things over and over again does absolutely nothing. What am I gonna do, and what's stopping me?
And I've already said this, and still, I'm in the exact same place saying the same thing.
What was stopping me from going to Camden? To Haiti? Anywhere I can dedicate my time, care, and love to my brothers and sisters?
uh oh... aand I'm still here.
I guess I'd just rather sit smugly at my computer and make a pathetic attempt to reach some stupid level of profundity to make myself feel better...
In reading the first chapter of Enrique's Journey, I think the thing that stood out the most was the fact that Lourdes never said goodbye to her son. And clearly, this boy adored his mother. He had no idea where she was going, or that he might not see her for years. We all know how children act when their mothers are gone. If you've ever babysat, you may know how a kid acts when the mother first leaves. To me, that scene from the book was by far the most moving. It is an emotional experience that I think we have all seen, yet on a scale many times more difficult to bear.
Enrique's Journey shows us the painful decisions that lead to one's leaving their own children behind in a desperate, third-world situation, only to risk life and limb in trying to get to a place one has only ever seen on TV (for short amounts of time, at that) in order to someday be able to provide for one's own in a more appropriate manner. Lourdes does not leave Tegucigalpa for herself--she does it for her kids, whom she will only speak to once a year, and may not ever see again. Lourdes is not perfect, but she is certainly not at fault for her situation or for her actions, which we may consider technically illegal, but she would consider (and the book gives support to this) entirely necessary.
In considering this chapter and the passage from the Compendium, we should dwell on one point. Every person has a duty to their fellow (paraphrased from 43). We have a duty to Lourdes, to Enrique and Belky, to so many other nameless people. Yet what does this truly mean? I think it means that we have a duty to do what we can to help those we can help. It may not be assistance to Lourdes, or even someone like her, but it is living our daily lives in a way that attempts to be in service to others. Though we may never be in direct service to Enrique or Lourdes--though their situations may not change at all--we are living a social ethic that is about service between people. In living these kinds of lives, we set a moral example for others, but, on a personal level, find ourselves fulfilled.
Jeremiah 22:3 informs us the Lords calling is: “Do what is right and just. Rescue the victim from the hand of his oppressor. Do not wrong or oppress the resident alien, the orphan, or the widow, and do not shed innocent blood.” As a ‘man of faith’ responding to this challenge, my response to Enrique’s Journey and the Compendium to the Social Doctrine of the Catholic Church, is to understand the connection between the two.
The highlight of articles 41-44 of the Compendium to the Social Doctrine of the Catholic Church is article 42 which states: “The inner transformation of the human person, in his being progressively conformed to Christ, is the necessary prerequisite for a real transformation of his relationships with others.” I am convinced that this underlying principle is key to understanding the calling of the church to recognize, understand, and assist others. This message of social charity is in evidence in Enrique’s Journey when Carlos Carrasco and the towns-people of Las Anonas demonstrate compassion and brotherhood towards Enrique. He is battered and naked, but, instead of turning him away, they offer him their daily earnings and clothing. This act of mercy is God at Work and indeed the “prerequisite for a real transformation of [relationships] with others.”
Article 42 of the Compendium to the Social Doctrine of the Catholic Church is another meaningful section of the Doctrine; in particular, the emphasis on the obligations to the followers of Christ. It obliges Christians to act in accordance with the teachings of Christ of “bringing the appropriate remedies to institutions and living conditions…so that they conform to the norms of justice and advance the good rather than hinder it.” Accordingly, I believe this message of awareness is the calling that the author of Enrique’s Journey is attempting to convey. By portraying the soul-moving struggles of a particular Honduran family, the despair and agony of a teenage boy, and instances; such as, children eating from rubbish (p. 26), the author is exposing law makers to the truth behind the immigration issue. This section of the Compendium challenges us to become the “new [men]” and through the first chapter of Enrique’s Journey we observe first hand why it is imperative that as Christians we find the remedies to the problem of immigration instead of ignoring this issue.
By staying informed of the decisions and policies of institutions who address the immigration issue, can perhaps be the first step in responding to the challenge of the immigration issue. On a personal level, even though I do not have the means to offer sanctuary to immigrants, I try to befriend people in similar situations. By reading Enrique’s Journey, I have become more aware of the problems of immigrants.
Just like countless other children living in Central America, Enrique is left behind as his mother journeys to the U.S.A. to find work and provide (send back money) for her family still in Honduras. The pain Enrique felt after his mother left leads his relationships with others to be shattered and his “personal and social life” to be severely threatened by sin. For the many years following his Lourdes departure, E feels nothing but rejection after countless family members turn their backs on him when he becomes too much of a burden. Enrique feels alone, and as if everyone is leaving him (i.e. his father left him to make a new family, his mother left him for the U.S., his uncles killed). After each rejection he falls deeper and deeper into a sin, and begins to rebel against his family and friends.
Enriques upcoming “journey” requires Gods grace in order to help him overcome his problems and assist him in fulfilling his goal to be reunited with his mother. As we read about the problems these children face with poverty and the dangers they face in theirs quests to find their mothers in the U.S., we realize how America is viewed in other countries, and how much we take our lives for granted. People immigrate here in search for better lives for not only themselves but also their families. Their lives are hard, and in addition to the discrimination they encounter, many are desperately longing to be with their families once more. This is why we must not insult them or leave them with no hope, but attempt understand the situations they are coming from. We must assist in improving their home countries so that so many do not have to make the dangerous journey to America in the first place.
The main connection between Enrique's Journey and the document on the disciple of Christ is that both deal with the role of a Christian in relations to the society's treatment of marginalized persons. While the disciple of Christ document addresses the role of an individual and that individual's faith in bringing about social change, Enrique's Journey presents a vivid depiction of social conditions in many impoverished Central American countries.
I believe that both of these views are essential to understanding our role as Christians. Enrique's Journey is highly emotional and serves to remind us that, although we may not face such horrible situations on a daily basis, we begin to look at the issue from a different perspective. This new perspective helps us to understand the situation in which Enrique, and countless others, find themselves. But this view should, above all, help us empathize with Enrique. Empathy, according to the church document, is essential to forming a relationship with God and our neighbors and in bringing about social change. As it says in paragraph 43: "In fact the more deeply we come to understand their ways of thinking through kindness and love, the more easily wil we be able to enter into dialogue with them." This quotation tells us that we must understand and empathize with our neighbors, including marginalized persons, in order to start a dialogue with them and through that dialogue bring about social change. The disciple of Christ document tells us one way in which we must relate to our neighbors to achieve salvation, while Enrique's Journey is a tool that we can use to relate to our neighbors, many of whom are marginalized persons. Through this dialogue and feeling empathy, we can begin to bring about social change.
Jesus Christ, however, “by suffering for us ... not only gave us an example so that we might follow in His footsteps, but He also opened up a way. If we follow this path, life and death are made holy and acquire a new meaning”[41]. And through this we are given that heavenly example, but this example must be shown to us in a different way as well so that we may "walk in newness of life".
Enrique is left by his mother, father, and uncle. No one remains to help him along this path. The only path he knows is one of sin. He does not have that relationship with others that is needed to achieve the inner transformation as a human being. He needs the appropriate remedies to living conditions that are inducement to sin.
It is not possible to love one's neighbour as oneself and to persevere in this conduct without the firm and constant determination to work for the good of all people and of each person, because we are all really responsible for everyone[44].
Enrique also does not have this. He constantly is being left alone with nobody taking responsibility to try to bring Enrique onto the correct path. His family and friends notice his flaws and addictions but just ask questions like the one posed to Maria Iasbel..."What do you see in him?" We should be able to respond with Christ and hope.
The Compendium to the Social Doctrine of the Catholic Church for me is a direct set of rules and guidelines as to how we must approach this situation. We as human beings have the responsibility to love everyone.
After reading the first chapter of Enrique's Journey and then reading part of the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Catholic Church, I believe there exists a strong connection, namely that we are all united through Christ. The Compendium says, "For since Christ died for all, and since all men are in fact called to one and the same destiny, which is divine, we must hold that the Holy Spirit offers to all the possibility of being made partners, in a way known to God, in the Paschal Mystery" (42). This quotation from the Compendium illustrates this notion that we are all working together towards a singular goal, eternal salvation. If you truly buy into this suggestion, you will find that justice, perhaps in the form of assisting Latin Americans gain citizenship in the United States, is the most important thing on Earth.
Furthermore, the Compendium states "It is not possible to love one's neighbour as oneself and to persevere in this conduct without the firm and constant determination to work for the good of all people and of each person, because we are all really responsible for everyone" (44).
But with all of that, becomes the ever-difficult question: How?
How do I love my neighbor as myself?
How do I work for the good of all people?
If I donate money to Central's mission drive, am I fulfilling my duty as a Christian, citizen, and human? It sure doesn't feel like it.
After reading forty pages of Enrique's Journey, I truly empathized with him. Yet, what did my empathy do?
Nick made the important point that nothing is stopping us from going to impoverished areas to help as many people as we can. But realistically, that probably will not be the case for most of us. When reflecting, I believe empathy is a good place to start. However, I think it would greatly benefit our class if we discussed how to turn empathetic sentiment into action so that this valuable book and its message are not reduced to words on the page of an Internet blog but used as an impetus to actually do something.
I find the most direct relation between the "Compendium" and the beginning of Enrique's Journey (or really, between the Compendium and the environment/times, arguments, and sentiments encircling our reading of Enrique's Journey) in the fourty-second and fourty-third paragraphs of the Church document.
The first citation: "The acknowledged priority of the conversion of heart in no way eliminates but on the contrary imposes the obligation of bringing the appropriate remedies to institutions and living conditions when they are an inducement to sin, so that they conform to the norms of justice and advance the good rather than hinder it." Smack in the face of those who would trumpet "keep your eyes on Heaven/suck it up while on earth" doctrines to people in poverty, this portion of the Compedium firmly establishes the activist role of Christians: as Believers, we are obligated to rectify and augment the institutions and living conditions of our brothers and sisters in Christ "when they are an inducement to sin," so that they more smoothly and successfully result in a society and existence of which Christ would approve. Chapter One of Enrique's Journey clearly indicates the tendency of Central American national and local institutions and living conditions to act as an "inducement to sin": Enrique and his neighbors, including policeman and government workers (representing some of the Compendium's institutions), slide quite easilly into sin as an escape from their poverty and forsaken lives, and resultant misery. For instance, regrettably like so many of the other people (particularly males, I gather) from his town, Enrique becomes addicted to sniffing glue and becomes an avid marijuanna user (at one point, Nazario tells us he has accrued a debt of some 400 U.S. dollars solely for the drug). It is here, in illustrations like that of Chapter One, that I find the necessity of more fortunate Christians to mobilize and demand/create positive change. It is also here, however, that I am conflicted with the notion of national sovereignty. I find that this conflict - the prerogative of Christian beneficence and giving vs. the independence of nations - is much of the crux of the debate over how America should react to illegal immigration.
The second citation: "[T]he more deeply we come to understand their ways of thinking through kindness and love, the more easily will we be able to enter into dialogue with them." Learning of the lives of immigrants like Lourdes and Enrique is an imperative; any decisions related to the issue of illegal immigration lacking an understanding of why the immigration occurs in the first place are inherently void. Before one goes out and argues one or the other side of the immigration debate going on at the moment, one must be informed. Just look at our extremely well-funded debate team at Central: each debater stocks and travels with a large trunk full of articles and information on their various issues. To properly debate, they must have information with which to argue. When one is informed, especially on an issue all about the livelihoods and well-being of other humans such as this, it can often spur one to make a "more Christian" (I'm sure Clive W. Lewis is cringing in his grave) or Christ-like decision. In the immigration debate, an understanding of the origins of illegal immigrants should cause an experience of empathy, sympathy, and, possibly, guilt. All three of these, especially in combination, will lead to action in the name of social justice. When those three reactions are based on CST, the result will be so much more fruitful.
Throughout the first chapter of Enrique’s Journey, Sonia Nazario vividly depicts the constant struggles and inhumanities that face a poverty stricken family within Central America. Specifically, Nazario focuses on a young child, Enrique, and his maturation process since the time of his mother’s departure to the United States. Stifled by the loss of his mother, Enrique finds himself continually making poor decisions in all faucets of his life. Furthermore, the loss of several different loved ones during various times of Enrique’s life only catalyzed his disobedient behavior, as we find an individual growing up in unsuitable living conditions with little to no parental guidance.
After reading the first chapter of Sonia Nazario’s novel, and then paragraphs 41-44 of The Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church, paragraph 42 oddly struck me as very informative toward Enrique’s Journey. “The Inner transformation of the human person, in his being progressively conformed to Christ, is the necessary prerequisite for a real transformation of his relationships with others” (42). The paragraph goes on to speak of conversion or transformation of an individual as the necessity or obligation to bring appropriate remedies to institutions and living conditions when they are an inducement to sin (43). Thus, given his circumstances it is understandable why he continually finds himself making shoddy decisions with his life. He is unfortunately a product of his environment, and unless his surroundings or the people who influence his life change, he will be unable to transform into a better person and will be left to constantly take the wrong paths in life.
Dear Fellow Bloggers,
Since we all have read both Enrique's journey and the Compendium, I regret to inform you that i will not be providing a detailed summary. I would like to say however that the first chapter of Enrique's journey certainly opened my eyes to the everyday struggle that immigrants encounter. After only reading a few pages it became clear that the media coverage of this issue excludes the human aspect and portrays immigration as merely a political issue. One of the defining images in Enrique's Journey is that of the children who rummage through the infested garbage dumps just trying to find a stale piece of bread. This image opened my eyes to the struggle of fellow humans that we often turn our backs to. The Compendium talks about how all Catholics have the moral responsibility to care for each other, and clearly we have not being doing a good job of this.
It is very easy for all of us to say basically the same thing in that we have to take care of each other, but performing this often proves to be problematic. How can we transfer our opinions and suggestions into acts?
In Ms. Nazario's prequel, she discusses her encounter with her Latino housecleaner and how it became the impetus for her indepth research that ultimately resulted in the book that we are now reading. For me, this was extremely profound, simply because Esther, our housecleaner, is an immigrant from Brazil. I profoundly remember her coming to work on Tuesdays and just start crying, because she feared the government would revoke her Green Card, and her legitimate status in the United States.
All in all, she used the money she maid to bring up her immediate family to Pittsburgh and all have joined her cleaning company full-time, a real success story.
Above all, as far as I have read, Enrique's Journey is an extremely sobering read. It really presses the reality of the situation. And after reading Nick's post, I began to wonder about the distinction between action (which Nick felt he had a lack there of) and understanding. What we really need to realize here is that the first step of purposeful change is understanding. Once we begin to decipher to complicated situation immigration is, the quicker we can act progressively and positvely on it. The great sin here is not acting, but in fact ignorance.
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