Why Pope Francis will visit Chile’s Araucania region

January 10, 2018 CNA Daily News News Briefs 0 Print

Temuco, Chile, Jan 10, 2018 / 03:03 pm (ACI Prensa).- Pope Francis will spend a day in Temuco, the capital of a Chilean region with a large indigenous population, during his Jan. 15-18 visit to the nation. The city’s bishop has said the Pope decided to come to the area because it represents Chile’s peripheries.

“If we look at where the Pope likes to go when on a visit, it is precisely the borders, the existential borders, where there is pain, where there is suffering, where there are wounds, where there is poverty, Bishop Hector Vargas Bastidas of Temuco told ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language sister news agency.

Temuco is the capital of Araucania, a region in south-central Chile where one-third of the population is ethnic Mapuche, who are by far the country’s largest indigenous group.

Bishop Vargas offered the indigenous population, their conflict with the Chilean state, and the region’s poverty as three reasons Pope Francis has chosen to visit Temuco.

During his Jan. 17 visit to the city, the Pope will say Mass at Maquehue Airport and will lunch with inhabitants of Araucania at the Madre de la Santa Cruz house.

Bishop Vargas explained that some 200,000 Mapuche people live in Araucania and live profoundly  “their Mapuche identity, their worldview.”

While many Mapuche have moved to Santiago, the Chilean capital, many who have remained in Araucania live in their communities led by and encouraged by their ancestral authorities.

“There is a very great richness there,” the bishop explained. “This is a region where the issue of inter-culturalism is lived out and understood more and more, so this is a very important reason that the Pope certainly considered in planning his visit.”

He cited the Mapuche conflict as a second reason for Pope Francis’ visit.

Chile incorporated Araucania by military conquest between 1861 and 1883, and the manner of the region’s “pacification” led to “a major rift  between the government and the Mapuche people,” Bishop Vargas explained.

“A very great historic debt was created with this people, who are still waiting for this debt to be rectified,” he said.

Mapuche communities ask for the return of ancestral lands, respect for their cultural identity, and even autonomy.

Even though the majority of those involved in trying to settle the conflict are working to find solutions, the bishop pointed out that some radicalized groups in the minority “unfortunately think that this can be solved or that much more rapid progress can be made through violence.”

From 2014 through 2017, thirteen Catholic churches were burned by these groups.

“The violence has only brought more poverty, new injustices, and new suffering,” the Bishop of Temuco lamented. In 2016 he took on the responsibility of acting as a facilitator in talks between the government and the Mapuche people.

Finally, Bishop Vargas explained that among the country’s 15 regions, Araucania “ranks first in poverty in Chile.”

According to a 2015 government survey, 23.6 percent of the people in this region are living below the poverty line, the highest rate in the country. And a 2017 survey showed an unemployment rate in the region of 8.4 percent, the nation’s second highest.

Given this situation, Bishop Vargas said that “the transformation that one and all hope for in Araucania is going to come only if all of us who live here changes our hearts.”

“First of all, we have to change our hearts, we have to grow in humanity; then, laws and decrees will have their place. What people want will not be achieved if first we don’t undergo a conversion and a major transformation, and that is something only the Lord can give,” he concluded.

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This article was originally published by our sister agency, ACI Prensa. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.

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The world needs you, Francis tells young people at children’s home

January 19, 2018 CNA Daily News 0

Puerto Maldonado, Peru, Jan 19, 2018 / 11:35 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Speaking to kids at a home for orphaned and abandoned children on Friday, Pope Francis said they have much to offer the world by being themselves and sharing their experiences.

“The world needs you, young men and women… and it needs you as you are. Do not be content to be the last car on the train of society, letting yourselves be pulled along and eventually disconnected. We need you to be the engine, always pressing forward,” the Pope said Jan. 19.

“Share what you learn with the world, because the world needs you to be yourselves, who you really are, and not an imitation of someone else. We need you to be authentic, young men and women who are proud to belong to the Amazonian peoples and who can offer humanity an alternative for a true life.”

Francis spoke at the “Hogar Principito” (“Little Prince Home”) in Puerto Maldonado on the second day of his Jan. 18-21 visit to Peru. The children’s home was founded in 1996 to help deal with with the high rate of neglect and child exploitation that occur in the city.

It currently houses around 40 children and adolescents, who have come from orphanages, at-risk families, or illegal mining camps. Some have been abandoned or been victims of physical, sexual, or psychological abuse.

Pope Francis met with the children and their caretakers on the basketball court of the home.

Before his speech he was greeted by the director of the home, Fr. Xavier Arbex, and listened to the testimony of Dirsey Irarica Piña, a woman who was raised in the home. He also watched performances by the children of songs and a choreographed dance.

Irarica described having been orphaned at the age of 11, and being welcomed into the Hogar Principito a couple of years later, saying the home “was ready immediately to give me the fullness of support and love … I thank my teachers and the ‘little father’ for filling this void in me. Thank you for this unconditional love which makes us feel at home.”

She now lives in Tacna, where she works and studies psychology.

In his address after listening to Irarica, the Pope referenced the recent celebration of Christmas, where our hearts were touched by the coming of the Child Jesus.

“He is our treasure. You children are his reflection, and you too are a treasure for all of us, the most precious treasure that we have, and one that we are called to guard,” Francis said.

He asked forgiveness for the times that adults have neglected to care for them and protect them as they deserve, saying how their lives demand a greater commitment and effort on the part of everyone – that we do not remain indifferent to children who suffer and are in need.

“Without a doubt, you are the greatest treasure that is ours to care for,” he underlined.

Speaking to Irarica, who gave a testimony before his speech, he said she was brave to share that sometimes she feels very hurt, and misses her father and mother.

“You told me; ‘I hope my message may be a light of hope,’” the Pope referenced. “But let me tell you something. Your life, your words, and the lives of all of you, are a light of hope.”

He said a wonderful witness “is offered by all of you young people who have travelled this road, who found love in this home and now are able to shape your own future! You demonstrate to all of us the enormous potential of each person. For these boys and girls, you are the best example to follow, a sign of hope that they will be able to do the same. We all need good role models: children need to look to the future and have positive role models.”

“Everything that you young people can do, like coming here to be with them, to play and spend time together, is important,” Pope Francis said. “Be for them, as the Little Prince says: the little stars that light up the night,” referring to the Antoine de Saint-Exupéry character for whom the children’s home is named.

The Pope went on to note how the children who came from indigenous communities may have been witness to the destruction of their home, saying: “today those woodlands have been laid waste by the intoxication of a misguided notion of progress.”

“Young people, do not be resigned to what is happening! Do not renounce the legacy you have received from your elders, or your lives and dreams.”

He also encouraged them to study and to take advantage of the educational opportunities available to them.

“Listen to your elders; value their traditions; do not curb your curiosity. Get in touch with your roots, but at the same time open your eyes to new things; bring the old and the new together in your own way,” he encouraged.

Society often needs correction and you, young people, can help greatly with this “by teaching us a way of life based on protection and care, not on the destruction of everything that stands in the way of our greed,” he said.

[…]

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