Cause for beatification of Sister Clare Crockett opened

Buenos Aires, Argentina, Dec 9, 2019 / 07:00 pm (CNA).- The latest report issued by the Argentina Observatory of Social Debt of the Pontifical Catholic University of Argentina showed that the rate of poverty and indigence is the highest in ten years.

The report indicated that 6.5% of households and 8.9% of people are indigent, and during the last trimester of 2019, 32.1% of households and 40.8% of people are below the poverty line.

These results show the sudden reversal of the economic conditions recouped by households during 2017.

The Observatory pointed to “cumulative regressive effects” in the country creating “the pitfalls of a growth model that is unstable, unbalanced and unequal, due to the absence of sustainable economic, social and environmental development policies.”

“Both persistent inequality and structural poverty are the result of an economic-productivity imbalance with the effects of exclusion, marginalization, and inequality on the socio-cultural, socio-demographic, and socio-occupational level,” the Observatory stated.

The report measures poverty and indigency rates by income and incorporates a multidimensional measurement that includes access to rights such as food, healthcare and education, basic services, a healthy environment, employment and social security, as well as subjective well-being.

The Observatory determined that although there were “improvements during the decade, structural inequality has increased, expressing itself in food insecurity, poor environmental quality and deficient access to water, energy, sanitation services and decent housing.”

“Repeated devaluations, rising inflation, stagnation, rising unemployment and changes agreed to with the International Monetary Fund explain the deterioration,” they said.

In addition “household labor and non-labor income in the lower middle sectors of society were below the increases in the price of goods and services of basic consumption ”.

Triggering this decline is a greater deterioration of the labor market due to job losses as well as “the impossibility of compensating that deterioration with alternative work. This explains the increase in the rate of indigency as well as the increase in the poverty gap.”

“All this had regressive effects in terms of economic inequality,” the report summarized.

According to a Congressional Research Service October 10, 2019 analysis, the Argentine peso “has lost two-thirds of its value since 2018; inflation is hovering around 30%; and since 2015 the economy has contracted by about 4% and its external debt has increased by 60%. In June 2018, the Argentine government turned to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for support and currently has a $57 billion IMF program, the largest program (in dollar terms) in IMF history.”

“Despite these resources, the government in late August and early September 2019 postponed payments on some of its debts and imposed currency controls…Argentina has a long history of economic crises. It has defaulted on its external debt (debt held by foreigners) nine times since independence in 1816. Argentina has also entered into 21 IMF programs since joining the international organization in 1956. The current economic crisis facing Argentina stems from longstanding challenges, as well as more recent developments.”

A version of this story was first published by ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.

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Jesuit Fathers Javier Campos Morales and Joaquín César Mora Salazar were murdered June 20, 2022. / Photo courtesy of the Mexican Jesuits

Denver Newsroom, Jul 22, 2022 / 14:21 pm (CNA).
In a statement released July 20, the Jesuits in Mexico decr… […]

Santiago, Chile, Jan 19, 2018 / 09:58 am (CNA/EWTN News).- At the end of his three-day visit to Chile, Pope Francis came to the defense of a controversial bishop, saying accusations that he helped cover up abuse are unproven and amount to “calumny.”

Responding to a Chilean journalist who asked about the issue, Pope Francis said “the day they bring me proof against Bishop Barros, I’ll speak. There is not one shred of proof against him. It’s all calumny. Is that clear?”

The 2015 appointment of Bishop Juan Barros Madrid to lead the Diocese Osorno, continues to draw harsh criticism from activists and abuse victims who accuse the bishop of covering up the crimes of his longtime friend, Father Fernando Karadima.

Karadima, who once led a lay movement from his parish in El Bosque, was convicted of sexually abusing minors in a 2011 Vatican trial, and at the age of 84, he was sentenced to a life of prayer and solitude.

Barros has repeatedly insisted that he knew nothing of the abuse, at one point telling the Associated Press that “I never knew anything about, nor ever imagined the serious abuses which that priest committed against the victims.”

“I have never approved of nor participated in such serious dishonest acts and I have never been convicted by any tribunal of such things.”
 
In January 2015 Francis named Barros to head the Diocese of Osorno in southern Chile, setting off a wave of objections and calls for his resignation from several priests. Dozens of protesters, including non-Catholics, attempted to disrupt his March 21, 2015 installation Mass at the Osorno cathedral.

Days later, Archbishop Fernando Chomali Garib of Concepcion said that Pope Francis had told him that there was “no objective reason at all” that the bishop should not be installed. The pontiff had been kept up-to-date on the situation.

On March 31, 2015, the Vatican’s Congregation for Bishops also released a statement, saying that the office had “carefully examined the prelate’s candidature and did not find objective reasons to preclude the appointment.”
 
The then-apostolic nuncio to Chile, Archbishop Ivo Scapolo, said that all information about Barros was passed on to Pope Francis. Most of the people in the church, he said, were not protesters, but “people who love their bishop.”

On May 6, 2015, five months after Barros was appointed to lead the Diocese of Osorno, Deacon Jaime Coiro, general secretary of the Chilean episcopal conference, told Pope Francis that the Church in Osorno “is praying and suffering for you.”

“Osorno suffers, yes,” Pope Francis said, “for silliness.” According to a video of the conversation released by Chile’s Ahora Noticias, the Pope had told Coiro that “the only accusation against that bishop was discredited by the judicial court.”

“Think with your head, and do not be carried away by the noses of the leftists, who are the ones who put this thing together,” the Pope added.

In his first speech after landing in Chile Jan. 15 Pope Francis acknowledged the pain and distress the scandal has caused to the local Church and to the wider Chilean society, telling the country’s civil authorities he feels “pain and shame at the irreparable damage caused to children by some ministers of the Church.”

Asking for pardon, he said “I am one with my brother bishops, for it is right to ask for forgiveness and make every effort to support the victims, even as we commit ourselves to ensuring that such things do not happen again.”

However, in response to the Pope’s comment Jan. 18, Juan Carlos Cruz – one of Barros’ most outspoken accusers and one of Karadima’s victims – tweeted: “As if I could have taken a selfie or a photo while Karadima abused me and others and Juan Barros stood by watching it all…These people are truly crazy, and the pontiff talks about atonement to the victims. Nothing has changed, and his plea for forgiveness is empty.”

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