Category Archives: Racism

Build Anew Series – Housing

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Build Anew Series — Part 9
Housing

Virginia Schilder
November 30, 2023
Welcome back to our Build Anew Series, with weekly posts covering the people, policies, and values at the heart of the issues we work on. This week, we’re talking about housing.   

Everyone can agree that food, water, shelter, and health care are the most fundamental necessities of life. Yet, the United States, the wealthiest country in the world, is facing a long-term trend of increasing houselessness. From 2015-2022, the unsheltered population increased by 35 percent — which means an additional 60,560 people in this country are without shelter. In 2022, the numbers of unhoused persons (over 420,000) and chronically unhoused persons (nearly 128,000) reached record highs.

Leaving so many of our neighbors out on the street is a policy choice. A structural refusal to control rent prices and designate and maintain affordable housing is a moral issue. The housing crisis most affects the people already made vulnerable by unjust systems, including the elderly, children, Black and Brown communities, LGBTQ+ persons, Native Americans, and families in poverty. The COVID-19 pandemic only worsened these disparities.

We know that housing is an essential part of the wellbeing of ourselves and our families. Access to affordable housing creates stability and unlocks a greater ability to get and keep a job, to pursue education, to stay out of the criminal legal system, to tend to one’s health, and to care for oneself and loved ones. We all deserve the basic security of a safe and stable place to live. This is why NETWORK supports a housing first model, and why we must engage federal policy to build anew our systems of ensuring housing security for all.

Present Realities

In our profit-driven housing market, millions of people experience housing insecurity every year. The largest problem renters and potential homeowners face today is a lack of affordable housing. In the United States, a record number of over 40 million renting and homeowning households are cost burdened, spending more than a third of their income on housing. When so much of a family’s income must go towards housing, they have to cut back in other areas. Cost-burdened renters or homeowners may experience hunger, struggle to pay for transportation, find it harder to pursue educational or professional opportunities, and experience higher rates of eviction and foreclosure. Rising rents and housing costs are worsened by stagnant wages, the decreasing public housing stock, and the poor condition of remaining units. (Since the 1990s, the U.S. has destroyed almost a quarter-million public housing units, and replaced only a fraction.) Meanwhile, rent prices for new privately developed housing are unattainable for low-income families.

Peter Cook, executive director of the New York State Council of Churches, participates in a NETWORK “Care Not Cuts” rally NETWORK on Long Island on May 22.

For people of color in the U.S.—especially for Black families—banks, the real estate industry, and local, state, and federal policies have enforced centuries of legal segregation and housing discrimination. Practices such as forcing Black families into higher-cost and lower-quality segregated housing (often in neighborhoods near toxic waste sites or highways with poor air quality), denying federally backed mortgages, and preventing the racial integration of white neighborhoods, have had devastating impacts on economic, education, community safety, and health outcomes. The legacies of redlining, environmental racism, and exclusionary zoning persists. Today, more than 50 years after the Civil Rights Movement won the passage of the Fair Housing Act, the gap between white and Black homeownership (which exacerbates the racial wealth gap) is even larger than it was in 1960 before the legislation went into effect.

Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, more than half a million people in the U.S. were experiencing houselessness, disproportionately in Black, AAPI, and Native American communities. With housing costs already stressing families’ financial security, layoffs and other unexpected costs during the COVID-19 pandemic caused many to fall behind on rent and mortgage payments, leading to evictions and foreclosures where state or federal eviction moratoriums failed to protect vulnerable households. Before the national eviction moratorium went into effect (temporarily), the expiration of state eviction moratoriums in 27 states led to tens of thousands of additional COVID-19 cases and deaths.

Access to safe, affordable housing is absolutely critical for every person and supports our country’s overall health. Housing creates stability that helps people pursue education, employment, and health, as well as eliminate contact with the criminal legal system, comply with the terms of their probation, and reduce their risk of recidivism. By failing to ensure housing for all members of our society, we harm family development and deprive millions of the stability of a secure shelter. Lack of housing is a matter of life or death, and one disproportionately faced by communities of color. This is immoral. We must respond to this urgent need and build anew with housing policies that dismantle systemic racism in housing and ensure equitable access to safe and affordable housing for all.

Facts and Figures on Housing in the U.S.
Our Values

“Dorothy Day and The Holy Family of the Streets,” Kelly Latimore

As we’ve been exploring throughout the Build Anew Series, Catholic Social Justice principles call us to uphold the dignity of each person as an equally valuable member of the global family. Because dignity refers to what people deserve by virtue of their humanity, upholding dignity means ensuring that each person has what they need to live well. Stable, affordable housing — a shelter, a home — is among the most basic of these necessities.

The pervasiveness of houselessness and housing insecurity stands in stark contradiction to the Catholic call to uphold the dignity of each person. The Vatican II encyclical Gaudium et spes reads, “All offenses against human dignity, such as subhuman living conditions… all these and the like are criminal: they poison civilization; and they debase the perpetrators more than the victims and militate against the honor of the creator.” In other words, failing to ensure safe living conditions for all people is an offense against God!

Widespread houselessness is also where we see our social sin of racism and classism especially clearly. It is immoral that some people in this country have multiple houses, while so many have none. It is immoral that so many offices, hotel rooms, and other gathering spaces remain empty at night while our neighbors sleep out in the cold on the streets below. Whether or not you have shelter should not have anything to do with the color of your skin, or how much money is in your bank account. Yet, this is the reality in the U.S., an unconscionable affront to the equal dignity and worth of every single human being which our faith emphatically professes. We have an obligation to our siblings to redress this grave moral harm, as a matter of what it means to live a faith of justice, peace, and compassion.

We are all interconnected. When we all have the food, water, health care, and shelter that we deserve by virtue of our humanity, the whole community benefits. When we all have housing, our nation as a whole will be a healthier, safer, more stable, and more caring place to be for all of us.

When he visited a homeless shelter, Pope Francis asserted, “The home is a crucial place in life, where life grows and can be fulfilled, because it is a place in which every person learns to receive love and to give love.” Housing is a basic human right and the foundation of a person’s ability to meet their needs and care for themselves and their family. Each person deserves a stable shelter in which they can feel safe and at home. Together, we have the resources to make this a reality, and our faith calls us to do so.

Housing Justice and Federal Policy

Luckily, we know that good policy can significantly reduce houselessness. We saw this in the period from 2020-2022, when the rate of increasing houselessness slowed, due to strong (yet temporary) investments in human services programs during the pandemic.

The federal government must take action to promote lasting housing stability for all people. Congress must expand vouchers and increase funding for Section 8 rental assistance (including tenant-based assistance and project-based rental assistance), as well as invest in public housing repairs and rehabilitation (which need more than $26 million in major capital repairs). Additionally, federal lawmakers should pass legislation to provide a renter’s tax credit and expand the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit program.

In addition to ending houselessness and bolstering rental assistance programs, Congress must address the ongoing legacies of redlining, by investing in Black and Brown neighborhoods and creating sustainable pathways to homeownership for communities of color, who still face racial discrimination in housing and lending practices.

In rural America, homeownership is the principal form of housing. Yet, access to mortgage credit is limited, especially for Black households. Another challenge for rural households is clean water infrastructure. Hundreds of rural communities nationwide do not have access to clean residential drinking water and safe waste disposal systems. The government should support the fostering of sustainable, vibrant rural communities, including by increasing investment in Department of Agriculture housing grant and loan programs to ensure every rural household has the resources to repair, buy, or rent affordably.

Most urgently, as Congress appropriates funding for Housing and Urban Development (HUD), let your elected officials know that housing programs must be bolstered, not cut!

Join us again next week for our tenth and final installation of the Build Anew Series, looking ahead to 2024! And don’t forget to stay tuned on Instagram (@network_lobby) and Facebook for our Build Anew video series!

Tax Justice is Racial Justice

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Tax Justice is Racial Justice

Undo the Hidden Racism of the U.S. Tax Code

Jarrett Smith
November 16, 2023

 

Jarrett Smith, pictured above at an August 25 reparations event outside the White House, is a NETWORK Government Relations Advocate.

It is no secret that the U.S. suffers from a staggering degree of wealth inequality. Resources are increasingly concentrated in the possession of the top 1 percent, creating a degree of inequality never before seen in the country’s history.

This wealth stratification is most acute across racial lines. A Pew Research study in 2016 found the median income of white households was $117,000, while Black households had only $17,000. And while a white person in the U.S. has an equal chance of being a millionaire and having no wealth, a Black person is 20 times more likely to have no wealth than to be a millionaire. Between 1983 and 2016, Black wealth decreased year over year, and education did not stop this trend.

This vast inequality did not happen by chance. As NETWORK’s Racial Wealth and Income Gap workshop helps to illustrate, the Transatlantic Slave Trade, Jim Crow, and centuries of the U.S. government’s racist policies created and still preserve this hoarding of wealth in the hands of a small class of white folks. Many of these policies shaped our tax system. Indeed, the U.S. tax code plays a central role in not only keeping rich people rich, but also rewarding white people at the expense of Black folks.

The marriage joint filing bonus, for example, privileges married couples, especially when one spouse makes high income while the other isn’t employed. A high earner can split their income with their spouse, and thus split their tax liability. Usually, these couples are white, as the highest-earning demographic in the country is overwhelmingly white. Because Black married households make the least household income in the country, rarely does one member of the household make enough money to enable their spouse to stay at home. Joint filing or married filing separate tax incentives do not help Black or Brown households because they earn so little income compared to their white counterparts.

In addition, tax incentives are structured to reward the things that wealthier, white folks can afford. For example, there are tax incentives for home ownership, but not for renting or for buying cars. Moreover, medical insurance is tax-deductible, but medical debt is not — penalizing Black and Brown communities who face inequities in access to affordable health care.

Long-term capital gains, usually enjoyed by white wealthy folks, are taxed at a lower rate than “ordinary income” — that is, wages, salaries, or even short-term capital gains. In 2021, an unmarried middle-income worker like a teacher or truck driver paid 22 percent of income tax on every dollar of taxable salary she made over $40,525. Meanwhile, a billionaire living entirely off long-term capital gains or dividends paid no more than 20 percent on millions of dollars of unearned income.

Over the past several centuries, white families have been able to amass wealth off the backs of enslaved and underpaid workers. They then pass that wealth on to their descendants, usually without having to pay their fair share of taxes on what is passed down. The tax code specifically protects this preservation of generational wealth in white families, and even helps it build up, by providing tax benefits to assets that are inherited. Under one policy called “Step Up in Basis,” if the owner of an investment or asset that has increased in value dies, neither the owner nor the inheritor owes any tax on that gain!

We know that for all nations, not just the United States, social and health outcomes — including for the richest folks — are worse in countries with high wealth inequality. Wealth inequality is immoral. It harms the most vulnerable and marginalized among us, especially Black and Brown communities, and it harms the wellbeing of the country as a whole.

The fact that racism is written into our tax code makes three things clear. First, it confirms that racism is systemic and is enacted through policies and structures. Second, the road to equality is reparations now, to begin to heal our society and close the ever-widening gap between those who have been allowed to amass and hoard resources, and those who have had to go without – so that all communities can truly thrive. And third, as we think, dream, and envision a future with reparations, transforming the tax code must be part of what it means to repair and build anew our society.

 

This story was published in the Quarter 4 2023 issue of Connection. 

Build Anew Series – Criminal Legal System

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Build Anew Series — Part 7
Criminal Legal System

Virginia Schilder
November 3, 2023
Welcome back to our Build Anew Series, with weekly posts covering the people, policies, and values at the heart of the issues we work on. This week, we’re talking about the criminal legal system, and the urgent need for reparations.   

The United States incarcerates a greater percentage of its population than any other nation in the world. Stop and let that sink in. In a nation with this extreme incarceration rate, where migrants and refugees seeking safety are placed in cages, and where millions of people — especially people of color — are ripped from their communities and locked up for years or decades, we must ask if the U.S. is really “the land of the free.”

The U.S. criminal legal system targets impoverished, working-class, and Black and Brown communities — seen in who and how the system polices, arrests, prosecutes, sentences, and even executes. In reacting to real social need with surveillance and criminalization, the system fosters instability and insecurity, and furthers the cycles of crime, violence, and poverty. Under the 13th Amendment, incarcerated persons can still be forced into labor for little to no pay. As a result, mass incarceration, which disproportionately locks up Black and Brown Americans, is the primary system of racial segregation, oppression, and coerced labor of our time.

Prisons and cages are incongruous with the Gospel message of true community. No human is disposable. The prevailing ethic of punishment (including capital punishment), separation, and imprisonment is not justice. We are called to a fuller picture of true justice — one characterized by community accountability, integration, healing, and well-being for everyone in our country, with no exceptions.

Present Realities

Since the end of legal slavery, U.S. criminal legal policies have targeted people of color, especially Black Americans. Professor Michelle Alexander writes, “Like Jim Crow (and slavery), mass incarceration operates as a tightly networked system of laws, policies, customs, and institutions that operate collectively to ensure the subordinate status of a group defined largely by race.” The “tough on crime” movement of the 1980’s gave way to policies, like the The Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 (the “1994 Crime Bill”), which caused widespread over-criminalization, mass incarceration, and police militarization. Years of “tough on crime” policies and a focus on punishment rather than community healing have targeted already vulnerable communities, worsening racial inequality and creating cycles of poverty for many individuals, families, and neighborhoods. Financial incentives for drug arrests have encouraged over-policing in Black and Brown communities, who are left with disproportionate numbers of folks with criminal records (mostly for minor non-violent offenses) and face ongoing brutality from the police.

The U.S. has the highest percentage of incarcerated people in the world, largely a result of extreme sentencing measures such as mandatory minimums and “three strikes” laws. Even non-violent offenses can result in years in prison and continuing restrictions and penalties after release. Disparities in sentencing policies for comparable offenses, such as using powder cocaine vs. crack cocaine, have yielded vastly longer average sentences for people of color compared to white folks. The ongoing use of cash bail and barriers to accessing adequate legal defense trap low-income people in the system. And, the practice of referring kids (usually Black and Brown children) to the youth justice system for misbehavior at school has facilitated a “school to prison pipeline” that disrupts the lives of children and perpetuates cycles of incarceration.

Within U.S. prisons, the inhumane practice of solitary confinement, disproportionately used for people of color and people with mental illnesses, persists — along with other dangerous living conditions, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. Moreover, the U.S. is the only Western nation that still implements the death penalty and ranks fifth in the world in executions.

Restore Act Leave BehindA person convicted of a crime in the U.S., whether or not they serve time in prison, suffers long-term discrimination in employment, education, and public services. Requirements to “check the box” on employment applications and prohibitions against licensing in certain fields cost formerly incarcerated people both the immediate income they need and their long-term earning potential, which hurts not only themselves but also their families and children. Returning citizens face restrictions in accessing federal student aid, health care, the right to vote, public housing (which impacts family reunification), and nutrition programs like SNAP. These policies all contribute to the cycle of poverty for families and communities.

Head to our recent Build Anew Series – Food Systems post to learn more about the SNAP ban for citizens returning from prison with felony drug convictions. Read a testimony from Serena Martin-Liguori about the need to pass the RESTORE Act, which would end the ban on SNAP for returning citizens in the upcoming Farm Bill.

Facts and Figures on the U.S. Criminal Legal System
  • 2 million people are currently in jail or prison in the U.S. The U.S. has over 25% of the world’s population of incarcerated persons despite accounting for only 4% of the world’s total population. The U.S. has the highest percentage of incarcerated people in the world, 655 per 100,000.
  • The U.S. prison population has increased by 500% over the past 40 years. People of color comprise nearly 78% of the prison population. These trends are explained by changes in policies and laws, not crime rates.
  • In 2013, the Sentencing Project reported that if incarceration rates continue to grow at the pace they have since the 1970’s, 33% of Black American males can expect to go to prison in their lifetime, as can 16% of Latino males, and 6% of white males.
  • The U.S. carceral system costs taxpayers $80 billion per year.
Our Values

The murders of George Floyd and countless others are examples of the systemic violence committed every day by our country’s “justice” system. Our people cry out for change. We cannot tolerate the loss of another generation to mass incarceration. Our legal system’s punitive, “tough-on-crime” mentality perpetuates poverty, instability, and a dehumanizing ethic that harms us all.  

A legal system predicated on control, alienation, and racial subjugation stands in complete affront to the restoration, inclusion, peace, and racial justice into which the Catholic faith calls us.  Throughout the Bible, God moves to set free the imprisoned: “The Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the poor; he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound” (Isaiah 61:1).  In Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus says that when you visit people in prison, you visit him. 

Further, the Psalms proclaim that God looked at Earth to “hear the groans of the prisoners, to set free those who were doomed to die.” Pope Francis has clearly stated that the death penalty is “an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person” that is “inadmissible” in all cases. The Catholic Church is unequivocal in opposition to capital punishment, which in the world today is needless, state-sanctioned murder that perpetuates vengeance, violence, and militarism. Moreover, the death penalty is a mechanism of white supremacy, disproportionately executing Black Americans and our siblings with mental illness.    

We are rooted in our faith in a God not of punition, retribution, and abandonment, but of healing, mercy, and transformation. We are called to extend these graces to one another. To be truly just, our legal system must affirm the human capacity for reconciliation, reintegration, and reconnection. Even further, we must recognize the ways in which racist constructions of “crime” and oppressive social conditions undergird the punitive carceral system.

During his lifetime, Jesus did not look away from social problems and the people they affected, but moved into encounter and was an agent of healing. In his example, we cannot cast away our neighbors behind cell doors. As Angela Davis articulates, 

“Prisons do not disappear social problems, they disappear human beings. Homelessness, unemployment, drug addiction, mental illness and illiteracy are only a few of the problems that disappear from public view when the human beings contending with them are relegated to cages.” 

The Catholic teaching of the immeasurable worth of each human being means that no one is disposable. We cannot let illusions of disconnection — “us vs. them” narratives — keep us from responding to the suffering in our prisons: “Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body” (Hebrews 13:3). Salvation means wholeness, liberation, and communion. God does not leave a single person out of the circle of care, forgiveness, and restoration, no matter their past — and neither can we.  

Take Action: H.R.40 Reparations Study Commission

White text on a dark blue background reads, in capital letters, "IT'S TIME TO ADDRESS, REPENT, AND REPAIR." Throughout the Build Anew Series, we’ve been noting the operation of racism in and through our economy, our tax code, and our political, immigration, and even food systems. This week, we see that the legacy of enslavement is acutely visible in the system of mass incarceration. In conjunction with other social and economic barriers, our carceral system continues to chronically destabilize and tear apart Black and Brown families and communities.

All of this makes clear: we need reparations. The legacy of enslavement persists today. Structural racism keeps communities from accessing the housing, health care, food, economic stability, safety, and political participation we all deserve and need to thrive. As a country, we need reparations in order to move towards repair, transformation, and liberation for all of us.

Catholics are called to be agents of peace, healing, truth-telling, and justice. Take action here by telling President Biden to use his executive power to establish an H.R. 40 reparations study commission. Together, we can work for reparations and take a crucial step towards true healing, democracy, and flourishing in our country.

Join us again next week for part eight of the Build Anew Series on health care. And don’t forget to stay tuned on Instagram (@network_lobby) and Facebook for our Build Anew video series!

Build Anew Series – Democracy

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Build Anew Series — Part 6
Democracy

Virginia Schilder
October 27, 2023
Welcome back to our Build Anew Series, with weekly posts covering the people, policies, and values at the heart of the issues we work on. This week, we’re talking about democracy.   

This past weekend, NETWORK held the third iteration of our White Supremacy and American Christianity event series, with Fr. Bryan Massingale, Dr. Robert P. Jones of the Public Religion Research Institute, and NETWORK’s Joan F. Neal — this time joined by Darcy Hirsh from Interfaith Alliance and Laura Peralta-Schulte, NETWORK Senior Director of Public Policy and Government Relations.

Fr. Massingale and Dr. Jones articulated how Christian nationalism and white supremacy (we cannot talk about one without the other) suppose that America belongs to white Christians, who are therefore entitled to its control and its resources — and justified in achieving that control through violent means. Our speakers explained that white supremacist Christian nationalism is a “consistent ethic of hatred” that benefits only a specific subset — “the right kind” — of white folks. This hostile ethic, predicated on exclusion and hierarchy, is fundamentally anti-democratic.

In seeking to concentrate power in the hands of a select few, Christian nationalism and white supremacy pose an urgent threat to democracy today. While this threat to democracy is growing, it isn’t new. Systemic racism has worked to disenfranchise Black and Brown voters for centuries. The restriction of voting rights, gerrymandering, the undermining of election integrity, and the unchecked role of corporate money in politics all weaken democracy and threaten free and inclusive political participation.

The weakening of democracy in the U.S. is part of a larger trend of marked decline of democracies worldwide. Pope Francis has lamented this decline with urgency, affirming that “Universal participation is something essential; not simply to attain shared goals, but also because it corresponds to what we are: social beings, at once unique and interdependent.” Catholic Social Justice emphasizes the sociality and the dignity of each human being, which means that each person has a right to a say in the decision-making processes that affect their lives. What could it mean for our democracy to be oriented towards participation, encounter, the common good, and truly collective decision-making?

Facts and Figures on Democracy in the U.S.
  • Between 2016-2018, after the Shelby County v. Holder Supreme Court decision, at least 17 million voters were purged from voter rolls. Counties with a history of voter discrimination continue to purge voters at a much higher rate than other counties.
  • Research demonstrates that strict voter ID laws significantly increase the turnout gap between white voters and Latinx, Black, and multiracial voters.
  • As of 2020, 5.17 million people — one out of 44 adults, and 2.27% of the total U.S. voting-eligible population — are disenfranchised due to a current or previous felony conviction. Over 6.2 percent of the adult Black American population is disenfranchised, compared to 1.7 percent of the non-Black population. It is estimated that over 560,000 Latinx Americans are disenfranchised, and approximately 1.2 million women are disenfranchised, comprising over one-fifth of the total disenfranchised population.
Present Realities

While democracy is much more than what happens on election day, even the right to vote, our most basic method of democratic participation, is not fully realized. Voting rights in the U.S. are under assault at the state and federal levels.

In particular, election policies continue to deliberately undermine Black and Brown voter participation. Since the 15th Amendment codified the right to vote for Black American men in 1870, state and local governments have continued to pass discriminatory laws to disenfranchise voters. One in 16 Black Americans of voting age is disenfranchised, a rate 3.7 times greater than that of non-Black Americans. Today, voter ID laws and restrictive voting rules disproportionately affect people of color, low-income and disabled voters, elderly and young voters, and voters who are unhoused.

The 2013 Shelby County v. Holder Supreme Court ruling gutted Section 4(b) of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, dismantling protections that prevented states from disenfranchising voters based on race. Since then, Congress has failed to pass legislation to restore that oversight provided in Section 4(b), meaning that states are still able to enact racist restrictions without accountability. As a result of the Shelby decision, over 1,000 polling places have closed — again, disproportionately harming voters of color, rural voters, and voters with disabilities. According to the White House, since January 2021, 18 states have enacted 30 separate laws that will make it more difficult to vote. What’s more, over 400 bills that would make voting less accessible, including restrictions to voting by mail and early voting, as well as voter roll purges, have been considered in various state legislatures in recent years.

Varied methods of voter suppression, in addition to the undue influence of corporate money in politics, gerrymandering, felon disenfranchisement, and other anti-democracy tactics limit political participation, particularly for our most marginalized community members. States that make voting harder or redraw districts unfairly strip their neighbors of access to involvement in our collective political life. These efforts are serious threats to our democracy, that not only harm our communities’ well-being but harm our ability to politically engage in the pursuit of our communities’ well-being at all.

Lived Experience

Rabbi Bonnie Margulis, with Wisconsin Faith Voices for Justice, spoke about the 2020 Wisconsin primary at a Faithful Democracy Town Hall in April 2020.

Rabbi Bonnie Margulis. Photo from Madison365

“Our election on April 7th was a morass… The Thursday before the election, a federal court judge said that our absentee ballots did not need witness signatures, so people were sending in their absentee ballots without signatures because they were safer at home [during the pandemic] and didn’t have any way to get their ballots witnessed. 24 hours later, that decision by the federal court was overturned by an appellate court, and so all of those ballots were invalidated. At least 750 ballots in Milwaukee alone were invalidated for lack of signature.”

Rabbi Margulis explained that in Dane County, where Madison is, the county clerk said that if you requested an absentee ballot online you didn’t need an ID. However, “That also was declared to be illegal, so people who didn’t submit an ID couldn’t get an absentee ballot.” At the same time, “A federal court judge had said that absentee ballots could be postmarked as late as April 13th, and on April 6th (the day before the election) the United States Supreme Court overturned that and said no, ballots have to be postmarked by April 7th, the day of the election.”

Further, in part due to a shortage of polling workers during the pandemic, “In Dane County, the number of polling places was reduced from 95 to 63. In Waukesha, a suburb of Milwaukee, the polling places were reduced from 13 to 1. But the most egregious was Milwaukee, which usually has 180 polling places, and it was reduced to 5.” Rabbi Margulis emphasized that this was a blatant attempt to suppress the votes of people of color because Milwaukee has the greatest percentage population of people of color anywhere in the state.

Our Values

A core principle of Catholic Social Justice is that we all have both a right and moral responsibility to participate in our shared public life and political processes, as a matter of our dignity and agency. As the Leadership Conference of Women Religious states, “As women religious and believers in the abundant love of God for all, we are called to bring our faith and our voices to the public square.”

People cast their votes for federal democracy reform as part of NETWORK’s “Team Democracy” events across the country in 2021. Voting rights, which have come under threat at the state level since the U.S. Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act in 2013, are a key component of NETWORK’s efforts to defend democracy.

People cast their votes for federal democracy reform as part of NETWORK’s “Team Democracy” events across the country in 2021.

This responsibility to participate means each person also has a fundamental right to participate and must be equipped with the resources needed to do so. The intentional curtailing of political participation by restricting voting, gerrymandering, and undermining elections is a serious moral failure and a threat to the free society we are called to build. We have a responsibility not only to participate in the democratic process ourselves but also to protect our most vulnerable neighbors’ right to join in shaping our society.

But participation alone is not enough: political participation must be aimed at and committed to advancing the common good. The Catholic Catechism states, “It is necessary that all participate, each according to his position and role, in promoting the common good. This obligation is inherent in the dignity of the human person.” The Catholic tradition also calls us to move beyond partisan politics in our pursuit of justice and social transformation. The US Council of Catholic Bishops writes,

“As citizens, we should be guided more by our moral convictions than by our attachment to a political party or interest group. When necessary, our participation should help transform the party to which we belong; we should not let the party transform us in such a way that we neglect or deny fundamental moral truths or approve intrinsically evil acts. We are called to bring together our principles and our political choices, our values and our votes, to help build a civilization of truth and love.”

Our democratic processes are a vehicle of participation in the public realm, which is where our Catholic obligation to cast our nets wide in cultivating social solidarity, loving one another, and working for the good of others happens. Scriptures tell us, “There should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it” (1 Corinthians 12:25-27), and “So in Christ we, though many, form one body, and each member belongs to all the others” (Romans 12:5). The political arena is where we are called to act as the body of Christ, honoring each of its parts, alleviating suffering anywhere. And just as Jesus did not lead by force or concentrated power but spoke of casting down mighty rulers, we are called to assert the strength and needs of our communities, always opposing the imposition of authoritarian, unilateral rule — the kind of government to which Christian nationalism points.

The Catholic tradition affirms that public service is a noble vocation, but only when it serves justice and the flourishing of life. Elected officials must be accountable to all our people, especially the most vulnerable among us, and center the needs of real communities—not the interests of wealthy donors and corporations. In Fratelli Tutti (66), Pope Francis reminds us that we are called to direct society to the pursuit of the common good, and policies and laws that allow unlimited money in politics threaten this democratic and moral obligation. We are called to uncover these workings of wealth and power (“Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them” (Ephesians 5:11)) and institute justice in their place.

We know that there are alternatives. Catholic sisters, for example, have long modeled “contemplative dialogue, deep listening, and mutual respect” in consensus-based, collective decision-making processes that serve as an example for our political life at large. A democracy is not a democracy unless it is a culture of participation, encounter, and solidarity with those on the margins, in which our communities can work together to solve problems and meet needs. Transforming our politics and working for a multi-racial, multi-faith, and anti-hierarchical society in which all our communities can thrive is the real meaning of democratic participation — our right and responsibility.

Take Action

WATCH: Watch “White Supremacy and American Christianity: A Consistent Ethic of Hate Threatens Our Democracy” to learn more about the threats that Christian nationalism and white supremacy pose to democracy, how it shows up in current policies and legislation, and what we can do protect our democracy.

SIGN: Tell President Biden that the U.S. needs an H.R. 40 reparations commission. In this installation of the Build Anew Series, we’ve talked about how systemic racism operates through our political system. Support a reparations commission to help transform our politics into a multiracial, multifaith democracy.

LISTEN: Listen to a recent episode of the Just Politics podcast, “Actual strategies for saving democracy,” in which Rachel Kleinfeld reflects on why democracy in the U.S. is in decline and names some steps we can take to protect it.

READ: And, check out this reflection by NETWORK Advocate Bob Kloos on his experience as a poll worker.

Join us again next week for part 7 of the Build Anew Series on our criminal legal system. And don’t forget to stay tuned on Instagram (@network_lobby) and Facebook for our Build Anew video series!

Just Politics Catholic Podcast Season 2

Season 2 of Just Politics Podcast is Complete – Listen Now!

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Season 2 of Just Politics Podcast is Complete – Listen Now!

August 24, 2023

After a successful inaugural season of the Just Politics podcast, produced in collaboration with U.S. Catholic magazine, we came back for an exciting second season!  

Our hosts Sister Eilis McCulloh, H.M., Colin Martinez Longmore, and Joan F. Neal spoke with more advocates, Catholic Sisters, scholars, faith leaders, and even a Vatican official about how we can transform our politics for the common good.  

In season 2, which wrapped up in May, our hosts covered topics ranging from Pope Francis and integral ecology to the urgent, Spirit-filled call for economic justice, health care access, and women’s leadership.  

You can find the podcast on the U.S. Catholic website, as well as on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Don’t forget to subscribe, and join the conversation about #JustPoliticsPod on social media!  

Also check out Just Politics press at www.uscatholic.org/justpolitics where you can also sign up for email updates, learn more about each episode, and find additional reading on each episode’s topics. 

COMING SOON: Season 3 of Just Politics podcast drops Monday, Sept. 11!  

Reparations United Rally Concertgoers Send an H.R.40 Action Alert

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Reparations United Rally Concertgoers Send an H.R.40 Action Alert

Reparations United Rally Concertgoers Send an H.R.40 Action Alert

No matter what we look like, where we live, or how our ancestors came to our country, we should all feel safe in our communities and earn the resources we need to take care of ourselves and the ones we love.

Sadly, for hundreds of years, U.S. lawmakers have failed to reckon with the original sin of slavery and its legacy of racist violence and laws — and they’ve created policies designed to keep Black people from healthy wages, homeownership opportunities, and trapped in a discriminatory criminal legal system. This has hurt our whole country. Instead of offering real solutions to decrease violence, economic disparity, and inequitable health and education outcomes in Black communities, some lawmakers and lobbyists use power and money to continue a harmful agenda and shame and blame Black people for suffering in inequitable economic and political systems.

We know the misery that slavery has wrought. Now we need to experience the healing blessing that repair and redress can provide. Let the Administration know that the U.S. needs an H.R.40 reparations commission.

When we come together, as we did recently to gain equitable policies in the Inflation Reduction Act, we can influence policy that will transform our country into a multiracial, multi-faith democracy. Join us and send notice to President Biden that we need an H.R.40 study commission so all of us in our country thrive — no exceptions!

NETWORK is grateful for Reparations United’s reparatory efforts and advocacy. We are proud to help Reparations United Rally concertgoers send an H.R.40 action alert to the President.

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Continue to pray for Reparations

Sister Anita Baird, DHM

Sr. Anita is a member of the Religious Congregation of the Society of the Daughters of the Heart of Mary having served as Regional Superior, Provincial Councilor, and most recently as United States Provincial. A trail blazer and history maker, Sister Anita became the first African American to serve as Chief of Staff to the Archbishop of Chicago in 1997. In 2000, Cardinal Francis George appointed her the founding director of the Archdiocese of Chicago’s Office for Racial Justice.

She is a past president of the National Black Sisters’ Conference,  and recipient of the organization’s Harriet Tubman “Moses of Her People” Award. Since 2001, Anita has traveled the country preaching at parish revivals, directing retreats, and presenting anti-racism workshops.

Rabbi Aryeh Bernstein

Rabbi Aryeh Bernstein has written and taught extensively about the case for slavery reparations in Torah and Rabbinic literature, including in a 2018 article, “The Torah Case for Reparations”. Aryeh is a fifth-generation Chicago South Sider who works as National Jewish Educator for Avodah and Educational Consultant for the Jewish Council on Urban Affairs.

Aryeh is a Senior Editor of Jewschool.com and a member of the Tzedek Lab. Aryeh studied at several institutions of higher rabbinical studies and was ordained by Rabbi Daniel Landes’s Yashrut Institute.

Dr. Iva Carruthers

Dr. Iva E. Carruthers is General Secretary of the Samuel DeWitt Proctor Conference (SDPC), an interdenominational organization within the African American faith tradition focused on justice and equity issues. SDPC is both a 501c3 and United Nations Non-Governmental Organization (NGO). As founding CEO and a trustee of SDPC, she has steered the organization as a unique, influential and esteemed network of faith based advocates and activists, clergy and lay. Former director of the Black Theology Project, Dr. Carruthers has a long history of teaching, engagement in community development initiatives and social justice ministry, fostering interdenominational and interfaith dialogue and leading study tours for the university and church throughout in the United States, Caribbean, South America and Africa.

Dr. Carruthers is Professor Emeritus and former Chairperson of the Sociology Department at Northeastern Illinois University and was founding President of Nexus Unlimited, an information and educational technology firm. She was appointed to the White House Advisory Council on the internet, “National Information Infrastructure”, Mega Project and the educational software she developed was awarded a ComputerWorld Smithsonian Award. She is also founder of Lois House, an urban retreat center, Chicago, Illinois.

Rev. Dr. Jacqui Lewis 

The Rev. Dr. Jacqui Lewis—Author, Activist, and Public Theologian—is the Senior Minister at Middle Collegiate Church, a multiracial, welcoming, and inclusive congregation in New York City that is driven by Love. Period. Jacqui is the author of several books, including her latest: Fierce Love: A Bold Path to Ferocious Courage and Rule Breaking Kindness That Can Heal the World. Jacqui earned her Master of Divinity from Princeton Theological Seminary and earned a M.Phil. and a Ph.D. in Psychology and Religion from Drew University. Ordained in the Presbyterian Church (USA), she is the first African American and first woman senior minister in the Collegiate Church of New York, which was founded in 1628.

Middle Church and Jacqui have been featured in media such as The TODAY Show; Good Morning America; The Takeaway; The Brian Lehrer Show; and in The Washington Post, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal. Her podcasts include Love.Period., which is produced by the Center for Action and Contemplation, and The Four—a fearsome faith foursome talking about Black Life, Love, Power and Joy, with Otis Moss III, Lisa Sharon Harper and Michael-Ray Mathews.

Rabbi Jonah Pesner

Rabbi Jonah Dov Pesner serves as the Director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism. He has led the Religious Action Center since 2015. Rabbi Pesner also serves as Senior Vice President of the Union for Reform Judaism, a position to which he was appointed to in 2011. Named one of the most influential rabbis in America by Newsweek magazine, he is an inspirational leader and tireless advocate for social justice.

Rabbi Pesner’s work has focused on encouraging Jewish communities to reach across lines of race, class, and faith in campaigns for social justice. In 2006, he founded Just Congregations (now incorporated into the Religious Action Center), which engaged clergy, professional, and volunteer leaders in interfaith efforts in pursuit of social justice. Rabbi Pesner was a primary leader in the successful Massachusetts campaign for health care access that has provided health care coverage to hundreds of thousands and which became a nationwide model for reform. Over the course of his career, he has also led and supported campaigns for racial justice, economic opportunity, immigration reform, LGBTQ equality, human rights, and a variety of other causes. He is dedicated to building bridges to collectively confront anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, and other forms of hate and bigotry.

Keep Up with NETWORK

Just Politics Catholic Podcast Season One
Reflections on Solidarity and Democracy - Connection

The Edge of Solidarity

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The Edge of Solidarity  

Renewal Comes from Expanding Our View of the Human Family 

Joan F. Neal
July 20, 2023
Joan F. Neal, Deputy Executive Director and Chief Equity Officer at NETWORK

Joan F. Neal, Deputy Executive Director and Chief Equity Officer at NETWORK  

This past spring, the Vatican issued a document repudiating the “doctrine of discovery,” which was used to justify colonialism and atrocities against Indigenous people for centuries. While this movement by the church is welcome and long overdue, it is not without its flaws. Not only does the Vatican document minimize the church’s active and supportive role in colonialism and the oppression and abuse of Indigenous people, it also makes no mention of the transatlantic slave trade. Once again, the institutional church has failed to take responsibility for its role in enslaving human beings.  

This is a helpful illustration of how even those who seek to be allies in the struggle for justice in our society will be confronted time and again by the limits they place on solidarity — by the people whose struggles we fail or choose not to see. Solidarity is like the edges of a canvas or picture frame. It can be extended wide to include the entire human family. Or it can be narrowed so that some individuals, or even entire communities, are left standing beyond the edges of our “family picture.”  

Solidarity can also be like the aperture that adjusts how much light is let into a camera lens. When we set the aperture of solidarity wide, the light can be dazzling, causing so many people — overcome by their role in systems and structures of injustice and oppression — to shut down and retreat to a place of defensiveness and frailty. Every time a politician or media figure decries “wokeness” in our society, I shake my head, sadly aware that this is probably a person who sees the systemic problems and injustices in our midst, but also doesn’t want to do the work to correct these problems, perhaps afraid of what they might be asked to give up in the process.  

It is essential that we persist in doing the real work of solidarity — that we let in the light and extend the frame to the whole picture. We know from Scripture and Catholic Social Teaching (such as articulated by Pope Francis in Laudato Si’) that all of us are connected. When we’re selective in our solidarity, we can make well-intentioned missteps. Recall, in the wake of the 2016 election, how reporters flocked to diners in rural Pennsylvania in an effort to understand and empathize with the “left behind” Trump voter. This attempt at solidarity with one group was admirable, of course, but failed to recognize the wave of destructive policies against Black and Brown communities and the very fabric of U.S. democracy that was unleashed by Trump’s victory. 

Today, it’s clearer than ever that we face a political movement in this country whose capacity for solidarity is completely closed off to others and only includes themselves and people who look and think like them. Christian nationalism embraces the dismantling of democratic structures and weaponization of systems of government to punish those outside of their group and to further oppress people who question this raw use of power that benefits only a white, wealthy few. 

This aggressive anti-democratic movement has been on full display as it moves through state legislatures and other government bodies. It is animated by an awareness that, ironically, feeds into the worst aspects of its own rhetoric: that white Christians represent a shrinking, dying demographic, and that their values are not shared by younger generations. Of course, full participation in society by a multitude of diverse communities is not the end of anyone’s way of life, unless that way of life is defined by racism. The fear of being replaced by one’s neighbor is the antithesis of solidarity.  

Pope Francis has distinguished between populist political movements, which destroy democracy, and movements that are truly popular — that is, of the people — which can be a source of deep renewal in their societies. During this first half of 2023, NETWORK has embraced Pope Francis’ distinction and embarked on a movement for unflinching solidarity, declaring that communities in poverty cannot be held hostage to reckless and cruel budget cuts. That migrant people cannot be left out of our calculus of who matters as we build this country anew. That Black and Brown people, women and children are also made in the image and likeness of God, and their dignity must be respected. That solidarity is our only path out of the destructive environment of our society today.  

We affirm time and again that universal solidarity cannot be separated from the long-term protection of our democracy and the transformation of our politics. In fact, it is the key to lasting freedom and equality, and to the renewal and the authenticity of our own popular movement. Leaving people neglected outside the limits of our frame is a recipe for disaster. But journeying together in true solidarity is indeed the way to the Beloved community, “one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.” 

Joan F. Neal is NETWORK’s Deputy Executive Director and Chief Equity Officer.

This column was published in the Quarter 3 2023 issue of Connection. 

Catholic Organizations Urge Safety and Rights of Asylum Seekers as Title 42 Ends

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Catholic Organizations Urge the U.S. Government to Promote the Safety and Rights of Asylum Seekers as Title 42 Ends

May 11, 2023

As Catholic organizations serving asylum seekers and people seeking safety, we urge the U.S. to promote the safety and rights of asylum seekers as Title 42 ends.

Today, we mark the termination of Title 42, a policy that critically limited or denied access to asylum for thousands of individuals and families seeking refuge and protection. But with the end of Title 42, we are appalled by the continuation of asylum restrictions through different measures enacted and proposed both by the Biden administration and Congress. With the new rules and proposed Congressional policies, the U.S. government is changing the asylum system as we have known it since 1980 and is failing to improve and provide protection to people seeking safety in a just and humane manner. Despite the government’s previous promises to protect the right to seek asylum, the new measures make asylum seekers pay the ultimate price.

We are deeply concerned by the Administration’s announcement yesterday that the Title 42 expulsion policy will be replaced by the final asylum ban rule. This rule will further restrict access to asylum by requiring individuals to first seek asylum in another country before coming to the U.S. It also includes extremely limited exceptions that will place many individuals and families in dangerous and life-threatening situations.

The Administration will continue to require that asylum seekers apply through CBP One application, a process that limits access to asylum due to its language, technical glitches, and requirement that individuals have a smartphone in order to seek protection. We also fear the use of Title 8, paired together with the new policy on credible fear interviews in CBP custody and other rushed processes of adjudication, will gut due process for immigrants all together.

The Administration’s announcement that 1,500 additional troops will be sent to the border raises additional concerns. We fear that further militarization of the border may compromise the safety and rights of those seeking safety and traumatize communities who live at the border.

In late April, the Biden Administration announced a new proposal to manage regional migration. We recognize that the Administration is taking steps to expand refugee resettlement and family reunification parole, measures that will provide a life-saving pathway for individuals and families in need of protection. Yet these expansions are part of a proposal that further restricts access to asylum for those arriving at the U.S.-Mexico border.

Meanwhile, in Congress, we oppose bills in both the House and Senate that would severely cut access to asylum and limit the rights of asylum seekers. We call upon Congress to find long-term solutions to ensure that the U.S. has the processes in place to welcome and provide refuge for asylum seekers.

As organizations guided by Catholic values, we see it as our duty to welcome those in need of refuge. As recently stated by Pope Francis, “How sad and painful it is to see closed doors. The closed doors of our selfishness with regard to others; the closed doors of our individualism amid a society of growing isolation; the closed doors of our indifference towards the underprivileged and those who suffer; the doors we close towards those who are foreign or unlike us, towards migrants or the poor.”

We urge the U.S. government to promote the safety of asylum seekers and protect their rights. Through continued restrictions on asylum and the militarization of the border, the U.S. government has shut the door to many of our siblings who are calling out for help. This failure to provide welcome sends a clear message to the rest of the world that the U.S. will not keep its previous asylum promises and instead continues to turn away from those most in need.

Signed,

NETWORK Lobby for Catholic Social Justice
Jesuit Refugee Service – USA
Hope Border Institute
Kino Border Initiative
Franciscan Action Network
Catholic Charities of Southern New Mexico
Maryknoll Office of Global Concerns
Dorothy Day Catholic Worker – Washington DC
St. Columban Mission for Justice, Peace and Ecology
Pax Christi – USA
Jesuit Conference Office of Justice and Ecology
Franciscan Network for Migrants – USA
Diocesan Migrant and Refugee Services Inc
Sisters of Mercy of the Americas – Justice Team
Catholics Against Racism in Immigration (CARI)
Quixote Center


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STOP ANTI-ASIAN RACISM & CHINA BASHING RALLY at Chinatown Archway at 7th and H Street, NW, Washington DC on Saturday afternoon, 27 March 2021 by Elvert Barnes Photography

AAPI Heritage Month Invites Reflection and Reparation

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AAPI Heritage Month Invites Reflection and Reparation

Jarrett Smith
May 1, 2023

The human brain is excellent at recognizing threats. If something upsets the patterns, we associate with normal – or fits into a pattern we associate with as harm – our fight-or-flight response is triggered, and we react accordingly. Our Neanderthal cousins’ ways of processing the world live on. But this very old impulse has caused a lot of harm in recent centuries because human beings have developed a destructive tendency to see one another as a threat, even when they have no reason to believe this.

A terrible example from the last century is U.S. government’s internment of Japanese Americans following the attack on Pearl Harbor and the U.S. entry into World War II. In the name of national security, entire communities were disrupted. People lost everything. And the harm is still in living memory of the young Japanese Americans who joined their families in the camps where the government forcibly relocated them.

May is Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, so it’s good to remember such chapters of U.S. history and apply their hard lessons to our world today. At NETWORK, we take from it a couple of key lessons. First, it’s sober context for the terrible border policies of recent years, including family separation, kids in cages, Title 42, and the ongoing inability or refusal to restore basic function to our immigration and asylum systems. Racist policies are sadly nothing new.

But we can also take encouragement in the fact that, in 1981, in recognition of the harm done by Japanese American internment, the U.S. government gave Japanese Americans $20,000 in reparations, along with an apology from President Ronald Reagan. This move served as one inspiration for H.R. 40, the bill that would form a commission to study the question of reparations for Black Americans. NETWORK is part of the coalition that endorses this bill, and our work on the Racial Wealth and Income Gap and Tax Justice for All demonstrates the pernicious structural and intergenerational racial inequities that would need to be addressed as part of reparations.

And sadly, we have far more recent examples of anti-Asian hate in the U.S., especially the ugly and paranoid response of many people to the COVID-19 pandemic. Facing the peril of a new and dangerous respiratory disease, many people projected their fear onto a group of people, an “other.” This too requires solidarity, repudiation, and real examination of both the harm and its causes.

I believe that human beings have the capacity to learn and grow past the sin of racism and all its ugly patterns. We shouldn’t be recognizing threats in one another. We should be recognizing humanity. Humanity brings a vibrant diversity that is gift. And in Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, that gift is so abundantly clear. Our friends and neighbors of Japanese, Chinese, Vietnamese, Sri Lankan, Indian, and so many other Asian and Pacific Islander backgrounds are all gift, and the appropriate response to a gift is not fear, but gratitude.

This Asian American and Pacific Islander month is a call to reflection on the actions, past and present, of the society in which we live, and an invitation to repair the harms, to break the patterns and cycles of racism. Breaking those habits and finding areas to collaborate with marginalized groups seeking reparatory justice would truly put us in a place to celebrate the future we want.

Jarrett Smith is a NETWORK Government Relations Advocate.