Catholic Secretariat meet Catholic charity workers

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• Ambrose Yennah, Accra, Ghana 9 years ago

  I was privileged to be a participant at the two day forum. The initiative to have coordinated development efforts and sharing of lessons and experiences amongst Catholic Development Organizations that would make them more eff ...
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  I was privileged to be a participant at the two day forum. The initiative to have coordinated development efforts and sharing of lessons and experiences amongst Catholic Development Organizations that would make them more effective is appropriate and could not have come at a better time.
  The Catholic Church in Ghana together with its development partners are doing a lot of good especially in education and health services provision only second after the Government as part of its mission of integral human development. The Church’s mission of evangelization is a mission that seeks to transform the human being. As part of the mission of spreading the good news of the salvation of Christ, the Church seeks to share God’s love, peace and justice, and bring liberty and freedom for the oppressed. The mission of Jesus is to liberate people from dehumanizing or debilitating conditions, poverty, hunger, disease, ignorance, illiteracy, indignity, oppression and or torture. Many young people today are faced with a bleak future arising from inadequate or inappropriate education, child abuse and neglect, school dropouts, streetism, drug abuse, teenage pregnancy, unemployment, war etc leading to migration. The Catholic Church in its development work has taken education, health, human rights, rural development and socio-economic activities of the communities in which they operate as key sectors of human development as an integral part of its mission of evangelization and as an expression of Christian love. The Church has always and will continue to be a key player alongside Governments and Development Partners in the development of people in a holistic way, i.e. mental, physical and spiritual. The Church in its development efforts is guided by the social teachings of the Church which hinges on “Common Good”, teachings that ensure that the Gospel values of justice, peace, love, dignity are shared by all humanity as part of its ethics and minimum operating standards.
  Pope Francis in his first apostolic exhortation “Evangelii Gaudium”, “The Joy of the Gospel” calls on the Church to resist the forces of consumerism, capitalism and greed. Materialism drowns the voice of God and offers “pleasures” that cannot bring joy to the world but misery. The document celebrates the dignity of the human person, “Imago Dei” that all human beings are created in the image of God and deserve to be treated with dignity. The laws of competition and the survival of the fittest lead us to forget about the dignity and worth of human beings who suffer under consumer capitalism.
  The relevance of the theme and the topics that were treated at the two day forum of Catholic Development Organizations cannot be overemphasized. There is an obvious correlation between “Climate change”, “Food security” and “Migration and development”. Climate change arising out of human activities involving the irresponsible use of the earth’s resources resulting in global warming affects food security leading to migration and all its positive and or negative contribution to the development of economies. Some of the causes of Climate change arise from unbridled capitalism, capitalism that promotes greed, inequality, unsustainable use of the earth’s resources, resulting in planet earth being depleted its natural resources without any hope of being re-generated. It is therefore gratifying that the Holy Father is leading the global campaign for the preservation of earth’s resources for generations yet to come. A campaign for the re-distribution of the world’s resources in a desire to end hunger in the World through programs such as “The right to food and food for all” and “The right to health for all”. We should all add our prayers to the Holy Father that there will be a change of heart from the world most richest, call them “Billionaire philanthropists” to share at least half of their wealth with the world’s poorest of poor and hunger poverty diseases and want will be eliminated and create a just world for all. It is interesting to know that the wealth of 67 Richest People in the world is more than the combined wealth of 3.5 billion people (half of the world‘s 7 billion people). It is our prayer that the Holy Father has the moral authority and the leadership to make this happen for the greater glory of God and for the good of all humanity.

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