Poverty, and my contribution to continuing the cycle. Chances are we go to church on Sunday. We pray and we believe in God. Most of us do not really consider that we personally contribute to poverty. How would you feel if your father had been working overseas for many years? He did this because he had to.
There was no way he could support his family and live at home. You only got to see your father for about two months of the year. How would you feel if you had a job and you were fired. The reason was that the factory was relocated to a place where the labour was cheaper. Poverty is real. Poverty can be very brutal. Pope Francis has condemned the conditions of workers who died in a Bangladesh factory collapse last week as “slave labour,” saying unjust salaries and the unbridled quest for profits were “against God”.
In the pope’s toughest words yet on workers’ rights since his election on March 13, another indication that the former arch…bishop of Buenos Aires is intent on making social justice a major plank of his pontificate.
“Living on 38 euros ($50) a month – that was the pay of these people who died. That is called slave labour,” Francis said in a private impromptu sermon at his personal morning Mass in his residence.
Nobody is unaffected by poverty or slave labour. There are families who are affected by this. Many of us by name brand clothes made in inhumane conditions. People travel to countries around the world work on building projects. They do this, because the people native to the country simply feel too important to do manual labour. We all presume certain goods will be available. We do not think that seafarers who travel the world in industrial ships do not see their families for any more than 2 months a year. Consider what you can do to make people more aware of poverty. If enough people recognize it, poverty becomes visible. Now, there are people who are doing their best to make it as invisible as possible. Imagine if you contributed to a more equitable world rather than contribute to a more injustice
Rt Rev. Olexander Kenez
