SASI workshops
Spiritual and Moral Imagination of a Catholic Peacebuilder
Dr. Scott Appleby
Catholic Social Action: Challenges and Opportunities
Leaders from each of the sponsoring organizations will participate in a panel on the state of Catholic social action today. Participants include:
- Chair, Roundtable Association of Catholic Diocesan Social Action Directors
- Susan Stevenot Sullivan, USCCB/JPHD
- Ralph McCloud, USCCB/CCHD
- Joan Rosenhauer, Catholic Relief Services
- Greg Kepferle, Catholic Charities
- Joe Grant, JustFaith Ministries
- Moderator: George Horton, Archdiocese of New York
Track I: Foundations of Catholic Social Teaching & Biblical Justice
Dr. Kristin Heyer and Tricia Hoyt, MA
- Biblical Justice
- The Social Mission of the Church: Historical and Contemporary Contexts
- Theological Foundations of Catholic Social Teaching
In these sessions, first-time attendees and others looking to enhance their knowledge of the fundamentals of Catholic Social Teaching will spend time in three sessions examining the biblical and theological foundations of the Church’s social doctrine. Using a model that blends storytelling with scholarly analysis, Ms. Hoyt will guide participants to look deeply into biblical texts, which point us not only to core themes, who the God is whom we adore. Dr. Heyer’s sessions will explore the history of the church's social mission with special attention to Vatican II as well as contemporary ways in which the church lives out her social mission and help participants reflect upon the theological commitments and concepts that ground Catholic social teaching principles and themes.
Track II: Peacebuilding for the 21st Century
Dr. Scott Appleby and Dr. Ami Carpenter
- What Is Peacebuilding?
- Social Action as Peacebuilding
- Becoming a Peacebuilder
Supporting Faith-Based Community Organizing Today Fr. John Baumann, Founder of PICO Network
Fr. John Baumann SJ, founder of the PICO Network, will moderate a lively discussion of faith-based community organizing. Participants will receive an overview and hear from an experienced pastor and community leader about the benefits and challenges of this particular form of community organizing. There will be ample opportunity for questions and discussion from the audience.
Poverty USA Tours
PACT, San Jose - People Acting in Community Together (PACT) is an affiliate of the PICO Network and was founded in 1985. It is an inter-faith, grassroots organization that empowers everyday people to create a more just community through leadership training and experience to community members of many different ethnic, religious, and socio-economic backgrounds. Through PACT, people work together to solve the most pervasive social problems of our day, including: failing public schools, lack of affordable housing, lack of affordable health care, and unsafe neighborhoods and poor services.
Participants will visit with PACT leaders and organizers in a Catholic parish in the neighborhood in which labor organizer, Cesar Chavez was active. They will learn more about PACT’s work and how it is transforming lives and improving communities. Afterwards, participants will have a free evening in San Jose on Santana Row, an area with eateries, shopping, and possibly the Winchester Mystery House.
Day Worker Center, Mountain View – The Day Worker Center serves the day laborer community in Mountain View, Los Altos, and other surrounding communities. The Center was established in 1996 by local business people, community leaders, and church leaders to provide job-matching services for hundreds of local homeowners and businesses annually. In addition to supporting the day laborer community, the Center also decreases the number of workers congregating on the streets, provides free weekly medical visits by the Gardner mobile medical van, provides a location for service providers to reach their clients, provides ESL classes to the workers, serves as a critical conduit for the city agencies and services to communicate with the Latino community.
Participants will learn more about the Day Worker Center’s offerings and its new project using a CCHD economic development technical assistance grant to explore creation of worker owner businesses. Afterwards, this group will have a free evening in San Francisco, including Fisherman’s Wharf
Closing Plenary: "Sent into the Eye of the Storm: Engaging Spirituality for these Times"
Joe Grant, JustFaith Ministries
This presentation will focus on the mission of the Holy Spirit to heal the world. We will be encouraged to practice prophetic-presence, a way of being deeply connected that holds the world together. This kind of "engaged-contemplation" empowers us to get underneath all that divides us and t experience intimacy at its deepest level.
Workshops
Diocesan Social Action Skills Track
Hispanics and Social Ministry: Time for a New Conversation?
Fr. Eduardo Fernández, SJ, Santa Clara University with Ms. Anne Grycz, Diocese of San Jose
This workshop, led by a Latino Jesuit pastoral theologian and the Director Emerita of the Institute for Leadership in Ministry in the Diocese of San Jose, will explore such areas as the present sociological reality of Hispanics in the United States, some important projections for the future, the challenges of multicultural parishes, the contribution which they bring to the social justice table, and how to engage them further in social ministry. In a way, it will explore the question of "What is working, what isn’t, and why?"
Step Up Silicon Valley: The Campaign to Cut Poverty
Greg Kepferle, Catholic Charities of Santa Clara County
Ending Poverty – One Community At a Time: We will explore ways to build a strong local community coalition to cut poverty as well as learn what works and what doesn’t in forming an issue-focused collaborative of diverse community sectors. Using Step Up Silicon Valley: The Campaign to Cut Poverty in Santa Clara County as a case study, participants will analyze lessons learned and apply them to their own local situations in order to build stronger networks of service and advocacy to cut poverty.
CCHD: Funding Both Community Organizing AND Economic Development
Sandy Mattingly-Paulen, USCCB/CCHD and leaders from WAGES
The Catholic Campaign for Human Development has a 40-year history of funding all types of community organizing and economic development. While both funding categories will be presented, come and learn more about the lesser known CCHD economic development program and the exciting business and asset development opportunities it can promote.
Embracing and Working on "Human Life and Dignity"
Susan Sullivan, USCCB/JPHD
This session will explore theological, philosophical and ecclesial foundations of “human life and dignity” and the need and opportunity to link them together more clearly and effectively. Workshop leaders will sketch out ways in education, policy, worship, and service to promote the dignity of all persons from conception to natural death. Participants will share experiences and offer ideas around messaging and how we can unite our Catholic community of faith in a principled, persistent and consistent commitment to defend the life and dignity of all, especially the most vulnerable and poorest of our sisters and brothers.
Engaging Young Adults in Church
Interested in involving young adults in your ministry? This workshop will discuss: Who are today's young adults? What strategies and tools can I use to reach out to young adults to involve them in my ministry? Workshop highlights will include: Sons and Daughters of the Light; generational research; developing a spirituality of hospitality; and best practices, resources and programs.
Think Globally, Act Locally
Tom Ulrich, Catholic Relief Services
We all know that global poverty is a critically important issue. However, moving from that passionate realization to concrete action in parishes can be a real challenge for diocesan social action staff. This workshop will provide some concrete methods and vehicles, based on sound theology plus organizing principles, to help meet that challenge. Catholics Confront Global Poverty will be featured.
Peacebuilding: Using Natural Resources for the Common Good, not Conflict
Steve Hilbert, USCCB/JPHD
This presentation will offer participants a description of a CRS-USCCB experience in applying Catholic Social Teaching on peacebuilding and justice. CRS and the USCCB worked with the Church in Chad and Cameroon to build their capacity to defend the common good by improving the transparency and accountability of a World Bank-sponsored $3.5 billion oil and pipeline project. Participants will discover the lessons learned and how the roles played by CRS and the Church evolved over the life of the project. Participants will also learn how the oil project was improved to provide better transparency and accountability and how these successes are being applied in our ongoing extractives work in places like the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Parish Social Action Skills Track
Communities of Salt & Light: Our Parish Can Make a Difference
Mr. Tom Ulrich, Catholic Relief Services and Cynthia Morris-Colbert, USCCB/JPHD
Drawing from the U.S. Bishop’s Statement, Communities of Salt and Light: Reflections on the Social Mission of the Parish, this workshop begins by focusing on the vocation of the parish. The presenters will challenge participants to visualize a comprehensive framework for parish social ministry and show how a local parish has integrated the framework into their faith community. Finally, participants will be called to see themselves as the leaders and animators of social ministry in the parish.
Leadership Skills for Parish Social Action
Rachel Lustig, Catholic Charities USA
Have the passion for parish social ministry, but do not have the direction? In this workshop, participants will learn a process for getting their parish social ministry started in a way that works and builds off their vision for what the parish can be and do and helps generate leaders from the community.
Transforming Hearts for Social Justice
Elizabeth Lilly, Catholic Charities of Santa Clara County, JustFaith Graduate
At its heart, parish social ministry is about growing to more deeply love God and each other. This workshop will remind us about the importance of the process of conversion, highlight how we can rely on God and our faith community, and identify ways to invite people into the transformation process. Time will also be spent on how to invite people into parish social ministry after they have been through a conversion based experience.
Descriptions will be updated as information is received.