Facts for Features: Katrina Impact
News Intro Text
[The Data Center, August 28, 2015]
News Item Content
<p>Allison Plyer, The Data Center</p>
<p>Published: Aug 28, 2015</p>
<div>
</div>
<p>NEW ORLEANS – August 12‚ 2015 – As we approach the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, people around the world will reflect on the devastating impact that the storm and subsequent levee failures had on New Orleans and the entire Gulf Coast region.</p>
<p><strong>Flooding.</strong> When the levees protecting New Orleans failed in August 2005, approximately 80 percent of the city was flooded. The business district and main tourist centers were relatively undamaged, but vast expanses of many New Orleans neighborhoods were inundated, making Katrina the largest residential disaster in U.S. history. The extent of damage varied greatly from one part of town to another. Some areas received one foot of flooding while others were submerged by more than 10 feet of water.</p>
<p><strong>Deaths. </strong>Hurricane Katrina and the levee failures resulted in the deaths of at least 986 Louisiana residents. The major causes of death include: drowning (40%), injury and trauma (25%), and heart conditions (11%). Nearly half of all victims were over the age of 74.</p>
<p><strong>Displaced residents</strong>. The storm displaced more than a million people in the Gulf Coast region. Many people returned home within days, but up to 600,000 households were still displaced a month later. At their peak, hurricane evacuee shelters housed 273,000 people and, later, FEMA trailers housed at least 114,000 households.</p>
<p><strong>Population decrease.</strong> The population of New Orleans fell from 484,674 before Katrina (April 2000) to an estimated 230,172 after Katrina (July 2006) — a decrease of 254,502 people and a loss of over half of the city’s population.(1) By July of 2014, the population was back up to 384,320 — 79% of what it was in 2000.</p>
<p><strong>Housing damage.</strong> Katrina damaged more than a million housing units in the Gulf Coast region. About half of these damaged units were located in Louisiana. In New Orleans alone, 134,000 housing units — 70% of all occupied units — suffered damage from Hurricane Katrina and the subsequent flooding.</p>
<p><strong>Total damages</strong>. The total damages from Hurricanes Katrina and Rita were $150 billion — $135 billion from Katrina and $15 billion from Rita.(2)</p>
<p><strong>Recovery funding.</strong> Of the $120.5 billion in federal spending, the majority — approximately $75 billion — went to emergency relief, not rebuilding. Philanthropic giving, while more than double the giving for either the 2004 South Asian Tsunami or 9/11, was only $6.5 billion. Meanwhile, private insurance claims covered less than $30 billion of the losses.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.datacenterresearch.org/data-resources/katrina/facts-for-impact/">MORE>></a></p>
<div>
</div>
<p>Published: Aug 28, 2015</p>
<div>
</div>
<p>NEW ORLEANS – August 12‚ 2015 – As we approach the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, people around the world will reflect on the devastating impact that the storm and subsequent levee failures had on New Orleans and the entire Gulf Coast region.</p>
<p><strong>Flooding.</strong> When the levees protecting New Orleans failed in August 2005, approximately 80 percent of the city was flooded. The business district and main tourist centers were relatively undamaged, but vast expanses of many New Orleans neighborhoods were inundated, making Katrina the largest residential disaster in U.S. history. The extent of damage varied greatly from one part of town to another. Some areas received one foot of flooding while others were submerged by more than 10 feet of water.</p>
<p><strong>Deaths. </strong>Hurricane Katrina and the levee failures resulted in the deaths of at least 986 Louisiana residents. The major causes of death include: drowning (40%), injury and trauma (25%), and heart conditions (11%). Nearly half of all victims were over the age of 74.</p>
<p><strong>Displaced residents</strong>. The storm displaced more than a million people in the Gulf Coast region. Many people returned home within days, but up to 600,000 households were still displaced a month later. At their peak, hurricane evacuee shelters housed 273,000 people and, later, FEMA trailers housed at least 114,000 households.</p>
<p><strong>Population decrease.</strong> The population of New Orleans fell from 484,674 before Katrina (April 2000) to an estimated 230,172 after Katrina (July 2006) — a decrease of 254,502 people and a loss of over half of the city’s population.(1) By July of 2014, the population was back up to 384,320 — 79% of what it was in 2000.</p>
<p><strong>Housing damage.</strong> Katrina damaged more than a million housing units in the Gulf Coast region. About half of these damaged units were located in Louisiana. In New Orleans alone, 134,000 housing units — 70% of all occupied units — suffered damage from Hurricane Katrina and the subsequent flooding.</p>
<p><strong>Total damages</strong>. The total damages from Hurricanes Katrina and Rita were $150 billion — $135 billion from Katrina and $15 billion from Rita.(2)</p>
<p><strong>Recovery funding.</strong> Of the $120.5 billion in federal spending, the majority — approximately $75 billion — went to emergency relief, not rebuilding. Philanthropic giving, while more than double the giving for either the 2004 South Asian Tsunami or 9/11, was only $6.5 billion. Meanwhile, private insurance claims covered less than $30 billion of the losses.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.datacenterresearch.org/data-resources/katrina/facts-for-impact/">MORE>></a></p>
<div>
</div>
Date
New Orleans 10 Years After Katrina: An Interview with Fred Kammer, S.J.
News Intro Text
America Magazine, August 29, 2015
News Item Content
<p>Sean Salai, S.J. | Aug 29 2015 | America Magazine </p>
<p>Fred Kammer, S.J., is a lawyer who directs the Jesuit Social Research Institute at Loyola University New Orleans. A New Orleans native and former Jesuit provincial superior in that city when Hurricane Katrina struck, Father Kammer holds a J.D. from Yale University, an M.Div from Loyola University Chicago, and B.A. from Spring Hill College. From 1992 to 2001, he was the President and CEO of Catholic Charities USA, the nation's largest voluntary social services provider. He also served as a policy adviser on health and welfare issues to the U.S. Catholic bishops from 1990 to 1992.</p>
<p>Father Kammer is author of “Doing Faithjustice: An Introduction to Catholic Social Thought” (Paulist Press; third printing, 2005), “Salted with Fire: Spirituality for the Faithjustice Journey” (Paulist Press, 1995), and “Faith. Works. Wonders.—An Insider's Guide to Catholic Charities” (2009, Wipf and Stock Publishers) in addition to the research and writing he does as a Catholic lobbyist on social issues. He also works as a retreat director and sits on the board of the Ignatian Solidarity Network.</p>
<p>Today, Aug. 29, is the tenth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. On Aug. 28, I interviewed Father Kammer by telephone about his perspective on how the city has fared in these past ten years. The following transcript has been edited for content and length.</p>
<p><strong>What has changed in New Orleans over the past ten years since Hurricane Katrina devastated the city?</strong></p>
<p>There have been improvements in the criminal justice system. There’s an enormous experiment going on in public schools, with almost all of our public school students now in charter schools. There has been a major change in public housing, where we’ve torn down major housing projects which were there for decades and put back mixed-use housing complexes in their place. In the process, of course, we’ve destroyed more available housing for low-income families.</p>
<p>Demographically, the city is a hundred thousand people smaller. There has been a major investment in rebuilding the levees and rebuilding them better. A number of entrepreneurs have come to the city to do new things; for example, there are more restaurants in New Orleans than there were before Katrina, if you can believe it. There have been a whole array of public prosecutions of politicians which really started before Katrina. Over the last 15 years there have been a number of prosecutions of politicians—both black and white, state and local—who have been indicted, convicted, or pleaded guilty. We’ve had an enormous influx of Latino workers who came to rebuild the city and stayed, doubling our Hispanic population. And right now, in fact, there is construction occurring on many of the major cross-streets because there is still a couple billion dollars of infrastructure money that has not been spent yet. On Aug. 1, we opened a new hospital—the University Medical Center of New Orleans—to replace the old Charity Hospital that served the poor from the 1930s until it was destroyed in the storm.</p>
<p>Also, an enormous amount of private houses have been rebuilt and there’s much less available rental housing. Katrina destroyed about one-half of the available rental housing in New Orleans. Those are just some of the changes.</p>
<p><strong>What has stayed the same in New Orleans?</strong></p>
<p>While the numbers have changed, the percentages in terms of poverty have changed and even worsened. The number of children living in poverty before Katrina was 38 percent and that’s now 39 percent. And the income gap between white families and black families has widened. I would say that the racial perceptions of how things are going, between the white community and the black community, were different before Katrina and have remained different. According to various surveys, these perceptions of the city’s well-being diverge over the future of youth and the status of public schools. So the perceptions among the white and black population continue to be starkly different.</p>
<p>And the state of Louisiana has still failed to make a significant investment in wetlands. We continue to lose an enormous amount of our wetlands every day and every year, which is eroding away the city’s protection against future storms.</p>
<p><strong>What can you tell us about poverty and jobs in the city right now?</strong></p>
<p>The median household income between white and black has continued to grow in difference. Over the years since Katrina, white household income has grown by 22 percent and black household income has grown about 7 percent. And that continues the divide between white and black households, judging by median family income, and that’s despite the fact that we’ve spent an enormous amount of money statewide on Katrina recovery.</p>
<p><a href="http://americamagazine.org/content/all-things/new-orleans-10-years-after-katrina-interview-fred-kammer-sj">MORE>></a></p>
<p>Fred Kammer, S.J., is a lawyer who directs the Jesuit Social Research Institute at Loyola University New Orleans. A New Orleans native and former Jesuit provincial superior in that city when Hurricane Katrina struck, Father Kammer holds a J.D. from Yale University, an M.Div from Loyola University Chicago, and B.A. from Spring Hill College. From 1992 to 2001, he was the President and CEO of Catholic Charities USA, the nation's largest voluntary social services provider. He also served as a policy adviser on health and welfare issues to the U.S. Catholic bishops from 1990 to 1992.</p>
<p>Father Kammer is author of “Doing Faithjustice: An Introduction to Catholic Social Thought” (Paulist Press; third printing, 2005), “Salted with Fire: Spirituality for the Faithjustice Journey” (Paulist Press, 1995), and “Faith. Works. Wonders.—An Insider's Guide to Catholic Charities” (2009, Wipf and Stock Publishers) in addition to the research and writing he does as a Catholic lobbyist on social issues. He also works as a retreat director and sits on the board of the Ignatian Solidarity Network.</p>
<p>Today, Aug. 29, is the tenth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. On Aug. 28, I interviewed Father Kammer by telephone about his perspective on how the city has fared in these past ten years. The following transcript has been edited for content and length.</p>
<p><strong>What has changed in New Orleans over the past ten years since Hurricane Katrina devastated the city?</strong></p>
<p>There have been improvements in the criminal justice system. There’s an enormous experiment going on in public schools, with almost all of our public school students now in charter schools. There has been a major change in public housing, where we’ve torn down major housing projects which were there for decades and put back mixed-use housing complexes in their place. In the process, of course, we’ve destroyed more available housing for low-income families.</p>
<p>Demographically, the city is a hundred thousand people smaller. There has been a major investment in rebuilding the levees and rebuilding them better. A number of entrepreneurs have come to the city to do new things; for example, there are more restaurants in New Orleans than there were before Katrina, if you can believe it. There have been a whole array of public prosecutions of politicians which really started before Katrina. Over the last 15 years there have been a number of prosecutions of politicians—both black and white, state and local—who have been indicted, convicted, or pleaded guilty. We’ve had an enormous influx of Latino workers who came to rebuild the city and stayed, doubling our Hispanic population. And right now, in fact, there is construction occurring on many of the major cross-streets because there is still a couple billion dollars of infrastructure money that has not been spent yet. On Aug. 1, we opened a new hospital—the University Medical Center of New Orleans—to replace the old Charity Hospital that served the poor from the 1930s until it was destroyed in the storm.</p>
<p>Also, an enormous amount of private houses have been rebuilt and there’s much less available rental housing. Katrina destroyed about one-half of the available rental housing in New Orleans. Those are just some of the changes.</p>
<p><strong>What has stayed the same in New Orleans?</strong></p>
<p>While the numbers have changed, the percentages in terms of poverty have changed and even worsened. The number of children living in poverty before Katrina was 38 percent and that’s now 39 percent. And the income gap between white families and black families has widened. I would say that the racial perceptions of how things are going, between the white community and the black community, were different before Katrina and have remained different. According to various surveys, these perceptions of the city’s well-being diverge over the future of youth and the status of public schools. So the perceptions among the white and black population continue to be starkly different.</p>
<p>And the state of Louisiana has still failed to make a significant investment in wetlands. We continue to lose an enormous amount of our wetlands every day and every year, which is eroding away the city’s protection against future storms.</p>
<p><strong>What can you tell us about poverty and jobs in the city right now?</strong></p>
<p>The median household income between white and black has continued to grow in difference. Over the years since Katrina, white household income has grown by 22 percent and black household income has grown about 7 percent. And that continues the divide between white and black households, judging by median family income, and that’s despite the fact that we’ve spent an enormous amount of money statewide on Katrina recovery.</p>
<p><a href="http://americamagazine.org/content/all-things/new-orleans-10-years-after-katrina-interview-fred-kammer-sj">MORE>></a></p>
Date
Facts of Features: Katrina Recovery
News Intro Text
[The Data Center, August 28, 2015]
News Item Content
<p>Allison Plyer, The Data Center</p>
<p>Published: Aug 28, 2015</p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong>New Orleans is a smaller city but continues to grow nearly ten years after Katrina.</strong></p>
<ul>
<li>
As of July 2014, the U.S. Census Bureau has estimated New Orleans’ population at 384,320, or 79 percent of its 2000 population of 484,674. The metro area, with 1,251,849 residents, has 94 percent of its 2000 population of 1,337,726.1</li>
<li>
According to the Census Bureau, the population of New Orleans and the metro area grew by 5,314 people and 9,900 people, respectively, between July 2013 and July 2014.</li>
<li>
As of June 2015, Valassis, Inc. data on households receiving mail indicates that more than half (40) of New Orleans’ 72 neighborhoods have recovered 90 percent of their June 2005 population, and 16 neighborhoods have more population than they did in June 2005.</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Metro New Orleans is taking the first steps toward a new path, with signs of a more competitive economy and expanded amenities.</strong></p>
<ul>
<li>
New Orleans’ sales tax revenue for Jan-May 2015 was 29 percent higher than for the same months in 2005 pre-Katrina (despite the city’s smaller population today), and 49 percent higher than in 2009 at the depth of the Great Recession.2</li>
<li>
Metro New Orleans has rebounded from the Great Recession impressively. As of 2014, metro New Orleans had reached 5 percent above its 2008 recession-era employment level while the nation had reached just 1 percent above its 2008 job level.</li>
<li>
Entrepreneurship in metro New Orleans at 471 business startups per 100,000 adults in the three-year period ending in 2013 exceeds the nation by 64 percent.</li>
<li>
Bikeways and trails (including shared lanes) are growing exponentially in New Orleans. As of 2014, the city had 92.4 miles of bikeways as compared to the 10.7 miles that existed in 2004.</li>
</ul>
<p><a href="http://www.datacenterresearch.org/data-resources/katrina/facts-for-features-katrina-recovery/">MORE>></a></p>
<p>Published: Aug 28, 2015</p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong>New Orleans is a smaller city but continues to grow nearly ten years after Katrina.</strong></p>
<ul>
<li>
As of July 2014, the U.S. Census Bureau has estimated New Orleans’ population at 384,320, or 79 percent of its 2000 population of 484,674. The metro area, with 1,251,849 residents, has 94 percent of its 2000 population of 1,337,726.1</li>
<li>
According to the Census Bureau, the population of New Orleans and the metro area grew by 5,314 people and 9,900 people, respectively, between July 2013 and July 2014.</li>
<li>
As of June 2015, Valassis, Inc. data on households receiving mail indicates that more than half (40) of New Orleans’ 72 neighborhoods have recovered 90 percent of their June 2005 population, and 16 neighborhoods have more population than they did in June 2005.</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Metro New Orleans is taking the first steps toward a new path, with signs of a more competitive economy and expanded amenities.</strong></p>
<ul>
<li>
New Orleans’ sales tax revenue for Jan-May 2015 was 29 percent higher than for the same months in 2005 pre-Katrina (despite the city’s smaller population today), and 49 percent higher than in 2009 at the depth of the Great Recession.2</li>
<li>
Metro New Orleans has rebounded from the Great Recession impressively. As of 2014, metro New Orleans had reached 5 percent above its 2008 recession-era employment level while the nation had reached just 1 percent above its 2008 job level.</li>
<li>
Entrepreneurship in metro New Orleans at 471 business startups per 100,000 adults in the three-year period ending in 2013 exceeds the nation by 64 percent.</li>
<li>
Bikeways and trails (including shared lanes) are growing exponentially in New Orleans. As of 2014, the city had 92.4 miles of bikeways as compared to the 10.7 miles that existed in 2004.</li>
</ul>
<p><a href="http://www.datacenterresearch.org/data-resources/katrina/facts-for-features-katrina-recovery/">MORE>></a></p>
Date
Katrina and the Least Among Us
News Intro Text
A ten year retrospective- Part 1
News Item Content
<p><strong>A ten year retrospective - Part 1</strong></p>
<p>by Fred Kammer, SJ</p>
<p>Katrina’s tenth anniversary (August 29th) brings many important stories about levees, wetlands, demography, entrepreneurs, venture capital, corruption convictions, and resiliency. JSRI’s interests and Gospel focus on the “least among us” cause us to examine in this issue what happened—or not—in terms of poverty, housing availability, and criminal justice. Next month we focus on public schools, health care, and new immigrants. The picture, like much of the past ten years, is a blend of good and bad, success and failure.</p>
<p>Poverty and Jobs. In brief, the income gap has widened, and New Orleans ranks second in income inequality among 300 U.S. cities.[1] Poverty is entrenched, and the percent of children living in poverty in New Orleans, 38% in 2005, has risen to 39%.[2] The racial income divide continues growing: white median household income in metro New Orleans, on a par with households nationwide, grew by 22% between 2005 and 2013 to $60,553. That was three times the 7% growth rate of black median households (to $25,102).[3] The disparity in 2013 incomes between white and black households was 54%, compared to 40% nationally.[4] This worsened despite $71 billion dollars received by the State of Louisiana for rebuilding. Closely tied was the fact that employment rates for white men in metro New Orleans was 77%, compared with 57% for black men.</p>
<p>Housing Affordability. According to an August 11th report from the New Orleans Metropolitan Association of Realtors, average New Orleans home prices climbed an amazing 46% since Katrina. (Increases in Jefferson Parish increased only 1%.)[5] For renters, the median gross New Orleans rents grew from $698 to $925 between 2004 and 2013.[6] One-bedroom apartment rents rose 33% and two-bedrooms by 41%. A key driver of inflated costs are estimates that Katrina destroyed over half of the region’s rental housing.[7] </p>
<p>In addition, public housing authorities took the opportunity to replace concentrated public housing complexes, even those untouched by Katrina, with mixed income apartments. However, the result is that there are 3,221 fewer low-income public housing apartments in the city.[8] In Orleans Parish, the percentage of those paying more than 50% of their income on rent and utilities—those termed “severely cost-burdened renters”—rose from 24% to 37% between 2004 and 2013. It should be no surprise, then, that the share of the metro poor living outside New Orleans has expanded from 46% in 1999 to 58% by 2013.[9] Even those with Housing Choice Vouchers, which tripled in number in Orleans Parish between 2000 and 2010, often found themselves consigned to high-poverty, low-opportunity neighborhoods by “discrimination against voucher users and differential access to rental housing opportunities generally on the basis of race.”[10] In 2010, 90% of voucher users in metro New Orleans were black.[11]</p>
<p>Criminal Justice. Before Katrina, New Orleans led the nation and the world in incarceration—more than five times the national average in 2005.[12] Since then, two consent decrees are forcing reform in the police department and the jail; an Inspector General’s office is holding criminal justice officials to account; our first independent Police Monitor was created; and constructing a new, smaller, and improved jail—holding two-thirds fewer people already—is the result of ongoing efforts by community members and local officials.[13] Violent crime is actually down in New Orleans by 17% since 2004, but the decrease has been less than that of the nation at 21%.[14] Innovation across the criminal justice system has started, but comprehensive cultural change needs strong leadership from city and system officials for years to come.[15] Orleans Parish still incarcerates at a rate twice that of the nation.[16]</p>
<p><a href="https://t.e2ma.net/webview/ze13i/3b0e69ffca0111b3799baad88a1c0526">MORE>></a></p>
<p>by Fred Kammer, SJ</p>
<p>Katrina’s tenth anniversary (August 29th) brings many important stories about levees, wetlands, demography, entrepreneurs, venture capital, corruption convictions, and resiliency. JSRI’s interests and Gospel focus on the “least among us” cause us to examine in this issue what happened—or not—in terms of poverty, housing availability, and criminal justice. Next month we focus on public schools, health care, and new immigrants. The picture, like much of the past ten years, is a blend of good and bad, success and failure.</p>
<p>Poverty and Jobs. In brief, the income gap has widened, and New Orleans ranks second in income inequality among 300 U.S. cities.[1] Poverty is entrenched, and the percent of children living in poverty in New Orleans, 38% in 2005, has risen to 39%.[2] The racial income divide continues growing: white median household income in metro New Orleans, on a par with households nationwide, grew by 22% between 2005 and 2013 to $60,553. That was three times the 7% growth rate of black median households (to $25,102).[3] The disparity in 2013 incomes between white and black households was 54%, compared to 40% nationally.[4] This worsened despite $71 billion dollars received by the State of Louisiana for rebuilding. Closely tied was the fact that employment rates for white men in metro New Orleans was 77%, compared with 57% for black men.</p>
<p>Housing Affordability. According to an August 11th report from the New Orleans Metropolitan Association of Realtors, average New Orleans home prices climbed an amazing 46% since Katrina. (Increases in Jefferson Parish increased only 1%.)[5] For renters, the median gross New Orleans rents grew from $698 to $925 between 2004 and 2013.[6] One-bedroom apartment rents rose 33% and two-bedrooms by 41%. A key driver of inflated costs are estimates that Katrina destroyed over half of the region’s rental housing.[7] </p>
<p>In addition, public housing authorities took the opportunity to replace concentrated public housing complexes, even those untouched by Katrina, with mixed income apartments. However, the result is that there are 3,221 fewer low-income public housing apartments in the city.[8] In Orleans Parish, the percentage of those paying more than 50% of their income on rent and utilities—those termed “severely cost-burdened renters”—rose from 24% to 37% between 2004 and 2013. It should be no surprise, then, that the share of the metro poor living outside New Orleans has expanded from 46% in 1999 to 58% by 2013.[9] Even those with Housing Choice Vouchers, which tripled in number in Orleans Parish between 2000 and 2010, often found themselves consigned to high-poverty, low-opportunity neighborhoods by “discrimination against voucher users and differential access to rental housing opportunities generally on the basis of race.”[10] In 2010, 90% of voucher users in metro New Orleans were black.[11]</p>
<p>Criminal Justice. Before Katrina, New Orleans led the nation and the world in incarceration—more than five times the national average in 2005.[12] Since then, two consent decrees are forcing reform in the police department and the jail; an Inspector General’s office is holding criminal justice officials to account; our first independent Police Monitor was created; and constructing a new, smaller, and improved jail—holding two-thirds fewer people already—is the result of ongoing efforts by community members and local officials.[13] Violent crime is actually down in New Orleans by 17% since 2004, but the decrease has been less than that of the nation at 21%.[14] Innovation across the criminal justice system has started, but comprehensive cultural change needs strong leadership from city and system officials for years to come.[15] Orleans Parish still incarcerates at a rate twice that of the nation.[16]</p>
<p><a href="https://t.e2ma.net/webview/ze13i/3b0e69ffca0111b3799baad88a1c0526">MORE>></a></p>
Date
Labor Day Statement
News Intro Text
United States Conference of Catholic Bishops
News Item Content
<p><img alt="" src="https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/Labor day 1.jpg" /></p>
<p><img alt="" src="https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/Labor day 2.jpg" /></p>
<p><img alt="" src="https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/Labor day 2.jpg" /></p>
Date
Katrina Immigrant Workers and Katrina Homeowners Press Conference and Rally for Immigration Reform
News Intro Text
Friday, August 28th at 12 noon on the Loyola Front Lawn.
News Item Content
<p><img alt="" src="https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/rally.jpg" /></p>
Date
JSRI to Sponsor BIG CHARITY Screening and Discussion
News Intro Text
Wednesday, September 2 at 7:00 PM in Nunemaker Auditorium (Monroe Hall)
News Item Content
<p> </p>
<p><img alt="" src="https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/big charity website.jpg" /></p>
<p>Watch full trailer <a href="http://www.bigcharityfilm.com/">HERE</a></p>
<p><img alt="" src="https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/big charity website.jpg" /></p>
<p>Watch full trailer <a href="http://www.bigcharityfilm.com/">HERE</a></p>
Date
One life, one love: The Earth and black lives matter
News Intro Text
[Alex Mikulich, Ph.D., August 3, 2015]
News Item Content
<p>Alex Mikulich | Aug. 3, 2015</p>
<p>Pope Francis develops the key theme of “integral ecology” in his encyclical “Laudato Si’, on Care for Our Common Home.” Integral ecology links the largest theological themes of the Catholic tradition -- that we are all intimately one in God’s being -- with the nitty-gritty of loving our neighbor and caring for the smallest and most vulnerable creatures.</p>
<p>God lures us into a dance with each and every one of us together with the whole of creation. We all share one life, one Earth. One cannot and will not thrive unless all thrive in the interdependent web of life.</p>
<p>And yet, in the wake of the brutal murder of nine members of the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, S.C., do we perceive the intimate connections between care for the whole of creation and black lives?</p>
<p>Our African-American brothers and sisters can’t breathe (Eric Garner), can’t eat skittles or wear a hoodie (Trayvon Martin), can’t play loud music (Jordan Davis), can’t play as a child in a park (Tamir Rice), can’t seek help after an accident (Renisha McBride), can’t walk to a store with a friend (Rekia Boyd), and can’t pray in their own church (Cynthia Hurd, the Rev. Clementa Pinckney, Sharonda Coleman-Singleton, Tywanza Sanders, Ethel Lee Lance, Susie Jackson, the Rev. DePayne Middleton-Doctor, the Rev. Daniel Lee Simmons and Myra Thompson).</p>
<p>As Claudia Rankine in The New York Times said a black mother told her, “The condition of black life is one of mourning.” That is perpetual mourning. If predominantly white churches value black lives, we would share in that mourning, not in passing, but as brothers and sisters bound by an integral life in Christ.</p>
<p>Pinckney and eight members of his congregation at Emanuel AME Church welcomed Dylann Roof as one of their own. Two things about the witness of these nine church members haunt theologian Willie James Jennings. First, Jennings is haunted by the fact that Roof was present “in the intimate space of that bible study, sitting there at a table with these saints of God who were seeking to hear a holy word just for them, just for this moment. I would feel less pain if he would have simply walked into church and started shooting; then I could live with the fact that this young man did not … give God’s voice the chance to penetrate his contorted heart.”</p>
<p>The problem is that Roof “did hear the sound of grace and communion. God’s voice was sounding in Emmanuel. He simply resisted it.”</p>
<p>Jennings further elucidates how Roof “showed us the deaf ear of those seeking whiteness, a deafness that reaches deep into the soul and thwarts the power of God’s love.”</p>
<p>Second, Jennings is haunted by the forgiveness that the families of the victims offered Roof. He cites the granddaughter of the Rev. Daniel Lee Simmons, Alana Simmons, who said, “We are here to combat hate-filled actions with love-filled actions.”</p>
<p>Jennings struggles to understand how black folks are called upon throughout the centuries “in tortuous repetition to forgive those who kill us, and we do it. The only way I can fathom this grace of forgiveness is if the very life of God flows through people like these black families.”</p>
<p>Yet Jennings struggles with the way forgiveness is interpreted. Too often, it is used to avoid dealing with whiteness and the “state of war” it creates in America. Forgiveness can be a “soothing high” that does not address the lie that is white supremacy.</p>
<p>White Christians ought to be haunted, too. Now and too many times in the past, white people disassociate ourselves from the depth of connection we have with white people who foment racial terror.</p>
<p>We ought not dismiss Roof as a lunatic. Yet we do. As we disassociate ourselves from this American son and the way he was malformed, we lose the opportunity to examine our own malformation and the conversion to which we are called in this kairotic moment.</p>
<p>This is a kairos moment, when Pope Francis and the #BlackLivesMatter movement call us to personal and cultural transformation.</p>
<p>If we are going to take up the cultural transformation the pope invites, it will mean confronting how white supremacy is a form of “tyrannical anthropocentrism” that divides us from one another and the Earth. By “tyrannical anthropocentrism,” Francis means every “irresponsible domination of human beings over other creatures.”</p>
<p>The Atlantic slave trade initiated a tyrannical anthropocentrism, in which whiteness equates with innocence and blackness with savagery. The slave trade deified ownership of both people and land. W.E.B. Du Bois captured that deification when he wrote: “Whiteness is the ownership of the earth forever and ever, Amen!”</p>
<p>The disproportionate negative impacts of environmental degradation on communities of color exposes, as theologian Shawnee M. Daniels-Sykes explains, the overlapping interconnections between environmental racism and lack of care for black lives lost to gun violence.</p>
<p>Do we hear the cries of the earth and of our brothers and sisters at the Emanuel AME Church? Their cries evoke God’s cry, ever groaning with the whole of creation for loving embrace and justice.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><a href="http://ncronline.org/news/politics/one-life-one-love-earth-and-black-lives-matter">More>></a></p>
<p>Pope Francis develops the key theme of “integral ecology” in his encyclical “Laudato Si’, on Care for Our Common Home.” Integral ecology links the largest theological themes of the Catholic tradition -- that we are all intimately one in God’s being -- with the nitty-gritty of loving our neighbor and caring for the smallest and most vulnerable creatures.</p>
<p>God lures us into a dance with each and every one of us together with the whole of creation. We all share one life, one Earth. One cannot and will not thrive unless all thrive in the interdependent web of life.</p>
<p>And yet, in the wake of the brutal murder of nine members of the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, S.C., do we perceive the intimate connections between care for the whole of creation and black lives?</p>
<p>Our African-American brothers and sisters can’t breathe (Eric Garner), can’t eat skittles or wear a hoodie (Trayvon Martin), can’t play loud music (Jordan Davis), can’t play as a child in a park (Tamir Rice), can’t seek help after an accident (Renisha McBride), can’t walk to a store with a friend (Rekia Boyd), and can’t pray in their own church (Cynthia Hurd, the Rev. Clementa Pinckney, Sharonda Coleman-Singleton, Tywanza Sanders, Ethel Lee Lance, Susie Jackson, the Rev. DePayne Middleton-Doctor, the Rev. Daniel Lee Simmons and Myra Thompson).</p>
<p>As Claudia Rankine in The New York Times said a black mother told her, “The condition of black life is one of mourning.” That is perpetual mourning. If predominantly white churches value black lives, we would share in that mourning, not in passing, but as brothers and sisters bound by an integral life in Christ.</p>
<p>Pinckney and eight members of his congregation at Emanuel AME Church welcomed Dylann Roof as one of their own. Two things about the witness of these nine church members haunt theologian Willie James Jennings. First, Jennings is haunted by the fact that Roof was present “in the intimate space of that bible study, sitting there at a table with these saints of God who were seeking to hear a holy word just for them, just for this moment. I would feel less pain if he would have simply walked into church and started shooting; then I could live with the fact that this young man did not … give God’s voice the chance to penetrate his contorted heart.”</p>
<p>The problem is that Roof “did hear the sound of grace and communion. God’s voice was sounding in Emmanuel. He simply resisted it.”</p>
<p>Jennings further elucidates how Roof “showed us the deaf ear of those seeking whiteness, a deafness that reaches deep into the soul and thwarts the power of God’s love.”</p>
<p>Second, Jennings is haunted by the forgiveness that the families of the victims offered Roof. He cites the granddaughter of the Rev. Daniel Lee Simmons, Alana Simmons, who said, “We are here to combat hate-filled actions with love-filled actions.”</p>
<p>Jennings struggles to understand how black folks are called upon throughout the centuries “in tortuous repetition to forgive those who kill us, and we do it. The only way I can fathom this grace of forgiveness is if the very life of God flows through people like these black families.”</p>
<p>Yet Jennings struggles with the way forgiveness is interpreted. Too often, it is used to avoid dealing with whiteness and the “state of war” it creates in America. Forgiveness can be a “soothing high” that does not address the lie that is white supremacy.</p>
<p>White Christians ought to be haunted, too. Now and too many times in the past, white people disassociate ourselves from the depth of connection we have with white people who foment racial terror.</p>
<p>We ought not dismiss Roof as a lunatic. Yet we do. As we disassociate ourselves from this American son and the way he was malformed, we lose the opportunity to examine our own malformation and the conversion to which we are called in this kairotic moment.</p>
<p>This is a kairos moment, when Pope Francis and the #BlackLivesMatter movement call us to personal and cultural transformation.</p>
<p>If we are going to take up the cultural transformation the pope invites, it will mean confronting how white supremacy is a form of “tyrannical anthropocentrism” that divides us from one another and the Earth. By “tyrannical anthropocentrism,” Francis means every “irresponsible domination of human beings over other creatures.”</p>
<p>The Atlantic slave trade initiated a tyrannical anthropocentrism, in which whiteness equates with innocence and blackness with savagery. The slave trade deified ownership of both people and land. W.E.B. Du Bois captured that deification when he wrote: “Whiteness is the ownership of the earth forever and ever, Amen!”</p>
<p>The disproportionate negative impacts of environmental degradation on communities of color exposes, as theologian Shawnee M. Daniels-Sykes explains, the overlapping interconnections between environmental racism and lack of care for black lives lost to gun violence.</p>
<p>Do we hear the cries of the earth and of our brothers and sisters at the Emanuel AME Church? Their cries evoke God’s cry, ever groaning with the whole of creation for loving embrace and justice.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><a href="http://ncronline.org/news/politics/one-life-one-love-earth-and-black-lives-matter">More>></a></p>
Date
Bread or Stones?
News Intro Text
Louisiana congregations challenge child poverty
News Item Content
<h4>
Louisiana congregations challenge child poverty </h4>
<p>by Alí Bustamante </p>
<p>Recently the Annie E. Casey Foundation updated its Kids Count Data Book, which measures and ranks the wellbeing of children across the U.S. Louisiana ranked 48th among the 50 states in overall childhood wellbeing, the state’s lowest ranking since the Kids Count rankings began in 2012. Only New Mexico and Mississippi ranked lower than Louisiana this year, 49th and 50th respectively. The rest of the Gulf South also performed poorly, Alabama ranked 45th, Texas 41st, and Florida 37th.</p>
<p>The low Kids Count ranking speaks to how poorly legislators, policymakers, and communities in the Gulf South are addressing the economic wellbeing, education, health, and family and community wellbeing of the region’s 13.9 million children. However, the low ranking is nothing new to Louisiana and the rest of the Gulf South. Since 2012, Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas have ranked among the ten lowest performing states in the country every year. Florida achieved its highest ranking of 37th this year.</p>
<p>The Gulf South states lag the rest of the country in most of the 16 social and economic indicators that comprise the Kids Count childhood wellbeing rankings. Among these are: childhood poverty, low-birthweight babies, children whose parents lack secure employment, children without health insurance, children in single-parent families, fourth graders not proficient in reading, high school students not graduating on time, and, rate of teens not in school and not working. </p>
<p>Despite continuous reporting on children’s wellbeing by the Annie E. Casey Foundation and other governmental and non-governmental sources the Gulf South has found significant improvement elusive. Only Florida and Texas have made modest gains in their rankings while performance has declined for Alabama and Louisiana. Mississippi is the lowest performer in the country for the third time in the past four years.</p>
<p><a href="https://t.e2ma.net/webview/bklwi/f9edf0f554a2d86f07ff178dd0a6ee44">MORE>></a></p>
Louisiana congregations challenge child poverty </h4>
<p>by Alí Bustamante </p>
<p>Recently the Annie E. Casey Foundation updated its Kids Count Data Book, which measures and ranks the wellbeing of children across the U.S. Louisiana ranked 48th among the 50 states in overall childhood wellbeing, the state’s lowest ranking since the Kids Count rankings began in 2012. Only New Mexico and Mississippi ranked lower than Louisiana this year, 49th and 50th respectively. The rest of the Gulf South also performed poorly, Alabama ranked 45th, Texas 41st, and Florida 37th.</p>
<p>The low Kids Count ranking speaks to how poorly legislators, policymakers, and communities in the Gulf South are addressing the economic wellbeing, education, health, and family and community wellbeing of the region’s 13.9 million children. However, the low ranking is nothing new to Louisiana and the rest of the Gulf South. Since 2012, Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas have ranked among the ten lowest performing states in the country every year. Florida achieved its highest ranking of 37th this year.</p>
<p>The Gulf South states lag the rest of the country in most of the 16 social and economic indicators that comprise the Kids Count childhood wellbeing rankings. Among these are: childhood poverty, low-birthweight babies, children whose parents lack secure employment, children without health insurance, children in single-parent families, fourth graders not proficient in reading, high school students not graduating on time, and, rate of teens not in school and not working. </p>
<p>Despite continuous reporting on children’s wellbeing by the Annie E. Casey Foundation and other governmental and non-governmental sources the Gulf South has found significant improvement elusive. Only Florida and Texas have made modest gains in their rankings while performance has declined for Alabama and Louisiana. Mississippi is the lowest performer in the country for the third time in the past four years.</p>
<p><a href="https://t.e2ma.net/webview/bklwi/f9edf0f554a2d86f07ff178dd0a6ee44">MORE>></a></p>
Date
Catholic Teach-in on Migration
News Intro Text
Monday, August 3rd 6:30-8:30 at Holy Name of Jesus School Cafeteria
News Item Content
<p><img alt="" src="https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/Teach in jpg.jpg" /></p>
Date