BISHOP ZUBIK ISSUES SECOND PASTORAL LETTER: ‘THE CHURCH SHARING!’ REFLECTS ON THE ECONOMIC CRISIS

PITTSBURGH – Calling on the community “to join me in reflecting upon how we can best support each other in the name of, and with the heart of, Christ in these difficult times of economic duress,” Bishop David A. Zubik issued his second pastoral letter as bishop of the Diocese of Pittsburgh.

Dated Ash Wednesday, February 25, 2009, Bishop Zubik writes that when “I embraced my responsibilities as your Bishop a year and a half ago, I could never have imagined that I would be writing a pastoral letter focused on the moral, spiritual and practical dimensions of an economic crisis whose length and depth have yet to be fully realized, yet to be fully understood.

“The Church as a whole, and individual bishops like me, are not economic specialists. But the Church in her faith and rich tradition of 2,000 years is an expert in humanity and the human and divine act of sharing,” Bishop Zubik said.

Bishop Zubik’s first pastoral letter, “The Church Alive!” was issued on June 29, 2008, and presented a challenge to “be excited about our faith and to grow the Church of Pittsburgh” in what Bishop Zubik called “this time of ‘A New Pentecost.”

This second pastoral letter is written in the context of the economic crisis that has gripped the nation and the world. The bishop’s pastoral letter is a call to be “The Church Sharing!” in these “hard times.”

The pastoral letter was published as a supplement in the February 20 issue of the Pittsburgh Catholic which was mailed to nearly 200,000 registered Catholic households throughout the Diocese of Pittsburgh.

A pastoral letter is an instruction and exhortation from a local bishop meant for the Catholics of his diocese, but often directed to the community as a whole.

In “The Church Sharing!” Bishop Zubik calls on the Catholic community to “face these hard times together in Christ. In a very real way, it means that you and I can’t retreat into ourselves. You and I can’t expect to find all the answers on our own. You and I can’t expect those in need to be able to get along without us. You and I can’t hold back from others. You and I can’t be held back from others. You and I have to be servants. You and I have to be served. You and I can’t refuse to help. You and I can’t refuse to accept help.”

Bishop Zubik writes that when “I think of the Diocese of Pittsburgh, I think of a Church sharing, reaching out to serve those who are in need. … It is neighborhoods, churches and schools that care for those in need without asking questions, without asking anything in return.

“I think of Pittsburgh—people of every race, color and creed—reaching out to those who need help….This is the Pittsburgh I know and love. This is the Pittsburgh you know and love,” Bishop Zubik says.

This is a time when “we have to turn toward each other—to find out what we can give and what we need. This is not the time to struggle alone. This is a communal challenge we face together, not alone.”

“When we talk about sharing—a divine activity that is an action of Jesus Himself and of His Body, the Church—we are not being simply sentimental,” Bishop Zubik explains.

“Real sharing is that glimpse of the divine love that exists from our Creator and through His Son, the Word made Flesh in our Church, in our lives and in our world. People are God’s tender mercy in our lives, our chance to live out—and experience—His sharing.”

Bishop Zubik describes the Church in Pittsburgh as “a friend—very often the only friend—to those in need. In 1910, Archbishop Regis Canevin organized the many private Catholic works under the name of the ‘Conference of Catholic Charities.’ … At that time, Catholic Charities served 1,200 families.

“Nearly 100 years later, Catholic Charities serves more than 80,000 people each year, supplying everything from free health care for the poor, to helping with gas bills to keep a home heated. The Church of Pittsburgh is a Church Sharing.”

Bishop Zubik states that “we live in a time when no forecast is certain. We do fear that unemployment could reach levels we have not seen in decades or more. We do fear that more people will lose their homes, their savings and their pensions. We do fear a significant increase in the demand for basic needs assistance. We do fear the rise of the unemployment rate in Pittsburgh, up sharply from a year ago. We do fear the loss of the basic necessities of life, with food banks challenged to serve longer lines of families at their door.”

But at the same time, the current economic crisis forces us “to recognize the ways in which our Faith challenges us to act, to share not only when those around us are suffering, but as we are suffering too! Faith—looking for and recognizing our need for God—is so necessary for all of us affected by our economic situation. Faith in God leads to hope, even when hope is hard to find.”

“Sharing,” he says, “is an obligation, not an optional interest. … Sharing with each other is more than a vague feeling of compassion for the less fortunate. Sharing is a frame of mind and heart which recognizes that we all need each other. Sharing finds its foundation in doing what Jesus did when He walked the earth and what He continues to do through the Church. Sharing finds its moral outreach in a commitment to the common good.”

Bishop Zubik says that the economic crisis provides the time to move away from the “old state of things,” characterized by “a world of exaggerated individualism and consumerism gone wild.”

Such consumerism often exists, he writes, “side by side with a purely secularist view of the human person and human society in general. And so importantly, and in contradiction to this secularism, is the Gospel of Life, the respect of all life from the first moment of conception to the last breath of natural death.

“In that ‘old state of things,’ the individual is encouraged to think of himself or herself as a totally self-reliant, self-determining ‘rugged individual,’ competing against others in the modern world’s quest for personal wealth, power and prestige.

“By contrast,” Bishop Zubik writes, “the follower of Christ sees the world as the place to share, recognizing in each person the very face of Christ. When we meet Christ in the other, Christ calls us out of our isolated selves. When we meet Christ in the other, Christ extends our hand to other members of the human family who deserve the help we are obliged to offer. When we meet Christ in the other, He gently opens the hands of the recipients to receiving help and by so doing increases their own dignity, not diminishing it.”

Bishop Zubik asks in “The Church Sharing!” that the community give “generously to Catholic Charities. Give generously to your parish and all that it supports. Give generously to the Saint Vincent de Paul Society and all the Catholic agencies that are doing such good. Give generously to all social services regardless of religious affiliation or no religious affiliation that are doing good in our community. Give generously of your time. Give generously of your talent. Give generously of your treasure, for ‘where your treasure is, there also will your heart be’ (Matthew 6:21).”

“It is not my intention to share with you some platitudes,” Bishop Zubik states. “It is not my intention to paint any rosy pictures about a less materialistic world. These times we face are rough. We are in this together as individuals and as Church. To say that we are in this together is to recognize our understanding of what the Church is, what it means to be Church, and what it means to say that sharing is a divine activity, the action of Jesus Himself continued in His Body, the Church.

“We are the Church of Pittsburgh together in Christ. Every parish, every Church-related institution and, most important, every Catholic is an integral part of this Church of Pittsburgh. I hope that no one of you is tempted to try to get through these hard times alone,” he writes.

Bishop Zubik addresses “the Church of Pittsburgh and beyond,” and asks that the entire community “look into the eyes of everyone whom you meet. These are people whose tears are looking for the compassionate and sharing response of Jesus through you, through me.

“Join with me in sharing, a divine activity, the action of Jesus Himself through His Body the Church. And when we are bold enough and caring enough to look into the eyes of those in need, may we treat them as if they are Christ; may we treat them as if we are Christ—in and through The Church Sharing!”

The full text of Bishop Zubik’s pastoral letter, “The Church Sharing!” as well as the text of his first pastoral letter, “The Church Alive!” is available on the website of the Diocese of Pittsburgh (www.diopitt.org).