Hoping Against Hope: obstacles to the option

Extract

In his inspiring and moving reflections on the church in Latin America Jon Sobrino can speak of that church as an identifiable and representative community; identifiable in the struggle against poverty and injustice, representative of many different sections of society:

In the Church of the poor the age-old barriers between hierarchy and faithful, priests and workers, peasants and intellectuals, have broken down... In this solidarity there is a sharing of the word ... There is a sharing of the yearning for liberation and of the various struggles that lead to liberation ... There is a sharing of hopes and successes. Above all, there is a sharing of what formerly had been the tragic destiny of the poor alone: martyrdom and persecution.

In England there are obviously Catholics who are living an option for the poor, without necessarily appealing to the example of Latin America. During the last few years I have witnessed the commitment to the homeless at Mary and Joseph House in Central Manchester; kept in touch with efforts to improve race relations in Leicester; seen the diversification of the Saint Vincent de Paul Society’s work for the poor at the east end of Newcastle; and been drawn into what seems to be an unceasing quest on behalf of the third world by Justice and Peace groups in Nantwich and Surrey. But, despite such options for the poor in different parts of the country, I do not believe that the Roman Catholic Church as ‘an identifiable and representative community’ will take an option for England’s poor.