US Catholics urged to 'express unity' with Latin American Catholics through collection

WASHINGTON (OSV News) -- By donating to the U.S. bishops' national Collection for the Church in Latin America, U.S. Catholics can support the church's mission in countries affected by poverty, political instability and natural disasters.

Most dioceses will take this offering up in their parishes at Masses the weekend of Jan. 25-26, though some have different dates. The online giving site #iGiveCatholicTogether also accepts funds for the collection.

The collection was founded in 1965 as a way for Catholics in the United States to express their unity and solidarity with Catholics in Central and South America and the islands of the Caribbean.

"Inspired by the Second Vatican Council, it recognizes spiritual bonds rooted in shared faith and history," said a news release about the collection issued by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

Last year the collection provided $6.2 million for more than 250 ministries in places where the Catholic Church cannot support itself without outside assistance. More than half the money supported pastoral needs, nearly 28% provided disaster relief and about 20% subsidized vocations and the formation of clergy and religious. Initiatives funded by the collection included:

-- In Haiti, where there is severe soil depletion, 330 lay leaders integrated Catholic social teaching on ecology and care for creation with practical instruction on improving their soil and water and on planting trees to prevent erosion.

-- In the Diocese of Choluteca, Honduras, the collection aided migrants who have settled there from other Latin American nations and from as far as Asia and Africa. This is part of a wider diocesan social outreach that includes evangelizing the poor "with respect and social sensitivity."

-- In the Dominican Republic, 18 young women who entered the religious community of the Order of St. Clare are receiving support "as they discover new approaches to praying for the world from their cloistered convent."

-- In Ecuador, the collection helped subsidize the September 2024 International Eucharistic Congress, which drew participants from 40 nations.

In the USCCB news release and in a reflection provided to OSV News, the chairman of the USCCB's Committee on National Collections, Bishop Daniel H. Mueggenborg of Reno, Nevada, recalled the heroic martyrdom of Blessed Stanley Rother, an Oklahoma priest fatally shot in Guatemala in 1981 "because some powerful people perceived his care for the poor as a threat to their own interests."

"He is the first martyr from the United States and was beatified by Pope Francis in 2017," he said.

In 1981, Bishop Mueggenborg recalled, he was the altar server for a Mass celebrated by "a priest from my hometown who was briefly back home in Oklahoma from Guatemala, where he ministered to a village of the indigenous Tz’utujil people."

"I didn't know his name," the bishop said, recalling Father Rother was that priest. In a nation where the church "was suppressed," Bishop Mueggenborg said, "he had worked with local translators to produce a Bible to catechize villagers in their own language and had labored with his own hands to improve the health and living conditions of desperately poor people. But his aura of holy joy inspired me to pursue priesthood."

Father Rother "soon returned to Guatemala in the face of great danger and was martyred," Bishop Mueggenborg added.

"Blessed Stanley Rother had returned to Guatemala, even in the face of death, because God had called him to love and care for Latin Americans in need," the bishop said. "His heroic witness inspired not only my own priestly vocation, but helped inspire in me a deep love for the people of Latin America. This love is rooted in the love that God has for all people and in the love that Our Lady of Guadalupe showed for the Indigenous peoples of the Americas."

As chairman of the USCCB national collections committee, "I have the privilege of inviting Catholics to join me in supporting the special Collection for the Church in Latin America," Bishop Mueggenborg said.

"The annual collection is an opportunity for all of us to continue the work of Blessed Stanley to share the merciful love of Jesus with Catholics in Guatemala and throughout Central and South America and the islands of the Caribbean," he said. "It may not cost us our lives, but a financial sacrifice, even a small gift, will go a long way to impacting the lives of many."