Archbishop's web site Denver Catholic Register Parishes Catholic Pastoral Center
February 28, 2001
Hispanic ministry leaders chart course for future
Symposium examines ways Hispanic ministry can serve all Catholics
By Maria Faulconer
According to census reports, by the year 2050, 86 percent of U.S. Catholics will be Hispanic. But this will mean little unless Hispanic ministers are trained to serve the entire church, said Ronaldo Cruz, executive director of the U.S. bishops' Secretariat for Hispanic Affairs.
``If we, as Hispanic ministers, are not trained and formed to be ministers to all Catholics, we will be a majority in numbers, but we will not be leaders in the church,'' he said during a symposium for 60 national and regional Hispanic ministry leaders.
The Feb. 14-17 symposium in Colorado Springs was organized by Bishop Arthur N. Tafoya of Pueblo, Colo., chairman of the U.S. bishops' Committee on Hispanic Affairs, to refocus Hispanic ministry given the growing multicultural and multilingual nature of the U.S. church.
New circumstances ``require that we find new ardor, methods and expressions that will promote a more inclusive and welcoming church,'' said the bishop in opening the meeting. ``In the very near future there will be no majority populations.''
The symposium was a follow-up to Encuentro 2000, a jubilee event sponsored by the U.S. bishops in Los Angeles last July which celebrated the cultural and ethnic diversity of the church.
Sister Marie Vianney Bilgrien, director of the Northwest Regional Office for Hispanic Affairs, said that parishes are challenged to become homes for a wide diversity of Catholics.
This involves changes in styles of prayer and singing in the liturgy, in how people are selected for leadership roles, in what social activities we offer, said the nun, a School Sister of Notre Dame.
The challenge is to create parishes that are intercultural, not just multicultural, she said.
Parallel church structures for English-speaking and Spanish-speaking Catholics must not be kept alive, she said.
Carmen Aguinaco, a member of the executive board of the National Catholic Council for Hispanic Ministry, said Hispanic ministry must help people think from the perspective of other cultures.
``The role of Hispanic leaders in the church today is to help the church think in Spanish, as well as in other languages. To think in Spanish is to think from and within Hispanic culture,'' she said.
``We must also aim for the ability to think in English and in many other cultures,'' she said.
Sister Jane Hotstream, program director of the Mexican-American Cultural Center in San Antonio, said ministry also includes putting many descendants of immigrants in touch with their lost cultural roots.
``When their ancestors came to this land the immediate task was to assimilate and to put behind anything that would cause them to be different from the dominant group that was already established,'' said Sister Hotstream, a Religious Sister of Mercy.
``Processes that call for naming and getting in touch with one's cultural roots can be very frightening for this group because they are afraid that they do not have a cultural heritage,'' she said.
Other ideas discussed at the meeting included:
— Developing collaborative ministries to deal with formation, education, evangelization, ecumenism and multiculturalism.
— Finding ways to invite youths and young adults, the fastest growing group of Hispanics, to participate in the church.
— Getting second and third generation U.S.-born Latinos to feel welcome in church structures so that their professional skills can be utilized.
— The possibility of incorporating into the liturgy elements of faith-oriented celebrations such as the ``quinceanera,'' a 15th birthday celebration for girls.
Paulist Father John Hurley, executive director for the U.S. bishops' Secretariat for Evangelization and Missions, expressed hope ``that those involved in the Hispanic dialogue going on now don't fall into the same trap that Western Europeans did when they came to this country. ``We had many similar values, the value of family, the language. When each generation got incorporated into what was then the norm, the melting pot, we lost many of those values and identities,'' he said.
