Archbishop Marino reflects on ministry to the growing number of Spanish-speaking Catholics in north Georgia in his first pastoral letter issued since his 1988 installation. The Church celebrates National Migration Week from Jan. 8 to 13.

On December 12, 1983, the National Conference of Catholic Bishops of the United States issued a pastoral letter, The Hispanic Presence: Challenge and Commitment.

“At this moment we recognize the Hispanic community among us as a blessing from God,” the bishops stated. With conviction and gratitude we acknowledged the “special gift which Hispanics bring to the Body of Christ in our nation.” Recently we celebrated the sixth anniversary of the bishops’ pastoral on the Hispanic presence in the United States on the feast day of Our Lady of Guadalupe, the patroness of all the Americas.

It is my wish now to reflect on the rapidly growing presence of our Spanish-speaking brothers and sisters in the Church in north Georgia, to affirm the gift this presence offers the Church, and to lift up the challenge it presents to all of us.

Spanish is neither new nor foreign to Georgia and the Southeast. Almost 200 years before James Oglethorpe consolidated his colony of Georgia in the 1730s, Hernando De Soto and his valiant band of explorers in the early 1540s were traversing the immense forests of present-day Georgia; by the last half of the 16th century, Spanish Franciscans were establishing missions among the Guale Indians in territory which included today’s city of Saint Marys and Cumberland Island. Undoubtedly Spanish was the first European language to be spoken in the lands which constitute the Georgia of today.

In 1992 we will mark the fifth centenary of the proclamation of the Gospel in the vast expanses of New World, from northern California to the tip of Tierra de Fuego, from the Antilles to the Andes, and a part of this truly glorious and immense enterprise was the preaching of the Good News in our own land to the Guales.

God’s gracious and loving providence is still at work today in the arrival of numerous Hispanic sisters and brothers to our nation and to our archdiocese. Approximately twenty-five million Spanish-speaking people have come to the United States. Consequently our nation ranks fifth among the world’s Spanish-speaking countries: Only Mexico, Spain Argentina and Colombia have more Hispanics.

Metropolitan Atlanta and north Georgia share in this Hispanic influx. It is estimated that approximately one hundred and twenty-five to one hundred and fifty thousand people of Spanish-speaking heritage live in the archdiocese. The greatest number reside in Atlanta. However, most counties of the archdiocese also have their Spanish-speaking communities.

Various factors continue to generate this constant exodus from Latin America. Among them are grinding poverty on a massive scale: galloping inflation which lessens the value of already meager wages and raises the cost of living; an ongoing process of urbanization drawing large numbers of rural people to overcrowded cities with millions living in inadequate housing and a high incidence of illiteracy in some nations because of an insufficient number of teachers and schools.

Immense numbers of Latin American people suffer from malnutrition with a correspondingly high rate of infant mortality. In some areas escalating violence has taken unemployment and underemployment figures: the continuing flight out of Latin America of capital investment and of professional people, both drastically needed, has resulted in a tragic slowdown in the construction of the industrial infrastructure indispensable for broad-based economic development.

The adequate pastoral care and service of this rapidly growing Hispanic population in Atlanta and north Georgia constitutes a great challenge to the archdiocese, and calls for the renewed commitment of its priests, Religious and laity to serve selflessly, courageously and creatively these brothers and sisters flocking to our cities, towns and communities. Pastoral resources for service of and outreach to our Spanish-speaking sisters and brothers are extremely limited, as are most pastoral resources in our archdiocese, and the demands are enormous. In spite of this, vibrant pastoral programs in Spanish flourish in some of our metropolitan parishes and in several rural parishes. Pastoral outreach to a scattered Hispanic presence is some rural areas where there is no resident Catholic priest or church is often limited and infrequent. It is my hope to address this growing need, and the entire Hispanic Apostolate in several ways:

1) By encouraging all our priests and seminarians of the archdiocese to learn the Spanish language and to develop a greater familiarity with Hispanic culture,

2) By inviting Religious men and women to come to Atlanta specifically to work in the Hispanic Apostolate,

3) By encouraging and promoting vocations within the Hispanic community,

4) By seeking out and developing new sources of funding for ministry in the Spanish-speaking community, and

5) By encouraging all our people in the archdiocese to support this effort with their prayers and sacrifices.

Because of historical factors in Latin America, a considerable number of our Hispanic brothers and sisters arrive among us with limited exposure to formal evangelization. Most have had little instruction in their home country, having come from remote villages, ranches or rural communities where pastoral ministers rarely, if ever, visit. Here in Georgia these sisters and brothers in the faith are at times the target of an aggressive proselytism and are in serious jeopardy of being separated from their ancient rightful heritage within the Catholic Church. Our responsibility as the Church of north Georgia is to provide an hospitable and supportive atmosphere in which our Hispanic sisters and brothers can nourish and deepen their faith while celebrating it in a culturally familiar environment.

It is our vocation and our duty as fellow Catholic Christians, concerned pastors, Religious and laity to welcome warmly, sensitively and generously our Spanish-speaking brothers and sisters into our communities, to invite them with respect and charity to our parish liturgies and other events, and, when possible, to facilitate for them the opportunity to hear God’s Word and celebrate the liturgy in their own language.

At the same time, we should recognize the gifts they bring to our community and to our individual parishes. They come with a long tradition of Roman Catholicism, culture, art, artifact and music. They bring with them a respect for all generations in the family, a celebratory spirit in worship and community, and a heart sensitive to the needy. By welcoming our Spanish-speaking neighbors, we enrich ourselves and strengthen the fabric of our culture, our nation, and our Church.

We could well learn from the sad experience of thousands of Irish immigrants who came to our region in the last century. Unlike their countrymen who came to other parts of this nation along with their native priests and Religious, the Irish immigrants who came to Georgia, for the most part, neither brought nor found here Catholic clergy to minister to their needs. The result was that in a single generation, many were lost to the Catholic faith. We must work and we must pray that this tragic loss of faith not be repeated in the case of our Hispanic sisters and brothers.

This Hispanic presence in the archdiocese challenges us to creative, courageous, and sensitive loving service. Love is the “band of perfection,” it is the sign we are sincere followers of Jesus! “In this shall all know that you are My disciples if you love one another.” (John 13:35)

Yahweh has constantly shown a very special love for the poor, the oppressed, the weakest members of the human family. God continually pleaded the cause of the alien and stranger, who was in a particularly vulnerable situation among the Jewish people: “You shall treat the aliens, strangers who reside with you no differently than the natives born among you. Have the same love for them as for yourselves, for you too were once aliens, strangers in the land of Egypt.” (Leviticus 19:33-34)

Our pastoral solicitude for Hispanic should not be our only concern. Because of particular factors, Hispanics may be especially vulnerable to discrimination, abuse, and injustice. As fellow Christians, we must be concerned that Hispanics are not victims of inadequate housing, unjust wages, unsafe and unhealthy working conditions, substandard educational opportunities, insufficient police protection, or of any discriminatory practices. When necessary, the Catholic parish community should strive to correct unjust conditions and practices and courageously, creatively, and perseveringly labor to bring about a transformation.

I had wanted to share these thoughts about the enriching presence of our Hispanic sisters and brothers among us on the occasion of this beautiful feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, the patroness of the Americas. Our Lady appeared as the Virgin Morenita, as an Indian princess, conversing in Nahuatl, the native language of the vanquished, with exquisite tenderness and respect, as she addressed the poor humble Juan Diego. Mary visited a conquered, disheartened people in the critical moment of their complete defeat and the ultimate destruction of their culture and way of life. She symbolized and was God’s privileged instrument in effecting an encounter of two different worlds.

May Mary, God’s bridge between Spaniard and Indian, also create one community of her son’s disciples – American and Hispanic – a loving community of warm welcome, deep respect and selfless service.

January 4, 1990

Archbishop of Atlanta