Human, civil rights connected in fight for equality, archbishop says

Published: 2006-11-22

MISSION, Texas (CNS) -- Human and civil rights continue to be interconnected in today's struggle for equality although they have different foundations, Archbishop Roberto Gonzalez of San Juan, Puerto Rico, told an NAACP dinner Nov. 17 in Mission. "Civil rights are granted by civil authorities; human rights are engraved in our humanity as such," the archbishop said at the annual Freedom Fund dinner of the Rio Grande Valley chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. "The difference between these two was a reality recognized by most leaders and participants in the civil rights struggle of African-Americans," he added. Archbishop Gonzalez recalled spending his high school and college years in the 1960s in the midst of the civil rights movement in the United States, and seeing the changes it brought about. "Although that stage of the quest for freedom was successful, the struggle goes on," he said. "It goes on around the world in countries and areas where the existence of such civil rights is not recognized."

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