Pope Francis meets with leaders of the US Organized Communities

By Vatican News

"To communicate to the Holy Father the progress made and to consult him on the next steps with RECOR," was the purpose of the meeting on Wednesday, August 28, between the leaders of the Organized Communities of the United States, Industrial Areas Foundation—West/Southwest, and Pope Francis at his residence in the Casa Santa Marta.

Around 20 leaders, including priests and laypeople, presented RECOR, the new Ecclesial Network of Organized Communities, to the Pope. This network, accompanied by their Catholic bishops, aims to take the lead in implementing the Church’s Social Doctrine, with the goal of ensuring "a way of life flavored by the Gospel" (FT, 1).

Audience with Pope Francis

During the meeting, Pope Francis encouraged the leaders to build a synodal bridge "so that our peoples may have life."

“Pope Francis greatly appreciates the capacity of a people to organize themselves. The wealth of a people lies in its ability to organize. He also reminded us of the words of Paul VI, who said that politics is the highest expression of charity,” according to Jorge Montiel, organizer of the IAF in the western and southwestern United States, after the meeting with the Holy Father.

María Guadalupe Valdez, from the Diocese of San Antonio, Texas, said the Pope "encouraged us to keep moving forward, to keep acting, and not remain indifferent.”

Elizabeth Valdez, a member of Industrial Areas Foundation—West/Southwest, recalled that the network is "composed of churches, unions, universities, and other organizations, with the majority participation of Catholics, along with Protestant churches, synagogues, and mosques."

Earlier, on Wednesday morning, representatives of Industrial Areas Foundation—West/Southwest met with Emilce Cuda, Secretary of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America (PCAL), to continue working on strategies for building bridges between South and North America, focusing on how to continue constructing these bridges for the common good.

The Path towards RECOR

The Ecclesial Network of Organized Communities (RECOR) was born at the Latin American Episcopal Council (CELAM) with the goal of sharing "experiences of community mysticism and transfer skills between both hemispheres of the Americas."

The origins of this network date back to 2021, when the Executive Commission of the Industrial Areas Foundation—West/Southwest (IAF, USA) first met Pope Francis in Rome. Following this meeting, with the suggestion of Bishop Cantú of San Jose, California, and Pope Francis himself, they connected with the Pontifical Commission for Latin America (PCAL).

After several virtual and in-person meetings, IAF West/Southwest and the Commission began building a new North-South bridge of Organized Communities, under the guidance and support of the Holy Father.

Evidence of this was the video message Pope Francis sent to IAF in 2022 and two subsequent meetings with the Pope in Rome in 2022 and 2023.

The first steps of RECOR

In response to the common challenge faced by both the North and South of the American continent regarding the plight of marginalized migrant workers, CELAM’s General Secretariat and the USCCB’s Department of Justice and Peace, with mediation from PCAL, held their first virtual meeting in 2023. As a result, RECOR (Ecclesial Network of Organized Communities) was born within CELAM.

Subsequently, as part of the seminar organized by IAF West/Southwest under the title "Politics and the Teachings of Pope Francis," the first North-South in-person meeting of Organized Community leaders took place on February 19-20, 2024, in San Antonio, Texas.

The second in-person meeting was held in Buenos Aires from August 4-10, 2024, where IAF West/Southwest leaders visited organized communities in Argentina, invited by the Familia Grande de los Hogares de Cristo.

Building bridges between organized communities

In the context of this new meeting with the Holy Father, IAF visited the offices of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America, as this new Network of Urban Organized Communities is also supported by the Building Bridges PCAL-LUC Initiative.

This initiative, which began by building university bridges among students across the Americas with Pope Francis’ in-person participation, is now collaborating on constructing a second bridge between organized communities, fostering ties between both continents. Two new meetings are planned for 2025: one in the United States and one in Europe.

What are organized communities?

Organized communities are urban community organizations of workers—both internal and external migrants—where the entire community, accompanied by their Catholic bishops, takes on the leadership to form and implement the Church's Social Doctrine, with the aim of ensuring "a way of life flavored by the Gospel" (FT, 1).

They are not popular organizations driven by political-party, economic-sectoral, or academic-ideological projects, nor do they unite to ask for charitable subsidies from NGOs.

They are urban community organizations formed "from the ground up," as Pope Francis describes in Fratelli tutti. 

Organized communities "organize hope" around the fundamental principles of the Church's Social Doctrine, which include: decent work with social guarantees recognized by the ILO; universal access to resources like clean water, housing, urban beauty, sports, public health, and education; institutionalized solidarity structures such as libraries, cultural centers, and clubs; and subsidiary structures led by their own leaders, walking alongside national and subnational governments in fulfilling their duties and obligations.

An effective expression of the principle of subsidiarity

In other words, Organized Communities are an effective expression of the Catholic principle of subsidiarity in participation, as a constitutive principle of a people that is both a political and ecclesial subject.

They are the opposite of abstract institutional principles, which are constructed while "observing life from a balcony," as Pope Francis states in Querida Amazonia, and detached from our social teachings.

Urban Organized Communities are formed by the decision to unite for mutual salvation, while organizing to dialogue with the state, accompanied by their bishops, public policies, and fiscal policies, to care for people and the planet.