St. John is the one who reminds us that the well-being of our brothers and sisters, their survival and development, are inseparable from our search for God. This is something we have all learned. However the question is to pass from a relationship with a specific individual who is suffering to the level of the group of persons who suffer, (those I do not know personally, those "far away"). and from there to the root cause of the suffering.

We have to learn to see beyond the effects of a problem if we want to reach the cause and if we are to be effective in bringing to it any type of resolution (efficiency). The goal is not merely to help the person who is suffering or in need, or to accompany him/her in their trials; the goal is to do something to alleviate the state of poverty and/or suffering in order to reduce violence, gender discrimination or injustices based on ethnic origin so that all of creation be fully respected. This is a fundamental question for all those who are promoters of Justice and Peace who sometimes because they remain at the inter-personal level do not see the broader picture.

Dieudonné cannot find a job despite the fact that he is a certified assistant accountant. Because he has no job he sometimes goes to the nearby priory to ask the brothers for financial assistance. The reason he has no job is because there is very little investment happening in the country where he lives. The wealthy prefer to invest their money in foreign countries, or to speculate on the international money market, rather than invest at the local level which would in turn create jobs. Dieudonné has no choice but to suffer the consequences of economic injustice. Dieudonné is also a foreigner, he is from a neighboring country where the living conditions are even more difficult. His father had been hired in a cocoa plantation during the economic "boom" of this export culture. Despite all of the good will in the world, the fact remains it is almost impossible to find a job when you are an immigrant. The people in the capital where he lives are very wary of foreigners because they themselves are faced with hard economic times, due to a sharp decrease in the price of raw materials and the wasteful spending habits of their politicians. The media portrays all foreigners as robbers and as people who take jobs away from the residents. Recently Dieudonné was stopped and beaten by the police simply because he was an immigrant and was out riding on his bicycle after dark. No one would dare file a complaint of violence and injustice against the police. Dieudonné has no money, therefore a lawyer is out of the question and he knows that any attempt on his part would be absolutely useless. Injustice has been legitimized... The place is flooded with tourists in search of an exotic place to vacation, to take advantage of the sun, the beaches and the perverse sex trade that is available for a pittance.

It is only right that we help people like Dieudonné from time to time but we also have raise a few questions, about the relationship between the economic situation and the politics of the country, about the treatment of immigrants and police violence... and maybe even have the courage to act at that level.

In a town called K, the women of the place have reached the point of saturation. There is no garbage pick-up, no toilets and no schools for the children...To make matters even worse, this year the exceptional quantity of rain has destroyed the small metal and cardboard shacks where they live. The situation is intolerable and has become the cause of many neighborhood disputes. The municipal government has done nothing to improve the situation and the police raids have only added to the confusion by adding to the already existent tension among the families. This is a multi-faceted issue: political (municipal), social, medical and urban...

The women often meet at the well where they line up for water. They formed an association though the men were very much against this move. The men were afraid to lose some of their power and were very much against their wives becoming independent. The men knew that the women would be extremely critical of them at their meetings because the men spent most of their time drinking and playing cards, rather than doing something to help feed their families. Gender conflicts such as this can become a serious obstacle to the development of these poverty stricken families.

The work of Justice and Peace requires that we take up the question of gender relationships, that we get involved with women's issues and deal with municipal leaders ... it is not sufficient to give a bit of money to the families who knock at the convent door and then return to their shacks, which are usually far enough away .

Christopher is twenty years old and has been " living " in Paris for the past three years. In reality he lives on the street, sleeps outside or in the train stations and lives off of begging and acts of petty theft. He has nowhere to go and often resorts to drinking and drugs to help him forget his miserable condition. Fr. Pedro knows Christopher and many other young people just like him, who have no way out of the economic and psychological crises that are so prominent in society today.

A few years ago fr. Pedro succeeded in convincing Caritas to give him some money to open a shelter for these youth. The shelter does not provide the young people with food or money, for the intent is not to treat them as welfare cases, ( there are many other places in town to get food and a bed ). At the shelter they find a presence, friends who are ready to listen to them, to analyze the situation and help find a way out...

A few months ago a workshop on writing skills was set up and the participants were given the opportunity to express themselves and to write whatever they wanted. The shelter is called " la Moquette " ( the Carpet ), because that is the only thing in the house. It provides great freedom to Christopher and his friends and gives them a bit of relief from the solitude of their everyday life. It also gives them a place to "be" like real "people" and not just homeless wanderers who scare the rich.

In this case the work of Justice and Peace took the shape of a search for an alternative to social assistance ( which really doesn't solve anything ) and to the solitude experienced by the marginalized. To be listened to and to be given the possibility to express oneself in writing are two fundamental dimensions of our existence. They are often considered a luxury that the poor do not need. The fact that these young people were given access to both of these, gave them a chance to re-discover their dignity and self-worth.

Going from the study of an individual case to the analysis of those mechanisms that generate exclusion and violence allows us to contextualize what we are doing or could do, thereby optimizing our efficienty by acting on the causes. Working through the micro (the individual case) to the macro (global process) is a fundmental experience of truth making.

Using a structural or global analysis helps us identify three major axes which determine the problems upon which the sisters and brothers working in the field of Justice and Peace, must intervene. Thees three main axes are three sub-systems that express one aspect of the global socio-economical and political reality; these three axes are related to each other and mutually re-enforce each other. These sub-systems are:

- the economical and financial system

- the socio-cultural system

- the cultural and symbolic system

Reading social reality from the perespective of the difficulties encountered by the persons and groups we work with in our ministry brings to the fore the different explanations that are posited within these three axes or sub-systems. The same grid allows us to be less naive and more lucid about he content of the information received through the radio and TV programs.

For many of our brothers and issters their commitment in Justice and Peac eis rooted in this process of analysis so as to better serve all those who are concerned by this on andaily basis at a practical level. Those of us working in the field also need to do this work of analysis, otherwise they will be dealing only with the effects and never efficiently deal with the real struggle against exclusion and violence.

The systemic approach is probably not familiar to many of us. It needs to be explained if we want to implement it and highlight the causes upon which we must act.

Outline of the Global Social System

a. The economic and financial system is made up of a series of mechanisms and structures that play an important role in maintaining systems of exclusion, poverty and violence. The most important components of the system are:

• the production of goods and services ( immaterial things such as information and research ).
• consumerism ( famine, waste, garbage...)
• trade and international exchange.
• investment ( productive, arms, prestige ).
• price-fixing ( by the state or the market ).
• jobs ( unemployment, automation ...).
• currency ( finances, speculation ...)

Outline of the Economic System

b. The socio-political sub-system is made up of:

• structures of identification and belonging ( family, generation, class...),
• structures of conflict and of cooperation,
• structures of power and of freedom ( legislation, rights, repression...),
• political structures ( democracy, oligarchy ...),
• human rights; peoples, groups, individuals.

c. The cultural and symbolic sub-system is made up of:

• relationships with the environment: status of nature, of the preservation of the earth.
• gender relationships: men/women, status of homosexuality.
• ethnic representation.
• religions and beliefs ( myths...).
• the explicit and implicit values that fashion social, familial and individual behaviors.
• artistic expression

You will find formation examples for each of the above in the appendices to this workbook. They can be used with specialized groups and with people already involved in this type of intervention...

The formation component on these issues was placed in the initial formation process for the brothers ( Chapter of Quezon City, 20 and the following General Chapters. This was reintegrated in the "Ratio Studiorum Generalis" of the brothers, # 14:

"From the very outset of the formation process, during the period of initial formation, particular attention will be given to questions of social order and the economy, so that the brothers will be better able to understand the living conditions of those to whom they will be sent to proclaim the Word of God and of those with whom they will be called to work for the promotion of justice and peace. Because the goal of our preaching is the conversion of men and women working together for the transformation of the unjust structures existing in our society, the brothers must be well informed regarding the origins of these injustices, if they are to be able to identify them and fight to change them. Every brother should also receive a minimum of training in the area of economics, enough to allow him to assume administrative positions within his community. This concern for justice and peace which constitutes one of the apostolic priorities of the Order should be honored from the beginning of the formation process through a theological approach that will help the brothers in their future commitments,

Every "Ratio Formationis" of the women's congregations of apostolic life refer to this type of training as being essential for understanding the mechanisms that go against the advancement of the men and women to whom they will be sent to bring the Word of Life.

The pedagogical methods presented in this workbook could also be used for follow-up activities to the various life stories and case studies like those presented in Workbook 1. It would be interesting to have people work in groups, using the stories and cases as a basis to discover the causes of the problems identified by the brothers or sisters, and how they discovered the underlying dynamics of systems present in their work.

All of theses elements that describe the system and the mechanisms that create exclusion and violence, constitute a more or less detailed grid that would be very useful to apply to situations where justice and peace are practically non-existent. Many approaches could be used. They express different levels of depth that are the result of a survey of the context (milieu).

The first level is abstract in nature. It consists in the quadruple questionnaire method based on four specific questions. What are the economic factors at play, are they the cause or the effect of the situation ? What are the socio-economic factors? What cultural factors are involved ? the final phase consists of listing the causes by order of priority. This method is particularly relevant when analyzing situations of a global nature such as wars and various other crises.....

The second level is more practical but also more demanding. It can be particularly useful during times of specialized training in the area of Justice and Peace, during the Novitiate (particularly if a novice is searching for a new form of ministry) and with the student brothers.

The following example comes to us from a novitiate in Africa:

R. and K. are two novices in Africa who chose to work with the young "girl servants" for one- half day every week. These girls are usually very young, often distant members of the extended family, who leave their villages and come to the city to do the cleaning. the cooking and the baby-sitting...

For the most part, they receive very little salary and in some cases nothing at all for their work. The majority have no room where they can go and are left to sleep in the stairwells or the kitchen. They spend their whole life working with nothing more than their meals and a few trinkets in return... Some of them are forced to live in extremely annoying conditions, even beatings or have to submit themselves to sexual abuse by their employers. They hardly ever go out of the area except to go to the market and to bring the children to school. They meet with the others at the market or on the way to school with the children and sometimes for a very short time in the afternoon while the employers are either out or at work.

This is the time when R. and K. get to meet with the girls, very informally, but it gives the novices an opportunity to hear their story, their problems and their concerns about the future. Upon their return they would write a report on their experience which brought them to the realization that the girls did not know how to read.

With the consent of the novice director, the two brothers decided to meet with the employers to get to know the other side of the story. Those who accepted to participate, were for the most part people who knew the community; the other families refused. Their survey provided them with new insights about family networks, and the lifestyle of the urban middle-class where a working woman receives a special social status and consequently needs to bring someone in to do keep house in her absence. The brothers tried to understand the issues of violence and sexual abuse...

After the survey was compiled the brothers decided to write a letter to the employers. The letter was distributed to the parishioners at the community Mass. The letter was an appeal to the employers to provide the girls with an opportunity to go to school so they could learn to read and write and asked that they be paid a just wage. This non-aggressive letter was an attempt to have the employers reflect on their behavior and on the Christian character of family life.

This very simple activity helped the novices gain new knowledge pertaining to given neighborhood, with its problems, its language and its anguishes. They could have gone further and done something to alleviate the situation, but they did succeed in dis-covering an injustice which up until then had been taken for granted. They also came in contact with numerous facets of the daily life of those to whom they were sent to proclaim the Good News of salvation, and realized to what degree the people were unconscious of the fact that by their behavior toward the servants, they were perpetuating a situation of injustice.

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