By Anthony Barich
National Reporter
Caritas goes where the rest of the world won’t, its Australian chief executive Jack de Groot told the 25 February Project Compassion launch at Parliament House in Perth.
Caritas’ work is often “awkward” in helping during “uncomfortable” crises, Mr de Groot said, including in Zimbabwe where it has responded to thousands through its food and water programmes “while the State falls apart and the world shrugs its shoulders in despair”.
“The same can be pointed to in Afghanistan where we support programmes for children who live in a context of fear,” he said.
“Our work is not easy, it is awkward; complex at times when you hear of places like Zimbabwe, Afghanistan and Sri Lanka. However, when you do give, you change a life and that is multiplied by the hundreds of thousands each year.”
The horror of the Haiti earthquake beamed into Perth television screens over the past month is but a visible version of the hidden suffering that millions more are subjected to around the world, he added.
He said Caritas has received $3 million for its work saving lives and reaching nearly 600,000 in six weeks through medical trauma assistance, the distribution of hundreds of thousands of meals and the first steps in provision of rudimentary shelter, water and sanitation systems in the centres where displaced Haitians have moved since the 12 January earthquake.
The suffering that has been streamed into Western Australian homes this past month is replicated on a daily but hidden basis throughout the world, he said.
“The women and girl child victims of the systematic use of rape as a weapon of war in the DRC (Democratic Republic of the Congo); the chronic food insecurity in parts of Timor or the victims of cyclones in the Pacific such as in Vava’u 10 nights ago, unfortunately go unnoticed by the media most of the time,” he said.
Though secular media largely ignores these tragedies, they are not ignored by Australian Catholics through their support of Project Compassion, he said.
The projected target of $10 million for Project Compassion 2010 covers but half of Caritas’ $20 million programme commitments it has to tens of thousands of families in poverty.
“It’s not just the physical feeding or skilling that you do,” he said, “but your support also contributes to the transformation of lives by the building of peace.”
Over recent years, Caritas’ programmes in Timor, Cambodia, Myanmar and the Congo have all contributed to the creation and nurturing of environments where peace is made possible, he said.
“The Caritas that you support is one that also stands up and advocates for change,” he added. “This includes communities in Cambodia and East Timor which for the first time in over a generation now have a full year without any hungry season for themselves and their children due to the sustainable agriculture programmes.”
These programmes are an effective response, he said, to the crippling problem of hunger which now sees a billion people around the globe facing serious malnutrition and ongoing hunger and illness.