Silence on the pope’s pet issue
Income inequality fails to draw S.F. archbishop’s fire
San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone isn’t shy about taking bold public stances on national issues like same-sex marriage. But he’s been reticent to use his bully pulpit to speak as loudly about income inequality, the most pressing concern in San Francisco — and Pope Francis’ pet issue.
Francis is using his six-day tour of the U.S. to urge clergy to advocate on behalf of the poor. In a speech to 300 American bishops this week in Washington, the pope told Catholic leaders to “face the challenging issues of our time.” In the first-ever papal address to a joint meeting of Congress on Thursday, Francis lauded Dorothy Day, an American who founded the Catholic Worker Movement, for her standing up for the poor.
“Her social activism, her passion for justice and for the cause of the oppressed, were inspired by the Gospel, her faith, and the example of the saints,” Francis said.
Cordileone has spoken forcefully about other social ills, but some of the region’s leading politicians say Cordileone hasn’t been involved with their efforts to tackle the area’s affordability crisis.
The statewide Catholic Conference of Bishops supported state Sen. Mark Leno’s failed attempt to raise California’s minimum wage to $11 an hour in 2016. Leno, D-San Francisco, wished Cordileone would have raised his voice on an issue so pressing to many in his diocese, which includes San Francisco, Marin and San Mateo counties.
“We needed every strong
voice on that,” Leno said.
Cordileone has not worked directly with Mayor Ed Lee’s office on affordability issues, though the city’s Interfaith Council, which includes Catholic congregations, has.
In March, the archdiocese became the subject of national ridicule when sprinklers at St. Mary’s Cathedral were turned on homeless people sleeping in its doorways.
‘Wedge issues’
“You have an archbishop who is on a different page from the pope when it comes to” income inequality, said Supervisor David Campos, who proposed a moratorium on market rate housing development in the Mission District. “I haven’t heard him talk about it at all. Instead, his focus has been on wedge issues, like same-sex marriage.”
Cordileone became a national figure by speaking out against same-sex marriage. He helped raise $1.5 million to put Proposition 8 on the 2008 state ballot and then rallied evangelical Christians and Mormons to help pass the measure that banned samesex marriage in California. He referred to gay nuptials as “the ultimate attack of the Evil One,” and has emerged as the point man in national demonstrations against samesex marriage through the powerful U.S. Conference of Bishops, on which he chairs the Subcommittee for the Promotion and Defense of Marriage.
Though Francis has not changed church policy on same-sex marriage, he has focused much of his attention elsewhere. On other issues, Cordileone has joined him.
From his perch as leader of the 560,000-member Archdiocese of San Francisco, Cordileone has also spoken out on immigration. About 46 percent of the diocese’s members are Latino, including many new immigrants.
In July, he wrote a letter to both the Senate and House Judiciary committees when they were holding hearings on immigration. Amid national debate ignited by the San Francisco slaying of Kathryn Steinle, allegedly by an immigrant facing deportation, Cordileone urged lawmakers not to use the crime to scapegoat all immigrants.
“It is also important that we recognize that the vast majority of immigrants — both those with and without papers — are not a violent threat to society and so should not be subject to guilt by association,” Cordileone wrote. “In fact, statistics show that immigrant communities are by and large safe and that a cooperative relationship between law enforcement and those communities enhances public safety and reduces crime.”
He’s called for immigration reform and supports the leftleaning preference for a pathway to citizenship for millions of immigrants in the U.S. illegally.
Cordileone’s supporters say the archbishop cares deeply about the region’s housing and affordability crisis, particularly as it affects low-income people and immigrants. But, they say, he has chosen to do his work behind the scenes.
Focus on social concerns
Two years ago, Cordileone created an Office of Public Policy and Social Concerns and tapped Auxiliary Bishop William Justice as the diocese’s point person for income inequality. That group has spent the past months organizing at the parish level, especially on immigration and eviction issues, said Lorena Melgarejo, coordinator of Parish Organizing.
The group has trained thousands of local parishioners on how to advocate for themselves and others on housing rights, Melgarejo said. It has organized monthly immigration rights Masses in the Mission, where legal advocates work with parishioners after the service, and held demonstrations at Immigration and Customs Enforcement offices and on behalf of parishioners who have been evicted.
Cordileone’s backers also point to the efforts of organizations like Catholic Charities, which work to aid the poor.
Jennifer Martinez, executive director of the San Francisco Organizing Project, which has advocated on immigration and housing issues for three decades, said even though Cordileone hasn’t been on the street himself, “the archbishop has been very supportive of our work to make sure that people have a safe and stable home.”
“The archbishop is leading this work — it’s not his words, it’s his actions,” said Melgarejo, who aside from her work at the diocese has been a longtime labor activist in San Francisco. “It goes beyond the homilies and the preaching and the church. It’s about how do we walk our faith outside of the church walls.”
So why isn’t the archbishop talking about income inequality, a topic few dispute in San Francisco, with the same vigor with which he rails on same-sex marriage, an attitude that won’t win many converts in San Francisco?
That might change this fall, his backers say.
“We need to get him in the front more,” Melgarejo said. “Soon, you may see it.”