FOCUS AREAS GLOBAL HEALTH

Catholic agencies that provide relief services around the globe are grappling with how to respond to plans to gut the U.S. Agency for International Development.

CHA's Bruce Compton co-authored study with leaders around the world

To better navigate the complexity of today's global health relationships, we must ground our work in Catholic social teaching and embrace the wisdom of the Serenity Prayer, which begins: "God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference."

Now, perhaps more than ever, the world's most vulnerable populations are in the crosshairs of geopolitical turmoil, and leaders worldwide, including representatives of the Catholic Church, are calling us to action.

At Shirati KMT Hospital in rural Northeastern Tanzania, 50% of the hospital's HIV/AIDS clinic personnel and support staff were let go in recent months due to the Trump administration's dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and freezing of funds earlier this year.

If I were to write a book about my global health journey, it would likely be called From Parachutes to Paradigm Shifts. I jumped with one of those "parachutes" when I took my first mission trip 28 years ago. I have been untangling myself from the aftereffects of that mess for more than two decades. After living in Haiti and seeing the complexities that these "parachute missions" created when they didn't have the appropriate perspective, I decided that if I wasn't part of the solution, I would be part of the problem. You may be confused, so let me explain.

Recent conversations with David Addiss and Heather Buesseler, from the Task Force for Global Health's Focus Area for Compassion and Ethics (FACE), reminded me of the synodal process the Catholic Church has undertaken. It was great to hear how this secular organization embodies a similar process that Pope Francis describes as "a dynamism of mutual listening, conducted at all levels of the Church, involving the whole people of God." As the saying goes, the shortest distance between two people is a story, so I have asked Buesseler to share hers.