Community Outreach Programs
 

Catholic Charities recognizes the value and contribution that parish based organizations and committees (Knights of Columbus, Human Concerns Committees, Outreach Committees) provide to their faith community and the broader community. 

Our vision as an organization focuses on forming more meaningful relationships with parishes and to work collaboratively with parishes to further the reach and impact of both the parish and Catholic Charities.

Through this effort we look to effectively implement the seven principles of Catholic Social Teaching as we work together to serve the poor in our midst, to live the Gospel imperatives, and to become ever more faith-filled communities in concrete works of charity, justice and peace.

Catholic Charities' Community Outreach actively works with parishes and other Catholic and non-Catholic organizations to provide outreach to the poor.  Programs in this ministry area include:

• social worker outreach - connecting the poor and vulnerable to needed services
• collaborating with parishes to address social justice issues and community needs
• consultation and education programs aimed at filling gaps in social service networks

Community Outreach Programs
Parish Connections



The Principles of Catholic Social Teaching

The Church identifies seven key principles of Catholic Social Teaching that stand today as a guide for furthering the education and understanding of what our response should be to the needs of those in our midst - whether locally or worldwide. Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Milwaukee fully embraces these seven principles as our core values, and indeed our mission and vision, our programs and services are all wrapped around these vital principles in fashioning our response to our brothers and sisters in need.
 

• Life and Dignity of the Human Person - All people are sacred, made in the image and likeness of God. People do not lose dignity because of disability, poverty, age, lack of success, or race. This emphasizes people over things, being over having. 
   
• Call to Family, Community, and Participation - The human person is both sacred and social. We realize our dignity and rights in relationship with others, in community. "We are one body; when one suffers, we all suffer." We are called to respect all of God's gifts of creation, to be good stewards of the earth and each other.
   
• Rights and Responsibilities - People have a fundamental right to life, food, shelter, health care, education and employment. All people have a right to participate in decisions that affect their lives. Corresponding to these rights are duties and responsibilities to respect the rights of others in the wider society and to work for the common good. 
   
• Option for the Poor and Vulnerable - The moral test of a society is how it treats its most vulnerable members. The poor have the most urgent moral claim on the conscience of the nation. We are called to look at public policy decisions in terms of how they affect the poor.
   
• The Dignity of Work and the Rights of Workers - People have a right to decent and productive work, fair wages, private property and economic initiative. The economy exists to serve people, not the other way around.
   
• Solidarity - We are one human family. Our responsibilities to each other cross national, racial, economic and ideological differences. We are called to work globally for justice.
   
• Care for God's Creation - The goods of the earth are gifts from God. We have a responsibility to care for these goods as stewards and trustees, not as mere consumers and users.