Migrant pastoral care: Its lights, shadows and the Church's response

Based on a presentation by Fr. Joe Quilongquilong, SJ

Migration has been a significant phenomenon throughout Philippine history. Filipinos used long boats called balangay to move from place to place in search of food and a place to settle. About 18 meters long, these boats could transport a small clan or large family. Filipinos moved along the island chain to trade, sailing across the Malacca Strait to Vietnam. When the Chinese traders arrived sometime in the 13th century, some of the locals who had been trading aggressively drifted towards Mainland China.

Even after the Spanish conquest of the archipelago, Filipinos kept on the move. Native slave labor was de-ployed from one area to another around the country. The Spaniards realized and benefited from the crafts-manship of the Filipinos. Filipinos, for example, built vessels for the Galleon trade. The Canton-Manila-Acapulco Galleon Trade from 1565 to 1815 gave Filipi-nos an opportunity to move beyond Asia while it enriched Spanish colonizers.

The first and second waves

When the United States took over the country under the Treaty of Paris signed on December 10, 1898, it developed the economy for the export of goods to a niche market, this time to the US.  In 1906, eight years after the Americans took over the islands, the Hawaiian Sugar Planters Association came to the Philippines to recruit manpower. Thousands of Filipino farm workers sailed to California, Alaska, and in other American territories in the Pacific to work in plantations and canneries. Between 1906 and 1930, there were 120,000 Filipinos working in the US.

While the first wave of Philippine labor migration was based on skills for farm and factory work and blue-collar service in American military facilities, the second wave filled a labor shortage in the US mainland arising from the Vietnam War and included professionals such as doctors, nurses, and engineers.

The third wave

The movement of migrants rebounded on the third wave when thousands of Filipinos left the country in the 1970s bound for jobs as construction workers and other blue-collar professionals in the Middle East. By the late ‘70s, the Philippines experienced relatively high economic growth due mainly to the remittances of Filipino workers abroad.

The country sent out an average of over 30,000 migrant workers a month from 1984 to 1990. That figure grew to more than 50,000 a month from 1991 to 1995 and to more than 60,000 a month from 1996 to 2001. Meanwhile, OFW remittances continued to grow, from $545.87 million annually in 1981 to a peak of $5.7 billion in 1997 at the start of the Asian financial crisis. Remittances have stayed within the six-billion-dollar range from 1999 until the present.

‘Feminization’ of migration

The third wave (moving to “fourth wave”?) of migration continues until the present, and it has brought about many breakthroughs for the Filipino overseas workforce. It expanded the market for migrant workers to places other than the Middle East and the US. Entertainers were hired for the Japanese market; medical practitioners such as doctors, nurses and caregivers were recruited for Canada and Great Britain; and domestic helpers were in great demand in countries in Europe, in Hongkong and Singapore.

While up to the mid-80s the vast majority of migrant workers were men, by the late 80s, when the demand grew in the international service sector, women workers found that they too could join the migrant work force. In 1987, some  47.2% of the migrant workers were women, climbing to 50% in 1992, and up to 69% in 2002. Many women take on jobs as domestic helpers and entertainers, but a substantial number are professionals, such as nurses and other caregivers. In general, the demand for overseas Filipino labor has drastically changed the Philippine economic structure. For one, the educational system is now geared towards overseas instead of local employment.

Poverty, high unemployment and underemployment rates are seen as the crux of the exodus of labor from the Philippines. Economists maintain that workers always compare what they can earn in the country to what they can earn abroad. “Its always a comparison of what you will get here and what you will get abroad. When you are unemployed, then better go abroad, but if you are employed here, you want to go abroad to get more,” says Dr. Edita Tan, from the UP School of Economics.

There are both lights and shadows in the current situation for workers.

Lights (positive): remittances (US$ 6 to 7 billion annually); sustained families; children get to go to school; aid to government during these times of economic crisis; manifold sacrifices for workers’ families; endurance in the face of adverse conditions; determination to turn risks into opportunities; courage in the face of real physical threats and moral dangers; various positive contributions to host countries.

Shadows (negative): brain drain; illegal recruitment (through “middlemen”); contract violations; trafficking and abuse of women: internal/group conflicts; illegal detention; unfair labor practices; loneliness and separation from families; reported crimes committed in the host countries (drug trafficking, etc.).

Church Response

In 1955 the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) created the Episcopal Commission for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant Peoples (ECMI). In various pastoral letters the Philippine Catholic Church has expressed the following points:

Need for pastoral care: We are training and assigning more church personnel, clergy as well as laity, to this particular ministry.

Need to pray and work hard for the economic recovery of our country so that fewer and fewer Filipinos will be forced to leave our country because of poverty.

On May 17, 1987, Pope John-Paul II told Filipinos living in Europe: “Indeed, in Europe, you are called to be the new and youthful witness of that very faith which your country received from Europe so many generations ago.” The Second Plenary Council of the Philippines in 1991 recognized the missionary potential of Filipino migrants: “For economic reasons, wave after wave of Filipinos have sought work in other countries. There they witness through their religiosity and piety whenever this is possible for them. Many are the stories of the positive effects of their faith witness on others. (PCP II, Part II, A Church Renewed # 108). PCP II also saw the need for appropriate catechesis and the need for pastoral and social care for migrants and their families in a way that “their spiritual and material welfare is served, their rights protected, and their faith strengthened.”

Some resolutions and recommendations

As contained in CBCP Pastoral Letters, we believe the State should not promote overseas employment as a means to sustain economic growth and achieve national development. Overseas employment should be allowed only if protective measures are in place so that the dignity and human rights of the Filipino migrant workers are not compromised or violated.

We urge our government to formulate and implement migrant policies and programs that are gender-sensitive, i.e., that take into special consideration the situation of our women workers.

We appeal to host churches. The Catechism of the Catholic Church, no. 2241, teaches: “The  more prosperous nations are obliged, to the extent they are able, to welcome the foreigner in search of the security and the means of livelihood which he cannot find in his country of origin” and to treat with compassion “all strangers in their midst.”

We again exhort the whole people of God—bishops, priests, religious and laity—to give more attention and pastoral care to our migrant workers and their families. The Philippine Church should “journey with” our migrants. “Journeying with” our Filipino migrants, they are called to nourish and strengthen their faith, promote their rights and protect them from abuses.

Because of the evils that often accompany Filipino overseas employment, we do not promote overseas employment for the purpose of evangelization. We, however, exhort you, our Filipino brothers and sisters who are already working abroad, to live truly Christian lives.

References

1) "Four Centuries of Philippine Migration" by Villy G. Cabuag, Philippine Migration Journalism:A Practical Handbook, Institute on Church and Social Issues OFW Journalism Consortium, 2003.

2) The Ministry to Migrants and their Families, Episcopal Commission for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant Peoples