Hélder Câmara

Dom Hélder Pessoa Câmara (February 7, 1909, Fortaleza, Ceará, North East Brazil - August 27, 1999 Recife) was Roman Catholic Archbishop of Olinda and Recife.

He was known as the 'Bishop of Corum' and took a clear position with the urban poor.[1]

In 1959 he founded Banco da Providência in Rio de Janeiro, a philanthropic organization that still exists fighting poverty and social injustices.

He is famous for stating, "When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why they are poor, they call me a Communist."[2]

Camara's short tract, Spiral of Violence (1971), was written at the time of the Vietnam war. It is distinctive not just for the manner in which it links structural injustice (Level 1 violence) with escalating rebellion (Level 2 violence) and repressive reaction (Level 3 violence), but also for the way in which Camara calls upon the youth of the world to take steps for breaking the spiral to which their elders are often addicted. This book has been out of print for about 20 years (in the UK), but a scanned version is now available on the web at the link given below.

In 1973, he was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize by the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC).[3] He was awarded the Pacem in Terris Award. It was named after a 1963 encyclical letter by Pope John XXIII that calls upon all people of good will to secure peace among all nations. Pacem in Terris is Latin for "Peace on Earth."

References

  1. ^ `Bishop of the slums'
  2. ^ "Quando dou comida aos pobres chamam-me de santo. Quando pergunto por que eles são pobres chamam-me de comunista." - cited in "Helder, o dom: uma vida que marcou os rumos da Igreja no Brasil"‎ - Page 53, by Zildo Rocha - Published by Editora Vozes, 2000, ISBN 85-326-2213-5, 9788532622136 - 208 pages
  3. ^ AFSC's Past Nobel Nominations

External links

John Howard Griffin and John F. Kennedy (1964) • Martin Luther King, Jr. (1965) • R. Sargent Shriver (1966) • A. Philip Randolph (1967) • James Groppi (1968) • Saul Alinsky (1969) • Dorothy Day (1971) • Harold Hughes (1974) • Hélder Câmara (1975) • Mother Teresa (1976) • Thomas Gumbleton (1979) • Crystal Lee Sutton and Ernest Leo Unterkoefler (1980) • George F. Kennan (1982) • Helen Caldicott (1983) • Joseph Bernardin (1985) • Maurice John Dingman (1986) • Desmond Tutu (1987) • Eileen Egan (1989) • Mairead Maguire (1990) • María Julia Hernández (1991) • César Chávez (1992) • Daniel Berrigan (1993) • Jim Wallis (1995) • Samuel Ruiz (1996) • Odebrecht Foundation and Philip Hannan (1996) • Jim and Shelley Douglass (1997) • George G. Higgins (2000) Lech Wałęsa (2001) • Gwen Hennessey and Dorothy Hennessey (2002) • Arthur Simon (2004) • Donald Mosley (2005) • Salim Ghazal (2007) • Marvin Mottet (2008) Hildegard Goss-Mayr (2009) • John Dear (2010) • Álvaro Leonel Ramazzini Imeri (2011)

Hélder Câmara (1983) · Homer A. Jack (1984) · Zhao Puchu (1985) · Philip A. Potter (1986) · World Muslim Congress (1987) · Etai Yamada (1989) · Norman Cousins (1990) · Hildegard Goss-Mayr (1991) · A. T. Ariyaratne (1992) · Neve Shalom ~ Wahat as-Salam (1993) · Paulo Evaristo Arns (1994) · M. Aram (1995) · Marii Hasegawa (1996) · Corrymeela Community (1997) · Maha Ghosananda (1998) · Community of Sant'Egidio (1999) · Kang Won Yong (2000) · Elias Chacour (2001) · Samuel Ruiz García (2002) · Scilla Elworthy (2003) · Acholi Religious Leaders Peace Initiative (2004) · Hans Küng (2005) · Rabbis for Human Rights (2006) · Cheng Yen (2007) · Prince Hassan bin Talal (2008) · Gideon Byamugisha (2009) · Ela Bhatt (2010) · Sulak Sivaraksa (2011)