Social Analysis – Linking Faith and Justice, Joesph Holland and Peter Henriot, Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1980
What leads people to apply their faith to social issues? First, they need to be connected—they need to be personally impacted by the issue, or at least feel how it effects others. Second, they need to understand the issue well enough to believe that their response will make a difference. Third, they need a sense of direction and hope, a sense that as large as a problem may be, it can be whittled down to size when people of faith work on it together. The four-step process developed by Peter Henriot and Joseph Holland offers a framework for helping families apply their faith to social issues. The process begins with insertion—our experience with an issue/injustice, moves to social analysis and theological reflection on the issue/injustice, and culminates in action—working for social change and serving those in need.
Insertion
The first step in the process—and the basis for any action—is Insertion. Through Insertion we identify our experience of social issues in our family, community, and world. We try to feel and understand how the social issues affect our family and touch the lives of others who are affected. Getting in touch with what people are feeling, what they are undergoing, and how they are responding to the situations they find themselves in—these are some of the experiences that constitute Insertion. The entry point for analyzing and acting on an issue may be 1) an event—an experience of injustice; 2) an issue—hunger, poverty, environment, the arms race; 3) a set of problems—economic deterioration of a neighborhood, pollution; or 4) a question—why does poverty persist in the richest country in the world? Sometimes we begin naturally with the experience of the family on a particular issue, providing them with the opportunity to express their feelings and thoughts about their experience. In other cases we will need to provide activities that connect families with the issue to be explored. This will mean simulating the experience of injustice, helping families “feel” the issue being analyzed, or expose families to what is happening in the local community, helping them to “hear” and “think” from a broader perspective. Once families are connected with an issue, they are ready to move to analysis, to ask the” why” questions from a first-hand perspective.
Questions to help people surface their experience:
What is our personal experience of this issue or concern? Have any of our family or friends experienced it? What was the experience like? How did it impact how they felt about themselves? How did it impact how they felt about others?
If we haven’t personally experienced this need, where do our information and feelings come
from? Can you point to any specific article, story, song or video about the issue that struck you? What do we know, as a group, about this issue? What questions do we have?
What feelings do we connect with the issue? Why do people experience this injustice or
issue? Could it happen to you? Why or why not? What does it do to people? How does it make them feel? How does it make us feel?
What are we doing personally to change this situation? Are there ways we are already
involved around this issue? How? Where?
How do we see the issue being dealt with in our local community? Does the issue touch us
at all? How? Where?
What are the thoughts and feelings of the people in our local community, state or nation
about this issue? How are these thoughts and feelings shared? Do they have any impact on what we think or feel? Why or why not?
What is being done in our local community, state, or country to change this situation? Is it
enough? Too much? Why?