CNS STORY: Caritas struggles to reach rural victims of Chilean earthquake

CHILE-RURAL Mar-2-2010 (800 words) With photos posted March 1 and 2 and map posted March 1. xxxi

Caritas struggles to reach rural victims of Chilean earthquake

By Barbara J. Fraser
Catholic News Service

LIMA, Peru (CNS) -- While media attention focuses on looting in Concepcion, the largest city near the epicenter of the magnitude 8.8 earthquake Feb. 27, Catholic Church workers struggle to reach quake victims in rural areas who are far from the spotlight.

"We are receiving funds to help the poorest people, who are in the countryside," Father Waldo Alfaro, head of the Caritas Chile office in Linares, told Catholic News Service March 1 in a telephone interview. Linares is in the Maule region, where most of the quake deaths occurred.

"The entire coast was hard-hit, but this is an area where the poorest rural residents live," Father Alfaro said. "Aid is not reaching them because these are very small villages."

Three trucks left Linares early March 2 to distribute supplies, especially food and water, to residents of far-flung villages in the farming region. The greatest need is for milk, water, food, fuel and cots for victims, as well as assistance in rebuilding houses that collapsed in the quake, Father Alfaro said.

The adobe houses common in the poorest rural regions "are the ones that collapsed," he said. The Linares office of Caritas, the church's social assistance agency, is compiling an inventory of damaged and destroyed homes.

Meanwhile, buckled and cracked highways complicated aid distribution.

"Roads are passable, but dangerous," Father Alfaro said.

The national government is sending aid to the region by ship to bypass the buckled roads, damaged bridges and crowds of people who swarm vehicles arriving in urban areas, he said.

Between 30 and 40 churches and chapels in the Linares Diocese were badly damaged or destroyed, along with two orphanages. In coastal villages, churches that remain standing have been turned into makeshift morgues.

The official death toll is nearly 730, with 542 of the confirmed deaths in the Maule region. But "many people are still missing," Father Alfaro said. "There are many bodies that have not been identified."

The last weekend in February marked the end of summer vacation for students, and many families were spending a few final days on the coast, camping on the beach or visiting small resort and fishing villages.

The earthquake, which struck at 3:34 a.m., triggered a tidal wave that was more than 30 feet high in places and which swept more than a mile inland. While some people reached high ground, others were washed away. Cars were left piled on top of houses, Father Alfaro said.

While church leaders mourned the deaths, they also called for solidarity and condemned the looting of stores and businesses.

Archbishop Ricardo Ezzati Andrello of Concepcion called the pillaging a "second earthquake." Bishop Alejandro Goic Karmelic of nearby Rancagua, president of the Chilean bishops' conference, said it "strikes our conscience" and "raises questions for us about deeply held values."

Chilean President Michelle Bachelet imposed a curfew in Concepcion and sent military troops to stem the looting. Curfew hours were extended to noon March 2.

President-elect Sebastian Pinera, who was to take office March 11, faces the task of reconstruction, which he estimated could cost between $15 billion and $30 billion. Up to 500,000 houses were badly damaged or destroyed.

In a statement issued March 1, Bishop Goic said the church was "praying for the eternal rest" of those who had died and asking "the God of life for consolation and hope" for their families.

"We join in prayer with those who are anxiously looking for loved ones, and for the many families who have lost everything, the fruit of a lifetime of labor. In Jesus Christ, we trust that the most battered families and communities can rise again, spiritually and materially, with the support and solidarity of the entire country and the international community," he said.

"We love this country, which has recovered from earthquakes, tidal waves, volcanic eruptions and floods, a people that has risen in peace from death and violence so many times in its history," he said. "At a time of understandable desperation, we call for calm and solidarity, and intense family and community prayer."

In the United States, Cardinal Francis E. George of Chicago, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, offered prayers for earthquake victims in a March 1 letter to Bishop Goic.

"I write to assure you of my prayers and those of my brother bishops in the United States for all who have been affected by this tragedy," Cardinal George wrote. "I assure you also of our prayers for the church and for our brother bishops of Chile."

He told Bishop Goic that Catholic Relief Services, the U.S. bishop's international relief and development agency, "stands ready to be of assistance to you and your Caritas groups as they work to alleviate the suffering caused by the earthquake."

Donations to CRS can made through its Web site at www.crs.org/chile/maule-quake.cfm.

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