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Let’s Talk About Race
Sen. Barack Obama’s speech on race March 18 at Philadelphia’s National Constitution Center may or may not significantly affect his prospects for being elected president in November, but it just may spark a new conversation about race relations in the nation.
You can argue about whether or not, Sen. Obama sufficiently distanced himself from the scurrilous remarks of his pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, but there’s no getting around the fact that we as a nation still need to look at our feelings about race.
Earlier this year Catholic Charities USA said in a paper, “Poverty and Racism: Overlapping Threats to the Common Good,” that “History shows that the Catholic Church has not been immune from the racial virus that afflicts American culture.” It cited the 1992 U.S. bishops’ statement, “A Time for Remembering, Reconciling and Recommitting Ourselves as a People,” which acknowledged “the Church’s tragic complicity in racism.”
There’s no getting around the fact that we once refused to admit nonwhites to seminaries, convents and religious life.
Racism is a persistent and destructive evil that is much more complex than the typical understanding grasps. The perpetuation of poverty still breaks down along racial lines in our country.
Obama’s speech may provide a template for people at all levels of public or nonpublic life to talk more openly about race and what it means, suggests Precious Blood Father Clarence Williams, who is senior director of racial equality and diversity initiatives for Catholic Charities USA.
“I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community,” Obama said. “I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother – a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.
“These people are a part of me,” he said. “And they are a part of America, this country that I love.”
When Catholic Charities released its paper on racism and poverty in observance of the Rev. Martin Luther King’s birthday this year, Father Williams said, “We said we want to begin the conversation that we’re not having as a nation. His talking about it helps the conversation get started.”
Breaking the Hold of Death
In his Easter homily in Jerusalem, Patriarch Michel Sabbah rightly points out that the political situation in the Holy Land has become deadlocked and new means must be found to break the cycle of violence.
Politicians have come to accept the “routine of death,” believing that they only need to govern it without trying to find a solution that can give people a new life.
The continuing bloodshed in the Gaza Strip is enough evidence that both Palestinians and Israelis must bear the burden of blame for the horrendous conditions in the Middle East.
Life in the Holy Land, he said, has become “a permanent cross.”
“We will not stop repeating that security cannot be achieved by inflicting insecurity on others,” said Patriarch Sabbah.
Jesus’ resurrection signaled a new way for living for Christians. It was not meant as a blueprint simply for the followers of Christ but for the whole world.
To believe in Jesus’ resurrection is to believe and hope that the situation in the Holy Land can change, that there need not be an endless spiral of violence and injustice.
“That is what Easter means for us: death that leads to life, to the Resurrection.
Death, which becomes through the power of love and forgiveness a redemptive power, creates a new man, a new person,” the Patriarch said. “No one has the right to turn personal suffering, even great and incomprehensible, into a prison for oneself or for generations to come.”
As witnesses to the resurrection of Jesus, Christians should give new hope and help maintain the hope in others despite those who are destroying the land.
We challenge politicians and world leaders to take a new look at the Middle East. The oft-heard mantra “Think outside the box” comes into play here. It should not be trivialized by repetition. Instead, let Easter’s burst of new hope bring with it new ways to burst through the chains of hatred and violence which has plagued this sacred space for far too many years.
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