Volume 26, Number 1    April 2004

Why a CTA anti-racism campaign?

by Tom Honoré

How many of us know that during the height of slavery in this country, our leading Catholic moral theologian, Archbishop Francis Kenrick of Baltimore, wrote the textbook that was used in all of our seminaries, a textbook that condoned the owning of slaves as acceptable morally, so long as the slave (property) was not brutalized by the owner?  Does it affect us now that most of the U.S. Founding Fathers owned slaves and counted a slave for only three-fifths of a person in order to get the Constitution ratified?  Where did the U.S. Catholic hierarchy stand with regard to the Abolition Movement?  Do we all know that the Jesuits and Franciscans and Ursulines and countless other priests, nuns and lay Catholics owned slaves here in America well into the 19th century?  We have much to learn about the racism in our U.S. Catholic church history from writers like Cyprian Davis (“A History of Black Catholics”) and Stephen J. Ochs (“Desegregating the Altar”).  Of course, our lives are intended to be so much more than simply avoiding the mistakes of ancestors.  We are called to be the Body of Christ -- to fulfill St. Paul’s dictum in his letter to the Galatians that now, baptized in Christ, we are “neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” (Gal. 3:28)

This is why I agreed to join the CTA board—to help end racism.  As an African American born in the South in 1936, I grew up experiencing the legal discrimination of the American apartheid era.  I was ordained a Josephite priest in March 1965, hoping at long last to take my place alongside those ministers of the gospels then in the forefront of the civil rights movement. It was that dream that sustained me through 12 years of seminary training.  I left the priesthood in 1969, when it became apparent to me that most of my brother priests and my sisters and brothers in the U.S. Catholic Church had little interest in or support for ending racism in this country.  In 1969 the Josephites were predominantly paternalistic white men who took their place with ease, as did most U.S. Catholics, among the privileged in American society.  So I went elsewhere to follow my dream, lest it might become, in the words of Langston Hughes, like “a raisin in the sun.”  This is the moment, maybe my last opportunity, to bring that dream to the table where I share the most precious communion in my life.

Today, we the people of God, of the U.S., and of CTA, are often conflicted and in degrees of denial about our dark side. Most of us in CTA would assume that since we marched in the ’60s for civil rights and do not now harbor any personal bigotry toward people of color, we must be beyond any need for self-analysis to end vestiges of racism in our midst. Many might deny even the possibility of racism being part of our CTA fabric organizationally, even as we decry every year, after every conference, the almost total absence of people of color. (Admittedly, racism and the lack of diversity are not the same, but they could have a causal relationship.)  We are good and liberal people. But without well designed training and prayerful work, few can appreciate the depth of our racist legacy and how deeply our church and society have been infected by hundreds of years of racism in this country. For truth and reconciliation to occur, we need to eradicate the racist viruses embedded in our national and institutional life, giving privilege to some and disadvantage to others. (Many would be shocked to see how much harder it is for a person of color to get a mortgage loan these days.)

 
Since our founding in Detroit in 1976, CTA has addressed issues that contribute to racism but has not addressed in a sustained, systematic, intentional way racism itself. The time has come to get serious — to join forces with other truth-tellers and freedom workers.

What to expect soon

In the 1990s, CTA leaders began a concerted outreach to progressive Black and Hispanic Catholics.  Four people of color joined the CTA board. Fine speakers of color addressed our conferences. 

In 2002 the board hired Crossroads Ministry from Racine, Wis., an interfaith organization that can teach us to understand and combat institutional racism.  Far beyond rooting out personal prejudice, Crossroads defines racism to include issues of power in our culture and society. Crossroads has worked with Pax Christi USA, several major religious communities, universities and businesses.  Crossroads conducted a one-day introduction for the board in 2002 and led the board, staff, and some regional leaders in a two-day analysis in 2003.  An Anti-Racism Planning/Design Task Force was formed to produce a project description tailored to our specific needs and to set up the recruitment and formation of an Anti-Racism Team.  We can expect soon to receive a substantial packet of information from the board about the intended training and work of the CTA Anti-Racism Team along with an invitation to members to join the team.

For more information or to receive the packet to apply for training and membership on CTA’s Anti-Racism Team, contact staffers Mauro Pineda (mauro@cta-usa.org) or Crystal Chan (crystalchan@cta-usa.org) or board member Tom Honore (thonore@sbcglobal.net).