Sorry and Sorrowful
Before this past weekend, I had sent in a totally different post for today’s The Table.
Then I watched my own city ravaged by an understandable, justifiable, and yet horrific
anger. I do not know how to express how sorry and sorrowful I am.
I think Shannen Dee Williams, assistant professor of history at Villanova University and
author of Subversive Habits: Black Catholic Nuns in the Long African-American
Freedom Struggle, in an article in the June 2020 issue of America speaks out for all of us
at this time in calling for our own Church to practice and demand justice:
If the Catholic Church is truly invested in the flourishing of the entire human family, then it must finally make racial justice a leading priority. It must also begin to understand what African-Americans, especially women, more than any other group foresaw and fundamentally understood in 2016: The violence of white supremacy is never exclusively reserved for black people but always imperils all. If this is not understood, history has already made clear that we will be here again or somewhere much worse.
How chillingly prescient she was – and is – considering all that has happened this past
weekend.
I cannot end this though without at least the possibility of some respite and comfort.
And so, I quote the words of the Greek poet, Aeschylus:
Drop, drop—
In our sleep,
Upon the heart
Sorrow falls,
Memory’s pain,
And to us,
Though against our very will,
Even in our own despite,
Comes wisdom
By the awful grace of God.
2 Responses
Patriarchy is the root cause (Genesis 3:16). Racism impacts a large percentage of people. Sexism impacts 100% of people. As long as patriarchal gender ideology prevails in human relations, there is no way in the world that racism, or any other derivative of sexism, can be overcome.
I’d like to gently push back on that, Luis — like sexism, racism also impacts 100% of people. I know you know that sexism affects women AND men. I am white, and I and fellow white people benefit from a racist system, just as black people and other people of color are harmed by it. In addition, I am less human when I even subconsciously follow the belief — instilled by a systemically racist society since I was born — that black people’s lives are less important than my own. Though it is not the same harm — racism is deadly for black people and people of color — 100 percent of people are impacted by racism.