If systemic racism does exist, then dismantling it demands systemic action.
When my trees have insect damage, I visit a gardening center, where I often hear something like, “You could treat the affected parts of the shrub, or you could use a systemic insecticide.” T
opical treatments work if the damage is limited and the critters live on the surface. But, if the damage is deep or they have developed a cycle of persistent invasion, then a systemic treatment is the way to go. Racism is a similarly deep and persistent infestation in society.
Responding to racism, therefore, cannot mean replacing individual racist persons with other individual “non-racist” persons. It cannot mean simply better training for police officers or teachers or managers. Rather, it means complete reform.
Systemically tackling racism demands, at least, dismantling and rebuilding infected institutions and their structures that generate racist outcomes. It is like subjecting the body to deadly radiation and chemicals to kill an even more deadly cancer: painful, terrifying and disruptive, but essential.
Although people of color feel the impacts of racism most deeply, white people like me bear a moral responsibility to deepen our understanding. We must be more prayerful and introspective; more ready to listen than to speak; more open to different ways of education, policing, economics and politics; and think of ways we can grow as one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church.
Undoing systemic racism requires three levels of action: spiritual, institutional and advocacy.
SPIRITUAL
For far too long, white Catholics like myself have not been introspective enough about race and racism. Our first challenge is deep spiritual work on our attitudes, emotions and preconceptions about Black persons. This is spiritual work: prayer and dialogue with God and each other.
Begin with Scripture, meditating on passages that speak to overcoming culturally determined divisions of “us” versus “them.” Examples include: Gn 1:27; Gal 3:28; Rm 10:12-13; 1 Cor 12:12-13; and Col 3:11.
Prayer is fundamental in our response. The Holy Father has frequently spoken of our need to pray for an end to racism. In his June 3, 2020, General Audience remarks following the death of George Floyd, Pope Francis said, “We cannot tolerate or turn a blind eye to racism and exclusion in any form and yet claim to defend the sacredness of every human life.” He decried the “self-destructive and self-defeating” violence that erupted in reaction to Floyd’s killing, and he urged people to pray for peace and reconciliation, asking Our Lady of Guadalupe, patroness of the Americas, to “intercede for all those who work for peace and justice...”
Dialogue is also important. Jesuit Father Matt Malone told this story as he watched the riots after the Rodney King trial in 1992: “I asked one of my professors, an African-American man whom I greatly respected, whether we could get together to talk. ‘I’m happy to talk,’ he said. ‘But the conversation you need to have is not with me, but with your white brothers and sisters.’ We need to do most of this work on our own, not expect Black Catholics to explain racism to us.”
I have an obligation to become aware of implicit biases and unconscious privileges I have carried for 75 years. Then I must ask myself some difficult questions: What is my personal sphere of influence? To what action against systemic racism is God calling me at this point in my life? What am I willing to sacrifice for greater justice, to dismantle systems sustaining racism that I personally benefit from?
We must also educate ourselves about the history of racism in the United States, and perhaps in our own parish. Was my parish church built with slave labor or by Black persons under Jim Crow conditions? How do different racial and ethnic groups experience Sunday morning worship (what Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. called “the most segregated hour of Christian America”)?
INSTITUTIONAL
The U.S. bishops have urged the Church to confess its own sins of racism and to reform its own structures. “Open Wide Our Hearts: The Enduring Call to Love – A Pastoral Letter against Racism” outlines a call for action. The letter, as well as educational materials, statements about the 2020 protests, and other resources for parishes can be found at www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/human-life-and-dignity/racism. (The Catholic News Herald’s Nov. 6 edition featured a summary of the letter.)
Clergy and lay Catholic leaders could embark on a “listening tour” of parishes and dioceses to hear the voices of our Black brothers and sisters in the faith. Do no talking; do no “fixing.” Just listen. In some places this could be done in conjunction with other faith leaders. Here at St. Peter Church, we have engaged with Our Lady of Consolation Church, a historically Black Catholic parish nearby, on such group discussions and the results have been enlightening – bringing us closer as brothers and sisters in Christ.
We could also build on the successful model of “Protecting God’s Children,” the U.S. bishops’ charter that made the Church a worldwide model for rooting out and preventing child sexual abuse.
Why not a comparable program on systemic racism for parish leaders, staff and volunteers, comprised of education and training about race and racism?
There is a tremendous wealth gap at every part of the income scale between white and black Americans. The reasons for this gap are complex but fundamentally rooted in federal and state policies that restricted Black home ownership. Those restrictions are largely gone, but the major national banks are still slow to extend home loans to minority families. However, black-owned financial institutions have a track record of supporting Black home ownership and small businesses. Churches and businesses, then, might consider keeping deposits and other investments in
Black-owned banks and credit unions. Such practices could help close the wealth and income gaps among low-income minority Americans.
This is not a moment for the Church, other faith communities, or local businesses to sit on the sidelines. We must look at ways to help to heal and to build racial justice at an institutional level.
ADVOCACY
As one speaker at an online forum put it, “When you see a wrongdoing, change it with your hand. If you cannot change it with your hand, change it with your tongue. If you cannot change it with your tongue, hate it in your heart. But know that this is the weakest form of faith.” Heart, tongue and hand – our times call for action.
Catholic policy advocacy on behalf of change is essential to working together to redress these wrongs.
Systemic racism has resulted in numerous social ills, but I would like to focus on four significant areas for advocacy: law enforcement, health care, housing and economic development.
We rely on police to address too many social needs, with the result that police officers are sometimes called upon to respond to mental health emergencies, minor traffic enforcement, noise problems or neighbor disputes. We could consider deploying community mediators, mobile health crisis response units, and specialized traffic patrol officers for such issues – saving our law enforcement officers to respond to crimes and major issues for which they have been highly trained.
COVID-19’s disparate impact on Black, Latino, and Native American communities reveals just how our health care system fails the most vulnerable. Expanded access to health insurance is a critical need in our country. Expansion of Medicaid in North Carolina advances this goal.
Segregated, dilapidated and unsafe neighborhoods did not come about by chance. The current affordable housing crisis has almost everything to do with state and federal laws throughout the 20th century that permitted deed restrictions based on race, required racial segregation, and encouraged red-lining minority neighborhoods to exclude them from mortgages. Urban “renewal” and federal highway projects in the second half of the century destroyed historically Black neighborhoods with high levels of home ownership and turned their residents into renters, unable to build wealth in the value of a home. Any remedy should include more affordable housing and access to financing to encourage Black homeownership.
Just as private institutions should direct investments toward Black-owned businesses, so should federal and state governments. Strong preferences for minority-owned businesses should be built into small business loan programs, economic opportunity zones, and neighborhood revitalization programs.
Economic progress demands a living wage as called for by Catholic social teaching. For decades, the minimum wage has fallen in purchasing power, contributing to the economic stagnation of minority communities, and putting financial pressure on low-income families. Raising the federal minimum wage would go a long way to helping all low-income persons.
Some might object that these policies would be expensive or lead to government overreach. However, justice – restorative justice, in particular – demands that we work together to address these problems, even if it is difficult.
The simple truth is that the Lord calls us to do justice, even when it is not particularly in our self-interest. I am sure many of our parents taught us always to “do the right thing.” They did not add: “except when it hurts.”
I am under no illusion that I have all the answers to systemic racism because I am uncertain that I know the right questions. These proposals are opening gambits in a continuing conversation.
However, conversation cannot be the goal. Dialogue must lead to action.
Deacon Clarke E. Cochran, PhD, serves at St. Peter Church in Charlotte. This is the second in a two-part series. Read his first commentary “Thinking as a Catholic about systemic racism,” on www.catholicnewsherald.com.