My dear friends,
I’ve been asked to answer the question, where do we go from here? What is our future before us? And it seems to me that the answer perhaps has already been given by a man 60 years ago, on the 28th of August 1963, when he gathered with those of like mind on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC.
On that day, Dr. Martin Luther King, I think gave the nation a roadmap for its future for Americans of all goodwill. And 60 years later, that path had still not been fully created. It still remains our path for the future.
Because as you know, my friends, Dr. King spoke of a dream. A dream for all Americans. A dream where everyone, black, white, brown live in dignity and respect that’s given by God and not the state. That all people could live in equality and justice and peace.
In that dream, he refused to believe that the bank of justice could be completely bankrupt, but that justice could no longer be delayed. He has a dream that says that soul force would overcome all physical force because evil meeting evil leaves no one standing. And that, my friends, I believe is still our future. It is the path that God has given us to walk together.
And yet it seems to me the very word dream can mean different things to different people. And for us to appreciate what Dr. King was asking of us we need to remember that, for example, for those who may be psychologists a dream is something that occurs that allows us to deal with our fears and our anxieties. And sometimes those fears and anxieties cannot be addressed.
If you ask the scientist, perhaps he or she would say that our dreams particularly in the deep sleep that you and I have each night, that they express the deepest desires of our happiness or to be satisfied, but to find peace that may or may not be fulfilled.
But for our future, my friends, to realize the dream that is before us, we need to remember that that dream lives in a biblical spirit. Because when God dreams He’s inviting us to fulfill His deepest desires for us. He invites us to action together. And at times, that action may cost us dearly.
In the history of salvation we know that dreams have been so much a part of the unfolding of God’s grace. Think of the patriarch, Joseph – the two dreams he had that the bundles of grain that his brothers gathered would bow down to his bundle. That the moon and the stars, eleven of them, would bow down to him. And the response of his brothers was to nearly put him to death and throw him in a cistern for they refused the desire of God. No differently, Joseph of Nazareth, the boss, the father of Jesus, we know from sacred Scripture he also received dreams from God. And he upended his entire family and became an immigrant and refugee losing his language, his livelihood, his position so that those entrusted to his care, our lord and our lady that they might be free.
You see, my friends, for us to understand where the future will lead us when we look at the dream that was put before us in the spirit of the sacred Scripture in the spirit of our God, the Lord has given us a choice as a community, as a nation, as individuals, you and I. How is it that we can fulfill God’s dream for us as a community of sisters and brothers?
And my friends, I would be a liar if I told you how that path will unfold. I do not know. No one does. But allow me to suggest three steps that you and I together can take.
And the first is, as Father Reggie said so beautifully in his own remarks, we as a people of faith must remember the past with honesty and contrition. For my friends, we all know in our heart of hearts, we know with clarity of mind and conscience that slavery was an abomination and an atrocity that should never have occurred. And although Christianity has always taught that it is a great evil, the truth is that slavery flourished even among Christian nations. And the untold suffering endured by men, women and young people can never be forgotten.
We celebrate freedom that came at the price of great cost. And the effects of that slavery, racism and segregation still remain in our midst. His Father Reggie said so beautifully in his very poignant and honest remarks, and yet they become systemic hidden in so many ways. So segregation is illegal by law, and yet redlining continues to segregate people. We have equality in law, and yet the halls of influence are closed to so many of our sisters and brothers who don’t believe, don’t belong to the club hall of industry, where they can be included in opportunities denied to others.
My dear friends, for our future, we cannot forget our past. We cannot fight an unnamed sin.
And so I stand before you as your spiritual father in the Church, committed to do whatever I and we can together to educate and challenge our people and or people of goodwill to know what it is in our midst that we must root out once and for all. And we can do that together.
But I, as your bishop, to be able in any way I can, to help the people of God to understand the truth of the evil of racism, discrimination, segregation, and to offer an invitation of repentance and conversion in Jesus Christ, who is the Savior and Redeemer. He is the one who gives freedom to all God’s children. And we can do that through the preaching and teaching of our clerics and pastoral leaders, by the training of all those who are in leadership for celebrating our racial and cultural diversity and to celebrate the communities that make the one community of the Catholic Church together.
My friends, in our future, this is what you and I must do together. And I want to say publicly to you, Father Reggie, thank you for your leadership of the vicarioan black Catholics. But more importantly, I want to thank you for being a man of honesty and integrity, a man of faith, a man who speaks the truth and lives what he preaches and teaches. And I think Father Reggie demands our collective thanks. Let us show him.
And also Valerie. Valerie where are you? Oh, she’s probably not just preparing for the reception. I want to thank Valerie Bien-Aime for her tremendous work in working not only with Father Reggie, but all the vicars of all our different communities to lift up the diversity of our church and to tell the story of who we are in Jesus Christ.
The second step, my friends, in our future, is whatever we decide to do, we must do it together as one family. Baptism has made us sisters and brothers adopted in Jesus Christ. There is only one Lord, one faith, one Savior, one baptism, one redeemer. And we are all brothers and sisters in Him. And each of us is made in the image and likeness of God. So imagine the beauty, the grand, the power of God. For we all, in our diversity, are reflecting His life and love in the world. We must stand together as sisters and brothers in faith.
And if I may, there are those here whom we honor, whom I honor, those who have stood together in the face of great trial and persecution, who have endured personal attacks and attacks upon their family simply because of the color of their skin or for the history of their people. I want to thank you for your perseverance, for your courage, for your faithfulness when society did all it could to try to marginalize you. And if we ought to stand together, and we will, then I ask you to continue to share your personal story of courage and integrity. Because those stories, my friends, can melt the hardest of hearts in our midst.
So how can we work together? Allow me three suggestions.
The first is that we must continue to create a safe space, an environment that truly welcomes from the heart in every parish and school and mission in our diocese and in that space for God’s people to tell their stories of freedom and integrity.
I ask you, secondly, to support Father Reggie and the vicarian of Black Catholics. For we can come together in the events that are being sponsored so that we can give witness to a community that is alive and an intrupal part of the heart of our Church. And it is important that every community council committee that we have in our diocese, that in every office of leadership, that our diocese reflect who we truly are in the richness and beauty of our diversity. And so, if I call to ask your help, please say yes.
My dear friends, the third step is perhaps the hardest, but the one you and I must do together. And that is never stop dreaming. You know, my friends, I very often do not remember my dreams. I have a little pad of paper next to my bed, and I always promise myself when I wake up and I have some. Vague recollection of what I was dreaming. I’m going to try to write it out. And of course, the desire for coffee when I wake up is more important – sometimes – than to write down what I dreamt. And it just fades away.
But our future does have a dream. A dream we need to believe in, stand together in and fight together as sisters and brothers. And can you imagine, 60 years from now, 120 years after the dream was first put before us? Can you imagine the world that our children’s children will inherit if that dream becomes a reality? My friend, that dream must be realized. That dream can be realized. That dream will be realized if we work together in the grace of Jesus Christ. Our future depends on it.
Thank you, my friends, and God bless.
