2. EXAMINING OUR

counties, the way in which parish communities can

PRESENT SITUATION: HOW

become parish fortresses was sometimes and can be still

today a source of tragedy. For too many Catholics during

DO WE DWELL TOGETHER? 

the decades just passed,  Where are you from?  became an

interrogation, not a gesture of welcome. Some groups

The indwelling of the Holy Spirit instills within us the

embraced ethnocentric patterns of exclusivity and notions

desire to continue the mission of Jesus as his disciples.

of racial superiority without considering the moral

The Spirit calls us to reflect about how we embody God's

implications or the psychological and emotional wounds

salvation and his universal love in parishes and schools, in

inflicted upon others. In some cases, the vision of faith was

the Pastoral Center and in other Catholic institutions.

narrowed; the community of faith became a private club.

The Spirit moves us to reflect on how to make that love

Resistance to racial integration and culturally mixed

visible in our neighborhoods and places of business, in

communities is as old as the first Christian communities,

our work and recreation.

where Jewish Christians and Greek Christians found

I invite all Catholics of the Archdiocese to examine

themselves at odds. For Chicago Catholics, cultural

with me how our local Church reflects that unity in

differences were especially important in the last decades of

diversity, which mirrors the nature of the Blessed Trinity.

the nineteenth century and the first decades of the

We cannot be leavens of love and justice in a society

twentieth century, with the great migration of European

fighting racism if we are captured by the sin of racism in

Catholics to this city. Chicago's  race  problem a century

the Church.

and more ago was one of Germans versus Irish, Poles

Each of us needs to examine how we in the

versus Germans, Christians versus Jews, Protestants versus

Archdiocese respond to Jesus' prayer that we be one. How

Catholics. My predecessors as Archbishop sometimes

does the Archdiocese manifest the unifying presence of

addressed these disputes, spoke to Catholics on their

the Spirit in the midst of the racial and cultural, the

common membership in the Mystical Body of Christ and

gender and class, the religious, theological and ideological

preached intermittently against the sin of anti Semitism.

diversity that characterizes our society?

While ethnic and cultural barriers somewhat diminished

For Chicago Catholics of a certain age, and for some

after the First World War and the cut off of mass

who are not Catholic too, seeking the answer to these

immigration from Europe, the ethnic identity of parishes

questions brings us back to patterns of life, which

remained strong.

protected and nurtured even as they also divided.  Where

Another mass migration, this one internal to the

are you from?  could not be answered simply with Hyde

country, presented more imposing challenges. Between

Park or Humboldt Park, the West Side, the South Side,

the 1910's and the 1960's hundreds of thousands of

the Southeast Side, the Northwest Side or Evanston. The

African Americans moved to Chicago from the South.

answer that counted was St. Clement, St. James, St.

Forced to live on the near south and west side of the city

Thomas the Apostle, Holy Angels, Holy Cross, St.

in often substandard housing owned by landlords living

Anselm, St. Elizabeth, St. Stanislaus, Visitation, St.

elsewhere, many African American families that could

Sabina, St. Mel and Holy Ghost, St. Malachy, Our Lady

afford better housing could not move into nearby

of Sorrows, St. Matthew, Precious Blood, St. Agatha, St.

neighborhoods because of the color of their skin.

Boniface, St. Thomas More, St. Mary Magdalene, St.

Catholics, loyal to their parishes, often made up the bulk

Margaret of Scotland, or St. Nicholas. The parish the

of the white population in neighborhoods near the

place where Catholics attend Mass, confess their sins, send

expanding African American sections of the city.

children to school, watch children get married and bury

Sometimes these same Catholics mixed parish loyalty with

their dead mattered as much as official city designations.

racial prejudice in a desperate, always unsuccessful, effort

The Baltimore Catechism, once memorized by

to  save  particular neighborhoods by preventing the

generations of Catholics, asked,  Where is God?  The

entrance of black people. Another question became part

answer was  everywhere  and in Chicago, Catholic

of the conversation:  Where are they now?  And

parishes seemed to be everywhere. The fact that these

everybody knew who  they  were and knew, as well,

parishes inspired loyalty to a place and devotion to God is

which blocks were changing, sometimes almost overnight,

perhaps Chicago Catholicism's great achievement.

from white to black.

Catholic institutions have helped shape this area's story.

Many have heard the stories of priests, nuns and lay

If strong parish communities remain today the glory of

people unwilling to welcome even Catholic African

Catholic life in Chicago and throughout Cook and Lake

Americans into parishes and schools. There are stories of

36

DENOUNCING RACISM