Catholics divided by BLM ahead of 2020 elections
Protesters — one of them holding up a Black Lives Matter sign — during a 2015 rally in Minneapolis. Creative Commons photo.
NEW YORK — The video of 75-year-old activist Martin Gugino being pushed to the ground earlier this month by police in riot gear highlighted the divide between protesters seeking criminal justice reforms and the very officers tasked with ensuring the safety of all citizens.
Gugino suffered a fractured skull in the June 4 incident in Buffalo, a city in upstate New York. He quickly became an example of officers using excessive force, one of many captured on video during protests that arose following the Memorial Day murder of George Floyd while in police custody in Minneapolis. Gugino, described by friends as a devout Roman Catholic and a lifelong advocate for the poor, remains hospitalized.
“I think it's very unnecessary to focus on me. There are plenty of other things to think about besides me,” Gugino said in a statement.
Gugino’s activism and the Black Lives Matter protests have not only drawn attention to deep fissures in American society on the issue of race, but have further polarized American Catholics. This intra-Catholic doctrinal debate, which began in the 1960s with the Second Vatican Council, remains relevant regarding the relationship between faith and politics.
Progressive Catholics, dating back to Dorothy Day and her social activism of the 1930s, see it as their role to help the United States achieve racial equality. Traditional Catholics, however, see Black Lives Matter as part of a sinister force that wants to spread Marxist ideology. While Catholics agree that racism is an issue in American society, the proposed remedies for those ills differ wildly. For example, many Catholics, particularly Latinos, were angered when protesters toppled a statue of Catholic missionary St. Junipero Serra in Golden Gate Park in San Francisco this past weekend. The same was done to Serra’s statue in Los Angeles. Some have accused the Spanish-born Serra, an 18th century Franciscan friar who is credited with bringing Roman Catholicism to California, of brutalizing Native Americans and forcing them to convert.
The events of the past few weeks and the looming presidential election continues to fuel the divide among Catholics across the political spectrum. While Catholics agree that racism is an issue in American society, the proposed remedies for those ills differ wildly. Following Gugino’s treatment, Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden tweeted in response to President Donald Trump — who had called Gugino a member of Antifa, who some have denounced as a militant left-wing group — that “there’s no greater sin than the abuse of power” and that he, like Gugino, is a Catholic.
Floyd’s death also got the attention of Pope Francis, who said on June 3 during his general audience at the Vatican: “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.”
Differences between clergy emerges
In addressing Floyd’s death, reactions to the massive nationwide protests that followed (despite there being restrictions on gatherings due to COVID-19), looting, destruction of property, what political progressives have labeled “systemic racism” and calls to defund the police also exposed the differences that exist among Catholics in the United States.
“It’s not true to say the Catholic Church has said nothing and done nothing. But what the Catholic Church has said and done is always predicated upon the comfort of white people and not to disturb white Catholics,” said the Rev. Bryan Massingale, a black priest who teaches theology at Fordham University, during a recent online forum. “If you make that your overriding presumption and goal, then there are going to be difficult truths that will never be spoken, and we will never have an honest conversation.”
In a already polarized political climate, even Catholics have a difficult time having a candid conversation about race in America. The Rev. James Altman, pastor of St. James the Less Church in La Crosse, Wisconsin, focused a recent homily on the civil unrest that resulted in the looting of businesses in New York and other U.S. cities.
“The very thing [the protesters] are doing is alienating the law-abiding majority,” he said.
Altman said civil disobedience was allowed to go on, while people who wanted to have a funeral — but couldn’t because of strict social distancing measures — were denied the right to because of the pandemic.
“We do not have a right to enable looting and burning,” he said.
At the same time, the Rev. Daniel Patrick Moloney was asked by the Archdiocese of Boston to resign as chaplain at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology just last week, after he sent an email to the university’s Catholic community contending that Floyd’s death may have had nothing to do with racism.
Two officers with the Buffalo Police Department were caught on camera pushing 75-year-old Martin Gugino, a Catholic activist, to the ground. Video still via YouTube.
“Many people have claimed that racism is a major problem in police forces,” Moloney’s email read. “I don’t think we know that.”
MIT, in turn, rebuked Moloney’s comments. Suzy Nelson, the school’s vice president and dean for student life, said Moloney’s email “failed to acknowledge the dignity of each human being and the devastating impact of systemic racism.” The Archdiocese of Boston agreed and asked Moloney to resign. In a statement, the archdiocese said Moloney was “wrong” and that “he accepts the hurt [his words] have caused.”
BLM fight compared to pro-life movement
How popular is Black Lives Matter, a group that openly advocates for defunding local police departments? A new poll by Rasmussen Reports found that 62% of likely U.S. voters have a favorable opinion of the group — up from 37% when the same question was asked four years ago. Despite the group’s surge in popularity over the past month, most Americans do not want to see police departments defunded.
For many Catholics, the respect for human life can be found in the anti-abortion movement. National Review writer Kathryn Jean Lopez, a devout Catholic, wrote a column earlier this month arguing that the recent protests should be a call for unity, but she doubts whether Black Lives Matter was the right organization to galvanize such a movement.
“This, needless to say, is a time of unrest. And one of the things that would seem to be bringing people together is the fact that black lives matter. May it be a stepping stone to a new appreciation that all lives matter, and that life is a precious gift,” she said. “But when you take a look at the Black Lives Matter website, you read an agenda that isn’t quite as unifying. There’s a hostility to the nuclear family — exactly the fundamental unit that I’ve been praying has been undergoing some healing during our coronavirus time together.”
On its website, Black Lives Matter says they aim to “disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure requirement by supporting each other as extended families and ‘villages’ that collectively care for one another, especially our children, to the degree that mothers, parents and children are comfortable.”
The divide among many Catholics, aside from being doctrinal, is also political as well as based on race and socioeconomic conditions. In 2016, Pew Research found that 60 percent of white Catholics voted for Trump, second only to evangelicals. But support for Trump has eroded in recent months, with about 37 percent of white Catholics now holding a favorable view of Trump. The president continues to court Catholic voters, even appearing at the March for Life in January.
Church hierarchy takes sides
Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, who accused Pope Francis of being aware of now-defrocked Cardinal Theodore McCarrick’s past abuse of seminarians, warned Trump in a June 6 letter that the current crises over the pandemic and the Floyd protests are a part of a spiritual struggle between good and evil. Trump, in response, tweeted out a thank you to Vigano, who previously served as the Apostolic Nuncio to the United States.
U.S. bishops, meanwhile, have generally tried to steer clear of politics, especially in an election year. Archbishop Jose Gomez of Los Angeles, who also serves as president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said protests “should not be exploited by persons who have different values and agendas. Burning and looting communities, ruining the livelihoods of our neighbors, does not advance the cause of racial equality and human dignity.”
“We should not let it be said that George Floyd died for no reason,” he added. “We should honor the sacrifice of his life by removing racism and hate from our hearts and renewing our commitment to fulfill our nation’s sacred promise — to be a beloved community of life, liberty and equality for all.”
Cardinal Sean O'Malley of Boston was even more forceful, saying all Catholics “need to uphold and defend the truth that black lives matter.”
“As Catholics, we are taught to nurture and protect life… They call us to affirm the inestimable value of every person’s life,” he added.
Massingale, who also authored the book “Racial Justice and the Catholic Church,” said the church hierarchy’s response to racism in this country over the years had generally been inadequate. Massingale said the church has been forceful when it comes to combating abortion or affirming the teachings that counter the LGBTQ movement, but not so on issues of race.
“My ministry,” he said, “is trying to help the church catch up with God.”
Clemente Lisi is a senior editor and regular contributor to Religion Unplugged. He is the former deputy head of news at the New York Daily News and teaches journalism at The King’s College in New York City. Follow him on Twitter @ClementeLisi.