Recently in one of the Scripture readings at Mass, we heard someone ask Jesus if only a few people would go to Heaven. In response, He tells us to try our hardest to enter by the narrow door.* To love as best as we can, we have to fit through a narrow space, we must humble ourselves so we can love more. We are to strip away all in ourselves that prevents us from loving God and our neighbor.
We are called to shun anything that leads us to hate. God calls us to uphold the dignity of our neighbor. We all must respect our neighbor regardless of the race of our neighbor; to do otherwise is to be racist and reject God's law of love. Racism reflects hate, and so we are called to be antiracist, working against racism. I think of the Black Lives Matter sign that I saw in the window of a bookstore in San Jose last week.
A sign is just a beginning. Last month, on the feast day of Saint Peter Claver who ministered to slaves in the 1600s partly by bringing food and medicine to them, I heard someone say that Saint Peter Claver would have approved of the statement that Black lives matter. While likely true, Saint Peter Claver showed that Black lives matter much more through how he treated them rather than what he said about them.
What we do matters much more than what we say. Black persons should not be subject to the discrimination which continues to be inflicted on them. Black individuals should not be brutalized by police officers or anyone else because of their skin color. While it is important to declare that Black lives matter, it is much more important that we show through our actions that we value the lives of our Black sisters and brothers.
This particular bookstore I've mentioned prominently stocks books on racial justice. They are encouraging their customers to be antiracist, to change not just what they say but also what they do.
It is easier to change what we say than what we do. Nevertheless, God has given us free will. We can use our free will to work for racial justice. We can decide to be in psychotherapy to address the psychological insecurities which drive us to degrade others, including on the basis of race. We can get to know and become friends with others of various races, to demolish walls of prejudice. We can read books on racial justice so we recognize how institutional racism breeds, in our voting laws, our criminal laws and our law enforcement policies, and in how these laws and policies are made, interpreted and implemented. We can make the choice to pray, to ask God for grace. Through grace, we can do what we would not otherwise be able to do. If God pours His love into our hearts,** then we can love our neighbor as God does. Amen.
* Matthew 7:13; Luke 13:24
** Romans 5:5
