A Lesson in Racism from the USA

The assumptions of white privilege and what we can do about it

Jun 1, 2020

by Bryan N. Massingale

 

Opinion

Justice

 Social life is made by human beings. The society we live in is the outcome of human choices and decisions. This means that human beings can change things. What humans break, divide, and separate, we can — with God's help — also heal, unite, and restore.

What is now does not have to be. Therein lies the hope. And the challenge.

Come, Holy Spirit!

Fill the hearts of your faithful.

Enkindle within us the fire of your love.

Come, Holy Spirit!

Breath into us a fiery passion for justice.

Especially for those who have the breath of life crushed from them.

Amen.

I could call it white supremacy, although I know that white people find that term even more of a stumbling block than white privilege.

The only reason for racism's persistence is that white people continue to benefit from it.

Until white people call out white people, there will always be safe places for racial ugliness to brew and fester.

[Fr. Bryan N. Massingale is a theology professor at Fordham University in New York. He is the author of Racial Justice and the Catholic Church.]