Our country requires a revival of love of God and neighbor and a new birth of civil rights rooted in the only firm foundation: the natural law and the truth about the human person. America has a deficit of love, of authentic freedom and truth, and of respect for human dignity—which manifests itself in part through racial discrimination and unjust inequality. It has led to police misconduct and racial discrimination in our criminal justice system, and to the disproportionate suffering that Covid-19 has wrought in many communities of color.
Racial injustice is part of the culture of death. To build a culture of life in America, we need a revival of God’s love and a new era of civil rights. As a black man, I am pained to learn of police officers killing unarmed black people. As an attorney who has also worked as a staffer in Congress and the executive branch, I have seen that the majority of law enforcement officials are good people seeking to protect and serve. However, racial discrimination in the criminal justice system continues in the form of racial profiling, police misconduct, and discriminatory criminal sentencing. Our country has not fully realized the central American creed: Every person—born and unborn—is endowed by his Creator with the inalienable right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Further criminal justice reform is still needed.
Unfortunately, the Covid-19 crisis has also exposed racial inequality in our health care system. Many black communities already had unequal access to medical care, inadequate access to preventative health and wellness options, and insufficient health education. These health disparities have made it more difficult for many in these communities to fight the virus. Even once this health crisis ends, many African American communities will still not have the medical care they deserve. Historical patterns of racial exclusion have exacerbated negative health care outcomes. Ensuring that the vulnerable have access to proper medical care is necessary to restoring a culture of life.
Strong leadership is needed to achieve racial equality in our society. While it is important to affirm the truth that black lives matter, unfortunately, the Black Lives Matter organization (BLM) itself is ill-equipped to lead. Black lives do matter—the phrase is correct that all God’s people deserve love, dignity, truth, and freedom. Our brothers and sisters who peacefully protest for justice with signs of “black lives matter” march justly. However, there is a difference between asserting “black lives matter” and the BLM organization itself, which is seriously flawed….
The above is an excerpt from a Sept. 18 article in First Things by Louis Brown Jr.,executive director of the Christ Medicus Foundation.
I sincerely appreciate the moderators of this site for posting such a clear and insightful piece. I fail to understand how anyone can deny basic humanity to others and still claim to follow the Holy Catholic church.
While I agree all lives matter, since God created all of us, I dont understand how the BLM movement is flawed
As noted in the article “the BLM organization itself… is seriously flawed.” I don’t know anyone stating the movement, phrase or sentiment is wrong. Go to the BLM organization’s own website and you’ll see that it is a Marxist, anti-family organization. That’s why black Catholics, among others, oppose the organization. And, the organization is making a ton of money on yard signs for those intent on virtue signaling to the neighbors. (It’s a lot easier to put up a yard sign than engage in dialogue and the difficult and complicated work of improving the lives of all in our communities.)
CCC 2477 Respect for the reputation of persons forbids every attitude and word likely to cause them unjust injury. He becomes guilty:
– of rash judgment who, even tacitly, assumes as true, without sufficient foundation, the moral fault of a neighbor;
Have you read their statement of political and ideological commitments? They are thoroughly Marxist.
They have removed it from their website.
You’re right. Looks like they purged their website and wikipedia to remove their Marxist and LGBTQ+ origins.
BLM leaders Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors and Opal TometiIn in a revealing 2015 interview: Cullors said, “Myself and Alicia in particular are trained organizers. We are trained Marxists.” That same year, Tometi was hobnobbing with Venezuela’s Marxist dictator Nicolás Maduro, of whose regime she wrote: “In these last 17 years, we have witnessed the Bolivarian Revolution champion participatory democracy and construct a fair, transparent election system recognized as among the best in the world.”
One proclaims: “We disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear-family-structure requirement by supporting each other as extended families and ‘villages’ that collectively care for one another.”
As a NY Post piece said: “The goals of the Black Lives Matter organization go far beyond what most people think. But they are hiding in plain sight, there for the world to see, if only we read beyond the slogans and the innocuous-sounding media accounts of the movement.”
Please read their mission statement and you will completely understand.
“Denial, Deceit, Delusion.” The usual.
I read it before they removed it. Definitely a Marxist agenda,
What do you bet Jussie Smollett ghost-wrote this piece?
First Things gone woke.
White racism/black victimization is a hoax. It’s not the police who need retraining. Black crime, both intra- and interracial, is wildly out of proportion which statistics painfully bear out. The retrainees suggest themselves.
I visit this site to get American Catholic views on current events from various perspectives. Of course I don’t always agree, but it encourages dialogue and requires tolerance of difference that is key to our lives in California today. This comment is simply undereducated and represents neither the foundation nor the future of our Church.
Stubborn things, aren’t they? Facts, that is, and our lying eyes. But I promise to take a Good hard look at myself. Say hi to Jussie for me.
I think a lot of us come here for the comments. Only I would not call them “American Catholic views.” These are extreme.
BLM = Critical racial theory = communism
Wayback machine shows thousands of changes to BLM website
https://web.archive.org/web/20200401000000*/https://blacklivesmatter.com/
You can go back days and see the old versions.
Of course Black lives matter
But what about the babies (70% in 2016) who have absentee fathers.
That is the,tragedy
Leaving:
-No Dad to love and role model for them; to supervise study habits and homework;
-Gangster Rap which inculcates hate for police & law and order, and
-disrespect of women.
The result is failure to mature, need for immediate gratification, over permissiveness, lack of discipline, envy, jealousy, materialism, greed, resentment, poverty, projection of self-hate on “others”, and self-justification of crime.
We see Knock Out game, Bart gang-attacks, and other high levels of crime.
We all want to help our communities, especially those fatherless children,
but projection of this unethical parenting behavior onto “white privilege” will not help future children.
https://web.archive.org/web/20200629154213/https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/garza-alicia-1981/
BLM leader Alicia Garza
“Garza describes herself as a queer social justice activist and a Marxist.
She has a mixed-race background; her father is white and Jewish, while her mother is black
She is best known one of three founders of the Black Lives Matter movement”
Excellent article, thanks for posting it.
One can certainly believe that black lives matter and not be a part of the Black Lives Matter movement.And that’s fine. But that’s the thing: Black Lives Matter, like any movement, is composed of individuals who believe and fight for various things. Sure…there are Socialist Workers Movement people who try and inflitrate any left leaning march, rally, and movement. But the vast majority of BLM movement-identified people are not marxist, do not want the police “defunded”, don’t create violent havoc in the streets. In fact, most BLM movement people are horrified by these things.
But like everything else, we have no nuance in our world. Everything is polarized. If Black Lives Matter, that must mean that theirs are the only lives that matter. If police misconduct is a problem, then all police are a problem. But that’s just not the way life is. It’s not the way I live my life, and it’s not how YOU live your life.
We’ve got to get beyond these dichotomies, these divisions, these mutual hatreds. We’ve got to stop characterizing each other in – pardon the expression – black and white. Most of us are pretty gray. Especially at my age.
I have a feeling that most people who read CCD really do believe that black lives matter. That they are not in their hearts racist. That they do want to do the right thing. That is why I appreciate that CCD published this article in the first place.