Newsletter Vol. 1 Issue 7

Racism is Our American Cultural Ethos

 
The second week of the Spiritual Exercises invites us to see how God looks down on our world with compassion and sees the diversities of people. God longs for those peoples to become one in their diversity, and so enters the world as Jesus. Before we can become reconciled with each other, it is important for us to understand how racism separates us through what we take for granted or as normal. 
 
Compared with other nationalities, Americans tend to think about things quite individually. We learn early on that our hard work and achievement will lead us to fulfill our individual dreams, and hopefully, their natural culmination into the “American dream.” The American project is intended to be one of equal opportunity, liberty, and justice for all. Our media glamorizes stories of people who have “made it” and we learn we too can make it if we just try a little harder. While this belief has incentivized many people to accomplish great things and has contributed to economic benefits for some, it is not universally true.  And it has greatly contributed to a widespread lack of understanding of larger issues plaguing our culture. When we come up short, for example, many think that the problem is a result of individual failing or self-imposed misfortune.

So too is our common understanding of racism. Typically, when we hear the word racism, what most often comes to mind is a White person who holds overt prejudices against people of color, usually Black people. That person discriminates against people of color, votes against the interests of people of color, and may even resort to violence. In this example, January 6th rings as a clear image for us.
 
With this in mind, it is easy for us to say “I am not a racist” because most of us do not think or act like the clearly racist person above, who privileges White supremacy. Yet, racism operates culturally to privilege the ideas, experiences, norms, and values of White people as normal, taken, for granted, and better than others. Because we are socialized into a culture that sees White culture and values as superior, we frequently lack the tools to be able to see it at work in the most everyday experiences. Here are some common examples of widespread cultural racism in the United States:
 

• The assumption that French cuisine is superior to Mexican;
   
• The thought that White names like John and Emma are normal, but Tanisha or Tuan are foreign or exotic;
   
• Thinking English is the “right” American language
   
• Valuing efficiency and “objective standards” over individual differences.

In the words of African American theologian Fr. Bryan Massingale, “Because we live in the society that we do, in which meanings and values are attached to skin color and learned almost by osmosis when we relate to one another, we carry implicit biases and associations. These unacknowledged biases and associations, when they become widespread and commonly shared, lead to making public policies that benefit some and disadvantage others.”
 
Our Church teaches that all of us are made in the image and likeness of God, the Imago Dei. God looks down on all of us and sees us all as inherently good and born with dignity. Racism in its many forms violates that dignity each of us has by virtue of being made by our loving God. It is clear in the case of the overtly racist person that by discriminating against or hating certain persons, they fail to see the dignity in the person of color. They also fail to see it in themselves, because their own self-image is based on a belief that they are superior to other people.
 
Dignity can be violated culturally as well, as we saw in the above examples. Dignity is violated when we see White norms as the standard to which all people should be measured in our country. It is violated when we unconsciously assume that people of color do not fit in because they do not understand “how we do things here.” It is violated when we conclude that European languages, liturgical music, and art represent our Catholic faith.
 
We are participating in this program because all of us are good people called by God to grow in faithfulness to God’s promise that we are all brother and sisters. As such, we are invited to explore how all of us, by virtue of being part of this culture, internalize messages that the dominant White standard is the “good” standard. We are invited, too, to begin tracking the ways we take these assumptions for granted in our daily lives. By doing so, we can change how we think and see the Spirit of God at work in the diversities of peoples we encounter.

 

Resource Video: Watch the video above and read Massingale's article in Conversations in Jesuit Higher Education. 

Meditation:

15-30 Minutes

What do I assume is normal, taken for granted, or the “way things are?” Do I subconsciously think these ideas are better than another way of thinking, speaking, or acting?
 
How has Church imagery “colored” how I understand who God is and what is good and right? Who is left out when I see things this way?
 
Jesus himself realized his own cultural assumption that his ministry was for Jews only when he encountered the Syrophoenician Woman. The implication is that he previously thought Jews were better than Gentiles, a common cultural assumption in his day. Praying with Mark 7:24-30, what might Jesus be inviting me to discover about my own cultural assumptions? 

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