Category Archives: Sister Spirit

Action to Take After Watching Faith in Reparations

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Here's an action to take after watching Faith in Reparations

Tell President Biden

NOW is the time to sign an executive order for a reparations commission.

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Just Politics Catholic Podcast Season One

Faith Speaker Bios

Sister Anita Baird, DHM

Sr. Anita is a member of the Religious Congregation of the Society of the Daughters of the Heart of Mary having served as Regional Superior, Provincial Councilor, and most recently as United States Provincial. A trail blazer and history maker, Sister Anita became the first African American to serve as Chief of Staff to the Archbishop of Chicago in 1997. In 2000, Cardinal Francis George appointed her the founding director of the Archdiocese of Chicago’s Office for Racial Justice. 

She is a past president of the National Black Sisters’ Conference,  and recipient of the organization’s Harriet Tubman “Moses of Her People” Award. Since 2001, Anita has traveled the country preaching at parish revivals, directing retreats, and presenting anti-racism workshops.   

Rabbi Aryeh Bernstein

Rabbi Aryeh Bernstein has written and taught extensively about the case for slavery reparations in Torah and Rabbinic literature, including in a 2018 article, “The Torah Case for Reparations”. Aryeh is a fifth-generation Chicago South Sider who works as National Jewish Educator for Avodah and Educational Consultant for the Jewish Council on Urban Affairs. 

Aryeh is a Senior Editor of Jewschool.com and a member of the Tzedek Lab. Aryeh studied at several institutions of higher rabbinical studies and was ordained by Rabbi Daniel Landes’s Yashrut Institute.

Dr. Iva Carruthers

Dr. Iva E. Carruthers is General Secretary of the Samuel DeWitt Proctor Conference (SDPC), an interdenominational organization within the African American faith tradition focused on justice and equity issues. SDPC is both a 501c3 and United Nations Non-Governmental Organization (NGO). As founding CEO and a trustee of SDPC, she has steered the organization as a unique, influential and esteemed network of faith based advocates and activists, clergy and lay. Former director of the Black Theology Project, Dr. Carruthers has a long history of teaching, engagement in community development initiatives and social justice ministry, fostering interdenominational and interfaith dialogue and leading study tours for the university and church throughout in the United States, Caribbean, South America and Africa.

Dr. Carruthers is Professor Emeritus and former Chairperson of the Sociology Department at Northeastern Illinois University and was founding President of Nexus Unlimited, an information and educational technology firm. She was appointed to the White House Advisory Council on the internet, “National Information Infrastructure”, Mega Project and the educational software she developed was awarded a ComputerWorld Smithsonian Award. She is also founder of Lois House, an urban retreat center, Chicago, Illinois.

Rev. Dr. Jacqui Lewis 

The Rev. Dr. Jacqui Lewis—Author, Activist, and Public Theologian—is the Senior Minister at Middle Collegiate Church, a multiracial, welcoming, and inclusive congregation in New York City that is driven by Love. Period. Jacqui is the author of several books, including her latest: Fierce Love: A Bold Path to Ferocious Courage and Rule Breaking Kindness That Can Heal the World. Jacqui earned her Master of Divinity from Princeton Theological Seminary and earned a M.Phil. and a Ph.D. in Psychology and Religion from Drew University. Ordained in the Presbyterian Church (USA), she is the first African American and first woman senior minister in the Collegiate Church of New York, which was founded in 1628.

Middle Church and Jacqui have been featured in media such as The TODAY Show; Good Morning America; The Takeaway; The Brian Lehrer Show; and in The Washington Post, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal. Her podcasts include Love.Period., which is produced by the Center for Action and Contemplation, and The Four—a fearsome faith foursome talking about Black Life, Love, Power and Joy, with Otis Moss III, Lisa Sharon Harper and Michael-Ray Mathews. 

Rabbi Jonah Pesner

Rabbi Jonah Dov Pesner serves as the Director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism. He has led the Religious Action Center since 2015. Rabbi Pesner also serves as Senior Vice President of the Union for Reform Judaism, a position to which he was appointed to in 2011. Named one of the most influential rabbis in America by Newsweek magazine, he is an inspirational leader and tireless advocate for social justice. 

Rabbi Pesner’s work has focused on encouraging Jewish communities to reach across lines of race, class, and faith in campaigns for social justice. In 2006, he founded Just Congregations (now incorporated into the Religious Action Center), which engaged clergy, professional, and volunteer leaders in interfaith efforts in pursuit of social justice. Rabbi Pesner was a primary leader in the successful Massachusetts campaign for health care access that has provided health care coverage to hundreds of thousands and which became a nationwide model for reform. Over the course of his career, he has also led and supported campaigns for racial justice, economic opportunity, immigration reform, LGBTQ equality, human rights, and a variety of other causes. He is dedicated to building bridges to collectively confront anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, and other forms of hate and bigotry.

Black Sisters Testify: Interview with Sinsinawa Dominican Sr. Patricia Rogers

Black Sisters Testify: Full Length Interview with Sinsinawa Dominican Sr. Patricia Rogers

November 11, 2022

In the fifth episode of Just Politics, Sr. Emily, Sr. Eilis, and Colin talk to Sinsinawa Dominican Sr. Patricia Rogers, who shares her insight as a Black Catholic Sister and a community leader in Milwaukee’s Amani neighborhood. 

This November, NETWORK observes Black Catholic History Month in collaboration with the National Black Sisters Conference, centering the voices of Black Sisters and sharing their testimonies with our spirit-filled network of justice-seekers.

Find more: networklobby.org/black-catholic-history-month

A youtube screenshot showing peoples' faces

An Election-Time Prayer

An Election-Time Prayer

Sr. Erin Zubal, OSU
November 7, 2022

In the third episode of Just Politics podcast, our hosts discuss the importance of being a “Pope Francis Voter” and NETWORK Chief of Staff Sr. Erin Zubal offered this prayer.

Listen to the entire episode on  Apple | Google | Spotify.

O Lord,

We turn to you in these days before our country’s elections.

We know that your ways are not our ways and that your wisdom surpasses any human understanding.

We also know that – as a wise woman once said – the Holy Spirit does not have much use for comfort zones. And the systems and structures that we associate with stability and well being, we have also foolishly come to associate with permanence. Help us in our fear, and help us to see that we too, have a part to play.

We also believe that we are working to build up your kin-dom, and that the arc of the moral universe bends toward justice. And we know that, when chaos and lawlessness prevail, the most vulnerable among us suffer the most harm. Help us to feel the hope that encourages us to keep laboring, to keep building, to keep trusting in you.

Free us from the defeatism that says no amount of effort will ever make a difference. Save us from the cynicism that says people will do the wrong thing if it’s in their best interest.

Be with the people of our country as we contemplate the Signs of Our Times and discern our choice of elected leaders for the years ahead. Awaken in our souls a yearning for your tenderness and compassion manifested in the world. Spark in our hearts a solidarity for those who are most in need and pushed to the margins. Quench the destructive will to power and cultural dominance that too many of us have mistaken for your Good News.

Give us wisdom as we show up to vote.

May we see you at work in whatever happens. Reassure us with your faithfulness and the constancy found only in you. Surprise us with your lavish goodness.

May Our Lady of Guadalupe, patroness of the Americas, intercede for us.

Amen

Sr. Barbara Beasley, RGS

Black Sisters Testify: To Oppressed People, Let Us Bring New Life

Black Sisters Testify: To Oppressed People, Let Us Bring New Life

Sr. Barbara Beasley, RGS
November 1, 2022
Sr. Barbara Beasley, RGS

Sr. Barbara Beasley, RGS

When I think about my own story and the story of every Black woman religious, there is a unifying theme, whatever the congregation we have membership in: We all testify that we have experienced the hand of God laid on us and a strong invitation to follow, to surrender to being loved by God and called to love and serve God’s people and to live together in a way that generates life.

The power of God’s call has been, and continues to be, the “why” and the “how” behind the determination and courage to move into the storm, whatever it feels like, whatever its form.

I often fall back to the beautiful lyrics by Curtis Burrell:

“I don’t feel no ways tired.

Come too far from where I started from.

Nobody told me that the road would be easy.

I don’t believe He brought me this far to leave me.”

In 1968, when the National Black Sisters’ Conference was founded, I was 30 years old and had been perpetually professed for three years. For that first meeting I traveled from Denver to Pittsburgh, to the Mercy Sisters’ campus to meet about 100 of myself! Although I had not seen many other Black Sisters before, I knew immediately the feeling of home.

Sister Martin De Porres Grey, RSM, was the woman of vision who convened us. Together we reclaimed (or reaffirmed) our identity, with the realization that Blackness is Gift to ourselves, our people, our congregations, the church, and beyond. From that first meeting until now, I have seen NBSC as a support and resource for the continuing growth of Black women religious, an advocate for justice for all people and a voice of conscience within the structure of the Catholic Church.

Nearly 40 years after the founding of NBSC, in 2007, Dr. Shannen Dee Williams stumbled upon an old news article, with a photo of four smiling African-American nuns at the first NBSC meeting. Dr. Williams was intrigued to discover that Black Catholic Sisters existed, not to mention that this large group of them had met to strategize on how to strengthen their impact for the sake of the liberation of their people.

As historian and educator, Dr. Williams knew she needed to find out more about these women, but little did she know that her own life would be radically changed by the work she was about to undertake. Her research led her to locate and interview the hidden storytellers who knew the story of the foundation of NBSC and wanted to share it.

Dr. Williams eventually tracked down Dr. Patricia Grey, formerly Sr. Martin De Porres, founder of NBSC. Dr. Grey’s prophetic words to Shannen were: If you can, tell the whole story of Black nuns in the United States. “Subversive Habits: Black Catholic Nuns in the Long African American Struggle for Freedom” did indeed tell the whole story.

As I read the book, what stirred a strong and painful reaction in me was the narrative of the foundation of the three Black religious Orders: the Oblate Sisters of Providence, the Sisters of the Holy Family, and the Franciscan Handmaids of Mary. No doubt it would be terribly difficult for small bands of Black women doing works of mercy on behalf of oppressed people. To those served by the Sisters, education, health care, social services, and advocacy would serve as lights on the path to a new life.

What was so deeply painful was the description of the outrage and resistance by white nuns to the mere thought of African-American women becoming consecrated religious in the Catholic Church and offering the ministry they were called to give. That the three Black Congregations are alive today gives witness to the mighty power of God’s Spirit ablaze within these faith-filled women.

I am profoundly grateful that this book about Black Sisters has been written. Dr. Williams did more than full justice by chronicling so magnificently what has been achieved, at what cost, and that the struggle goes on.

I venture to think that most/many congregations would welcome the gifts of Black recruits. There is awareness that each congregation has an obligation to support and encourage the culture of the persons who enter, a new level of responsibility on the side of the religious communities these young people come into. Like their predecessors in religious life, I pray that young religious today feel God’s hand firmly upon them and know in their hearts that God is and ever will be a Promise-Keeper.

Sr. Barbara Beasley, RGS, is a Sister of the Good Shepherd and a founding member of the National Black Sisters’ Conference.

This November, NETWORK observes Black Catholic History Month in collaboration with the National Black Sisters Conference, centering the voices of Black Sisters and sharing their testimonies with our spirit-filled network of justice-seekers.

Catholic Women Religious Sign-on to Urge a Reparations Study Commission

Letter to President Biden from Catholic Sisters and Associates of Religious Communities

Dear President Biden:

As Catholic Women Religious and associates of religious communities, we recognize, affirm, and commit to uplift the sacredness of Black lives. In this country, we must honestly reflect on the history of racist and immoral policies sanctioned by the United States government and Catholic institutions. It is time to provide repair and redress for the ongoing repercussions of chattel slavery and continued systemic racism.

For more than 400 years, our federal policies and economic practices fostered the Atlantic slave trade, chattel slavery, segregation and Jim Crow, and other forms of discrimination. This sinful racism, which fueled the economy and built the very foundation of the United States, was given moral absolution by the Catholic Church.

The Catholic faith tradition calls for confession, penance, and restitution when a sin has been committed. Telling the truth is, indeed, the only way we can begin to repair and redress the pain caused by slavery and our country’s failure to repent for centuries of systemic racism.

President Biden, as people of faith, we call on you to act with courage and fulfill your campaign promise to ‘support a study of reparations’ by establishing a national reparations commission via executive order.* As Catholic institutions, including orders of women religious, grapple with and make reparations for their pasts, so must the United States.

The sinful legacy of white supremacy and the enduring racial wealth gap must no longer be allowed to deny Black people good health, educational, and economic outcomes. It is time to act on your commitments to dismantling racist laws, policies, and frameworks, and to advance racial equity by establishing a reparations commission. We implore you to answer this urgent moral imperative to advance justice and build a better future for our country.

Sincerely,

Catholic Sisters and Associates

*President Biden said during his campaign, “a Biden Administration will support a study of reparations.” joebiden.com/blackamerica

Sisters and Associates – Add Your Name

*This sign-on letter is now closed. To continue making your voice heard, please send an email to the White House.

Affirming the Black Catholic Voice and Presence in Our Church and Our Country

Affirming the Black Catholic Voice and Presence in Our Church and Our Country

Joan F. Neal
Aug 10, 2022

NETWORK applauds the National Black Sisters’ Conference (NBSC), National Black Catholic Clergy Caucus, National Association of Black Catholic Deacons, and the National Association of Black Catholic Seminarians for a successful four-day gathering and congratulates the newly elected NBSC Board, including Sr. Addie Lorraine Walker, SSND, NBSC’s new President, who received the organization’s Harriet Tubman Award, for being the “Moses for her people.” As she accepted, Sr. Addie Lorraine said she would “only accept the award if those in the banquet hall would accept the responsibility of being Black in a white-dominated American Catholic church.“

The National Black Sisters’ Conference, which was founded in 1968 to serve as the unifying voice and forum for religious Black Sisters, held its Board election as part of the general assembly. The new Board for the 2022 -24 term includes:  President:  Sr. Addie Lorraine Walker, SSND, who has served on the NBSC Board since 2019; Vice President: Sr. Melinda Pellerin, SSJ, who has also served on the NBSC Board since 2019; Secretary: Sr. Nicole Trahan, FMI, who will be serving on the Board for the first time; and Treasurer:  Sr. Patty Chappell, SNDdeN, who has held previous Board positions.  The other elected members of the Board include:  Sr. LaKesha Church, CPPS, Sr. Roberta Fulton, SSMN, Sr. Gwynette Proctor, SNDdeN, Sr. Patricia Ralph, SSJ, and Sr. Callista Robinson, OSF.

Sandra Coles-Bell, NBSC Executive Director reported from the gathering, “After a two-year hiatus, 150 attendees and members of four national Black Catholic organizations met for four days of reflection, study, conversation, planning, and prayer on the campus of the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana with the unifying theme of ‘Come Together Children.’ Participants were reminded of the importance of walking together in the Roman Catholic Church in the United States and the relevance of the Black Catholic voice and presence in maintaining the Roman Catholic Church in the United States. The South African principles of UBUNTU and SAWUBONA engaged participants in robust conversations on how to move prayerfully forward as Black men and women with the full force of Catholicism informed by the faith and experiences of Black people in this country.”

National Black Catholic Sisters Receive Inaugural Justice-Seeker AwardEarlier this year, NETWORK awarded the National Black Sisters’ Conference with the inaugural Distinguished Justice-Seeker Award to honor the NBSC’s dedicated and persistent witness for racial justice in the Catholic Church and society. NETWORK looks forward to collaborating with NBSC’s newly elected Board and commends the continued prophetic witness of the National Black Sisters’ Conference.

Sr. Simone receives Medal of Freedom from President Biden

Watch Sr. Simone receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom

Watch Sister Simone receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom  

Mary J. Novak
July 7, 2022
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xjAMDSY1ro&t=4182

On July 7, 2022, President Joe Biden awarded Sister Simone Campbell, SSS and 16 other extraordinary Americans with our country’s highest civilian honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom. While leading NETWORK from 2004 to 2021, Sister Simone propelled NETWORK’s mission of political ministry into the national spotlight with her committed advocacy for justice.   

President Biden said that Sister Simone and her fellow medal recipients “embody the soul of the nation — hard work, perseverance, and faith,” and I strongly agree. It is people like Sister Simone and each of you — advocates for justice, participating in politics to dismantle systemic racism and advance the common good — who give me hope.  

As we witness rising tension and growing threats to our democracy, it is more important than ever to lobby for federal policies that dismantle systemic racism and create a country where all people can thrive. 

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NETWORK's reparation vigil featured Reverend Traci Blackmon

NETWORK’s Reparations Vigil in Cleveland Featured Revered Traci Blackmon

NETWORK’s Reparations Vigil in Cleveland Featured Reverend Traci Blackmon

Elissa Hackerson
June 17, 2022

NETWORK Lobby for Catholic Social Justice hosted Repair and Redress: A Vigil for Reparations (In-Person) on Wednesday, June 15, 2022 at St. Aloysius – St. Agatha Parish in Cleveland, OH. People in the parish church and school community, sisters, the Cleveland NETWORK Advocates Team, justice-seekers, and NETWORK staff made a powerful stand for reparations for Black Americans and called for an H.R.40-style reparations commission by Juneteenth. NETWORK’s reparations vigil in Cleveland featured Reverend Traci Blackmon, Associate General Minister, Justice and Local Church Ministries (United Church of Christ). The United Church of Christ shared a condensed video presentation of her remarks.

Rev. Blackmon’s stirring and powerful remarks spoke to the theological call to repair a society broken by the sin of chattel slavery and the racism that has followed in its wake and addressed society’s need to atone and provide redress.  Rev. Blackmon declared that it is time to end government charity for Black people (giving fish) and deliver justice (equitable access to the lake).

The reason we have not reckoned with racism in this country–decision makers have decided that God cannot be Black, that God cannot be Brown. That God indeed must be white and therefore we have created a fractured and disabled society.Rev. Traci D. Blackmon

A classically trained violinist from Venezuela added music to the vigil.

NETWORK’s Build Anew agenda calls for a society where we all share equally in God’s abundance. For this to happen, our country’s laws, policies, and norms must:

  • Dismantle Systemic Racism
  • Cultivate Inclusive Community
  • Root Our Economy in Solidarity
  • Transform Our Politics

As Rev. Blackmon stated so clearly in her vigil remarks, “Reparations is about the church and the people and the society moving from charity to justice. Moving from hand out to hand up. Moving from simply offering to give someone a fish to giving them access to the lake so they can fish for themselves.”

From the Archives: Called to Challenge the Treatment of Poverty

From the Archives: NETWORK’s Vision Comes to Life

Sr. Mara Rutten, RSM
July 20, 2022

Dear Friend,

This week, I am back again with another story about the people and events that made NETWORK the organization it is today. This time, we’ll fast-forward to the 1990s and explore a key project from NETWORK’s long history of advocating for economic justice.

Some of NETWORK’s most spirited organizing and lobbying in the 1990s came in response to President Bill Clinton’s “Welfare Reform.” As far as NETWORK was concerned, the “reform” was an affront to the dignity of the human person, in particular, low-income families. NETWORK made sure the President and Congress knew how unjust the proposed welfare legislation was.

NETWORK's 1977 Legislative SeminarParticipants, 1970's

As President Clinton signed the 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act into law, NETWORK staff, including Executive Director Sr. Kathy Thornton, RSM, marched in protest outside the White House gates.

By 1996, we were 20 years into lobbying and organizing and we knew what we had to do: form partnerships, lobby and testify before Congress, and rally at the White House. Of course, we surveyed those closest to the pain of poverty to find out what they actually needed from policy and how they’d be impacted by President Clinton’s new law.

NETWORK believed the measures supported by President Clinton would make life worse for the 35 million people who struggled with poverty. NETWORK wasn’t alone. The Daughters of Charity, the Sisters of Mercy, the Federation of the Sisters of St. Joseph, and Pax Christi USA joined us to form the Welfare Reform Watch Project.

Our strategy was long range and considered diverse geographical areas. The nationwide, multi-year project rigorously monitored the new legislation in order to evaluate both its effectiveness and its limitations. The first Welfare Reform Watch Project report, “Poverty Amid Plenty,” was released in April 1999.

This report was the focus of NETWORK’s 1999 Lobby Day on Welfare Reform. The day began with a policy seminar on Capitol Hill attended by nine members of Congress and staff from 66 Congressional offices! Then, 62 NETWORK members left to lobby more than 50 Congressional offices.

While the 1999 Lobby Day was quite successful on Capitol Hill (thanks to the 400 NETWORK members who wrote their Members of Congress inviting them to the policy seminar), there would be many more Lobby Days in the years to come. Our economic justice advocacy on the Hill continues to this day, and I look forward to many more successful lobbying efforts in the coming weeks, months, and years.

This essay is part of a collection shared by NETWORK historian, Dr. Mara D. Rutten, to celebrate our 50th anniversary. To read more from the archives, click the links below.

Read From the Archives: NETWORK’s Vision Comes to Life
Read From the Archives: Spirit at Work from the Beginning

NETWORK’s history in our Cool Timeline

From the Archives: Called to Challenge the Treatment of Poverty

From the Archives: Centering Encounter for 50 Years

Sr. Mara Rutten, RSM
April 7, 2022

Dear Friend,

As we get ready for our 50th Anniversary Advocates Training and Gala next week, I invite you to reflect on the words of Sr. Jan Cebula, OSF:

“Yes, we face some critical choices as we decide
what kind of a people-a country-we want to be. It’s OUR choice
and we all have decisions to make at this pivotal time. Are
we going to choose: to remain isolated or recognize the strength
of community? To be fearful or reach out with compassion and love?”

~ Sister Jan Cebula, OSF, Nuns on the Bus 2016

In recent years, NETWORK continued to build on the legacy set by the lobbyists and organizers who came before, harnessing the power of community to advocate for federal policy change.

From 2012 up through a virtual campaign in 2020, NETWORK’s Nuns on the Bus NETWORK's Nuns on the Bustrips encouraged communities across the country to share their stories of how national policy issues of immigration, health care, and federal budgets are not just statistics, but have real impact on their personal experiences.

NETWORK lobbyists and organizers worked with people in the communities the Bus visited to meet with Members of Congress and advocate for policies that better serve their families and communities.

Throughout 2019 and in early 2020, NETWORK Lobby Raises Rural Voiceswe hosted roundtable discussions listening to diverse groups of more than 250 people living in rural communities all across the United States. NETWORK published a report titled “Raising Rural Voices,” lifting up their hopes and hardships, to help guide federal policy decisions in Washington.

“This report reflects the ‘active listening’ that doesn’t occur frequently enough within states or with policymakers in Washington. Too many decisions are made without understanding the perspective of rural residents or acknowledging the values of shared obligations.”

~ Kathleen Sebelius, Former Kansas Governor and Secretary of Health and Human Services, Forward to “Raising Rural Voices”

And friend, over the last year the NETWORK community has continued to prioritize encounter in our organizing. NETWORK's Title 42 White House ProtestJust last December, more than 80 Catholic Sisters and their advocacy partners rallied outside the White House to bear witness to their experiences serving migrants at the Southern Border and protest the inhumane misuse of Title 42 and call for its end. While strides forward have been made, there is still much to do in order to build a humane and just asylum system.

As we celebrate NETWORK’s 50th Anniversary, we recommit to centering encounter in our advocacy. This important work can only happen in community, and we are grateful to count you as part of our NETWORK community.

I have enjoyed sharing my stories with you over the past few weeks. Through the many changes in technology and shifts in politics over the years, NETWORK has remained steadfast in our political ministry. Together, we will continue to work for economic and social transformation for many years to come.

Read From the Archives: NETWORK’s Vision Comes to Life
Read From the Archives: Spirit at Work from the Beginning
Read From the Archives: Called to Challenge the Treatment of Poverty