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Welcome to Wednesday. Division in St. Louis over a webinar on immigration. Pope Francis responds to letter about racism in Brazilian church. Police are protected by a large and powerful institution, similar to the church.
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St. Louis Archbishop Mitchell Rozanski suspended a webinar series on immigration and placed one of its organizers on leave, causing backlash from area Catholics.
The webinar focused on refugees and the rights of asylum seekers. The archdiocese's Immigration Task Force helped to organize the event, which attracted an audience of an estimated 60 individuals.
A later memo by the archdiocese's office of communications and planning said that some of the content was not in line with archdiocesan policy. The memo also noted that Marie Kenyon, the administrator of the task force, had been placed on administrative leave, future webinars on the topic would be cancelled, and the task force's Facebook account, which included a link to the webinar, had been shut down.
Sara John, who was one of the speakers during the webinar and a member of the Immigration Task Force, said that the ensuing fallout has shown that "this isn't just about the webinar" and that Kenyon was "targeted by groups and individuals" who don't agree that justice and dignity "represent the Catholic Church or the archdiocese."
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Pope Francis has responded to a letter about racism in the Catholic Church sent by a group of Brazilian priests and bishops.
The letter was signed by 83 priests and five bishops and addressed themes such as alleged harassment of Black seminarians and the barriers for Black priests who wish to become bishops.
The priests introduced themselves as "descendants of Mother Africa" and mentioned the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, connecting it to their own experiences.
"Getting straight to the point, we, black priests, in order to answer to the call of Jesus Christ, our Lord, as laborers of His Harvest, feel during our formation our educators' knees pressing our necks," the letter said. "We know what the outcry 'I can't breathe' means."
In his handwritten response, Francis said he will take into consideration what the Brazilian priests wrote and said he feels "close" to them.
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Until Thursday,
Stephanie Yeagle
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