Black Catholic men: �Hear our voice�

By Priscilla A. Greear - Florida Catholic

Photography: ROBERTO AGUIRRE | FC

•  Related story: Celebrate Black Catholic History Month in November

MIAMI | Speakers at the 14th National Black Catholic Men’s Conference challenged nearly 350 participants to “silence the mind” amid recent violence and racial strife and find soul food for life in Christ. They exhorted them to boldly go forth in their communities to reach African Americans in psychological and spiritual conflict � including the younger generations leaving the Church for other denominations.

Participants hashed out holistic health topics ranging from mental wellness and the spirituality of Black Lives Matter to the nurture of “black power” and psychological strengths of African Americans. They sang praise music led by Men in the Fire, worshipped at Notre Dame d’Haiti Mission and had their blood pressure checked at a health fair promoting physical fitness. And they found inspiration to build ministries meeting practical needs, whether through housing, education or job placement following incarceration.

The Miami archdiocese’s associate superintendent of schools, Donald Edwards, said he renewed his sense of mission and history as a black Catholic and his conviction that “all lives matter” as God’s gift.

“The message of this conference is yes we are black but we are first of all Catholic men who have a mission and ministry, and ultimately that mission and ministry is to change the world. Not to make everybody think and be the way we are and think, but ultimately to build up the kingdom of God which is made up of black people, white people, brown people, yellow people, ugly people, pretty people�Catholic people, people who are not Catholic,” he reflected.

The conference, entitled “The Challenge Is to Silence the Mind,” was held Oct. 5-8 and drew 320 men and 20 young people from every diocese but Alaska’s to the Doubletree Hotel by Hilton Miami, where South Florida’s multicultural community infused more Caribbean and South American juices.

It was sponsored by the National Black Catholic Clergy Caucus, Josephites and the Bowman-Francis Ministry of Indianapolis. The ministry comprises three Society of the Divine Word priests commissioned to recharge Catholic African American youth and young adults. It was coordinated in partnership with the Miami director of the Black Catholic Ministry Office, Katrenia Reeves-Jackman.

 

Embrace blackness

Keynote speaker Father George Kintiba, a Divine Word missionary and Congo native, urged participants to embrace their blackness as men of God, affirming how all mankind originated in Africa. Only about 40,000 years ago did Africans venture north to Europe where their skin lightened in colder climates.

“Our strength as humanity came out of blackness and you have it, you are it,” said Father Kintiba, a doctoral student on history of the African diaspora at Howard University.

He encouraged the men to begin each day with affirmations of faith, zapping poisonous negative thoughts of victimization. “Be engaged in the Spirit, engage your spirit every single morning and talk positively to your spirit. I don’t care how hard it is out there because positivity will run through your mind throughout the entire day.”

They also must never forget to pray, forgive and remember their history. “To nurture ourselves we need to remind ourselves we are a strong people, about what we’ve been through and that we are still here,” Father Kintiba said.  “We are God’s people, a strong people, a praying people.”

Spiritual health starts with mental wellness, said Father Ricardo Phipps, an assistant professor of psychology and counseling at LaSalle University in Philadelphia. In a workshop, he discussed the “very important” need for accurate education on mental health and illness in parishes to overcome its stigma. “It’s primarily the education component in parishes about mental illness and helping people to take steps for good self care. It’s learning how to process stress and anxiety, whether through a Bible study or a support network.”

Worry, stress and anxiety become a concern when they hurt relationships, work and basic functioning. But in the black community, Father Phipps said, people needing treatment prefer to tough it out while others think that therapists of other races won’t understand them.  

“For treatment sometimes it is medication, sometimes psychotherapy. Hopefully it’s a combination because research says that is the best way to approach mental illness,” in addition to strong support networks and the spiritual resources available in churches, he said. “We have a vested interested because we see what the effects are in bringing people back to church and in evangelization. If we don’t address real life issues they won’t come back because they won’t see the Church as important in their lives in what they’re struggling with.”

Build needed programs

Divine Word Missionary Father Charles Smith and twin Father Chester Smith hope the conference planted seeds to inspire participants to be the best Christian men they can be and reach beyond themselves to build “programs of substance” that meet community needs.

One challenge is to reach more inner city black youths who are leaving the Church, and also are less loyal than previous generations due to the closing of urban Catholic schools.

“Instead of staying there and working it out these young people now say I’ll go elsewhere. Many of our young people go to nondenominational churches, mega churches,” said Father Charles. “This conference and what we are doing is to entice young people to come back to church and make it relevant, for them to take leadership in our churches and share with other young adults.”

Father Charles highlighted a community effort to get funds to reopen the Holy Angels School in Indianapolis through the Notre Dame ACE Academies network, which targets the underserved. “I’m pretty proud of it. Education to me is (the) key to liberate our people.”

The conference also celebrated diversity among African Americans. “We’ve got people from the Caribbean, South America who are natives of those countries and places and they are able to bring that culture to share that, to enrich the African American culture. I was very excited,” he added.

Marc Guess of Indianapolis said he was inspired to persevere in minority outreach ministry for Catholic adoptions and to be a better role model to his children. And it was good “to hear Father Kintiba really explain where man evolved and being proud of who you are, where you come from, in spite of the obstacles in front of you, knowing we as a race have made it through a lot and we continue to persevere.”

 

Passivity and the internet

Albert Doyle, 71, of Holy Redeemer Church in Miami, also said he appreciated that message, having been taught growing up to be subservient to whites. But with today’s youth, he’s concerned about a new type of passivity and overconsumption of media.

“Why are young people not voting? My son says it’s not going to make a difference. My forefathers and the people who came before me died for the right to vote,” Doyle said. “We have to silence more, silence the mind. Now there are good things on the Internet but that’s not what they’re looking at, other things are influencing them.”

He makes it a priority to discuss current issues with his young adult children. “We’ve got to get these minds right. The way I do is take an hour each day and we sit and have a family moment, sit for an hour and talk about different things happening in life and society.”

The conference also spotlighted Miami’s Black Catholic Ministry.

“We are black, we are Catholic and we are committed to the work of the Church of Miami,” said Edwards, the associate school superintendent. “It’s important to me for others to recognize we are authentically black and we bring a specific cultural experience and specific historical experience to our Catholicity and to the Catholic Church of Miami. We’re very grateful for the Smith brothers and their ministry. We are grateful they have given us the opportunity to bring this conference to our archdiocese so others will know of our presence and hear our voice as black Catholic men.”