In his Life of St. Augustine, the 5th-century bishop Possidius tells us that the greatest of the Latin Doctors of the Church, knowing that his earthly end was near, had four penitential psalms copied and […]
CNA Staff, Jun 10, 2020 / 12:34 am (CNA).- Catholics have a key part to play— in cooperation with God’s grace— in overcoming racism, the bishop of Phoenix said at the diocesan Mass for Forgiveness of the Sin of Racism this week.
“George Floyd did not die alone. Jesus was with him—praying with him and for him. At every time and every place, Jesus draws near to every person, especially in times of suffering and at the hour of death,” Bishop Thomas Olmsted of Phoenix said in the homily June 8.
As the Church gathers to pray for forgiveness for the sin of racism, Olmsted said, it is important to define what Catholics mean by the term.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church offers guidance, he said, defining it as “unjust discrimination on the basis of a person’s race.”
In Paragraph 1935 of the Catechism, it says “every form of social or cultural discrimination in fundamental personal rights on the grounds of sex, race, color, social conditions, language, or religion must be curbed and eradicated as incompatible with God’s design.”
Olmsted said he has seen racial discrimination manifest itself among some Catholics in Arizona. Nearly half of Phoenix’s pastors were born in other countries, he said, and sadly not all have been received well by Catholics in the diocese.
For example, “on the day that I installed one of our finest pastors, protestors came to the parking lot and distributed flyers on car windows denouncing the bishop for replacing their beloved former pastor with ‘these Africans,’” Olmsted said.
The Church provides, through the Sacrament of Confession, a means by which those who have perpetuated the sin of racism can seek God’s mercy.
“The rich mercy of God restores human dignity, even to the most hardened of sinners, if we have the humility to say six words: ‘I am sorry. Please forgive me,’” he said.
Jesus himself, and saints like Pope John Paul II, have modeled the kind of forgiveness that is necessary for healing from racism, Olmsted said.
“[Racism] is overcome by God, by His mercy. It is not our achievement. We have a key part to play, in cooperation with His grace, but only God can change minds and hearts. That’s why the Sacraments of Confession and the Eucharist play such vital roles in overcoming the sin of racism,” Olmsted said.
In responding to racism, Catholics— even if they are not themselves racist— must not allow their hearts to harden, frozen by indifference, and simply fail to respond altogether, Olmsted said.
“While racism is a sinful act that prejudice, injustice, and lack of respect for human dignity brings about, racism also hides itself behind indifference. Racists may not get caught because they are doing “nothing.” But, in Jesus’ description of the Last Judgment, found in Matthew 25:4, sin is depicted not as what people did but ‘what they failed to do,’” he said.
Olmsted recalled that during March 2000, Pope John Paul II led the whole Church in a Day of Pardon, in which he asked the entire Church to place itself “before Christ, who out of love, took our guilt upon Himself,” and to make a “profound examination of conscience,” and to “forgive and ask forgiveness.”
“Inspired by the example of St. John Paul II, let us beg the Lord Jesus, at this Mass, for the grace we need to overcome the evil of racism and to build a society of Jesus and solidarity,” Olmsted concluded.
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Rome, Italy, Jun 9, 2020 / 02:05 pm (CNA).- With police brutality in focus around the world, one priest says it is important to remember a policeman who might one day be declared a saint: Vice-Sergeant Salvo D’Acquisto, an Italian policeman who gave his life for those he had sworn to protect.
During the Second World War, Salvo D’Acquisto was a member of Italy’s Carabinieri police force, and deputy commander of the rural police station of Torrimpietra, outside of Rome.
In September 1943, German soldiers were inspecting boxes of ammunition at a military base nearby. One box exploded, and two German soldiers died. German officials decided the explosion wasn’t an accident. For that, they rounded up and arrested 22 people.
As the local police official, D’Acquisto did an investigation into the explosion, questioning the 22 people who had been arrested. After his interviews, he tried to explain to the Germans that the explosion was an accident, and that no one in the area was responsible.
But the Nazis were determined to exact revenge. They had the prisoners dig a mass grave, and announced they would be executed.
So Salvo D’Acquisto told the Nazis that he had arranged the explosion, and that he had acted alone.
The civilians were released. D’Acquisto was shot before a firing squad. He was 22 years old.
The Italian Military Ordinariate opened a cause for his canonization in 1983 in 1983.
Monsignor Gabriele Teti was the postulator of the policeman’s cause from 2014 to 2018. Himself a former member of the Carabiniere, Teti knows the story of Salvo D’Acquisto in depth.
Teti said that Salvo D’Acquisto considered his membership to Carabinieri a service for his countrymen.
The policeman “went so far as to demonstrate that his life was truly at the service of the people, even to self-sacrifice,” the priest said.
Before his death, said the former postulator, D’Acquisto met a friend who had attended Carabinieri training with him. By then, a large group of Carabinieri had gone underground to fight the Germans in Rome, and this friend invited D’Acquisto to leave the uniform and join the resistance.
“And he replied that his duty was to protect order and safety, and that his task was not to leave.”
In 2001, Pope St. John Paul II told Italian national police officers that “The history of the Italian Carabinieri shows that the heights of holiness can be reached in the faithful and generous fulfillment of the duties of one’s state. I am thinking here of your colleague, Sergeant Salvo D’Acquisto, awarded a gold medal for military valor, whose cause of beatification is under way.”
The sacrifice of D’Acquisto should be seen in the context of his whole life, the priest said.
“Certainly, he grew up in a very religious family.”
“Since childhood, then, there are small episodes that make us understand the nature of Salvo D’Acquisto. As a child, returning from school, he donated his shoes to a child he always met when returning from school and who was barefoot. Another time, he rushed to save a child who was about to end up under a train.”
The policeman’s cause for beatification ran aground on “bureaucratic” issues, Teti said. A cause for his martyrdom was set up, but Salvo D’Acquisto’s sacrifice falls more easily into a new category of saints, those who have made a “gift of life,” the priest said. His cause continues to be considered at the Vatican.
In Italy, the priests said, “devotion to Salvo D’Acquisto is everywhere. So much so that some even say that there is no need to make him a saint, given that they already consider him a blessed servant of God.”
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