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INTERVIEW Sowing the seeds of black Catholic lay ministry
The Interview, a regular feature of The Catholic New World, is an in-depth conversation with a person whose words, actions or ideas affect today’s Catholic. It may be affirming of faith or confrontational. But it will always be stimulating. This week, Catholic New World staff writer Michael D. Wamble talks with Adrian Dominican Sister Jamie Phelps. Lake Michigan’s waves crescendo, collapse and crest again. It is a wonderful view. “Yes. It is great,” says Dominican Sister Jamie Phelps, visiting professor of theology at Loyola University, of the natural resource outside her office window. Like those silver-caps, this theological doyenne has been in constant motion leading and assisting in the formation of institutions to improve the long range outlook of Chicago Catholics of the African Diaspora. Phelps is a founding member of the Institute of Black Catholic Studies at Xavier University in New Orleans and the Washington-based National Black Sisters Conference. In 1990, Phelps became Catholic Theological Union’s founding director of the Augustus Tolton Pastoral Ministry Program at Catholic Theological Union. She served as director until 1996. On March 4, Phelps will receive a special honor at “Harambee,” a celebration of the 10th anniversary of the Augustus Tolton Pastoral Ministry Program at CTU. The evening will begin with a 5:30 p.m. Mass at St. Thomas the Apostle Church, 5472 S. Kimbark Ave. Cardinal George will be the celebrant. A buffet dinner and the jazz stylings of the Von Freeman Quartet will follow the Mass. Phelps co-authored (with Tolton scholar Joyce Gillie) the cycle B African-American version of the “Disciples in Mission” (Paulist Press) program that includes insight and information on the history of black Catholics. “It would be great to put the different cultural versions into
one book,” said Phelps, also editor of “Black and Catholic: The
Challenge and Gift of Black Folk” (Marquette University Press).
“Being distinct, then put with the whole, we are all truly enriched
in the church.” Catholic New World: What lessons could one learn from your course on “Women and Religion?” Sister Jamie Phelps: One of the insights we explore about theology is that theology is influenced by people’s social location and their contacts. When I taught courses at CTU on God, I found that the dominant culture’s question about God is: “Does God exist?” That is a question of atheism. From a black perspective the question becomes “If God is so good, then why…?” Your cultural location conditions even your question of God. CNW: Does the question of God change if and when it is asked by an African-American Catholic woman in contrast to an African-American Catholic man? SJP: In the church you do experience—as all women experience—the sort of marginalization and the ambiguity of being a woman in the church, but I’m not sure if that is any more ambiguous than being a black [person] in the church. And even when I speak of ambiguity that does not preclude one from being fully Catholic, black and woman because the tradition is available for us. We’ve learned to pray. We’ve learned the tradition. And we’ve grown as black Catholic women despite the systemic problematic issues that you would notice as a black Catholic. I think where that provocative question comes in is the issue of the inclusion of black women in positions of authority within the church. The church has a double message on that. On one hand it excludes women from ordination; on the other hand, increasingly it has supported the role and presence of women in decision-making positions at all levels. CNW: A visible area one sees differences between Catholics of European and African descent is liturgical expressions. In an address to Catholic bishops at their national meeting last November, Leodia Gooch, Supreme Lady of the Knights of Peter Claver Ladies’ Auxiliary said, “It is very important to recognize that symbolic acceptance of ceremonial behavior is not acceptance of a people.” Gooch continued, “The people who sing gospel songs are absent from decision-making groups and commission memberships.” Those are strong statements. SJP: And they’re not inconsistent with what the church has said. In the bishop’s [1979] pastoral [letter] “Brothers and Sisters to Us”—and it’s worth quoting—wrote, “All too often in the very places where blacks, Hispanics, Native Americans and Asians are numerous, the church’s official representatives, clerical and lay, are predominantly white. “Efforts to achieve racial balance in government, the media, the armed services and other crucial areas of secular life should not only be supported but surpassed in the institutions and programs of the Catholic Church.” So when Supreme Lady Gooch says this really she is echoing what the bishops already have said. CNW: What did you see in 1988 that led you to the idea for the Tolton Program? SJP: I have a habit of looking around wherever I’m sitting and trying to figure out what we can do to enhance the situation of black folks in the church. As I entered CTU, they had already, as a white institution, decided that they wanted to open themselves up to cultural diversity because in fact CTU’s student body was diverse but more internationally than indigenously. As I completed my degree in systematic theology at Catholic University [CU] a job opened at CTU. I had worked in Chicago church since 1961 so I knew the territory. But when I took the job at CTU in 1986, I didn’t take it as a "black job." I told them I didn’t need a Ph.D. to be hired as a black person, I had to be hired according to my discipline-systematics-and that they would have to trust me to mainstream the questions that were coming from the black community in the ordinary courses. CNW: Why was that important to make the distinction? SJP: To counter the potential for black tokenism, where you are not respected for your professional degree but you are hired for your skin color. If you are hired for color you can be marginalized and devalued within the system. If you have a degree from CU like other colleagues, then you can sit at the table as an equal rather than being seen as "the black" or "the Hispanic." You are there because of your credentials and your gender and culture are simply plus factors. CNW: Isn’t that the same situation that can be found in relation to the Tolton program? You have parishes that have had volunteers for a long time. Now, when a person enters with professional background, then a different relationship is created. SJP: We have been so focused on priests and sisters that we don’t expect those who are our peers to be religious education directors or pastoral associates. It is important to remember that not only have we been impacted by the civil rights movement-though it was 20 years later [1988]-but also that the church was going through cultural shifts due to the Second Vatican Council that called for more lay involvement in the church. The seed for the Tolton program came from those shifts. I simply put the seed in the ground. Those who worked with me began to water it. Now, that water can has been given to another group of people: Vanessa [White, director of the Tolton program], the program’s steering committee and advisory board. I believe in collaborative ministry because if you die tomorrow and the program will continue. Most importantly, this seed has been watered by God so it can only grow stronger in the archdiocese. The seed for the Tolton program came from those shifts. I simply put the seed in the ground. Those who worked with me began to water it. Now, that water can has been given to another group of people: Vanessa [White, director of the Tolton program], the program’s steering committee and advisory board. I believe in collaborative ministry. And as long as you’re committed to collaborative ministry you could die tomorrow and the program will continue. But most importantly, this seed has been watered by God so it can only grow stronger in the archdiocese.
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