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Black Priests, Black Panthers: breaking barriers at every turn Stories by Michael D. Wamble Theologian and historian Dominican Sister Jamie Phelps said she
appreciates it when Catholics, such as the sisters of her order,
celebrate Black History Month. However, at times there is something
missing: the stories of African popes (Sts. Victor, Militiades
and Gelasius); and the histories of black bishops, priests and
men and women religious. “I said, ‘This is all great, but you
don’t have anything about black Catholic history.’” She continued, “As black Catholics, in terms of the public eye,
we are on the margins.” That perception has a historical basis. In 1941, blacks were conspicuous in their absence in the archdiocesan
seminary system. That was before Father Rollins Lambert. Lambert said Cardinal Stritch told him people all over the country
would be watching him to see how successful he would be. “‘If
you’re not [successful], it will set the cause back for black
vocations,’ he told me. “If I didn’t work out, people would’ve
taken it out on the guys that came after me.” Among the first of those who came after him was Father George
Clements. When Clements entered the seventh grade in 1945 at Corpus Christi,
the Franciscan priests at the parish had already made an impression
on him. “They visited homes and played games with the children and made
themselves part of the whole fabric of the community. I decided
early on that I wanted to be like them,” said Clements in an interview
earlier this year. Clements recalled being supported by a Franciscan sister to become
a priest. He also remembered when her encouragement suddenly dried
up. “It was only later that I found out that the Franciscans were
not accepting blacks. She, nor I, knew that in seventh grade,”
he said. Clements ended up in the archdiocesan high school seminary. Lambert entered the seminary in Mundelein after graduation from
the University of Chicago and his conversion to Catholicism. There,
Lambert said he experienced hostility from administrators but
welcome from faculty. Lambert credited the late Msgr. Reynold
Hillenbrand for support. After ordination, he became an associate pastor at St. Malachy
where he taught religion classes and Negro history at the parish’s
high school. “I wanted was to tell students our history didn’t
begin with slavery. It began in Africa. So I gave them as much
African history and culture as I could manage. I told them about
our African popes,” he said. Clements has called the history of black Catholics in Chicago
“bittersweet.” Adrienne Curry, a consultant with the archdiocesan Office for
Peace and Justice who is working on a book on Chicago’s black
Catholics, would agree. “Sometimes it makes me wonder how we [black Catholics] became
Catholic, how we stayed Catholic, especially in light of the fact
Chicago is such a segregated city and blacks were clustered in
so few neighborhoods,” said Curry. Curry said black priests told her that as children they heard
white priests preach racism from the pulpit. “The reason we are
here is because of the care certain priests took in evangelizing
African-Americans,” said Curry. Lambert and Clements evangelized, but in markedly different ways,
with radically different styles. In 1968, amidst America’s impassioned fight for civil rights,
the changes created by the Second Vatican Council, and a new black
consciousness, Lambert became the first archdiocesan black pastor
at St. James Church on the Near South Side. “Consciousness had been raised so much that the thought was that
there ought to be a black pastor in Chicago,” said Lambert, then
president of the Black Catholic Clergy Caucus. Later that year, parishioners of St. Dorothy, where Lambert once
served as associate pastor, demanded that then-Cardinal John Cody
appoint Clements pastor. Their voices were joined by those of Chicago’s Black Panthers,
including Fred Hampton, whom Clements once served as the group’s
chaplain. “Cardinal Cody would have none of it. He didn’t believe in other
people making decisions for him. Things got very tense. We [the
Black Catholic Clergy Caucus] did a lot of negotiating to try
to resolve the issue,” said Lambert. On Dec. 18, 1968, Cardinal Cody called Lambert to his residence.
“When I left I was pastor of St. Dorothy’s willy-nilly. It was
not well accepted by a lot of people.” In fact, many black Catholics and Black Panthers publicly hurled
racial insults at Lambert calling him “a traitor” and “an Uncle
Tom.” “It was the only time in my history that the archbishop [Cardinal
Cody] invoked the promise of obedience that we [priests] make
at ordination. Normally that is taken for granted, but this time
it was invoked explicitly,” said Lambert. There were people, he
said, who felt he shouldn’t have accepted. “That would have been defying the archbishop and I just didn’t
see my way clear to do that,” he said. Following the appointment, Lambert said he was assigned a police
guard. During his first Mass, half the congregation walked out. Who was Lambert being protected from? Was it the Black Panthers? “I wouldn’t blame the Panthers specifically. They may have been
involved,” said Lambert, who added at one time he served in a
treasury position with the group. “We [Lambert and Clements] held a Unity Mass. We got as many black
priests together as we could and the Rev. Jesse Jackson (was present),”
said Lambert. “I didn’t like it [being called a traitor] but that was part of
living at that time in history,” he said. In an official letter, Cardinal Cody wrote that St. Dorothy needed
“a pastor of longer experience.” The cardinal continued, “I am
confident that Father Clements will work very successfully with
Father Lambert in caring for the people of St. Dorothy’s parish.”
For his part, Clements began a speaking tour at black colleges
across the nation. “He was still my associate, technically, but
he never lived that at all,” said Lambert. Clements connected himself to organizations like the Panthers,
Jackson’s Operation Breadbasket [now Rainbow-PUSH] and other community
groups. In 1969 he was named pastor of Holy Angels Church. Later that year, the Chicago Police Department and other law enforcement
agencies began cracking down on the Panthers. On Dec. 4, police raided Black Panther Party headquarters. It
is an incident Clements recalled at the annual Black History Month
Mass at Holy Name Cathedral earlier this year. “Ninety-four bullets
[were fired at] Fred Hampton because he was young, gifted and
black,” Clements proclaimed to 1,500 archdiocesan students at
the Mass. Later, in an interview, Clements said he played a role in protecting
Panthers being sought by the police. “Bobby Rush was second-in-command in the Panthers when Hampton
was killed. Everyone knew that Bobby was next on the list. And
he fled,” said Clements. He said he told Rush about a little known thing in the Middle
Ages called the “right of sanctuary.” “I told him, I will hide you here at Holy Angels and that’s what
we did,” said Clements. A week later, police discovered where
Rush was, Clements said. “But they didn’t come to get him,” said
Clements. Today Rush is a U.S. representative for Illinois’ 2nd Congressional
District. Clements heads One Church/One Addict, a Washington D.C.-based
program matching faith communities with substance abusers to help
them better their lives. In 1981 he became the first Catholic
priest to adopt a child. Lambert retired to Albuquerque, N.M., after serving as director
of Calvert House, Catholic ministerial outreach at the University
of Chicago (1970-75), advisor for African American Affairs for
the United States Catholic Conference (1975-77) and a dean of
the South Suburban Deanery (1988-91), under then-Auxiliary Bishop
Wilton Gregory, now bishop of Belleville, Ill. While there have been tense moments, Clements took part in a 1998 honor for Lambert. “I would not have this Roman collar around my neck if it was not for Father Rollins Lambert,” he said.
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