Anti-Racism Committee (ARC)
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About This Ministry
St. Ignatius Parish is grappling intentionally with the realities of systemic racism and racial unrest in our country, church, and parish. This racial reckoning stems from the murder of George Floyd, an African American, by police officer Derek Chauvin on May 25th, 2020 in Minneapolis, Minnesota and the spate of anti-Asian attacks San Francisco experienced during COVID. The social era that emerged from these events inspired the birth of our parish's Anti Racism Committee (ARC), formed by a group of committed parishioners passionate about racial justice.
The committee meets every 1st Tuesday of the month at 5 pm via Zoom to plan programs for the parish to grow in its commitment to be anti-racist, and track progress on the Anti-Racism Strategic Plan.
Racial Justice offers an opportunity for education and theological reflection to discern ways we can work for racial justice in our daily lives through articles, community events, and the framework of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius.
As a parish, we engage in topics on racial justice because working for racial equity stems directly from our call as followers of Jesus. A man of his own culture, Jesus encountered the Syrophoenician Woman who taught him that his ministry was for all people, not just the people of Israel. He was able to break out of his preconceived notions shared by his cultural background. Consequentially, Jesus preached a message of radical inclusion and acceptance where all might be freed from chains of division and exclusion. Racial justice ministry at St. Ignatius Parish invites us to follow the lead of Jesus: to prayerfully consider where we are being invited to grow so that we individually and as a parish may work for racial equity.
Secondly, the Universal Apostolic Preferences of the Society of Jesus compel us to “walk with the poor, the outcasts of the world, those whose dignity has been violated, in a mission of reconciliation and justice.” Since our founding as a nation, many racial minorities have had their dignity violated and been deemed the outcasts of our society, what Pope Leo XIV (in Magnifica Humanitas) calls this "ontological dignity", "the dignity that belongs to every human being simply by virtue of existing, of having been willed, created and loved by God." To take up the call of the Society of Jesus in our own context is to work for racial equity and reconciliation. Our hope is that as a parish we will be more equipped to do this work following this discernment series.
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Discernment SeriesRacial Justice
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The Discernment Series, originally published in 2021, offers a collection of reflections on racial justice published in a biweekly newsletter, starting the week of the Baptism of the Lord and ending in Pentecost.
Read Archive -
Book Talk: Racial Justice
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Contact Us
If you have an interest in, or question about, the ARC (Anti-Racism Committee) at St. Ignatius Parish, please fill out this contact form to receive a response from Ana Gonzalez-Lane, chair of the Anti Racism Committee (ARC) at St. Ignatius Parish.
Contact ARC chair, Ana Gonzalez-Lane -
News
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September 30Every day when we watch the news, we see stories of war, famine, civil unrest, and global climate change forcing people to leave their homes and seek refuge in other lands. Unfortunately, this is not a new phenomenon. On Sunday, October 5, the Church observes the 111th World Day of Migrants and Refugees, an opportunity to reflect on the connections between hope, migration and mission. It began in 1914 to support the high numbers of people from the rural portion of southern Italy and the island of Sicily who were departing because of economic hardship with little hope of ever improving their lives.Read More
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August 27“Our response to the arrival of migrating persons can be summarized by four words: welcome, protect, promote and integrate.” - Pope Francis. Today, this response to a migrating person – welcoming, protecting, promoting and integrating them into the United States – also needs to include migrants who may have been here for years or even decades. One way to offer protection is to share information about certain rights and protections that all people in the United States, regardless of immigration status, have under the Constitution. That's where red cards come in. Immigrant Legal Resource Center’s (ILRC) red cards give examples of how people can exercise these rights, for instance when interacting with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) or other law enforcement agencies.Read More
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July 28My first exposure to the slave trade outside of something I read in a textbook was a visceral experience I had when I visited the Slavery Memorial at the Christiansted National Historic site when I lived on the island of St. Croix in the US Virgin Islands. St. Croix was a Danish territory from 1733 to 1917 and one of the centers of slave trading in the Caribbean. There are records of more than 100,000 slaves that were brought, confined, auctioned and sold in St. Croix from 1734 to 1803. The Danish West India Company kept meticulous records of the origin, family composition and disposition of each slave which were mostly sourced from what is now modern Ghana in West Africa which was also a Danish colony.Read More
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July 22My mother and I met in Romania this summer to prepare a memorial service for my uncle’s one year death anniversary and to put the home I grew up in for sale. I was not able to attend the funeral, so it was a particularly solemn visit for me. We wanted the presence of an elder, Mihai, the last surviving sibling of my grandmother at the memorial, so we went to our ancestral village to pick him up. At 85, he was jovially riding his bicycle on the unpaved medieval road.Read More
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