Collaborative Organizing for Racial Equity: An Ignatian Response

Jamal Adams, Director of Equity and Inclusion, Loyola High School of Los Angeles,  USA shares this personal reflection of the creation of CORE, the Jesuit Conference of Canada and the United States‘s Jesuit West’s Collaborative for Racial Equity Toolkit. 

I am hurting…
I am tired…
I am frightened…
I am frustrated…
I am confused…
I am angry…
I am…

Jamal Adams and I am the son of Kenneth Adams, a scholar who grew up in the segregated south, the grandson of Edward Adams, a college professor and college basketball coach before integrating college sports, great-grandson of Charles P. Adams, the founder of Grambling State University. I am also the Director of Equity and Inclusion at Loyola High School of Los Angeles. Given this context and our national reality, I pray that you understand my opening. It seems we have entered into a tumultuous perfect storm of anger, blaming, and violence. From our stay at home realities due to COVID-19, the genuine economic despair of so many Americans, the continual replaying of the graphic deaths of unarmed black citizens at the hands of law enforcement, and the infighting between the two major political parties in an election year, we find ourselves amid a “social earthquake.”

As Catholic, Jesuit schools, we are called to be agents of change – to be men and women for and with others. In the speech given by Fr. Pedro Arrupe, S.J., that gave rise to this terminology, he not only called upon his listeners to commit acts of service but also to dismantle systems of injustice. This call to confront the very structures of injustice is challenging, yet we cannot let the call’s daunting nature prevent us from taking action. Racism is one of those systems of injustice. Buoyed by the centering of voices of despair demanding that their lived experience be respected and that the proverbial knee is lifted off their neck, the Jesuit Global Community has been called to live our Mission intentionally in the most prophetic way. Pope Francis reminds us of this calling when he challenges Jesuit educators to form “mature people who are simple, competent and honest, who know how to love with fidelity, who can live life as a response to God’s Call, and their future profession as a service to society.”

It is time to leave what is safe and stand in solidarity with our BIPOC brothers and sisters for a hope-filled future built on the bedrocks of mutuality and kinship—in September of 2019, Jesuit West Provincial Fr. Scott Santarosa asked a gathering of Jesuit leadership in Santa Clara, “are there enough injustices against the people we love to consider flexing our Jesuit muscle again and regularly. The beloved is there before us: the immigrant, the gang member, the hungry, the incarcerated, the single mother separated from her deported husband. Are we offering to the beloved all the gifts we are truly in possession of? Can we also offer our power?” With that as our backdrop, it was an honor this summer to be part of many hands that created Jesuit West’s Collaborative Organizing for Racial Equity Toolkit. I would particularly ask anyone venturing into the toolkit to start with the section entitled, Reflections to Start. This section allows one to begin internalizing proper terms and language, learn about best practices around norm-setting for challenging discussions, and reflect on several questions designed to one’s personal, intrapersonal, and institutional relationship with Racial Equity. Good luck and God Bless!

Please note: this article was originally published in JSN Hemispheres September 2020