Upcoming Events in the Community

Throughout the month of May, the St. Louis Public Library will host a variety of activities in celebration of Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. Explore the diverse cultural expressions of Asian peoples through art, history, food, and storytelling.  For more detailed information, go to bit.ly/SLPL-AAPI

Ongoing: Open every day, 9 am to 5 pm. The Old Courthouse at Gateway Arch National Park Has Reopened! Through a longstanding partnership with the National Park Service and the generous support of Gateway Arch Park Foundation's philanthropic donors, the Old Courthouse has undergone extensive renovations to introduce brand-new exhibits, update critical structural elements, and enhance overall accessibility, ensuring this historic building will remain vibrant for future generations. It’s only the second time the Old Courthouse has been renovated since its completion in 1862. Some of the most pivotal court cases in American history were heard inside its courtrooms. It is where Dred and Harriet Scott sued for freedom, Virginia Minor fought for her right as a woman to vote, and more than 300 enslaved African Americans filed suit for their freedom.

May 24th  9:45 am – 1:00 pm Racial History Tour of Calvary Cemetery
The origins of Memorial Day celebrations in the United States date back to the Civil War and involve the commemoration of soldiers who perished. It is believed that one of the earliest ceremonies was organized by African Americans recently freed from enslavement. Today, we honor all women and men who died in service of our country. It is also a time to remember our ancestors and all whose contributions helped to build the society we know today.

As part of your recognition of Memorial Day this year, please join other parishioners for a racial history tour of Calvary Cemetery. We will visit the burial sites of figures notable for their roles in the racial history of the St. Louis Archdiocese, the Jesuit order, and our civil society.

The tour will be conducted by Fr. Jeff Harrison, SJ, and Dr. Kelly Schmidt (Reparative Public Historian and Lecturer, Washington University). A bus will depart from College Church at 10:00 am and transport us to the specific locations within the cemetery. Our guides will share stories from the experience of these ancestors and the connection to our lives today. The tour will involve standing and some walking over the cemetery’s grassy slopes.

There is a $10 per person fee to cover the cost of transportation. Please bring payment in cash on the day of the event. All are welcome, but reservations are required and can be made using the QR code or the link: bit.ly/CALVARYTOUR

We will gather on the front steps of College Church by 9:45 am. The bus will return to College Church by 1:00 pm, and an opportunity for discussion of the experience will follow. 

For more information, please contact Lisa Burks at lmburks60@gmail.com or Winnie Sullivan at penultim@swbell.net.

May 24-26  St. Louis African Arts Festival. Celebrate the rich and diverse cultures of African and African American people through arts and crafts, clothing, jewelry, cultural demonstrations, traditional foods, and African films. World's Fair Pavilion in Forest Park. Free. Fri., 10 a.m. - 8 p.m.; Sat., 11 a.m. - 8 p.m.; and Sun., 11 a.m. - 6 p.m. stlafricanartsfest.com

Juneteenth Celebrations will be held throughout the St. Louis area, honoring the implementation of the Emancipation Proclamation in the final location in the Confederacy. Please review this listing of local events scheduled through the month of June: thestl.com/juneteeth-events/

June 2 8:30 am – 5 pm  The Freedom Suits Exhibit will once again be on display in the Law Library on the 13th floor of the Clyde S. Cahill Courts Building, 10 North Tucker. Descriptions and original documents illustrating the history of the Freedom Suit lawsuits may be viewed through the month of June. No advance registration is required.

June 21  9:00 am – 1:00 pm  The Archdiocese of St. Louis and the Office of Racial Harmony will hold its annual Maafa procession and prayer service. The event commemorates the millions of lives lost in the Middle Passage and Transatlantic Slave Trade and will include a prayer service at the Old Cathedral and a procession to St. John the Apostle and Evangelist Church.  Save the date!  Additional details will be available soon.

Through August 10  The Contemporary Art Museum, 3750 Washington Blvd., is holding an exhibit entitled Make the River Present. The interactive exhibition highlights present-day and ancestral stewardship of the Mississippi and Missouri rivers and surrounding environments, especially focusing on Indigenous and African American perspectives. A series of community-based events will be held through the summer. For more details, go to camstl.org/exhibitions/make-the-river-present/

For information about additional community programs, see the calendar of events at Seeds of Justice Network: seedsofjusticenetwork.org/

For more information about antiracism at College Church or to suggest upcoming events, please contact Lisa Burks at lmburks60@gmail.com or Winnie Sullivan at penultim@swbell.net. 

The Love of Christ Impels Us:
Becoming an Anti-Racist Parish

Click here to learn more about our parish Racism and Reconciliation committee.

What is anti-racism?  Racial prejudice usually means a belief that some racial groups are better or worse than others.   Structural racism describes the ways in which our institutions and structures create and maintain racial inequalities. Anti-racism goes beyond simply avoiding racism, and is an effort to oppose and dismantle racism and to promote racial equity.

Why is College Church talking about anti-racism?  College Church has a long history of ongoing commitment to justice and racial equity. More recently, since 2014 and the Ferguson uprising, we as a parish have been asking ourselves some hard questions about our role in racial inequality.  How have we ignored it? How have we supported it? How have we worked to change it? In addition, the USCCB recently released its pastoral letter against racism, which explains how the work of anti-racism is deeply rooted in our Catholic faith.

What anti-racism work has College Church been doing? Since June of 2018, parishioners and staff representatives who had been working in various ways on racial equity efforts within our parish have been meeting monthly as the College Church Anti-Racism Leadership Team. We hope to create a focused vision and mission for our parish to become an anti-racist institution. That means we want to be working purposefully to oppose racism and create racial equity: within ourselves as individuals, within our parish as a community, and within our city.  We are asking: How can College Church increase our commitment to dismantle racism? How can we grow in our understanding of racism and inequality? What would College Church look and feel like if our intentional identity was that of a truly anti-racist institution?

How are we doing this work?   We have connected with Crossroads, an organization based in the Midwest that helps religious communities and secular organizations learn how to do the work of anti-racism.  Their vision is that Racism dehumanizes us all —Dismantling racism heals us all.  Their method is to help organizations transform themselves, thereby transforming their communities. The Leadership Team attended a full-day training with Crossroads and has been using their tools to conduct focus groups within already established commissions and ministries within our Parish.  

Want to be involved?  Our team has been evolving and is still very much in the beginning stages of this work. We value the experiences and gifts of all of our parishioners and want to enrich the makeup of our leadership team. Please contact Christine Dragonette at christine@sfxstl.org if you are interested in being a part of this impassioned ministry.

Undoing Our Knots

The webinar, Undoing Our Knots, presented by Dr. Maureen O’Connell was presented on March 30 , 2023. In this talk, Dr. O’Connell Maureen O’Connell tells the stories of her Irish Catholic family’s history, sharing some of the choices her relatives made that reinforced racial segregation and inequity, often with the encouragement of a complicit church hierarchy. She further explores some of the spiritual practices of our Catholic faith that help us to undo our own knots and free us to create more inclusive Catholic communities. You can view the webinar at the following link: youtube.com/watch?v=h_A3-njwx40

Our Parish vision: antiracism

 

Our Parish Racial History

As part of the ongoing Parish Racial Equity Review under way at College Church, the History Committee has been discovering and sharing some of the concealed stories of race that are part of the formation of our city, the archdiocese, and our parish, including its relationship to St. Louis University, and the Society of Jesus.  Sharing these stories is part of our work to interrupt the systemic racism that persists within our institutions.  Highlights of our findings may be seen in a printed brochure available through this link.

In 2022, a series of presentations was held to provide a more complete understanding of the story of race that continues to impact us today.  Recordings of those presentations may be viewed through the following links:

Slavery, Faith, and the Pursuit of Freedom – September 18, 2022

Jesuit Ministry to African American Catholics – October 16, 2022

Voices of Resistance, Advocacy, and Activism – November 20, 2022

If you have questions or would like more information about these presentations or the work of Antiracism at College Church, please contact Winnie Sullivan at penultim@swbell.net or Lisa Burks lmburks60@gmail.com.

We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And to know the place for the first time.                                          
T.S. Eliot, Four Quartets