Several black Christian leaders suggested the “Catholic Spring”
leaked emails showed “open contempt for religious freedom” and asked
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton whether their own
communities would be safe.
“The black church has served the poor for over two centuries; our
response to Christ’s call to care for all people has strengthened the
black community and contributed to civil society in important ways.
Freedom to do all this must be guaranteed to the Black Church,” more
than two dozen leading black clergy, activists and intellectuals said.
The leaders from Pentecostal-Charismatic Christian denominations
signed the Oct. 30 letter, “An Open Letter to Hillary Clinton Regarding
Religious Freedom for Black America.”
For the signers of the open letter, several hacked emails published on
Wikileaks indicated an effort “to subvert Catholic teaching on sexuality
by planting externally funded groups in the church to advance a
politically correct agenda.”
The February 2012 emails exchanged between Clinton’s present campaign
manager, John Podesta, and progressive leader Sandy Newman questioned
whether a controversy over mandated contraceptive coverage could be an
opportunity to “plant the seeds of revolution” among Catholics against
their bishops, in Newman’s words. The emails invoked the imagery of the
“Arab Spring” revolts.
Podesta indicated Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good and
Catholics United had been created for this purpose, but lacked
leadership. He suggested former Maryland Lt. Gov. Kathleen Kennedy
Townsend be consulted.
The emails troubled the signers of the open letter, who stressed the
value of black churchs' freedom to serve their neighbors and communities
in accordance with their faith.
“Will black pastors and intellectuals be free to lead and guide our
communities in accordance with our widely accepted faith-based knowledge
tradition?” they asked. “How will your policies encourage or discourage
our authority to lead?”
They requested a meeting with Clinton during her first 100 days in
office to discuss critical issues in the black community such as
education and employment, religious freedom, violence, and “justice for
the unborn.”
According to the letter, about 80 percent of 41 million American blacks are members of historically black churches.
The letter’s signers said that where religious freedom and conscience
is at stake, “we are prepared, for the sake of the gospel, to suffer
the consequences of standing on our convictions.”
“We must resist what Pope Francis has called the ideological
colonization of people of faith,” they added. “We do not organize to
suppress the freedom of other groups. We do, however, insist upon having
freedom to fulfill our call to righteous living and service to
humankind.”
“A well-financed war is now being waged by the gay and lesbian
community in the U.S. and abroad on the faith of our ancestors,” they
charged. The letter questioned “the drive to normalize immoral sexual
behavior.”
“Their argument that religious freedom laws are historically and
existentially equivalent to Jim Crow laws rests on false assertions.
Partisans who make these arguments have declared war on the truth of the
black experience as well as on the freedom of faithful Americans to
follow their consciences.”
The letter’s signers said a fundamental concern is their right as
religious leaders to minister to their congregants and to the black poor
regardless of religious belief “in a manner consistent with their faith
convictions.”
The open letter to Clinton also voiced a Christian view against abortion.
“The vast majority of black churches hold biblical teaching, which is
eternal, as authoritative for doctrine and practice,” the letter said.
“Abortion is the deliberate destruction of a human life in its most
vulnerable state … For the same reasons that we as black Christian
leaders oppose racism, unjust wars, capital punishment and euthanasia,
we oppose the violent denial of life to the unborn through abortion.”
The letter’s signers said abortion has had a “catastrophic impact” in
the black community, with 365 black babies aborted for every 1,000
born. In 2013, more black babies were aborted in New York City than were
born.
“How do you justify your unconscionable silence in the face of such
destruction of innocent black life?” they asked Clinton. “Don’t black
lives matter? What policies would you pursue as president to reverse the
soaring abortion rates among black women?”
The letter called for justice in cases of “egregious behavior” by
police officers, citing the death of the New York man Eric Garner, who
died when police officers attempted to detain him and appeared to use a
prohibited chokehold. It voiced an urgent concern about police violence
against blacks that appears to go unpunished. It also lamented the high
murder rate among black men.
The open letter cited concern about unemployment, especially among
young black men, whose unemployment rate is as high as 33 percent.
The letter also cited overseas religious freedom problems, including
the displacement of millions of Christians from their homes in the
Middle East.
The letter’s signatories include Pentecostal Presiding Bishop Charles
E. Blake of the Church of God in Christ in Los Angeles; Jacqueline C.
Rivers, executive director of the Boston-based Seymour Institute for
Black Church and Policy Studies; Bishop Frank Reid III, chairman of the
Social Justice Committee of the African Methodist Episcopal Church;
Bishop Lemuel F. Thuston, vice chairman of the general assembly of the
Church of God in Christ; and Prof. Frederick L. Ware of Howard School of
Divinity.
The letter was also critical of Clinton’s April 2015 remarks before
the National Organization of Women. That speech discussed girls’
education, women’s mortality rate, and access to safe childbirth and
“reproductive health care,” a common euphemism for abortion.
Clinton said rights must be put into practice and “deep-seated
cultural codes, religious beliefs and structural biases have to be
changed.”
The open letter construed this as a denial of religious freedom.