As spring semester comes to a conclusion and the joyous celebration of Commencement approaches, Georgetown made time this week for several significant events related to Sr. Thea Bowman. Bowman, a Roman Catholic religious sister considered a “Servant of God” (meaning that she is on the path to canonization by the Church), made important contributions in her lifetime both to her faith community and to the world. University President DeGioia captured some of Sr. Thea’s defining legacies in his announcement:
“[H]er vibrant Christian faith; her Protestant roots; her joining the Catholic community and the Franciscan Sisters of Perpetual Adoration; her courage in calling the Catholic Church and our nation to more fully engage with Black Catholics and to reject racism; her own academic background and role in establishing scholarship around the Black Catholic experience; her embrace of music as a form of ministry; and her faith-filled service and witness in living the Gospel.”
The context for honoring Bowman at the University is the naming this week of the chapel in Copley Hall in her honor. The chapel in Copley is both a consecrated Catholic chapel and the spiritual home for Georgetown’s Protestant community. An ecumenical service took place to commemorate the naming of the chapel and included the Roman Catholic Cardinal Archbishop of Washington, Wilton Gregory, as well as Fr. Mark Bosco, Vice President for Mission and Ministry; Rev. Ebony Grisom, Interim Director of Protestant Ministry; and Rev. TauVaughn Toney, Protestant Christian Chaplain. The event featured lively music provided by Georgetown’s Gospel Choir along with reflections by President DeGioia and testimonials about Bowman’s life from religious women who knew her well.
The celebration of Sr. Thea continued into the evening as the Initiative on Catholic Social Thought and Public Life hosted a Dahlgren Dialogue: “Faithful Life, Powerful Legacy, Continuing Lessons.” The panel of distinguished leaders explored key questions about the implications and lessons of Bowman’s life. At the center of the discussion was the recognition of the burdens Sr. Thea bore in battling the intersecting oppressions of racism and patriarchalism. She faced these challenges along with other marginalizations as she sought to lift up the Black Catholic experience in a Church and society that too often excluded and excludes the fullness of Black identity and experience.
All of the panelists pointed to Bowman’s 1989 address to the U.S. Catholic Conference of Bishops for insights about how to proceed today with hope in spite of the dispiriting challenges to greater inclusion and justice for marginalized persons and communities. Sr. Thea’s lively and courageous embrace of her own authentic self was a resource for her loving actions in the world and offers inspiration for us today:
“What does it mean to be Black and Catholic? It means that I come to my Church fully functioning. That doesn’t frighten you, does it? I come to my Church fully functioning. I bring myself; my Black self, all that I am, all that I have, all that I hope to become. I bring my whole history, my traditions, my experience, my culture, my African American song and dance and gesture and movement and teaching and preaching and healing and responsibility – as gifts to the Church.”
The panelists described a necessary caution in interpreting the significance of Sr. Thea’s life. It would be a temptation to reduce her life’s work only to the cause of racial justice and fail to appreciate the many other ways that she worked against social structures of exclusion. To honor Sr. Thea in a genuine way, the panelists agreed, is to live out her message by proactively and continuously standing with people of color, through policies, practices, and ways of being community, in the pursuit of justice and the common good. That would truly be honoring Sr. Thea’s legacy!