January 18, 2009
Change
This year as our nation commemorates Martin Luther King Day, we reach a milestone as the first African American is sworn in as president this week. I realize that when I was a child it was legal in parts of our nation to separate blacks from whites in education, transportation, commerce, etc. Within one lifetime, how things have changed! One of my biggest hopes for President Obama’s administration is that just as there is no longer legal segregation based on race, that there will be no longer legal avenues which discriminate against people based on their age. Right now, children in the womb don’t have legal rights that protect them from death. Our laws discriminate against little people who are so young that they cannot yet speak for themselves.
Some would think that my hope is foolish. Yet I want to give each new leader a chance to grow into grace. I hope that the truth will set the new administration free to act on behalf of the defenseless. In that way this milestone in American history will be doubly profound: we’re ending discrimination based on race AND we’re standing up for the youngest of human lives.
The bishops of the United States wrote to the president-elect:
“Dear President-elect Obama,
I write to you, in my capacity as President of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, to express our congratulations on your historic election as President of the United States. The people of our country have entrusted you with a great responsibility. As Catholic Bishops, we offer our prayers that God give you strength and wisdom to meet the coming challenges.
Our country is confronting many uncertainties. We pray that you will use the powers of your office to meet them with a special concern to defend the most vulnerable among us and heal the divisions in our country and our world. We stand ready to work with you in defense and support of the life and dignity of every human person.
May God bless you and Vice President-elect Biden as you prepare to assume your duties in service to our country and its citizens.
Sincerely yours,
Francis Cardinal George, OMI
Archbishop of Chicago”
I say, “amen.”
