Pope Sends Strong Message to US Catholics After Floyd Death

Pope Francis called George Floyd by name two times in a speech last week. And he offered support to an American religious leader who knelt in prayer during a Black Lives Matter protest.

Normally, the Vatican government might have shown a less direct reaction to killings² by police officers and protests against racism³ and police abuse. But the intense support for the protests clearly signals where the Vatican wants American Catholics to stand before the November election in the United States.

Anthea Butler is a presidential visiting fellow at Yale Divinity School, a religious school of Yale University in Connecticut. She said Pope Francis "wants to send a very clear message" to Catholics who support President Donald Trump⁴ that "this is just as much an issue as abortion⁵ is."

Butler, who is African American, said the Vatican is telling Catholics "to pay attention to the racism that is happening and the racism that is in your own church in America."

The Vatican has long spoken out about racial injustice⁷. And popes dating to Paul VI have voiced support for the civil rights movement in the U.S. and Martin Luther King Jr.'s message of nonviolent protest. Francis spoke⁶ King's words at length during his historic speech to the U.S. Congress in 2015. He also met with King's daughter, as the pope before him had done.

Alberto Melloni is a church historian in Bologna, Italy. He said the attention that Francis and the Vatican have given to Floyd's killing¹ is unusual. It suggests it is a planned message aimed at Catholic churches in the U.S. that the Pope has long criticized for its political and ideological⁸ partisanship⁹.

During his speech, the pope said, "We cannot close our eyes to any form of racism or exclusion," while acting¹⁰ as if we are defending the value of every human life.

Francis has been unhappy that the American church is "obsessed¹¹" with abortion, birth control and gay marriage while ignoring church's teachings on racism, immigration and poverty. And U.S. President Donald Trump is reaching out to Catholic voters with his anti-abortion policies.

The Pope spoke out after Trump had his picture taken in front of an Episcopal church near the White House. To make the picture happen, law enforcement used tear gas to push protesters away from a nearby park.

A day later, the highest-ranking African American bishop¹² in the U.S., Wilton Gregory of Washington, D.C., denounced Trump's visit at a religious place honoring St. John Paul II.

Last week, the pope called Bishop Mark Seitz of El Paso, Texas after seeing a picture of Seitz kneeling in prayer at a Black Lives Matter protest. Seitz has also taken a leadership role in demanding fair treatment for migrants attempting to cross the southern U.S. border, a cause Francis supports.

The Vatican would likely not want to be viewed as choosing sides before the U.S. election. But Francis was not alone in making the Vatican's views known.

The Vatican City newspaper, L'Osservatore Romano, had three Floyd-related stories on its front cover last Sunday. They were about peaceful protests, aggressive policing methods and injustices¹³ suffered by black Americans.

Natalia Imperatori-Lee is a professor of religious studies at Manhattan College in New York. She told the Associated Press that the Vatican's message is having an effect on American Catholics.

A poll from a religion research organization last week found a sharp drop between this and last year in the percentage of white Catholics with a high opinion of Trump. It was at 37 percent near the end of May 2020 compared with 49 percent across 2019.

Imperatori-Lee said the test will be if Catholic religious leaders are still speaking publicly about racism six months from now and what happens when Catholics vote in November.

I'm Anna Matteo.

Words in This Story

kneel - v. to move your body so that one or both of your knees are on the floor or ground

fellow - b. an advanced student at a university who is given money to pay for food, housing and other things

abortion - n. a medical procedure used to end a pregnancy¹⁴ and cause the death of the fetus¹⁵

church - n. A building that is used for Christian¹⁶ religious services

partisanship - n. The act of strongly supporting a particular leader, group, or cause

poll - n. an activity in which many people are asked questions to get information about what most people think about something

obsessed - adj. to think and talk about someone or something too much

bishop - n. a Christian official who is ranked higher than a priest and usually in charge of church matters in a geographical¹⁷ area

migrant - n. a person who goes from one place to another, especially to find work

1 killing   

n.巨额利润；突然赚大钱，发大财

参考例句：

• Investors are set to make a killing from the sell-off.投资者准备清仓以便大赚一笔。
• Last week my brother made a killing on Wall Street.上个周我兄弟在华尔街赚了一大笔。

2 killings   

谋杀( killing的名词复数 )； 突然发大财，暴发

参考例句：

• His statement was seen as an allusion to the recent drug-related killings. 他的声明被视为暗指最近与毒品有关的多起凶杀案。
• The government issued a statement condemning the killings. 政府发表声明谴责这些凶杀事件。

3 racism   

n.民族主义；种族歧视(意识)

参考例句：

• He said that racism is endemic in this country.他说种族主义在该国很普遍。
• Racism causes political instability and violence.种族主义道致政治动荡和暴力事件。

4 trump   

n.王牌，法宝；v.打出王牌，吹喇叭

参考例句：

• He was never able to trump up the courage to have a showdown.他始终鼓不起勇气摊牌。
• The coach saved his star player for a trump card.教练保留他的明星选手，作为他的王牌。

5 abortion   

n.流产，堕胎

参考例句：

• She had an abortion at the women's health clinic.她在妇女保健医院做了流产手术。
• A number of considerations have led her to have a wilful abortion.多种考虑使她执意堕胎。

6 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

7 injustice   

n.非正义，不公正，不公平，侵犯（别人的）权利

参考例句：

• They complained of injustice in the way they had been treated.他们抱怨受到不公平的对待。
• All his life he has been struggling against injustice.他一生都在与不公正现象作斗争。

8 ideological   

a.意识形态的

参考例句：

• He always tries to link his study with his ideological problems. 他总是把学习和自己的思想问题联系起来。
• He helped me enormously with advice on how to do ideological work. 他告诉我怎样做思想工作，对我有很大帮助。

9 Partisanship   

n. 党派性, 党派偏见

参考例句：

• Her violent partisanship was fighting Soames's battle. 她的激烈偏袒等于替索米斯卖气力。
• There was a link of understanding between them, more important than affection or partisanship. ' 比起人间的感情，比起相同的政见，这一点都来得格外重要。 来自英汉文学

10 acting   

n.演戏，行为，假装；adj.代理的，临时的，演出用的

参考例句：

• Ignore her,she's just acting.别理她，她只是假装的。
• During the seventies,her acting career was in eclipse.在七十年代，她的表演生涯黯然失色。

11 obsessed   

adj.心神不宁的,鬼迷心窍的,沉迷的

参考例句：

• He's obsessed by computers. 他迷上了电脑。
• The fear of death obsessed him throughout his old life. 他晚年一直受着死亡恐惧的困扰。

12 bishop   

n.主教，（国际象棋）象

参考例句：

• He was a bishop who was held in reverence by all.他是一位被大家都尊敬的主教。
• Two years after his death the bishop was canonised.主教逝世两年后被正式封为圣者。

13 injustices   

不公平( injustice的名词复数 )； 非正义； 待…不公正； 冤枉

参考例句：

• One who committed many injustices is doomed to failure. 多行不义必自毙。
• He felt confident that his injustices would be righted. 他相信他的冤屈会受到昭雪的。

14 pregnancy   

n.怀孕，怀孕期

参考例句：

• Early pregnancy is often accompanied by nausea.怀孕早期常有恶心的现象。
• Smoking during pregnancy increases the risk of miscarriage.怀孕期吸烟会增加流产的危险。

15 fetus   

n.胎，胎儿

参考例句：

• In the fetus,blood cells are formed in different sites at different ages.胎儿的血细胞在不同时期生成在不同的部位。
• No one knows why a fetus is not automatically rejected by the mother's immune system. 没有人知道为什么母亲的免疫系统不会自动排斥胎儿。

16 Christian   

adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒

参考例句：

• They always addressed each other by their Christian name.他们总是以教名互相称呼。
• His mother is a sincere Christian.他母亲是个虔诚的基督教徒。

17 geographical   

adj.地理的；地区(性)的

参考例句：

• The current survey will have a wider geographical spread.当前的调查将在更广泛的地域范围內进行。
• These birds have a wide geographical distribution.这些鸟的地理分布很广。