An Open Invitation to the Beloved Community
You and I are invited to a place of true love, a place that allows us to accept one another — with all of our strengths and weaknesses, virtues and sins. Popularized by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the Beloved Community is always open for citizens of the world. MLK provided us with his vision for this Community, which is on the mountaintop of compassion and acceptance. Here, each person knows their own self-worth and the inherent dignity of others. Here, we make tangible the desires for freedom, justice, and inclusivity. Most importantly, it is in this Beloved Community that the oppressor and the oppressed are reconciled to one another.
The kicker here, though, is that we all must make a concerted effort to make the Beloved Community a reality. Today, it is understandably difficult to envision and work towards this Community; the legacy of slavery, the prolonged greed of Wall Street, and gun violence in our schools have kept us in the darkness of despair. Fortunately, we have individuals such as MLK who have seen the Beloved Community and have become beacons of hope in this darkness. How do we realize the Beloved Community?
MLK said, “The end is reconciliation and redemption; the end is the creation of the Beloved Community”.
Many people seem to treat the very idea of reconciliation (not just the Catholic sacrament, but reconciliation as a whole) as irrelevant; in American society crimes must be punished in the court of law. If a transgression was committed against me, I must seek out punishment. In short, the guilty person must pay. In turn, justice has been dissolved into one singular focus: retribution.
I believe that reconciliation must be brought back into the forefront of our efforts to bring about the Beloved Community. The Catholic sacrament of reconciliation gives us a blueprint that profoundly reshapes our lives towards caring for one another. Here are the steps, re-imagined for our society.
1. Acceptance: the first step is always the hardest for us. We must provide a welcoming space for the oppressor and the oppressed to come together and begin this process of healing. Of course, I understand that this step seems insurmountable; would my mother ever be in the same room as Pol Pot? Could the oppressed ever face their oppressor? Yes, this is possible. It requires strength and kindness, not just for the oppressed, but also the oppressor. In this step, both sides must face the sin committed. Both sides must accept one another as fellow human beings, sisters and brothers in this one world.
2. Repentance: the oppressors must understand their actions in this sin (whether it be structural racism or systemic poverty), and directly address them to the oppressed. This direct interaction brings to light our shared humanity; we share our vulnerabilities to those that we have hurt, and we show that we understand the gravity of the sins committed that caused so much suffering.
3. Forgiveness: the oppressed comes to a place of full and utter love and mercy for the oppressor. This is a recognition of repentance, not an excuse to drop the consequences that the oppressor must still face. Again, this step requires courage and strength from the oppressed in order to forgive the oppressor.
4. Make amends: this love and mercy poured out endlessly would not go to waste. Now is the time for the oppressor to make intentional actions toward restoring the fullness of the oppressed. Of course, this absolutely means that both oppressor and oppressed work together in addressing these inequalities and injustices.
5. Redemption: what occurs here is the full restoration of the oppressed people’s dignity; the oppressor is also no longer shackled to known and unknown guilt.
In the words of Grace Lee Boggs: We urgently need to bring to our communities the limitless capacity to love, serve, and create for and with each other. We urgently need to bring the neighbor back into our hoods, not only in our inner cities but also in our suburbs, our gated communities, on Main Street and Wall Street, and on Ivy League campuses.
MLK also said, “We shall overcome because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice”. What MLK knew, but never said aloud, was that the arc of the moral universe leads us to the Beloved Community, where reconciliation and justice redeems us all.