All Souls Matter

Such rhetoric oversimplifies the position of countless Catholics perplexed by the call to join the BLM revolution. They are far from being the cold, heartless and oblivious Christians Mrs. Bruenig paints in her op-ed. They are filled, however, with legitimate concerns that need to be addressed.

Of course, these Catholics can pronounce a lowercased “black lives matter” without any problem. The Catholic Church was the institution that, for the first time in history, broke the back of “systemic” slavery that was the fate of most people in the ancient pagan world. The argument the Church advanced back then was that everyone is created with an immortal soul redeemed by Our Lord Jesus Christ. And thus, all souls matter.

For this reason, the Church went forth and taught all nations, races, and peoples baptizing them and instructing them on how to live lives of Christian virtue. The Church has a long and honorable history of seeking after the salvation of souls wherever they might be, even to the ends of the earth. She never wavered in her conviction that all souls matter.

Thus, Catholics are by their nature anti-racist. They ardently desire the salvation of all souls, without exception, regardless of race. Of this, there can be no doubt.

Attached to Unacceptable Causes

The doubts come when it is time to pronounce the uppercased brand: Black Lives Matter. Attached to this label are causes and philosophies that clash with the Church’s solicitude for the salvation of souls. Reluctant Catholics wonder how BLM activists can fail to grasp that the message being transmitted by the movement is: Not all souls matter.

The cry of these three volatile words implies an endorsement of the breaking of God’s moral law since the BLM movement enthusiastically embraces the LGBTQ+ cause and Planned Parenthood. The echoes of this catchy slogan resound on the violent streets of Portland, Oregon, where cursing Antifa and BLM rioters burn Bibles and U.S. flags, destroy property and injure police officers of all races. Intertwined in the motto’s short syllables is a Marxist class struggle narrative in bitter conflict with the Church’s social teachings and responsible for the death of tens of millions of lives…and the eternal damnation of countless souls.

Is it any wonder that Catholics cannot bring themselves to utter these three words that can represent a spectacular clash with the Great Commission, which affirms that all souls matter? Justice demands that the BLM subversive and immoral positions be rejected since they contain falsehoods by which souls might well be lost. Unless the movement abjures these evil influences, it cannot command the respect, much less the allegiance of those Catholics who sincerely want to help.