Thread by @gloria_purvis

“His parents were devout Catholics who said grace before and after meals, and led the children in a family rosary each day. Thompson discerned a calling to the priesthood, and while his white priest was supportive, his own diocese of Lafayette was not.“ commonwealmagazine.org/sign-contradic…

“He graduated from seminary in 1957, but his bishop would not accept him as a priest. Bishop Charles Greco of the neighboring diocese of Alexandria did accept him, and he became the first black priest to be ordained there.”

“While Thompson was grateful to Bp Greco for being the only Southern bishop willing to ordain him, the 2 frequently quarrelled, particularly about the treatment of black Catholics in the diocese. In 1963, Thompson gave an extended interview.....that did not sit well with the Bp.”

“Thompson held nothing back during the interview. His description of what life was like for black Catholics in the South at the time, including black priests, makes for painful, sometimes shocking reading.”

Unlike their wht Cath counterparts, blk Caths could NOT attend retreats or days of recollctn, both imp aspects of Cath devotional life, due to seg facilities. Moreover, blk Caths could ONLY attend a wht parish if the distance to the closest blk par was considered “inordinate.”

In one town where there was only one black Catholic and no black parishes, the white parish went so far as to pay someone to drive the black Catholic to a black parish in another town.

And even if a white parish allowed black Catholics to join because the distance to “their” parish was too far, they sat in a section segregated from the white parishioners and were allowed to receive the Eucharist only after the white Catholics had done so.

Thompson told Griffin that he was frequently treated as a second-class citizen within his own church, despite being a priest. Some white Catholics refused to call him “Father,” and he was often prohibited from attending certain churches for First Communions or confirmations.

He was not even allowed to say Mass at many why parishes. And as the only blk priest in the diocese, he was rarely invited to events w his fellow priests. He summed up how wht Caths in the Deep South viewed him as a blk Cat priest: “a Negro 1st, a Negro 2nd and finally a priest.”

When asked by Griffin about whether he had spoken to other priests or those in the hierarchy about the treatment of black lay Catholics and black Catholic priests, Thompson simply replied that he had “done [his] share of speaking frankly.”

Unfortunately, the hierarchy met his concerns w indifference. “It is suggested that I do not appreciate the complexities of the prob.” And while some bishops spoke out, Thompson explained...that the response of the church to racism both inside & outside of it was largely silence

Thompson refused to acquiesce, to remain silent in the face of such hatred. Moreover, black Catholics were unwilling to put up with prejudice in the church any longer. Thompson’s concluding comments on this point are stark:

There are many Catholics who do not go to Church because the pain of this kind of humiliation is simply unbearable.

Think of going to Church, going to Communion, and in order to receive Christ you must wait until every white Catholic has gone to the Communion Table and returned to his seat—knowing that you might well be skipped if you approach the altar while some white person was still there.

Think of that encouraging people to receive Communion. Many do, of course, but with a deep sense of sickness, and then resentment that even this great Sacrament should be clouded in indignity for them.

Unless the church took a radically different approach, both speaking out and taking action against racism, Thompson envisioned the small black Catholic population becoming even smaller—a dire possibility that would have consequences for the entire church.

“Each day we see more Negroes disillusioned with what they call ‘the white man’s Christianity,’” he said. “And each day we see more whites disillusioned by the same scandal; let’s not forget that.”

Bp Greco tried to stop the publication of the interview, first by legal means and then through canon law. Just months before it was published, he believed he had succeeded; he was livid when that was not the case.

On November 21, shortly after the interview was published, Greco wrote a scathing letter to Fr. Thompson from Rome. His anger is palpable from beginning to end.

He tells Thompson that his appraisal of the church "in her relation to the racial problem in the South is exaggerated, distorted and misleading, and constitutes a defamation."

Greco tells Thompson the interview amounted to "unjustified slander" against the church, made all the worse by the fact that it was expressed by a priest "consecrated to protect her interest."

Greco ended the letter saying that he expected more from someone who wouldn't be who he was apart from the church.

The Church had done much 4 u as a Cath & as a priest, & u owe her all that u r 2day. But the image of Ur Mother the Church which u, her son, have projected 2 the 🌍 is unfair, is a disservice 2 her & has inflicted a deep wound upon her. We pary [sic] God we may be able 2 heal it.

The ltr came as a shock 2 Thompson, who felt that he was simply speaking the truth abt the situation 4 blk Caths in the South. How could truth be defamation? Moreover, none of what he said should have been a rev 2 Greco given the # of times he had spoken to him abt these problems

Thompson did not allow Greco's letter to keep him from continuing to speak out about the church’s complicity in racial prejudice.

Thompson listed.. all of the ways he, as a blk Cath priest, as well as blk lay Catholics, were treated as 2nd class Catholics throughout the U.S....he emphasized that blk Caths in his diocese cont’d to experience prejudice, and that this was not isolated to the South

When he went to Minn MN 2 give a series of sermons 4 a parish mission, the priest at this parish called another **priest** in the diocese 2 ask if Thompson could come speak to his CCD class. The shocking response he received was, “I don’t want any n*gger priest talking my kids.”

Can we show the non-Cath that the Negro is integrated in every phase of Cath life? I fear if we went out now & tried 2 show the non-Cath Negro we r interested in him as a person he might refer us back 2 what is happening in r own Church & say “Baby get ur own home straight 1st.'"

Thompson's intervw & his ltr to Abp Dearden only scratch the surface in telling us abt the kind of oppression he experncd throughout his life. In an unpublished journal Griffin kept from 1964–1966 about Thompson, he describes in detail the threats Thompson faced on a daily basis.

Thompson’s friends and neighbors had businesses and homes bombed, and Thompson received regular threats against his life. “[Thompson] told me that he had been told the Klan promised to get three Negroes in Ferriday,” Griffin writes, “one of whom was ‘that n*gger priest.’”

But throughout it all, Thompson’s primary concern was for those under his care. He feared for the lives and well-being of his black parishioners, but also expressed concern for the white racists.

Thompson talked about his unwillingness to go uninvited to the homes of dying white Catholics for "fear that person would commit an act of hatred on his or her deathbed" and so put their soul in peril because of their racist reaction to his presence.

As for his own safety, Thompson told Griffin that he was willing to die if God willed it. "Don’t worry so much," he said. "Think how nice it will be if they get me—I can go to Heaven young."