Throughout the five-day National Eucharistic Congress, nationally-known speakers joined with bishops and one astronaut to speak witness to the faith. Gloria Purvis, author, commentator and host of her own podcast, spoke July 20 about an issue that doesn’t get enough attention within the Church – racism.
A native of Charlotte, North Carolina, Purvis joined the Catholic faith at age 12 after being exposed to the Eucharist at the Catholic school she attended.
“I remember the silence in front of the monstrance with our Lord exposed being completely consumed in flames,” she recalled to more than 50,000 people who gathered at Lucas Oil Stadium that evening. “I knew my body was on fire, but it didn’t hurt. I can still feel it all these decades later. But in that moment of being consumed by those flames, I immediately knew what was in that monstrance was real, was alive, and I was changed.”
The next day as her teacher, Sister Carmelita, took the Catholic students to prepare for confirmation class, Purvis said she was supposed to be Catholic. Sister Carmelita told the young child to get her parent’s permission.
“When I went home, I didn’t do what she said. I didn’t ask for permission. I, in my 12-year-old voice all proud and sure, said to my parents, ‘I’m going to become a Catholic.’ I remember my father looking at my mother and saying, ‘What is she talking about?’”
Her mother explained that being Catholic meant she would have to go to Mass every Sunday and every Holy Day of Obligation, refrain from eating meat on Fridays, and pray the rosary.
“Got it. So, that’s what I did,” Purvis said, adding that no one in her house ate meat on Fridays because her practical mother was not going to cook two dinners.
Quoting Genesis 1:26, “Then God said, Let us make man in Our image and likeness,” Purvis illuminated the meaning.
“There is a profound truth about who we are, not just in our relation with God, our cosmic ancestor, but in relation to one another,” she said. “Because if we’re all made in the image and likeness of God, that means we are brothers and sisters one to each other. We are one human family. This is God’s Word. This is God’s truth.” This drew heavy applause. “There is that unity that is real because God spoke it. And there are other signs of unity, visible signs of unity that I think about with the Church.”
But, she reminded everyone, racism is a form of disunity that is a direct affront to God’s word.
“It rends the bonds of the human family. When God said make man in our image and likeness, he didn’t qualify it. Racism, this ethnic hatred, this racial hatred says, ‘No God. Not everyone is made in your image and likeness. They’re not all worthy of dignity and respect.’ Stop the deception! Reject the devil, lies and temptation! And we must get away from this idea that racism only attacks some. No, it attacks all of us because we’re a family. Those of us deceived by or beneath our dignity as God made us. Those of us who are victims of it are frustrated by people who treat us beneath who we are. We are one human family.
“We as believers have the ability to make repairs of these moments of disunity. We have the ability to look at these things that are wrong.”
Purvis asked her audience how we can reject being Christlike and not sacrifice to be Christlike.
“We have the opportunity to follow the steps of our savior by making repairs. And we should remember if nothing else, sin is a cheap offense towards God who we love. That should be motivation enough to say, ‘No Lord, let my sacrifice, let my prayers, let my almsgiving, my fasting be a balm to the marks against Your faith.’”
The former co-host of EWTN’s “Morning Show,” Purvis speaks on life issues, religious liberty, and racial justice.