By Rita McInerney

The director of the Office for Black Catholic Ministry in the archdiocese of Atlanta has called “presumptuous” a statement attributed to Father George A. Stallings that black Catholics in Atlanta deserve a branch of the Imani Temple.

Rhonwyn Rogers, director of the archdiocesan office, said it was “presumptuous for (Father Stallings) to assume what is or is not taking place in Atlanta” when he had only been in the city for three days.

“To me it would be befitting to ask us and not to tell us,” Mrs. Rogers said.

A newspaper report quoted Father Stallings as saying that he had met with lay black Catholics in Atlanta and that he said, “I believe that the African-American Catholic community deserves an outlet here in the Atlanta area” of his breakaway church.

He was in the city for a few days in late October, preaching Oct. 29 at Ben Hill United Methodist Church.

“We recognize and realize that racism is prevalent in the Church and throughout society. Father Stallings is not the first to say that to us,” Mrs. Rogers said. She is a board of trustees member of the National Association of Black Catholic Administrators and of the National Black Catholic Congress, which drew together national black Catholic grassroots leadership in 1987. The pastoral plan adopted by the Congress is to be voted on by the U.S. Catholic bishops in Baltimore this week.

“Our black bishops have continuously asked us, as a people of the Church, to address the issue of racism, not just for the black community, but for the Church community,” she observed.

Mrs. Rogers sees change taking place within the Catholic Church, including more offices for black Catholics opening inside the structure of the Church; support being given the pastoral plan for black Catholics by bishops, both white and black, around the country and statements by Pope John Paul II. “The pope has charged us as black people in the Church to share our cultural gifts with the entire Church,” she said, citing this and other changes as “movements taking place within the Church.”

If racism is to be seriously addressed by black Catholics and all Catholics, she observed, “that change has to come from within the Church and not outside of it.”

Father Bruce Wilkinson, pastor of St. Anthony’s church, Atlanta, said that he had met privately with Father Stallings during his Atlanta visit.

Father Wilkinson said he would like the archdiocese to evangelize more effectively in the black community and expressed concern both about the number of blacks in the archdiocese who are unchurched and unreached by the message of the Catholic Church, and an unknown number of blacks who are Catholic but who are now attending other denominations in the city.

“I favor the archdiocese responding in a way that will help the Catholic Church in the black community grow,” Father Wilkinson said. “I hope that happens. Whether it will, I don’t know.”

A specific concern he has is the lack of awareness among pastors as a whole of the pastoral plan for evangelizing blacks that was drawn up by the Black Catholic Congress in 1987. “If you’re not aware of what the plan is, you can’t move on it,” he observed. He also said he was concerned about how fully the plan would be implemented after it is approved by the U.S. bishops.

Archbishop Eugene Marino, SSJ, said that Father Stallings’ appeal to black Catholics “can be moving, but the fact is that it doesn’t accomplish much in dealing with the real difficulties in the Church.” Pointing out areas of the Church that need change is one thing, but actually working to accomplish change requires staying within the Church and pursuing that path doggedly, he said. He pointed out the significant and growing accomplishments of Sister Thea Bowman, FSPA, who is charismatic, embracing of her black Catholic identity, and acting powerfully within the Church.

Merlin Todd, secretary of the Commission for Black Catholic concerns, which includes representatives of seven black or interracial parishes, said he did not see a need in the archdiocese for a branch of the Imani Temple.

Elements of African-American culture in worship, including music and liturgical dance, are available in various parishes in the archdiocese, already, he said. “I don’t think there is a need here. I don’t know why he chose Atlanta.” Father Stallings’ call for separate rite also struck him as unnecessary. “I think there are possibilities that can be explored” within the Church structure, he said.

Katherine Woodyard, former chairman of the Commission for Black Catholics Concerns, said emphatically that she did not think there was a need for Father Stallings to start a congregation in Atlanta.

While acknowledging that racism “will always be a problem,” she said. “I don’t think his method is the right one” for erasing it.

Two dioceses already have experience in dealing with the conflict for black Catholics between Catholic parishes and branches of the Imani Temple.

Eileen marks, spokesperson for the archdiocese of Washington, D.C., said in a telephone interview that “the story that has not been in the headlines for the past three and a half months is that while 1,500 to 2,000 black Catholics are attending Imani Temple most of our 80,000 black Catholics have stayed with their parish communities.”

It’s important to add, she said, “that Cardinal (James) Hickey and the entire Catholic community would feel that just one black Catholic leaving would be one too many.”

St. Teresa of Avila parish, Father Stallings’ former parish, is the parish where “the loss is felt the hardest,” she said.

Robert Edwards, communications director for the diocese of Richmond, Va., said Kuji Temple in Norfolk drew about 300 people to its first service. It is now meeting every other week in a Unitarian church, he said, after having to move out of a public high school because of a decision against their staying by the local school board.

The congregation was expected to draw most of its worshippers from St. Mary of the Immaculate Conception parish, but the pastor, Father Walter C. Barrett, said approximately 10 people have left the parish to attend services at the temple.

Both Father Stallings and Father Bruce Greening, a Salvadorian priest who leads the Kuji Temple, have been suspended.

(Gretchen Keiser also contributed to this article.)