A Spiritual Awakening : Part 2

Failing America's Faithful: How Today's Churches Are Mixing God with Politics and Losing Their Way
by Kathleen Kennedy Townsend

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Not so long ago, our churches helped engage their congregations in the fight for social justice in the world. But today I am unhappy and dissatisfied with my Church and its failure to honor its best traditions. It is time for all of us to do what we can to reclaim those traditions, and to reclaim our churches.

When I was twelve years old, I lost my uncle John Kennedy, who was one of America's most beloved presidents, in a brutal murder that to this day remains one of our nation's pivotal moments. The memory is etched forever in the minds of those old enough to remember where they were when they heard President Kennedy had been shot.

I was in my music class at my school, Stone Ridge, Convent of the Sacred Heart, when Mother Mahaney came to tell me the news. I immediately went home, where already many friends of my parents had gathered. I was too young to understand it fully, but I did realize that we had been struck by enormous loss. My normally loud and laughing home was now hushed.

I went upstairs to my parents' room and discussed what had happened with a great friend of my father, Dave Hackett. How could this have happened? Wasn't my uncle fighting the good fights - against communism and for civil rights, against poverty and for a more peaceful world? He'd inspired millions of young people across the globe with his call to service. How could his own public service not have been protected? Where was the God we prayed to every day to guide and protect Uncle Jack in his leadership? Did He know this had happened? Did He care?

On the day President Kennedy was buried, my father, Robert Kennedy, gave me a note he had handwritten that day. He was devastated. He had spent most of the time trying to comfort Aunt Jackie, and working out the vast logistics, protocol, and transition in the wake of his brother's death. But what he wrote to me did not convey fear, anger, or bitterness. He focused on the future and my duty to family and to our country. "Dear Kathleen, You seemed to understand that Jack died and was buried today. As the oldest of the Kennedy grandchildren - you have a particular responsibility now - a special responsibility to John [my cousin] and Joe [my brother]. Be kind to others and work for your country. Love, Daddy."

Can you imagine, in your own moment of unimaginable loss, reminding your child - and reminding yourself, really - to turn outward, not inward, to perform works of kindness and not of anger or revenge? It still stops my breath to think of him stealing away on that chaotic, dreadful day, for a quiet half-minute at his desk to make sure I would have this message with me always.

My father's message was very clear as he entrusted me with his sense of duty to family and to country. This duty was built on a foundation of Christian teachings about service to others and social justice. The promoters of that tradition, our priests and nuns, taught us weekly of the need to do good works in the world. And supporting them there was the entire Christian iconography, as interpreted by the Catholic Church, teaching us that the good life did not come just from following the rules and resisting temptations - after all, Jesus did not follow the rules - but from taking our faith out of our houses of worship and putting it into practice. And the more resources God had granted us, the more we were responsible to help those to whom less had been given. As Christians, we hold the suffering and agony of the Passion, death, and Resurrection of the Son of God at the very center of our faith. We reenact them every time we participate in the sacrifice of the Mass. These were miracles, but they are also guides for our own lives. The spirit in which we live will endure in the work we have done, and in the friends and foes we have made.

Even when I was twelve, the iconography and transcendent power of faith was as much a part of me as my lungs or my heart, and it provided me with a story to help me make sense of my uncle's death. In those immediate days and weeks after the assassination, I could not look at the image of Jesus without thinking of my uncle. No, he wasn't a saint, or the Son of God. But I could remember him sitting on the presidential yacht, named for his grandfather Honey Fitz, who had been a member of Congress and Boston's mayor, surrounded by family and friends, as he discussed the latest challenges in Washington - what to do about the segregationist Southern senators, or how to handle Soviet aggression in Berlin. My uncle's death had made me wonder why we should work for justice if justice was not to be given in return. But in thinking of the model of Jesus' life, I also was forced to embrace the model of Jesus' death. And in that, the tragedy of my uncle's death became bearable.

During the five years following Uncle John's assassination I watched my father carefully. In his immense sadness, he, too, wondered how and why this loss could have happened. How did God allow this? He wondered what he should do, what his public role should be. Could one's sense of duty be present if the universe made no sense? Through his years of searching for answers, my father resisted the temptation to despair, to be vengeful, to give in to bitterness.

This was difficult for him. He was home much more than before, much more quiet and less energetic. He spent many hours in his room alone. But he prayed, read Greek poets and Shakespeare, looking first to understand fate, and only later to accept faith. He reminded himself that the ways of God are inscrutable, and that our mission from Him is earthbound, and focused on helping one another.

My uncle and my father had always been a team. Over time I witnessed my father emerging from his shattering loss to reengage in public life, this time alone. As he found his way through his grief, he grew in sympathy and sensitivity to the loss and pain he found in the lives of others. He became more tender in his actions and feelings for Americans who were caught up in the throes of the wrenching reckoning of the civil rights movement.

Copyright © 2007 by Kathleen Kennedy Townsend

About the Author

Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, the eldest child of Robert F. Kennedy, worked in the U.S. Department of Justice before serving two terms as Maryland's lieutenant governor. She has taught at Georgetown University and the University of Pennsylvania, speaks regularly on political and religious issues, and is engaged in philanthropic work. She and her husband have raised four daughters and live in Baltimore.