Deacon Harold Burke-Sivers, a Black Catholic deacon of the Diocese of Portland, Oregon, author, and co-host of EWTN's Morning Glory radio show told Catholic World Report in August that, like Brown, he draws a distinction between a movement and an organization.
"When you put those three words together-black lives matter-as a social movement, it's a statement of truth, which is a good thing."
"But the term 'black lives matter' has been conflated with the national organization, Black Lives Matter. In a lot of people's minds, when you say 'black lives matter,' people automatically think of the national organization," he lamented.
Noting that the organization's values "raise some red flags" for him, he mentioned especially that the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation does not address the importance of fatherhood.
"Look at all that, plus the violence that is being perpetrated, the rioting, the looting, the tearing down statues, all of these things," the deacon said. "No Catholic in good conscience can have anything to do with a group like that. Period."
Brown's essay said that the U.S. needs to address "racial discrimination and unjust inequality," but called for a Christian approach to those issues.
He pointed to "police misconduct and racial discrimination in our criminal justice system, and to the disproportionate suffering that COVID-19 has wrought in many communities of color."
"As a black man, I am pained to learn of police officers killing unarmed black people."
"As an attorney who has also worked as a staffer in Congress and the executive branch, I have seen that the majority of law enforcement officials are good people seeking to protect and serve," Brown wrote, but "racial discrimination in the criminal justice system continues in the form of racial profiling, police misconduct, and discriminatory criminal sentencing."
Pointing to healthcare inequality, exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic, Brown noted that "Even once this health crisis ends, many African American communities will still not have the medical care they deserve. Historical patterns of racial exclusion have exacerbated negative health care outcomes. Ensuring that the vulnerable have access to proper medical care is necessary to restoring a culture of life."
Brown's essay came as polling shows declining support for the Black Lives Matter movement, and after the destruction of police stations and other public buildings amid protests in some cities, and the shooting of two Los Angeles sheriff's deputies Sept. 12.
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On that date, a gunman approached a parked police car near the light rail station in Compton, California, opening fire with a pistol at the two police officers inside. Both survived despite multiple gunshot wounds, and the shooter fled on foot.
The officers, a 31-year-old mother and a 24-year-old male, had been on the job less than a year, Sheriff Alex Villanueva said after the shooting.
The incident garnered additional attention because of a protest that took place later that evening outside St. Francis Medical Center, where the officers had been transported for surgery.
A video posted by a local journalist on the scene shows several men shouting at a group of police officers outside the hospital, and one can be heard shouting "I hope they [expletive] die."
Police arrested two people in connection to the protest, including the journalist who filmed the scene; the journalist was released later that night with a citation for obstructing a police officer.
Protestors blocked the path of the ambulance carrying officers to the hospital, and the LA County Sheriff's office said via Twitter: "DO NOT BLOCK EMERGENCY ENTRIES & EXITS TO THE HOSPITAL. People's lives are at stake when ambulances can't get through,"