Florida Catholic | Black History Month

Black History Month

Mass celebrates solidarity, identity and diversity.

PEGGY DEKEYSER | FLORIDA CATHOLIC PENSACOLA-TALLAHASSEE BUREAU EDITOR

Published: 02.15.08

Father Ian Bordenave, pastor of St. Anthony of Padua Parish in New Orleans, preaches at the 27th annual Mass commemorating Black History Month Feb. 3 in Fort Walton Beach. Father Bordenave grew up in Okaloosa County and served in the military before becoming a Dominican priest.
CARL RICHARDSON | FC

FORT WALTON BEACH | With a birth certificate from Keesler Air Force Base, Miss., that listed him and his parents as Negro, Dominican Father Ian G. Bordenave grew up thinking of himself more as Creole — French and Spanish — than as Negro. To escape discrimination, his family, when they moved to Eglin Air Force Base in northwest Florida in 1967, played down their ethnicity.

It was a story not unfamiliar to a number of participants in the 27th annual liturgical celebration commemorating Black History Month Feb. 3 at St. Mary Church. Heads nodded as Father Bordenave, now pastor of St. Anthony of Padua Parish in New Orleans, recalled growing up without a clear understanding of his African-American heritage. In fact, he said, in completing a school history project while a student at St. Mary, his brother discovered that many more of their ancestors came from Europe than from Africa, and most had distinctly French names. Indicative of the pain and turmoil of the times, others with similar backgrounds did the same thing 40 and more years ago: pass for white, or as the French would say, “passe-blanc.”

The Mass, sponsored by the Catholic African-American Cultural Awareness Group of Okaloosa County, calls attention each year to the importance of the contributions of African-American Catholics to the church and to society. In welcoming Father Bordenave back to northwest Florida, the group continued a tradition of bringing prominent black clergy to preach at the Mass. Father Bordenave grew up in Valparaiso and attended St. Mary School and Niceville High School. He graduated from the University of Dayton with a degree in chemistry, and served in the U.S. Army from 1988 to 1992.

Before the Mass, the Eglin Brotherhood Choir presented a selection of traditional gospel music and hymns. As a prelude to the entrance rite, members of the liturgical dance group from St. Joseph Parish in Pensacola presented a traditional African call to worship. Roland Simmons, CAACAG president, introduced Fort Walton Beach Mayor Mike Anderson, who presented a key to the city to Father Bordenave. The combined choirs of St. Joseph and St. Anthony of Padua churches in Pensacola provided music for the Mass.

Times change, and Father Bordenave’s life took a turn when he entered the Order of Preachers, or Dominicans, in 1993. His soul searching, as he discerned his vocation, led him to seek out his true racial identity. It was a struggle through his years as a Dominican friar right up to the time of his ordination to the priesthood in 2000 in New Orleans. His work in New Orleans took on added focus after Hurricane Katrina, and he has labored hard to revitalize his parish and school and the surrounding neighborhoods.

“The African-American people of New Orleans have shown me God’s love. The students at our parish school, mostly African-American, with their smiles and their inquisitiveness, have opened up for me the gift of being black,” he said in his homily.

Tying his story to the day’s Gospel, Father Bordenave said the Beatitudes (Matt. 5:1-12) fly in the face of conventional wisdom. “But in the words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., ‘darkness cannot drive out darkness, only light can do that’ and in today’s Gospel, we’re shown that hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that. If we wish to convert someone to the way of goodness, to recognize the dignity and beauty of their creation and being, we have to stick with love. In the long run, if we wish to experience the grace of God and to lead others to experience it, we have to stick with love, and run contrary to conventional wisdom.”

In his closing remarks, Bishop John H. Ricard, SSJ, who celebrated the Mass, thanked Father Bordenave for exploring the issues of ethnicity in the context of faith because “as Catholics and as Christians, that is where we are called to consider, to discern all that is important to us.”

The issues of race and ethnic identity confronted by African-Americans serve as a reminder, a throwback to an earlier time, before globalization, the bishop said. “We are one human family in solidarity. As Catholics, above all, as members of one catholic, universal church, we must focus on what unites us, not on what divides us.”

Following the Mass, Deacon Willie O’Neal commented on how meaningful the Mass is each year for people from all backgrounds and all walks of life, as they come together to consider and praise God for “how wonderfully he has made each and every one of us.”

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Black History Month

Mass celebrates solidarity, identity and diversity.

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