Dear CSB and SJU Community Members:

Today, our state mourns another life of a Black man killed by law enforcement. As a Benedictine community, we believe deeply in the power of prayer. Please hold in prayer Daunte Wright’s family, friends, and neighbors – including those within our CSB+SJU family who knew Daunte. And, please join us in praying for peaceful protestors, for just actions by law enforcement, and for changes in the racial disparities that lead to so many young lives lost. CSB and SJU Campus Ministries are available for ongoing conversation, prayer, and support.
As an institution informed by Catholic social teaching, we also see the necessity of action. Our work to be an inclusive community calls us to be informed, to learn, and to use the tools of a liberal arts education to process what we are learning. To that end, we urge you to participate in events planned for this week:

• IISS Support Group
  Henrita Academic Building, Rooms 117 & 118
  5:30 p.m. on Monday, April 12
  
  
• No More Elegies: Responding to Racist Violence and White Supremacy through Writing
  https://csbsju.zoom.us/j/97269567520
  6 p.m. on Tuesday, April 13
  
  
• Pursuing Justice: A Candlelit Guided Meditation
  Meet at CSB Mall
  3:15 p.m. on Wednesday, April 14
  
  
• Peace and Positivity Walk
  Begins at Gorecki Center
  4 p.m. on Wednesday, April 14

Thank you for engaging in reflection, learning and action, and for using your voice to speak, from a place of our values, about the importance of dismantling racism in all its forms.

Sincerely,

Laurie Hamen, J.D.
Interim President
College of Saint Benedict

Eugene McAllister, Ph.D.
Interim President
Saint John’s University