The Tablet February 11, 2021
Shannen Dee Williams, assistant professor in the department of history at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, addresses the Leadership Conference of Women Religious assembly in Atlanta Aug. 10. (Photo: Michael Alexander/ Georgia Bulletin via CNS)
NEW YORK When it comes to the earliest orders of Black Catholic religious sisters in the United States, Shannen Dee Williams wants people to recognize the perseverance, struggle, and commitment to God they put forth to make religious life possible for Black women and girls in the United States something she considers overlooked.
Williams, an assistant professor of history at Villanova University, understands the sisters’ legacy through years of interviews and sifting through records. And when she asks black Catholic sisters about their legacy, they understand it too.
Opinions | Black Catholic women like Amanda Gorman are forgotten prophets of American democracy Shannen Williams Amanda Gorman, the first national youth poet laureate, speaks during the inauguration of President Biden and Vice President Harris on Jan. 20. (Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP/Getty Images) On Jan. 6, a mostly White mob attacked the nation’s Capitol in a violent attempt to overturn the election of the nation’s second Catholic president and first female, Black and Asian American vice president. Two weeks later, 22-year-old Amanda Gorman took the stage at the Biden-Harris inauguration in front of the same Capitol, and delivered a sermon on equality and hope in the face of lethal resistance with her poem, “The Hill We Climb.”