Pope's slavery apology draws praise as Jesuit slaveholding legacy turns to reconciliation

In the days after the encyclical was released May 25, Maddox said she came to view the apology as "the first step" rather than a final resolution.

"I do not think it's the last word," she said. "I believe it's the beginning of more to come."

The Descendants Truth & Reconciliation Foundation emerged from efforts to address the legacy of one of the most consequential slave sales in American Catholic history. In 1838, the men's religious community the Jesuits sold 272 enslaved people from plantations in Maryland to Louisiana buyers in a transaction intended to help stabilize Georgetown University's finances. The descendants of those enslaved families, together with Jesuit leaders, later established the foundation as part of a broader reconciliation effort.

The organization traces its origins to research that brought renewed attention to the 1838 sale and has since focused on educational advancement, racial healing and dialogue between descendants and the Jesuits. Through scholarship programs and community initiatives, it seeks to address the long-term effects of slavery while promoting what its leaders describe as restorative justice.

Maddox said that for descendants, reconciliation is a long-term process rather than a single event.

"Healing is a journey. It doesn't happen overnight. We may feel better for a moment, but it is a journey," she said. "As someone who lives this past every single day, I work through this foundation and work with Jesuit priests who pray for the families who have been enslaved every single day. That is healing."

Some Black Catholics have said the pope's statement, while welcome, came too late and did not go far enough. But Jesuit Fr. Timothy Kesicki, chair of the Descendants Truth & Reconciliation Foundation and a central figure in Jesuit apologies related to slavery, rejected the notion that acknowledgment can come too late.

"I never think something is too late, because if you say it's too late, that means you can't do it," he said. "I don’t believe that our sins have an expiration date."

"[But] If I've hurt someone, until I acknowledge that hurt, that pain lives in both of us," he said.

"We want others to replicate what we're doing," Kesicki said. "There are hundreds of universities and banks and insurance companies and churches, to name a few, that benefited and found their roots in slaveholding. This is a way for them to connect with others, their historic descendants and partner together on making our lives better until we heal from this historic sin," he said.

Jesuit Fr. David Collins, a historian at Georgetown who chaired a Georgetown University initiative known as Slavery, Memory, and Reconciliation — originally formed to address the issue of renaming a building dedicated to the Jesuit superior responsible for the sale of slaves — said one of the most important developments over the past decade was the increasing role of descendants themselves in reconciling their ancestors' journeys with the church.

Collins cautioned against focusing exclusively on what the Vatican might do next.

"The real work of racial reconciliation is done by those who can hear words like that and whose hearts are moved," he said. His hope, he added, is that the pope's statement encourages broader participation in reconciliation efforts.

Among scholars and religious of race and Catholicism, reactions have been positive but more qualified.

Fr. Bryan Massingale, a professor at Fordham University and one of the most prominent Catholic voices on racial justice in the U.S., described his initial response as surprised.

"I was not expecting this treatment of enslavement, especially about the church's complicity in it," he said.

Massingale said that the encyclical includes an important acknowledgment by recognizing that slavery was not merely the work of isolated individuals acting against church teaching.

"For the first time, we're seeing a pope say that these agents were acting with the official approval of the church," he said. At the same time, he identified limitations.

"It's a crack, because nowhere in the document does it talk about the fact that this was a racialized enslavement," he said.

Magnifica Humanitas includes no acknowledgement "of the church's support for and complicity with an ideology of white supremacy that is at the core of enslavement and the core of colonization," Massingale said.

"The document is important," he said. "I think it's a positive step, but it's a very limited step, especially when dealing with something that's so complicated and complex in a single paragraph."

Massingale said that future efforts should include a more comprehensive Vatican treatment of slavery, a national truth-and-reconciliation process in the U.S., and stronger formation on racial justice in seminaries and Catholic educational institutions. "We cannot get beyond our racial, tragic past without a confrontation with our history. We can't get over something that we've never acknowledged," he said.

Nate Tinner-Williams, co-founder and editor of the Black Catholic Messenger, said he was surprised to learn that no pope had previously issued an apology explicitly acknowledging the Vatican's role in sustaining slavery.

"The church had never actually said we as an institution at the highest level helped perpetuate the slave trade," he said.

For Tinner-Williams, the timing of the apology is notable because Leo is both the first American pope and the first pope known to have African ancestry. "I would say it's better late than never, and what better time than with the first American pope and the first pope with known African ancestry, including enslaved people?" he said.

Like others interviewed, he emphasized the need for action by American bishops.

"I think there's still a lot of work to be done in fully reckoning with the fact that the church was a major part of what perpetuated this institution here in America," he said. That legacy, he said, continues to shape Black Catholic communities today.

Sr. Barbara Spears, president of the National Black Sisters' Conference, also welcomed the pope's statement, saying she felt the desire to pen a letter of gratitude to Leo after she read the encyclical.

"Wrong is wrong in any aspect, but so many times we pick and choose. I felt like the Holy Father could have talked about AI and what he thought about that and never mention slavery, but he did," she said.

She also expressed hope that the apology would encourage continued dialogue and reflection among Catholics.

"Words are empty without actions," she said. "I hope it will keep the conversation going. It will force us to begin to work."

"I know there are places I'm not welcome as an African American religious and I've been 65 years serving this church. I know that, but I'm not going to let it stop me from doing what I feel God calls me to do. That's what I want other Catholic people to do, that's what I want our bishops to do, just to live the Gospel, follow our words," she said.