Originally broadcast at 2 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 21, 2019.

The Rev. Eugene Taylor Sutton details the path forward to reach equality, and recalls his own experience as a Black man in America. Sutton, bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Maryland, speaks to the status of racial equality in the U.S., detailing four important steps: civil conversations; social critique; condemning racist language and behavior; and financial reparations.

Formerly the canon pastor of Washington National Cathedral and director of its Center for Prayer and Pilgrimage, Sutton has also served as a college chaplain, parish priest, and professor of homiletics and liturgy at Vanderbilt University Divinity School.

“When I speak today … I’m speaking as one who had to overcome what a society was telling him and all of his friends,” Sutton says. “Where are we now, 50 years after King? Are we better now than we were when I was growing up?”

About Chautauqua Institution: Chautauqua Institution is a community on the shores of Chautauqua Lake in southwestern New York state that comes alive each summer with a unique mix of fine and performing arts, lectures, interfaith worship and programs, and recreational activities. As a community, we celebrate, encourage and study the arts and treat them as integral to all of learning, and we convene the critical conversations of the day to advance understanding through civil dialogue. CHQ Assembly is the online expression of Chautauqua Institution's mission.