The Diversity of Bolingbrook

When I was growing up in Chicago in the 1980s, I thought racial diversity only existed in cities.

Years later, as a seminarian, I was invited for a first interview with The Church of St. Benedict here in . It was a weekday afternoon and as I drove down Lily Cache to get to the church, Independence Elementary was letting out. I got stuck in the parent pick-up traffic, big time. It took twenty minutes to go three blocks.

But my mouth fell open when I saw that the kids pouring out of the school were all the colors of the rainbow.

Huh??? Where was I?

One of the comments on was by , who said:

what I think it means to live in Bolingbrook is diversity. My children go to school with a diverse group and, as a result, have friends of various ethnic backgrounds and do not identify their friends by those backgrounds. This is a world away from the white neighborhood/black neighborhood/ hispanic neighborhoods of 1980's Chicago and inner ring suburbs.”

Another, from :

Bolingbrook is a diverse community filled with people who want the best for their families.

A comment from on a similar  on the specialness of Bolingbrook by , a pastor at New Song Church:

...one of the things that drew me to this town is the blending of people from different ethnic backgrounds. I am reminded of this every time I come across a couple with different skin shades, or when their children look different. That is a beautiful thing. The city I came from had lots of different kinds of people, but it was not blended; it was compartmentalized into neighborhoods. We mix much better in Bolingbrook.

It’s a blessing to live in a place with so many different kinds of people. Whether the difference is race, political party, or taste in Christmas decorations. We all “want the best for our families,” as Lettuce said. How neat that part of the “best” for Bolingbrook families is to have neighbors and classmates who are different from us.

Let’s be honest, it’s not always easy to live in a diverse community. We can disagree. We can still have stereotypes about each other. We can still think to ourselves, “If only they thought / behaved / voted the way I do, this world would be a better place.” 

Bolingbrook proves that people who are different can call the same place "home." We can fill the comment sections of Patch.com with disagreements and still call each other "neighbor." Maybe I sound like a greeting card, but we live in a country and a world that dearly needs to see that's possible.