One of ours.

Bill Clinton & African-Americans

One of the best homilies I've heard in recent years was given on the Feast of the Holy Family in my parish church, Saint Mary's, in Evanston, Illinois. Father Chuck LaChance was reflecting on the day's Gospel reading, in which Saint Matthew related how Joseph came to accept Mary as his wife, despite the surprising and distressing discovery that she already was with child."

Assured in a dream that it was "by the Holy Spirit that she has conceived this child," Joseph "did as the angel of the Lord had directed him and received her into his home as his wife."

"It's interesting to note," LaChance observed, "that the life of the Savior began in what most people would think of as a disaster."

That observation - and Joseph's saintly example of faith and acceptance - keeps coming back to me as I reflect on what some people consider the surprising and remarkable support that African-Americans have given President Bill Clinton from Day One of his Lewinsky troubles. It's really not that surprising or remarkable if you appreciate that "disasters" like Jesus are so common as to be almost routine among black Americans. And so, for that matter, is the kind of response manifested by Saint Joseph.

I have only my anecdotal observations to support this statement, but I suspect it would be hard to find an extended black family gathered for Thanksgiving dinner in the United States that conforms perfectly to the common ideal: Every child conceived in wedlock; no single mothers; no "love children"; every husband perfectly faithful to his wife and vice versa. (I suspect it would be hard to find such a family of any ethnicity, but we black folks seem to have less trouble admitting it.)

For a host of reasons, all stemming in one way or another from our tragic history as a people in this nation, we seem to have learned that life, especially family life and the sexual behaviors and emotional attachments that underlie it, are seldom simple and clean and perfectly orderly. On the contrary, they are almost always complicated and ambiguous and untidy. But the result, always, is family.

When I was growing up in rural East Texas, it was not uncommon, as we drove around the community, for the old folks to wave to someone sitting on a front porch or trudging down a dusty road and then tell us children, "That's your cousin." When we'd ask how they fit into the family tree, it often became clear that they weren't from one of the main branches, but had been grafted on somehow. Somebody - usually a male - had strayed off the straight and narrow and that person, that "cousin," was the result. The relationship was known and acknowledged, and the person was almost always cared for and included. And when the family gathered, they were invited. Because they were family.

It's not just because he is a Southerner who talks often and with such obvious sincerity about racial justice and fairness that black people cotton to Clinton. It's not just because, in the face of a furious right-wing assault, he said that we should "mend, not end" affirmative action. It's not just because his presidency has seen unprecedented prosperity and economic advancement for black Americans. It's not just those things, though all of them help. What most accounts for the African-American attachment to Bill Clinton is the perception that, in some way at some deeply spiritual level, he is one of us. He is, in a sense, family.

Clinton's own family background certainly is part of it: the traveling salesman father who apparently was not fastidious in his adherence to his marriage vows; the putative half-brother who apparently was fathered by Bill's wayward dad; the widowed mom who scuffled to raise her two boys and survive a relationship with an alcoholic second husband; the drug-addict younger brother who somehow pulled through, and the boy Bill himself, bright, charming, determined to succeed in the world but never, it seems, blessed with a male role model worthy of the name. It could be the story of any number of black people, any number of black families.

What makes Clinton special is that, unlike so many other white people, he never tried to deny or paper over this untidy family background. (Look at the denial that has surrounded Thomas Jefferson and his paternity of Sally Hemings's children for the last two centuries.) He couldn't have. His mother was too much her own person for him to have hidden her away, even had he been so inclined. Besides, why should he have? She had raised a president of the United States, and that's a distinction even very few blue-blooded families can claim.

He handled the revelation of his previously unknown "half-brother" with the kind of grace and decency one ought to - after all, it was no reflection on him in any case. And as for his younger brother, he seems to have been a helpful, protective big brother. No embarrassment. This was family.

So when it developed that Clinton had strayed from his marriage vows, I suspect it was neither surprising to most African-Americans nor disillusioning. After all, it happens. Remember, the life of the Savior of us all began in just such a dubious, difficult circumstance.

It also was not difficult, I suspect, for most African-Americans to believe Clinton when he said that, despite his moral failing, he desperately loved his wife. Such emotional paradox also is part of life. It's not always neat and tidy. In fact, it most often isn't. But again, that's what family is about.

So it is no surprise that African-Americans have remained loyal to and supportive of Clinton more than any other group. His life, his background, is a lot like ours as a people. And the attitude is, "Well, Bill, you've gone and messed up. But come on in and take a seat at the table. You're still family."

Don Wycliff is the editorial page editor of the Chicago Tribune.