As we take time to reflect, it seems that summertime is becoming our annual season of discontent. And it is deeply worrisome for our country and therefore for us as individuals.

Last year we witnessed riots culminating in attacks on police, some of whom were simply seated unsuspectingly in their cars. Most recently we have seen street violence in Charlotte and elsewhere.

Clashes flowing from ideologies of anger and hatred have resulted in injuries and death.

As is so often the case, the violence has not even served as a release that somehow lowers the tension, like steam being released from a kettle. Instead, it leaves more anger, more of that sense of looking for the next outbreak.

Particular attention has been drawn to the organizations reveling in white supremacy and neo-Nazi ideology.

The day after the Charlotte violence, Cardinal Daniel DiNardo, archbishop of Galveston Houston and president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops offered a clear and Catholic response.

He said, “We stand against the evil of racism, white supremacy and neo-nazism. We stand with our sisters and brothers united in the sacrifice of Jesus, by which love’s victory over every form of evil is assured.

“At Mass, let us offer a special prayer of gratitude for the brave souls who sought to protect us from the violent ideology displayed yesterday,” he continued. “Let us especially remember those who lost their lives. Let us join their witness and stand against every form of oppression.”

But the hatred was not limited to white supremacists who organized the Charlotte rally. A reporter for the New York Times reported that she “saw club-wielding ‘antifa’ beating white nationalists being led out of the park.”

It is deeply disturbing to see in our midst the claims associated with white supremacy. The claims of any racial supremacy and therefore of a lesser dignity of any class of human beings is abhorrent under any circumstances.

For us as Americans, however, white supremacy is especially so. Our national history of the suffering of slavery has deeply marked our society.

White supremacy cannot be separated from the legacy of the horrors of the transportation and trade of Africans, the sale of human beings, and the abuse of individuals and slave families. As a country, we fought a terrible war largely rooted in racially based slavery that cost as many as 750,000 lives with more wounded.

Likewise, many families today have relatives who sacrificed and died to oppose the spread of Nazi ideology that murdered and enslaved millions. To mention the Nazi history is to recall the horrors of death camps. How is it possible to celebrate such evils in our society?

What links so much of this decay in our society is that the violence and ideologies are united by the absence and exclusion of God and of prayer.

The ideologies of hatred and the responses of violence attempt to fill the growing spiritual void of a country and individuals who are distanced from the love of God.

The declining numbers of people attending Mass or church on Sundays lessens the union with God by which He transforms us for the better.

The absence of prayer, in personal lives and in public, weakens our spiritual strength, and society suffers as a consequence.

As Catholics, we are convinced that our living of the Church’s teaching, especially Her moral teaching, our reception of the sacraments and our prayer each day are the path to personal salvation. But they also contribute to the spiritual strengthening of others in the world.

Prayers obtain grace of perseverance for some and conversion in others. Sin begets more sin. Bur prayer assists the whole world.

Anger and violence in our streets feed on the increasingly harmful and destructive tone of our political and social discourse. The answer is as it has always been; turn to God, love Him and ask for His forgiveness.