The people most regularly involved with the Covenant also have full time pastoral or administrative duties and were unavailable for comment. The steering committee, which consists of Humberto Cardinal Medeiros of the Roman Catholic archdiocese, Bishop Edward G. Carroll of the United Methodist Church, Rabbi Herman Blumberg of the American Jewish Committee, Luster, Fr. Ernest Serino of St. Catherine's in Charlestown, Fr. Walter Waldron of the Cathedral of the Holy Cross in the South End, and Dr. Virgil Wood, dean of the African-American Institute at Northeastern University, still meets at rotating locations each Thursday to discuss ways to make the Covenant work. As of last February, some 275,000 people had signed the statement, and programs for youth participation, a pulpit exchange between churches, and emphasis on social services were announced in a shiny new pamphlet issued this fall.

Luster maintains faith that the Covenant will succeed, even if it takes a very long time. "I don't see it as failing, because I've seen a few times when the Covenant has helped people do right and not feel bad about doing right. It was an opportunity to set the climate for people to be as moral and ethical as they possibly could."

If there is disappointment surrounding the Covenant, Luster blames the people who expected it to do too much. "I think people assumed the Covenant was going to be a Band-Aid for a multiplicity of evils," he said. "A covenant is a contract, a vow between a supreme being and a human being, or between human beings."

"The Covenant can be nothing more than a way to persuade people to enter into a different kind of relationship--one of respect--regardless of sex or color," Luster said.

But people in a racially tense city still doubt the Covenant's effectiveness. Two people with a lot of questions are Richard and Kathleen Doherty of Dorchester, whose 19-year-old son Michael died in a unique situation last March. Michael, a student at Boston English High School, was at the Columbia MBTA station when he noticed three white youths attacking a Black man. He approached them and told them to stop. The white youths turned on Doherty and chased him onto the Southeast Expressway, where a car struck and killed him. When it happened, the significance of his action was nearly unrecognized by public officials, the local media, and the Covenant committee.

Richard Doherty, talking about his son's death five months later, made no effort to hide his anguish and bitterness. "I didn't get anything from Archbishop Medeiros," Doherty, an Irish Catholic said. "I dont' understand it. He's put millions of dollars behind that peace coventry [sic], for the pins and all."

"Instead of that peace coventry they could've used Michael's death, for nothing--zero."

The Covenant

Because as People of Faith we believe we are sons and daughters of God and brothers and sisters to one another;

Because as Americans we are committed to the fundamental constitutional principle that all people are created equal and are endowed with certain inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness;

Because we know that Freedom for everyone is the only climate conducive to full development of the human spirit;

And because we have witnessed in our society and in our city enough of conflict and violence so as to threaten the very fabric of our freedoms and diminish the dignity of us all;

Be it here resolved:

(1) That we seize the moment for a new day of peace and harmony in our common existence;

(2) That in our deeper reverence for the God who commands us and for the nobility of humankind that impels us, we denounce every form of violence in every neighborhood, we lay aside the weapons and words of political conflict, the taunts and jibes of insidious disrespect;