When difference becomes strength

There was a time, not so very long ago, when a soft drink company believed it could teach the world to sing.

In a now-iconic Coca-Cola commercial from the early 1970s, young people from different countries stood shoulder to shoulder on a hillside, singing about harmony, shared purpose, and the idea that people did not have to be the same to stand together.

Idealistic? Certainly. Naïve? Maybe. However, it was also rooted in a simple truth that remains relevant today.

At a time when division has become both profitable and performative, Burke County has been living out a version of that old promise, inside a brick church on West Union Street.

As Editor Emeritus Bill Poteat writes on 1A, Father Ken Whittington arrived at St. Charles Borromeo Catholic Church more than 30 years ago, when Burke County looked very different from what it does today. It was the early ’90s, and a growing number of Hispanic workers were beginning to settle in the area. They were drawn here by jobs in poultry plants, furniture factories, and textile mills.

Over time, families followed. Cultures mixed. The county changed.

Today, St. Charles Borromeo serves more than 700 families that come from different backgrounds — White, Hispanic, Hmong, Guatemalan — and yet share a common spiritual home.

That growth did not happen overnight, and it did not happen by chance. It unfolded through steady, often unremarkable choices to welcome people as they arrived.

Rather than viewing cultural differences as hurdles to overcome, St. Charles found ways to work within them. Father Ken learned enough Spanish and Hmong to celebrate the Holy Eucharist in all three languages spoken in the church. Not to make a statement, but to meet people where they were.

In a world where division often dominates the conversation, that experience stands out. Not because it offers easy answers, but because it shows what can happen when people approach change with openness rather than anxiety.

Burke County, like many communities, continues to evolve. New residents arrive. New needs emerge. Traditions shift, sometimes in ways that feel uncomfortable. Those changes can raise understandable questions about identity and belonging.

St. Charles suggests that growth does not have to mean loss.

Instead, it can mean expansion. Expansion of perspective, of relationships, of understanding. It can mean discovering that shared values often run deeper than surface differences.

Father Ken’s background in music offers an apt comparison. Music depends on contrast. Harmony is not created by everyone singing the same note, but by different voices finding their place together. A melody gains strength when it is supported, shaped, and balanced by others.

Over nearly 34 years at St. Charles, Father Ken helped guide a community that learned to do just that. Not perfectly. Not without effort. But with consistency and care.

As he enters retirement, the parish he leaves behind is firmly rooted and looking ahead. Its story offers a quiet reminder that communities do not have to choose between honoring the past and preparing for the future.

That old Coca-Cola commercial imagined a world singing in harmony. At St. Charles Borromeo, that idea has been practiced in smaller, more personal ways — week by week, family by family, voice by voice.

That lesson should not be confined to church pews.

Burke County, like many rural communities, stands at a crossroads. Cultural change is not a hypothetical — it is already here. The question is not whether our community will change, but how.

As Burke County continues to grow and change, there is value in noticing places where that harmony is already being lived out.