Friday, June 19, 2015

Reflections on Charleston...



I just returned from a prayer vigil at Baber AME Church on Meigs St. where a couple hundred of us gathered together, Black and White, to mourn the loss of nine sisters and brothers in Christ at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston.  We were told by their pastor that no liturgy was planned; that we just needed to come together in prayer and let the Spirit lead us; and lead us she did.

We heard the call of the prophet to let justice roll down like a mighty stream; we heard the words of Paul reminding us that Christ breaks down all barriers; and that if we don’t have love, we have nothing.  We heard a story of Jesus calming storms with a word; and we joined our voices in prayer and in song proclaiming God’s unstoppable and mighty acts of love.  To say that it was a powerful experience to worship with my Black sisters and brothers in Christ is an understatement.  

And yet in the midst of that kairos-time, the “elephant” of racism was still in the room.  Despite the feeling of being in solidarity with my Black sisters and brothers by hugs shared and hands held, the fact remains that I am not.  I am not in solidarity because I am a White, Anglo-Saxon male with all the racist privileges that come with it.  Unlike the young Black man helping lead us in worship, I can go into any department store assured that I will not be followed by security for fear that I might steal something.  I can walk down Main St. in Rochester and will probably never see women clutching their pocketbooks or crossing to the other side of the street fearing for their safety when they see me coming.  I can be assured that a routine traffic stop by police will not result in my being shot to death by those whose job it is to protect me.

Unlike Pastor Simmons at Baber AME Church, I don’t have to worry about copycat killers coming into my church to kill because of my skin color.  I don’t have to wonder if I’ll come home alive tonight because of a Bible Study I’m leading.  And unlike my Black siblings in Christ who live in South Carolina, I don’t have to drive down streets named after Confederate generals who fought a war to keep me enslaved.  I don’t have to wonder why a Confederate flag , a symbol of racial oppression, flies over the very building in which lawmakers are entrusted with every citizen’s well-being; and even then why that flag continues to fly at full mast in the midst of the Charleston massacre.  I don’t have to listen to the viral hatred spewed by those who claim to be “losing their country” to people like me. 

So, though I may stand with my Black brothers and sisters in the struggle against racism, I must also acknowledge that I will never be able to know what it’s like to walk in their oppressed shoes.  I must come to grips with and confess my own comfort with White privilege.  I must confess my own tendencies to stereotype and categorize those who seem different from me.  I must confess my default mode of doing nothing to curb racism by convincing myself that everything is okay.   Only when I have repented of these sins can I come clean and truly stand beside my sisters and brothers who are oppressed.

I will continue to pray ceaselessly for the friends and family of those who were brutally slaughtered just because they showed up for prayer and Bible Study, offering hospitality to the stranger.  I’ll pray for peace and justice in our land; I’ll pray for healing and reconciliation among races; I’ll keep God’s prophetic mandate of doing justice, loving kindness, and walking with God before me as I strive for systemic justice and equality.  I will repent of my own racist tendencies as I continue to follow the One who himself died an innocent victim of brutal violence.  And I will give thanks to God that because violence didn’t ultimately have the last word in Jesus’ life it won’t have the final word in ours.

And may we all be reminded of the gospel proclamation found in the very name of the church in which this unimaginable violence took place:  Emanuel.  “God with us”. 


Peace and Love,
Pastor Doug


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