JOURNAL QUOTE
Today I was reading a blog about social misunderstanding of race and people who have been abused. The blogger made a statement full of raw passion. She said that if her abuser was at the same table as her, it would demean her presence. She would be lessened in value by her abuser’s presence. She applied this to race inequality and the lack of understanding of the marginalized by society at large. An African-American joined in. His passion for the subject was apparent his comments, but he was not rude. He said, those on the other side, the rest of us, will never understand what it is like to be born black in America because they have not lived it.
It made me think of one of my professors, a Caucasian male married to an African-American woman, who made a striking comment during a multicultural graduate course. He said the playing field in America will never be even. That was a almost two decades ago, and I didn’t agree with him at the time though I kept my opinion to myself. I’m starting to get where he was coming from. He has biracial children. They have a different voice in the conversation than I have. There is a thread to this conversation I am only now starting to understand.
Prejudice is taught by example. Equality is lived by example.
I feel contemporary Christianity has failed and failed miserably. There are threads of prejudice in our own groups, sad to say. We fail to be like Christ (broadly speaking–not everyone). We play it close to the vest–make our own choices, choose our own path–and live for self, a pious self-righteous, careful path much of the time. What if we were to live it differently–really love our neighbor as one’s own self, really not count the cost, really and truly live for Jesus Christ without restraint? I believe our homes would become hospitals for wounded people, and we would become changed.
BACKGROUND TO THE JOURNAL WRITING
Race relations is in the news quite a bit, much more than a few years ago. Recent events involving young African American men and women expose mistreatment, brutality, and even death. African Americans are reacting and drawing attention to the racist behavior. As a nation, we are confronted with this ongoing struggle for social equality, justice, and acceptance.We need to face the facts and then do something about it.
I was researching articles on abuse in the church when I came upon an interesting blog written by a woman, the blogger mentioned above, from a fundamentalist evangelical background. I could identify, my roots are in fundamentalism (although I part company with the legalistic approach, but I do believe in biblical fundamentals). She has distanced herself from her religious background in part because of some negative experiences in the form of sexual abuse. Her blog did not “tell all,” but left the impression the abuse happened at an evangelical university. The past abuse has contributed to her speaking on behalf of those who need a voice, those who are being ignored or trounced on.
However, her blog that day was primarily was about race. She talked about a specific song’s lyrics which lump people into one big pot of familiarity, where all the marginalized are collectively put in the same category as Black Lives Matter. Fundamentalists are mentioned as well, that their lives matter because ALL lives matter. In her opinion, the song lyrics are flawed, too inclusive and too “let’s all just get along.”
In the blog comments, opinions were flowing back and forth between the blogger, song writer, and reading audience. The lyricist attempted to defend his message, but he was taking lots of heat. He then stated that he hates fundamentalists the most. Ouch! Strong words. Others challenged his whiteness, saying he was entitled by nature of his birthright of light skin color, and that he could never understand what it is like to be black in America.
I pondered what the African-American was saying about being birthed into a marginalized social group. A picture came to my mind that brought it into focus, what it’s like to be marginalized and outside the main established view. Within the dominant group is a blindness that only sees what it wants to see. Christian culture is in the process of becoming marginalized in America. The voice is being silenced or removed in many places. We can’t even say Merry Christmas anymore in some places. In the past, Christians in America were used to being accepted and respected (not dismissed as irrelevant or bigoted) but now that Christians are being seen with less favor and with a fair amount of disrespect, they are beginning to experience what it feels like to be viewed with less value and less public concern, and even with disdain.
In fact, Christians are being seen as haters even though for most of them (us), nothing could be further from the truth. Some Christians are asserting their right to be heard and are not aware of the reasons religious and Christian values and societal acceptance of them will not return to the way it used to be. There is not the same social consciousness, the traditional social construct has changed for the Christian community in America, although, in other parts of the world it has always been out of the mainstream and marginalized.
Religious freedom has been part of our American heritage, one that we have held dear. But the Christian message is not being heard by those who no longer believe in its validity or viability. It is being upended. When the majority of a nation’s people believe in its position as superior, it will affect the minority position whereby causing a form of social blindness. In some small ways, I can identify, now, with the status of a marginalized group. I’m beginning to know how it feels to not have “the power of influence,” because we Christians are heading in that direction.
However, in regard to current Christianity, this may change us in a good way. We might have a spiritual awakening. We will either draw closer to Christ or we will distance ourselves further from His teachings. We will either become real or it’s real over! The truth will always be the truth, and Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and The Life, no one comes to the Father except through Him.
You gave me a lot to think about with this one. Would have responded earlier but it was an abysmal day; pain beyond the power of will. Please forgive.
The worst thing about racism – and it is quite real – is that it engenders a culture of entitlement. Victims of racism and abuse are becoming professional sufferers…sometimes in reaction to wrongs endured by their ancestors.
I’ll probably get flamed for this by someone, but this is idiotic. Racism has always existed; the rich have always taken advantage of the poor; men have always abused women. It’s wrong. It should stop.
But making a virtue of being the subject of any abuse is simply perpetuating the whole thing. To say that a Caucasian (which I an NOT, I’m Asian) cannot understand what an African-American feels implicitly states that the latter’s view is therefore more valuable than that of the former. “Listen to ME, because of the colour of my skin…and don’t listen to HIM.”
That’s racism.
I am sorry for all the wrongs of the past; I am sorry for the wrongs of the present. But holding onto them as some sort of validation of one’s existence does nothing except to bestow the evil glow of self-righteousness, the luminescence of putrefaction. Get on with life, because the kindnesses you show will outweigh all the shouted protests.
As for the church…its public face HAS been taken over by haters. The more prominent preachers on Trinity Broadcasting really want to believe (or make US believe) that these are the last days, and that Islam is the harbinger of the Antichrist…and always was. Some of these worthies (sarcasm, there) have claimed that Islamic Terrorism was part of the USA’a problem over 200 years ago…in the Barbary Coast Wars.
In a culture when no one really knows history, it’s easy to rewrite it.
They seem to forget that the Moorish rule of Spain was the best of times for Christians and Jews in that part of the world. What followed – the Reconquista and Inquisition – were hardly models of enlightened thought, or Christian mercy.
And they paint all Muslims with the brush of criminals who are Muslim in name only – and cherry-pick verses from the the literature around Qu’ran to support their claim…often verses rejected as inauthentic by Muslim scholars. An enemy is needed, and it’s easy to recognize someone in a beard and turban.
Oops. Might be a Sikh, like the gas-station owner in Phoenix who was murdered after 9/11.
These ‘Christians’ claim to speak for me. They do not have that right.
They claim to follow Jesus. Don’t know what they’re reading but it’s sure not the Gospel.
Sorry about the long comment. Maybe I should have said that I think the lyricist got it right.
We should all try to get along, because feuding in a leaky lifeboat is not a smart thing to do.
Andrew, It’s an interesting discussion, but it’s more than that, every person matters. When we exclude people from the conversation, we are elevating ourselves as better or superior. One time, I had an experience where I didn’t help a person who asked for money. We were at the gas station. I wouldn’t give to him, but the verse, what you have done for the least of them, you have done unto me, kept playing in my mind. I still refused b/c I had my reasons for not giving money to street beggars. The man was neat, had brown longish hair and a beard and was wearing a black trench coat, and he had a black dog who was his companion. He stood ther watching me the whole time I was pumping gas. I felt flustered but wouldn’t do the right thing. When I drove away I looked back at him and he was looking at me. I knew I had failed the test. I argued with and ignored the voice in my head. I sometimes wonder if that man was Jesus. He was different than most men. He had a penetrating look, soft face, and was ultra clean and neat. I learned from that experience, I now respond more quickly and faithfully to God’s inner promptings. And I don’t dismiss people as “less than” because they aren’t “less than.”