I think the beginning of letting go of my faith started upon meeting a woman with a similar name. Still, I continued to plant seeds. And I thought that where I lived mattered. I thought that where I worked mattered, I thought that who I served mattered. And yet, no matter, the world churned on and on and on. Just the same as when a person dies. You know, how that is. Your heart is breaking and yet poverty continues, inequality continues, bigots still breathe and misogynists still ask you to smile to make them happy.
But I didn't really notice it slipping or that it had slipped until I couldn't kneel down and bury another seed. Sowing and watching, and nurturing the tiny little plants that grew. And that is how people knew me. It gave me something to talk about with people I did not know.
It's the witching hour again and I am awake. I think what woke me was the need for comfort from the shame I have felt from having "failed" as a community organizer. From having failed to make real objective changes in the lives of black people in a city neighborhood. Twenty ears ago, I had 20 people from a low income neighborhood protest and demand that the slumlords, banks and the city address housing issues.
- Stop buying houses and flipping them and feeding people into the subprime lending market.
- Stop leaving the neighborhood and provide banking products that meet the needs of people.
- Stop allowing abandoned houses to stand so drug dealers and prostitutes could do their deeds.
It was 12 hour-days and harder work than I knew. My mind would reel from what I saw when I was door knocking. I walked through drug deals, past the skeletons of Victorian homes, and yes, I had the audacity to ask poor people to fund an organization of their own to improve their neighborhood.
Because why shouldn't any people come together and pool their resources to improve their lives.
Perhaps, I am the perfectionist that my mentors told me I was. The work took a toll on my spirit though. And one night after a house meeting, I went home and bought a 6-pack of beer with the intention to forget about all the poverty, dirt, weeds and cracked sidewalk I saw.
That was hard.
And, now, the same streets I walked on look worse than before. Top that off with my nagging thoughts that we were right. Because we were like the canaries in the coal mines before the housing crisis.
I can't stand to believe that folks are still wondering what the hell happened.
That's what woke me again at 4 am.
It was a strong need to express to my to my white liberal friends that they must understand their whiteness and privilege and use it to make justice.
Perhaps, I am the perfectionist that my mentors told me I was. The work took a toll on my spirit though. And one night after a house meeting, I went home and bought a 6-pack of beer with the intention to forget about all the poverty, dirt, weeds and cracked sidewalk I saw.
That was hard.
And, now, the same streets I walked on look worse than before. Top that off with my nagging thoughts that we were right. Because we were like the canaries in the coal mines before the housing crisis.
I can't stand to believe that folks are still wondering what the hell happened.
That's what woke me again at 4 am.
It was a strong need to express to my to my white liberal friends that they must understand their whiteness and privilege and use it to make justice.
Understand that whiteness is a social construct, surrender to that idea and use it so that we can all have justice.
When folks were wary of confronting a slumlord, because they said he don't like black folks, I said so? And there was one white person in the group. I said so let John speak to him. We all agreed on what we wanted the slumlord to do, right? Heads nodded.
But we still, for the most part, lead segregated lives and know better than "the others."
We help or try to fix... without ever realizing that the bondage that black, brown, white, every and all are interwoven. We forget that all groups of people of every ethnicity have given up some thing to become middle class Americans. Or have you forgotten when the Irish were called black?
But we still, for the most part, lead segregated lives and know better than "the others."
We help or try to fix... without ever realizing that the bondage that black, brown, white, every and all are interwoven. We forget that all groups of people of every ethnicity have given up some thing to become middle class Americans. Or have you forgotten when the Irish were called black?
Our struggle is interwoven in this United States.
If you came to help me or fix me, I don't need it; because it causes a cycle of prey and predator - a circle of false superiority and inferiority.
However, if you come because my liberation is tied to your liberation, then you are my siblings in this struggle to create a beloved community. And that kind of liberation and struggle causes pain: pain of giving up power and privilege and pain of learning how to use and share power and privilege equitably.
Dreaming in twilight hours, I am in the pulpit shouting. . . .
I've come too far in this struggle to accept being quiet and telling you what you want to hear in order to feel good or guilty about whiteness, blackness, brownness, wealth, poverty or anything else.
If you came to help me or fix me, I don't need it; because it causes a cycle of prey and predator - a circle of false superiority and inferiority.
However, if you come because my liberation is tied to your liberation, then you are my siblings in this struggle to create a beloved community. And that kind of liberation and struggle causes pain: pain of giving up power and privilege and pain of learning how to use and share power and privilege equitably.
Dreaming in twilight hours, I am in the pulpit shouting. . . .
I've come too far in this struggle to accept being quiet and telling you what you want to hear in order to feel good or guilty about whiteness, blackness, brownness, wealth, poverty or anything else.
We don't get justice until we all have justice.
We can't just fix or help bodies floating down a river. We must go upstream to undo the cause of bodies floating down the river. And that journey is one where we will lose things- self-righteousness and the self-satisfaction that we know the answer and can fix it for someone else.
When I was younger I sought to change the world, but as I grew older I knew I had to change myself.
It is time for a more mature faith. It is time to change ourselves and do the hard painful work that is truly justice.
Not Just us.
That's not the end, though... You must be the change and that disrupts the social order. And you disrupt the social order, because you no longer can stand the constraints that have been put upon you.
Do you know why the caged bird sings?
If your faith makes you feel comfortable and self righteous, you must be doing it wrong. Because in the Greek sense of it we all miss the mark. We are all sinners. We don't have enough experience and abstraction to see it all.
You must find out why that caged bird is singing. Risk losing the sweet song. Set that bird free.
And now, I'll step away from the podium. . . maybe now I can sleep.
We can't just fix or help bodies floating down a river. We must go upstream to undo the cause of bodies floating down the river. And that journey is one where we will lose things- self-righteousness and the self-satisfaction that we know the answer and can fix it for someone else.
When I was younger I sought to change the world, but as I grew older I knew I had to change myself.
It is time for a more mature faith. It is time to change ourselves and do the hard painful work that is truly justice.
Not Just us.
That's not the end, though... You must be the change and that disrupts the social order. And you disrupt the social order, because you no longer can stand the constraints that have been put upon you.
Do you know why the caged bird sings?
If your faith makes you feel comfortable and self righteous, you must be doing it wrong. Because in the Greek sense of it we all miss the mark. We are all sinners. We don't have enough experience and abstraction to see it all.
You must find out why that caged bird is singing. Risk losing the sweet song. Set that bird free.
And now, I'll step away from the podium. . . maybe now I can sleep.
