Good Stuff - April - May 2015

Here are some of the things I have found most interesting online since the beginning of April.*

On racial injustice:

How Western Media Would Cover Baltimore if it Happened Elsewhere [or rather, if it happened right where it did happen, but the USA were a third-world country]:

International leaders expressed concern over the rising tide of racism and state violence in America, especially concerning the treatment of ethnic minorities in the country and the corruption in state security forces around the country when handling cases of police brutality. The latest crisis is taking place in Baltimore, Maryland, a once-bustling city on the country’s Eastern Seaboard, where an unarmed man named Freddie Gray died from a severed spine while in police custody. 

Black Americans, a minority ethnic group, are killed by state security forces at a rate higher than the white majority population . . . 

The United Kingdom expressed concern over the troubling turn of events in America in the last several months. The country’s foreign ministry released a statement: “We call on the American regime to rein in the state security agents who have been brutalizing members of America’s ethnic minority groups. The equal application of the rule of law, as well as the respect for human rights of all citizens, black or white, is essential for a healthy democracy.” Britain has always maintained a keen interest in America, a former colony.

We're Dying Too by Andrea J. Ritchie at Colorlines:

In the popular imagination a victim of a police shooting is almost always that of a young black man. Media headlines, presidential speeches, and rally chants all paint a picture of police violence as a problem plaguing black communities, but really, we’re only talking about young men. This time, the life of the unarmed black person taken was a young woman’s.

Boyd is one of hundreds of black women killed by police whose name has not grabbed national headlines or galvanized national movements. Chicago alone has witnessed the killings of Frankie Perkins, who police choked to death because they erroneously believed that she had swallowed drugs; LaTanya Haggerty, whose cell phone was mistaken for a gun; and Angelique Styles, who police fatally shot after coming to her home to address a domestic dispute. . . 

Sadly, these stories are not unique—although each black woman killed was. There are literally countless others we’ll never know because there is no official data about the number of police killings being collected and because black women’s stories rarely gain media attention.

She Who the Son Sets Free: Black Womanist Resistance in Context by Eboni Marshall Turman at Divinity Magazine:

Because black women’s bodies sit at the intersection of racialized subjugation on the one hand and gendered subjugation on the other, their experiences and distinct contributions are not only marginalized and caricatured but often rendered fictitious, as if black women do not know for themselves that their stories are true. Womanist theology recognizes that black women “are they which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes … in the blood of the Lamb” (Revelation 7:14, KJV).

On Christian Fundamentalism (and Recent Related Events):

Faith in the System, or Faith in Jesus? by Chaplain Mike at Internet Monk:

[T]he evangelical Christianity that I spent most of my adult life studying and teaching, is not, in the final analysis about Jesus, except insofar as Jesus is a part of the system. It is faith in the Bible that is more fundamental. It is believing in the system that is crucial. They are not just making a claim that reading the Bible aright leads to Jesus, it’s more than that. It is that the Bible is a divinely given systematic presentation of an entire worldview that must be believed in its entirety for one to be a faithful Christian (along with having “accepted” Jesus, of course). Indeed, beyond that, if we allow one crack in the wall of this system, society itself will become subject to moral decay, chaos, and ultimately destruction. . . 

When your faith is in a system, this system becomes your “platform.” 

Those who hold to it become the “party” of those defined by allegiance to the system. 

The party begins to function as a “political” entity. 

And the whole thing becomes a “partisan” affair in which faithfulness is defined as defending the system against all who suggest any other way.

Modesty is Causing Women to Stumble by PerfectNumber at Tell Me Why the World is Weird:

If you say something that causes a woman to stumble- to believe the lie that she's not good enough and she should feel shame because of her body- that's her own responsibility. Of course it's not your fault. Except that it totally is, and you have a responsibility to not contribute to a culture that heaps this kind of shame on your sisters in Christ. 

So the next time you want to make a comment on what women should or shouldn't wear, stop and think first. Will my words cause someone to stumble? (Your opinions on what's sexy are good and God-given, but they are meant to be shared only with your spouse, not the general public.) When in doubt, you can ask your mother or sister for their advice.

The Duggars: How Fundamentalist Teachings on Sexuality Create Predatory Behavior at Diary of an Autodidact:

[I]n the cases of all these cases of sexual assault within [Christian Fundamentalist] Patriarchy, we want to be able to dismiss them as outliers. Bad acts by bad people. Josh Duggar is a child molester, so we just keep him away from kids, and everything will be fine. 

And then we NEVER have to address the damage that our poisonous teachings on sexuality are causing. It is not an accident that we are attracting (and paying) narcissistic predators like Gothard and Phillips. And it is not an accident that there are problems with assault in Patriarchal families. At some point, one can't just blame bad luck for the lightning strikes. We have to admit we have been standing outside in the storm, holding a metal pole. We attract bad actors, and we make predatory acts by those who would not otherwise have been predators more likely. 

True, let's remove the bad actors, but let's not ignore the other source of poison: bad beliefs and teachings.

Weaponized Grace by Lewis at Commandments of Men:

In any setting - legal, cultural, religious - justice must first be established when people have been harmed or wronged. It's the ONLY way a victim can be the priority. The ONLY way. Once you figure out how justice shapes up, then, and only then, can you start talking about grace or mercy for the victimizer.  All of these people clamoring for "grace" to be immediately shown to Josh Duggar would feel entirely different were one of their daughters a victim of his crime. No matter what came out of their mouth, their heart would demand justice. Holding other people to standards by which you won't truly measure yourself is always ugly, and always lacking in genuine integrity.

People can hide behind the idea that his victims "forgave" him, but those of us who know the culture know they had a choice between "forgiveness" and being a familial AND religious outcast. They would be told, over and over again, how much of a sinner they are/were until they caved in and "forgave". In other words, "grace" would be weaponized against them.

On gender roles:

There Are No "Biblical Men" by Brandan Robertson at Revangelical:

As I have studied the cultural context surrounding the New Testament writings and early Christianity, it has become astoundingly clear to me that Dr. Rainey (and subsequently many other evangelicals) definition of masculinity is derived much more from the Greco-Roman culture than from any clear teachings of Christ. 

In the Greco-Roman world, there was an idealized version of manhood that all men were to aspire to become like. It is, for instance, a Platonic ideal that men should separate themselves from emotions and passions. It is from within the Greco-Roman culture men are seen as providers, leaders, and protectors of their families. But what of men who don’t have families? What of men who are deeply emotive and creative? According to the definition and logic of the culture of Ancient Rome and of many evangelicals today, they are seen to be less than masculine. . .

Any attempt to construct a Biblical model for masculinity proves to be an impossible task because even Christ himself, along with many other men in the New Testament, are constantly being called in to conflict with the predominate model of masculinity of their day. . . What we see demonstrated in the New Testament is a call to embrace the fullness of our unique identity in their Creator, whatever that may look like, rather than to conform to our cultures standards of manliness.

Here's What It Would Look Like If We Treated Our Sons Like We Treat Our Daughters by Lori Day at Everyday Feminism:

Logan is an active preschooler. 

As he runs through the house, you hear the tap-tap-tapping of his little shiny dress shoes on the hardwood floors. Occasionally, he slides in them and goes down on his bum, but he gets right back up again. 

Outside is a new swing set. He loves to try to run up the slide, but it’s tricky in those smooth-soled shoes. 

When he wears them to preschool, the teachers notice that it’s hard for him to run and climb like the girls, but they gush over how handsome he looks in them. . . .

***

Middle school! 

It’s a whole new world with different classrooms, different teachers, and kids who seem to have changed a lot over the summer. 

Sometimes he pretends to be dumb so girls will like him. 

Logan feels some pressure to conform. He wants to dress like the other boys in clothes that you and his father feel are a bit too clingy and revealing. 

He notices how hot and sexy all of the boys are on television and in the movies, and he wants to be hot and sexy too, so he rolls up the bottoms of his turquoise shorts to make them shorter, hoping not to receive a dress code violation. 

He has mastered the ability to look around nonchalantly as he walks down the hall, checking to be sure the girls are admiring his body.

*** 

Logan is now an adult in his final year of college, and beginning to interview for jobs after graduation. 

He always dresses well for his interviews, wearing a slimming outfit that makes him look both professional and attractive. 

As he navigates the city streets that he hopes will connect him to a future full of happiness and success, he passes by billboards and bus ads of men in G-strings with flawless, Photoshopped bodies. 

He barely notices them. 

As he mentally rehearses for an upcoming interview, he walks down the sidewalk, lost in thought. “Smile, baby!” a woman calls out to him. “You look more handsome when you smile.”

And finally, this beautiful mingling of sorrow and mercy that sounds a note of hope through it all:

Reading the Bible With a Red Pen by Esther Emery at SheLoves Magazine:

Now, I read the Bible and all over the thin and crinkling pages I see the madness. I see the hatred, the nationalism, the patriarchy, the appalling injustices. I see Jael, who invited her enemy into her tent and nailed his head to the ground with a tent pin. I see Saul, who lost God’s favor for failing to annihilate his enemy down to the last child and head of cattle. I see the language of homophobia, misogyny and violence … woven right into the fabric of redemption. 

I see God’s story of love and liberation, woven tighter than I ever dreamed with the reality of suffering. God’s threads, tied into our threads. God’s eyes, on the darkest places of the heart. No life unredeemable. No hatred or oppression invisible. No suffering too unspeakable to be given voice. . . 

I don’t like this, but I think it’s true. We are all threaded into this earthly world, tied right into this history of bloodshed and domination. When are we the ones who are sinned against? And when are we the sinners? We can’t always tell. This fabric is woven tighter than we thought. . . 

Though I might know and love compassion—and I do—yet still I have given my voice to the mob, sometimes by choosing silence. Yet still I have given my arms to stones that kill. I have been wrong as well as right. The Bible cries out to my heart to seek redemption, transformation, and holy hope.

///

The next time I read the Bible I will read it like food instead of words. I will drink it like salty water. I will feed the thirst of my soul with it, even with this brutally rendered portrait of a broken world, confessing itself at every turn in need of redemption.

------------------
*Where there is emphasis in any quote, it appears in the original.

If We Say We Have No Sin...

If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.… 1 John 1:8-9

This is a basic principle of Christianity: that we as human beings are prone to sin and error and should admit as much.  "Confession is good for the soul," the old saying goes, though our natural inclination is to deny error and not admit to wrongdoing.  This inclination seems especially prominent in politics, as this Washington Post article details:

No one likes to admit that they made a mistake. We have an ingrained reticence to do so, a near-primal response that little kids learn probably before they can speak. Admit your mistake, get punished. Don't, and maybe you can wiggle your way out of it. 

If your job involves being judged and evaluated by people, that instinct is almost certainly worse. And if your job involves being evaluated and you have a group of people committed to defending you on an ideological basis no matter what you say, admitting error becomes all but unthinkable.

Christian grace, on the other hand, is all about the freedom to admit wrong in ourselves and accept others in spite of their faults, knowing that God loves and forgives and wants us to do the same.  And I think this goes not just for our individual sins and errors, but for group ones too.  Humans don't just sin individually.  We sin as groups-- as nations, as communities, and yes, even as churches and religious communities.

So why are so many of us Christians involved in vigorous denial of any such thing?  Why are we more interested in defending ourselves than examining ourselves?  And why, when someone does point out how our group sins or how we might have participated in sin in the past or present, do we attack that person as if the only real wrong was the perceived insult to us?

The main thing that's bothering me is the reaction of prominent Christians against President Obama's remarks at the National Prayer Breakfast, when he said:

So how do we, as people of faith, reconcile these realities -- the profound good, the strength, the tenacity, the compassion and love that can flow from all of our faiths, operating alongside those who seek to hijack religious for their own murderous ends?

Humanity has been grappling with these questions throughout human history. And lest we get on our high horse and think this is unique to some other place, remember that during the Crusades and the Inquisition, people committed terrible deeds in the name of Christ. In our home country, slavery and Jim Crow all too often was justified in the name of Christ. Michelle and I returned from India -- an incredible, beautiful country, full of magnificent diversity -- but a place where, in past years, religious faiths of all types have, on occasion, been targeted by other peoples of faith, simply due to their heritage and their beliefs -- acts of intolerance that would have shocked Gandhiji, the person who helped to liberate that nation.

So this is not unique to one group or one religion. There is a tendency in us, a sinful tendency that can pervert and distort our faith.

The response to this has been really troubling, as detailed in this Slate article, as prominent Republicans and conservative commentators (largely professing Christians)  "reject the suggestion that Christianity has anything to apologize for."  They claim that the Crusades were justified and were the fault of the Muslims (the same article claims the Church had "almost nothing to do with the Inquisition").  They claim that Jim Crow laws were over thousands of years ago instead of being part of  reality for the Baby-boomer generation.  They claim that Obama was wrong to claim Christians have any responsibility for racism. And they accuse the President of not being a real Christian because he would dare admit that yes, Christians and Christian communities have sinned.

And yet it's the person they're claiming isn't a real Christian who is following the Christian principles of humility and confession which they seem to have lost sight of.  I can't help thinking that politics are partly to blame.  I'm not saying Christians shouldn't get involved in politics or shouldn't vote their consciences-- but that's different from practically turning Christianity into a political movement. And when we do that, it's not surprising that we end up acting according to political "admit no wrong" wisdom.  However, President Obama is a politician and a Christian, and this time (possibly because he's not part of that movement) he got it right.  It's too bad that his Republican Christian opponents can't see wisdom when it comes from someone on the other team.

I think, actually, that defensiveness against any admission of racism is actually one of our biggest problems even today.

Racism is still very much a part of our reality today in America, and most, if not all, of us white people have imbibed racist attitudes to some extent just by being born, growing up and living here.  And yet we have also been taught to believe racism is some archaic evil from the past-- so what upsets us most is the idea that someone might think we're racist in some way, or call us a "racist" because of something we said or did. The Agabond blog calls it "the R-Word":

The r-word is the word“racist”. It is in effect the n-word for white people:they get upset when you call them that and lose all sense of reason. Even on the Internet it pretty much ends any fruitful talk about race. . . Two things are going on here: 

1. Many whites seem to think “racist” means joining the Ku Klux Klan, flying the Confederate flag, using the n-word, stuff like that.The old Jim Crow sort of racism that was common in America before 1970. Most white Americans born since then are colour-blind racists. It is this subtler racism that most people of colour have in mind when they use the word “racist”. 

2.  White Americans have a self-image of themselves as fair and just, of not being racist. So when you say they are racist it threatens their self-image. That is why they get so upset. 

But that self-image stands in the way of any further progress.

It is like the kind of patriotism where people feel threatened when you say anything bad about their country. It is a false patriotism that stands in the way of making their country better.

It's interesting to me that Agabond equates the same two things I've been talking about-- denial of racism with do-no-wrong Christian patriotism-- because I think they're both rooted in the same thing. We're being "conformed to this world," as Romans 12:2 says.  We're following our natural, human desire to exalt ourselves and our causes, and our natural unwillingness to admit to wrongdoing.  But Christ would have us humble ourselves, be assured of grace, and let go of our fear of being found in the wrong.

Anyway, it seems to me that I, as a white person, can't really understand what black people go through as well as they do themselves, and certainly not without listening to their side of things. But when I first started reading Agabond's blogsite, I had to quell my defensiveness and my sense of injury at this word "racist," and learn to say, "God's grace is with me, even if I'm racist in some way and don't know it-- so am I? Because God can help me change, but only if I admit the problem!"

The fact is that being so defensive against the word "racist" and "racism" is keeping us from seeing where we might need to confess and repent.  And this isn't the Christian way to live.

Dr. Beverly Tatum on the By Their Strange Fruit Website puts it so well:

I consider myself a racist in the same way that I consider myself a sinner in need of forgiveness (see post Basically Good). People bristle at both characterizations (“I’m a generally good person, I don’t need Jesus”; “I’m not a racist, I’m color blind”). But to me, these terms simply identify the latent issues that I know I still have to work on, which is better than pretending the issues aren't there at all.

 As Christians, we ought to be the first to admit that Christians have done (and still do) wrong.  We ought to be the first to examine ourselves, the first to confess our errors and faults, and the errors and faults of our group, our nation, our community. The fact is that many times our faults are visible to the observing world anyway-- and when we act blind to them, we only come across as hypocrites.

Gregg Easterbrook in a 2011 Reuter's editorial encapsulates what most people probably really think when we do that:

Just as lying about what you did may be worse than what you did, refusing to admit an error may be worse than the error itself. 

All human beings occasionally are wrong — trust me, I’ve had plenty of experience! Honest admission of error makes a person upright and sympathetic. Refusing to admit error, by contrast, suggests deviousness or even megalomania.

We aren't enhancing either our own reputations, or God's, when we refuse to even open our eyes to our wrongs, much less confess and apologize. And we're not doing Christianity any good by pressing it into the service of a political agenda.

It's just making our Christianity look less and less Christian.

Out This Week - Prayers for Ferguson & Racial Reconciliation

I have been following as closely as I can the events taking place in Ferguson, Missouri after an 18-year-old boy named Mike Brown was shot to death by a police officer, even though his hands were raised in surrender, because he was black and the officer was white.

By Their Strange Fruit has details of the situation and important links to more information.  As I white person in a nearly all-white northern U.S. city, I haven't been quite sure what to say, but I find the advice from Janee Woods below very helpful:

Becoming a white ally to black people in the aftermath of the Michael Brown murder

A lot of white people aren’t speaking out publicly against the killing of Michael Brown because they don’t see a space for themselves to engage meaningfully in the conversation so that they can move to action against racism. It’s not so much that they have nothing to say but rather they don’t see an opportunity being opened up for them to say something or to do something that matters. Or they might not be sure what to say or how to do it. They might have a hard time seeing a role for themselves in the fight against racism because they aren’t racist, they don’t feel that racism affects them or their loved ones personally, they worry that talking about race and differences between cultures might make things worse, or they think they rarely see overt racism at play in their everyday lives. And, sometimes, they are afraid. There’s a real fear of saying the wrong thing even if the intention is pure, of being alienated socially and economically from other white people for standing in solidarity with black people, or of putting one’s self in harm’s way, whether the harm be physical or psychological. I’m not saying those aren’t valid fears but I am challenging white people to consider carefully whether failing to speak out or act because of those fears is justified when white silence and inaction mean the oppression and death of black people. 

Let’s talk about an active role for white people in the fight against racism because racism burdens all of us and is destroying our communities.

I am out of town camping with my family this week, and I don't have much to say that hasn't already been said anyway.  But my fervent prayer is that this incident will at last prove to be the turning point that will open the eyes of white people like myself across the country, to make real changes to halt the racism that's still going on in our nation.  I want to echo the apology at Beccyjoy to the family of Michael Brown, to the citizens of Ferguson and to people of color across the nation:

I’m sorry. I’m sorry you’ve had to be so loud to get our attention. I’m sorry that another beautiful boy had to die to make us notice that you are oppressed. I’m sorry that no one is listening. I’m sorry that no one believes your experiences. I’m sorry that this is still happening. I’m sorry for the ignorant, invalidating, and racist comments you’ve had to deal with on top of everything else. I’m sorry that I’ve turned a blind eye to your struggle. I hear you, I believe you, I stand with you for justice. You deserve way better.

I hope that "no one is listening" will change now; that we will listen, and pray, and try to effect change.  As Christina Cleveland says so eloquently:

 Can you see the suffering Christ in the oppressed, even the ones who aren’t responding perfectly to society’s oppression? Christ doesn’t just suffer for the innocent, the ones who don’t have the energy to fight back, or the ones who perfectly respond to injustice. He suffers for the ones who suffer now and sin in their suffering.

I pray that we will see the suffering Christ in the oppressed and stop judging them for not being perfectly patient under oppression we have never experienced ourselves (and thus have no idea how we would handle it).

I ask my readers who are Christians to agree in prayer with these voices:

Accidental Devotional

I began to hear that there was a distinct danger you face every day, if people just assume that you are dangerous because you are black and you are male. And I began to hear the stories of police brutality, of unnecessary aggression, of my sophomore boys being treated like criminals simply because of their bodies. . . 

I began to see that my skin granted me access to pretty much anywhere I wanted to go. I began to see how no one ever starts out aggressively toward me, because I am never seen as a threat. I began to understand that my students, my colleagues, my neighbors were not granted the same access, the same pass. . . 

I am praying the people of this country have softer hearts than mine. I am praying that we are broken over Mike Brown and that brokenness is only a beginning. I am praying we listen when we are told that this is only one of many. I am praying we hear when brown mothers tell us they fear for their babies’ lives. I am praying we do something when our eyes and ears are opened to injustice. I am praying we speak out, we reach out, we educate ourselves. I am praying we care.

Five Minute Friday

Black men have the monopoly on unarmed civilian murder by an officer of the law. It’s a fact. As a Christian, I look to my community to share the burden, the questions surrounding racism in America and how we can move forward. I’m trying to navigate this without being written off as another angry black woman. And I don’t want to be quietly spiritually shunned from all the online communities I love, for saying what you have to already know. 

I don’t have to tell you, do I? – Racism is real. . .

God you are greater, greater…
I sang softly, swaying back and forth wringing my hands. Eyes closed. . .

God wasn't upset with me for being angry. And He hadn’t asked me to be quiet. He took those keys with Holy Spirit force. Sometimes that’s what it takes. 

Please understand. 

Being Christian doesn’t exclude us from the conversation. We have to speak up. To be clear, I understand we aren’t all called to every conversation and maybe you won’t write about it, but standing in solidarity with a hashtag or sharing posts you’ve read that resonate with the spirit of Christ and reconciliation could be a beginning.

Shalom In the City

I can’t do anything tangible with these hands, but raise them high. Lord, we are restless for change and anxious for hope. We are witnesses of injustice. We are the women at the foot of the cross, empower us to stay through the torment so that we can be present to bind up wounds and then—see resurrection. 

I raise my hands to God who out of his great love for his children heard their cries and carved a path towards justice when there seemed to be no way. Make a way in Ferguson, MO, Lord. Make a way and drown the Enemy of your peace in your waves of Justice.
Today, I raise my hands because the truth is Black Lives Matter and black kids don’t have to be college-bound for their deaths to be tragic. I raise my hands for the truth that Jesus identified with the poor, broken, marginalized, and ignored. I raise my hands because Jesus is our Truth and he will make us free.

God bless all of you.  See you next week.

What I'd Like to See from Hollywood

This week I came across an interesting article, We're Losing All Our Strong Female Characters to Trinity Syndrome.  The author, Tasha Robinson, names this Hollywood phenomenon after the female character "Trinity" in The Matrix:

[T]he Strong Female Character With Nothing To Do [like Valka in DreamWorks’ How To Train Your Dragon 2] is becoming more and more common. The Lego Movie is the year’s other most egregious and frustrating example. It introduces its female lead, Elizabeth Banks’ Wyldstyle, as a beautiful, super-powered, super-smart, ultra-confident heroine who’s appalled by how dumb and hapless protagonist Emmet is. Then the rest of the movie laughs at her and marginalizes her as she turns into a sullen, disapproving nag and a wet blanket. .  . Her only post-introduction story purpose is to be rescued, repeatedly, and to eventually confer the cool-girl approval that seals Emmet’s transformation from loser to winner. . . This is Trinity Syndrome à la The Matrix: the hugely capable woman who never once becomes as independent, significant, and exciting as she is in her introductory scene. 

From there, of course, I had to read the link to an August 2013 New Statesman Article called "I Hate Strong Female Characters" by Sophia McDougall, which defines "strong female characters" and identifies the real problem with their ubiquitous appearance in modern Hollywood films:

They're still love interests, still the one girl in a team of five boys, and they’re all kind of the same. They march on screen, punch someone to show how they don’t take no shit, throw around a couple of one-liners or forcibly kiss someone because getting consent is for wimps, and then with ladylike discretion they back out of the narrative’s way. . . What do I want instead of a Strong Female Character? I want a male:female character ratio of 1:1 instead of 3:1 on our screens. I want a wealth of complex female protagonists who can be either strong or weak or both or neither, because they are more than strength or weakness.

All of this got me to thinking.  There is a lot more of this kind of thing going on in Hollywood films than just strong female characters, with or without Trinity syndrome.  And by "this kind of thing" I mean unoriginal, uninventive, follow-what-everyone-else-is-doing plots, characterizations and inter-relationships that I'm getting a little tired of.  I would say it's all about the tyranny of "what will sell," but I think it's even worse than that. It's the tyranny of "what we have seen sell already, and we're afraid to risk trying anything different."

So here's my list of what I wish Hollywood would try.  Maybe they'd lose some money on some of these efforts, but the fact is that lots of films lose money anyway despite sticking with "what we have seen sell already."  Part of what sells really is inventiveness, and I know Hollywood knows that.  So maybe it would be more worthwhile to take bigger risks, than to keep churning out the same sort of thing over and over.

A few disclaimers before I start:

A.  I know there are exceptions.  I know there have been one or two examples of some of these kinds of movies that actually have been made, some of which have done very well with moviegoers. But they've been very rare.

B. I know I'm not a professional or an expert, and maybe it's a little presumptuous of me to tell Hollywood moguls how to do their jobs.  But I have been a member of the moviegoing public all my life, and thus one of their target audience in the various demographics I have belonged to over the years, right?  So maybe my opinion does count for something. . .

C.  I am a white, middle-class, heterosexual, cisgender, Christian married person with kids.  I understand that I'm privileged in many ways, and that a great many more Hollywood movies are made with people like me and my family as the target audience than many people could ever hope to expect.  But that's part of why I do want to see some of the things on this list-- because I don't think only the privileged should have movies made that aim to please them, and the very fact that so many of them are aimed at people like me seems to be contributing to their sameness.

So with all that said, here's my list.

I'd Like to See a Movie About:

1.  A smart, adventurous young man who is black, and his best friend and sidekick, who is white.

2.  A group of kids having an adventure, in which the leader and her best friend are girls and there's one, and only one, boy in the group who is pretty much just along for the ride.  Bonus points if the girls are black, Hispanic or Asian and the boy is white.

3.  A woman over 35 who is not portrayed as someone's mother, but who gets to be in love with a male character her own age.  Bonus points if she's got some extra pounds on her.  Extra bonus points if she's the main character.

4.  An "ugly" female character in a movie on the theme of beauty, who is not actually a gorgeous woman wearing thick glasses.  Bonus points if the film doesn't end with her taking off the glasses, letting down her hair and putting on some makeup to show the audience that she's a real woman after all.

5.  A senior woman who is not portraying someone's grandmother.  Or Miss Marple.

6.  A senior, man or woman, who is the main character in a movie that is not about being old.  Bonus points if he or she is a person of color in a movie that's not about prejudice.

7.  A superhero movie where the main super-protagonist is female, and of color.  Bonus points if she's the leader of a group of superheroes.

8. Any nerdy character who doesn't have to stop being nerdy by the end of the film, either by getting the "cool" makeover or by winning the "cool" date.

9.  An Asian character (in an American-made film) who is not super-smart and super-good at school, but has other traits that render him or her a fully developed character.  Bonus points if he or she is the main protagonist and leader.

10.  A female character who is not, and does not end up, in a relationship.

11. A retelling of a myth or fairy tale that does not come from the Western European tradition.

12.  Gay, lesbian and/or transgender character(s) in a movie that is not about being gay, lesbian or transgender.

13. Person(s) with disabilities in a movie that is not about overcoming disabilities.

14.  Last but definitely not least, an Elfquest movie.  That is, a movie based on a comic book series that isn't about superheroes and which is written and drawn by a woman.

So there's my list. Would anyone like to add anything of their own?

America is Not the New Israel

I'm reading a book for my book club this month that I wouldn't have chosen myself.  It's called The Harbinger by Jonathan Cahn, and it uses a Dan Brown-style fiction approach to communicate the author's idea that certain events in American history are foretold in ancient Bible prophecy.  I'm not going to give an in-depth critique of the book at this time (partly because I haven't finished it!), but I do want to talk about its main premise, because it's a viewpoint that I've heard many times and which I think is doing more harm than good to Christianity in America.

Here it is in a nutshell, quoted directly from the book:

Israel was unique among the nations in that it was conceived and dedicated at its foundation for the purposes of God. . . But there was one other-- a civilization also conceived and dedicated to the will of God from its conception. . . America. . . Long before the Founding Fathers[,] those who laid America's foundations saw it as a new Israel, an Israel of the New World.  And as with ancient Israel, they saw it as in covenant with God. . .  

Not that [America] was ever without fault or sin, but it would aspire to fulfill its calling. . . To be a vessel of redemption, an instrument of God's purposes, a light to the world. . . No nation in the modern world has ever been given so much. None has been so blessed. . .  

[But] America began ruling God out of its life, turning, step by step, against His ways. . . In the middle of the twentieth century America began officially removing God from its national life.  It abolished prayer and Scripture in the public schools. . . removing the Ten Commandments from public view, banning it from its public squares, and taking it down, by government decree, from its walls. . . God was progressively driven out of the nation's public life. . . The standards and values it had long upheld were now abandoned. . . [what we call "tolerance" is] a tolerance that mocked, marginalized and condemned those who remained faithful to the values now being discarded.

The idea that America is the new Israel, the new chosen, covenant nation for God, does indeed go back to the Puritans and Separatists who came to the New World in the 1600s.  It has been part of our national mentality since its inception, and it is one of the main forces behind Christian engagement in the "culture wars" that seek to uphold America's symbolic civil religion as if this outward and cultural religious consciousness were the same as the actual faith that Jesus taught.  The loss of the hegemony of America's civil religion is thus held to be tantamount to the nation's "turning away from God."

But as far as I can see, the whole of the New Testament is against any idea of a new nation taking on the position or status of Israel; indeed, the New Covenant precludes any such notion.  America cannot be the new Israel, nor can it enter into a covenant with God as a nation in the way Israel did, because the New Covenant is about the kingdom of God, not about any nation on earth.

As 1 Peter 2:9-10 says:

But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. (Emphasis added)

To come to God through faith in Christ is to become part of a new, holy nation. The New Covenant is the covenant in Christ's blood (Mark 14:24) which makes us part of this spiritual nation; it simply does not envision covenants with earthly nations.  Ephesians 2:11-21 speaks of how all who are in Christ are part of one "new humanity" and "fellow citizens with God’s people and also members of his household."  The covenant God has made through Christ is sufficient; additional covenants with earthly nations are not envisioned.  Everything taught in the New Testament about God's covenant in Christ denies the concept of God making a new, Israel-type covenant with any earthly nation, America included. 

And of course, there's also the problem that despite what the Pilgrims hoped for their colony, the idea of America as dedicated to God from its inception is simply not true.  The first American settlement, Jamestown, was a secular colony established for profit and for the expansion of England's power.  The Dutch settlements in what would become northern New England tended towards religious pluralism and tolerance, and since the Dutch were eventually assimilated into the English colonial framework, their ideas became interwoven with the emerging nation's self-understanding:

By their actions, the Founding Fathers made clear that their primary concern was religious freedom, not the advancement of a state religion. Individuals, not the government, would define religious faith and practice in the United States. Thus the Founders ensured that in no official sense would America be a Christian Republic. Ten years after the Constitutional Convention ended its work, the country assured the world that the United States was a secular state, and that its negotiations would adhere to the rule of law, not the dictates of the Christian faith. The assurances were contained in the Treaty of Tripoli of 1797 and were intended to allay the fears of the Muslim state by insisting that religion would not govern how the treaty was interpreted and enforced.John Adams and the Senate made clear that the pact was between two sovereign states, not between two religious powers. (Frank Lambert, The Founding Fathers and the Place of Religion, summarized by Princeton University Press.  Emphasis added.)

The idea that America was founded as a Christian nation and is viewed by God as the new Israel leads to a number of practical problems.

1.  It distracts us from seeking first the kingdom of God.

Jesus said, "Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness (Matt. 6:33)."  When we focus on how America is supposedly falling away from its great destiny as God's chosen nation-- when we spend our energy on trying to restore the hegemony of American civil religion-- we can't pay much attention to building oneness as Christians, centered around love and service and the kingdom of God. And yet Jesus never prayed, "That they may all maintain Your Ten Commandments in public places and uphold traditional values throughout the land."  He prayed, "That they all may be one, so that the world may believe that You have sent Me (John 17:21)."

2.  It leads to spiritual pride.

Romans 12:3 says, "Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the faith God has distributed to each of you."  To think of America as a chosen, covenant nation leads to thinking of ourselves as American Christians (intentionally or not) as somehow more chosen and in a better covenant relationship with God than other Christians.  And when the American civil religion begins to lose its former powerful monopolization of the public square, we begin to think of ourselves as virtuous victims of evil religious persecution-- whether that image is truly accurate or not.

3.  It focuses our attention on minor issues and passes over our nation's greatest sins.

This is the crux of the matter, I think.  When we get distracted by whether Christian "traditional values" have supremacy in the land, and when we decide that making room in the public square for other faiths means America has "abandoned God," we are actually majoring on the minors.  To Israel God once said that far more important than their sacrificial system was "To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God (Micah 6:8)."  But throughout its history, these things are exactly what America has failed to do, over and over again.  From the treaty-breaking appropriation of Native American lands and the genocide of Native peoples, to the enslaving of African captives and the disenfranchisement of their descendants, to the internment of Japanese Americans, to the strong-arming of American interests over weaker countries of the world, America has continually shown that it is not truly following Christ and His law of "do unto others as you would have them do unto you."

In fact, the "chosen nation" mentality can act as a justification for this very behavior. As Betty Wood said in The Origins of American Slavery,

In New England, Puritan settlers used slavery to reinforce their image of themselves as religious refugees. Those that could not enter into the covenant and be saved were subject to servitude as approved by Scripture.

And according to this Excerpt from "Joshua and the Promised Land" by Roy H. May, Jr. (on the Joshua Website of the United Methodist Church, Global Ministries):

The sense of divine election and the identification of the Americas with ancient Canaan were used to justify expelling America's Indigenous Peoples from their land. The colonists saw themselves as confronting "satanic forces" in the Native Americans. They were Canaanites to be destroyed or thrown out. . .

Land rights of Native Americans were never taken seriously. Rather, they were seen as obstacles to the colonists' need for land. The Puritans did not respect the farms of Native Americans. They sought "legal" ways to get their land. If a Native American broke one of the rigid Puritan religious laws, the fine was paid by giving up land. In this manner, some Puritans were able to amass large landholdings through the Massachusetts courts. John Winthrop, for example [the same man who preached that the colony was to be God's "city on hill"!], obtained some 1,260 acres along the Concord River.

If we truly face ourselves, we have to admit that these are America's besetting sins from the time of its inception, and that we ourselves often still participate in systems that harm whole groups of people while even blaming them for what happens to them.  Whether or not children are praying a government-sponsored prayer in school, or whether a copy of the Ten Commandments hangs in our public buildings-- these are really beside the point, aren't they?

To act justly, love mercy and walk humbly with God.  To trust, believe in and follow Jesus, to love as He loved, to serve as He served.  This is what we are meant to be doing.

Not to be struggling and striving to keep America from "falling away" from something it never was in the first place.

America is not the new Israel.  No nation is, or should be.  This would be a good time to let go of the myth.

Another Take on the World Vision Question

Last Week I wrote about the controversy revolving around the international Christian charity World Vision and its decision, quickly reversed, to employ same-sex married Christian couples.  I wrote about the issue in terms of real, living children overseas who have developed long-distance relationships with their sponsors, and I will not back off my stance that breaking off such a relationship once it is formed is wrong. Regardless of the fact that the child will still receive World Vision benefits through his or her community, Christians should not abandon or reject kids they have started a relationship with, even if it's a very long-distance one.

But Rod at the Political Jesus Blog has added an important perspective to the discussion that needs to be taken seriously.  He asks the question: Are African, Indian, South American children being used as pawns in the White Culture Wars?  

The thing is that in focusing on the gay-marriage issue here in the United States and fighting among ourselves over it (with non-white children overseas caught in the middle as both sides accuse each other of not doing what's best for those kids) Christians in the white majority culture on both sides of the issue may be blind to our own self-centeredness.  And we seem to be missing the bigger question: Are World Vision and other Western-created charities actually the best way to give to poor children in other nations?

The problem is that as white American Christians, we have a weakness for falling into what the By Their Strange Fruit Blog calls a "white savior complex":

The 'white savior complex' is a perception that white folk have that they are the benevolent benefactors of helpless 'others.'. . The 'white savior complex' is particularly strong when it comes to white aid in Africa. . .Often church missions have a concept of the 'poor starving children of Africa' and very little understanding of the self-empowerment and independence that can thrive in our absence.

As Rod at Political Jesus put it:

Both sides (in their blog posts), were more than eager to press this story as one where we had to “save the children.” At no one point were the problematic practices of World Vision, its advancement of White Saviorism through its advertisements or its questionable method of “child-sponsorships” (but not really child-sponsorships) ever put under scrutiny. . . African and other nations populated by darker skinned people are represented time and again as the passive recipients of white benevolence. This “help” however, is just a re-hashing of old Western-style colonialism brought to those countries by missionaries. [Emphasis in original]

 To be fair to World Vision, they are aware of this weakness and have published an online paper about improving their accountability in this and other areas:

A related mistake is to ignore our ‘inbound’ accountability to listen and learn from the poor. The good news of Jesus implores us to seek only the best for the other. Ministry approaches which breed dependency, or which are patronising, or paternalistic, or which treat the poor as our “clients” diminish the Good News. All parts of our global family must be respectfully and sensitively engaged.  It has been wisely observed that “The Christian gospel has sometimes been made the tool of imperialism and of that we have to repent.”

Other Western Christian charities, such as Kinexxus, seem to have done their homework on this issue and are striving to overcome it:

Mission organizations and humanitarian agencies that operate from the same misguided assumptions that Africans are too poor or incapable of doing anything significant to bring about development to their communities only reinforce a receivership mentality. They come to Africa with a heart of compassion and noble intentions to alleviate the suffering of an impoverished people. But if they don’t take the time to understand the community and cultural worldview they are entering or attempt to learn even simple greetings in the local language, these well-intentioned “do-gooders” run the risk of rushing in and unconsciously imposing their will – utilizing material resources to gain control so they can make their project “happen.” The results will be short-lived and often counterproductive. The local community will not own the project, nor will they feel any obligation to maintain it.

Still, as I've been looking into this matter, it seems to me that for those who have not already committed to a relationship with a sponsored child (who need to keep that commitment), the best way to help impoverished people on other continents is to help those churches and other charities that are indigenous to the countries in which those people live, who already understand the issues and problems unique to those regions, and to whose knowledge and expertise we ought to be deferring.

As By Their Strange Fruit goes on to say:

The 'white savior complex' is basically based in pride. It reveals an attitude of superiority and paternalism, . . .Rather than perpetuate the myth that white folk are somehow the world's saving grace, we need to empower others to take the lead.

And of course, when indigenous charities and churches already are taking the lead, the best we can do is get on board to help them.  

For instance, we can contribute to the African Independent Churches that are local to countries we want to help:

Even though the denominational, ritual, and linguistic diversity of these churches makes it difficult to analyze and classify, the common thread uniting all of the Christian churches is that they were all established by African initiative rather than by foreign missionary agendas. Even though many of these churches have traditional denominational names and relationships, they are not defined by these traditions. These churches emphasize that they are established and led by Africans. In addition, all AICs place emphasis on the biblical warrant to include African cultural norms into their modes of worship, theology, and practice, though to varying degrees.

A link to the webpage for contributing to African Independent Churches is here. For those who want to help poor people in the Western hemisphere, there is a Pasadena-based ministry which specifically empowers indigenous church leaders in Latin America: Latin American Indigenous Ministries.  Or we can contribute to secular charities whose founders are native to an area we want to help, such as the Wayuu Taya Foundation, which empowers and aids indigenous Latin American peoples in many countries, or Alaffia, which is involved in communities in West Africa.

It's important to develop the humility to see that other people groups are quite capable of helping their own poor, and that God has already provided for leaders there.  Sometimes we white Western Christians aren't meant to be the team captains, but the water carriers; not the heroes, but the sidekicks.

But one thing we want to try hard not to be is the villains.  And historically, too often that's exactly what we have been.  We've got to open our eyes to this and work on breaking the cycle.

The key with overseas charity is to stop talking and begin listening-- to stop trying to teach and open ourselves to learn.

Black History Month: Women's Voices of the Civil Rights Movement

The theme of this year's Black History Month is "Civil Rights in America."  Today I want to celebrate by showcasing some of the voices of Black women who spoke during the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s.  Women civil rights leaders did not receive the recognition that men did in the movement, so it's important to me to do what I can to be sure they are remembered.  

I also want to acknowledge that women of color don't need me to speak for them.  That's why today's post is not about what I have to say, but simply about giving room in this small space for their voices to be heard by my mostly white readership.  These voices from decades past should never be forgotten.

Fannie Lou Hamer

Fannie Lou Hamer was a Civil Rights organizer and spokeswoman from 1962 to 1972.  Jailed and beaten in prison for breaking a restaurant's "whites only policy," she went on (though permanently disabled from the beating) to found the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party and to spearhead a lawsuit against Sunflower County for school segregation.  She also founded the Freedom Farm Cooperative and helped found the National Women's Political Caucus, and authored two books. She is known for leading her fellow activists in Christian hymns such as "This Little Light of Mine."

Here is her story in her own words (from About.Com Women's History):

• One night I went to the church. They had a mass meeting. And I went to the church, and they talked about how it was our right, that we could register and vote. They were talking about we could vote out people that we didn't want in office, we thought that wasn't right, that we could vote them out. That sounded interesting enough to me that I wanted to try it. I had never heard, until 1962, that black people could register and vote. 

• When they asked for those to raise their hands who'd go down to the courthouse the next day, I raised mine. Had it high up as I could get it. I guess if I'd had any sense I'd've been a little scared, but what was the point of being scared? The only thing they could do to me was kill me and it seemed like they'd been trying to do that a little bit at a time ever since I could remember. 

• The landowner said I would have to go back to withdraw or I would have to leave and so I told him I didn't go down there to register for him, I was down there to register for myself. 

• I am determined to get every Negro in the state of Mississippi registered. 

• They just kept beating me and telling me, "You nigger bitch, we're gonna make you wish you were dead." ... Every day of my life I pay with the misery of that beating.

And here is a portion of her "We're on Our Way" speech given in 1964 at the Negro Baptist School in Indianola, Mississippi:

We want people, we want people over us that’s concerned about the people because we are human beings. Regardless of how they have abused us for all these years, we always cared what was going on. We have prayed and we have hoped for God to bring about a change. And now the time have come for people to stand up. And there’s something real, real peculiar but still it’s great: there used to be a time when you would hit a Negro—a white man would hit a Negro—the others would go and hide. But there’s a new day now, when you hit a Negro, you likely to see a thousand there. Because God care. God care and we care. And we can no longer ignore the fact that we can’t sit down and wait for things to change because as long as they can keep their feet on our neck, they will always do it. But it’s time for us to stand up and be women and men. Because actually, I’m tired of being called “Aunty.” I wondered in life what actually time would they allow for me to be a woman? Because until I was thirty-six I was a girl: “Girl this.” And now I’m forty-six and it’s “Aunty.” But I want you to know tonight: I don’t have one white niece or nephew. And if you don’t want to call me Mrs. Hamer, just call me plain “Fannie” because I’m not your aunt.

Daisy Bates

Daisy Bates and her husband operated the Arkansas State Press, a weekly African-American newspaper in Little Rock, Arkansas.  In 1957 she became the advocate and champion of the "Little Rock Nine," nine students who became the first to attend the all-white Central High School.   President of the Arkansas Chapter of the NAACP, she was the only woman to speak at the 1963 March on Washington.   Here is the gist of her short speech:

[T]o Martin Luther King, Roy Wilkins and all of you fighting for civil liberties—that we will join hands with you as women of this country. Rosa Gregg, Vice President; Dorothy Height, the National Council of Negro Women; and the Delta Sigma Theta Sorority; the Methodist Church Women, all the women pledge that we will join hands with you. We will kneel-in; we will sit-in until we can eat in any corner in the United States. We will walk until we are free, until we can walk to any school and take our children to any school in the United States. And we will sit-on and we will kneel-in and we will lie-in if necessary until every Negro in America can vote. This we pledge to the women of America.

Dorothy Height

Dorothy Height was president of the National Council of Negro Women and one of the organizers of the March on Washington. She directed the integration of the YWCA in 1946 and founded and ran its Center for Racial Justice from 1965 to 1977.  She was a gifted orator and held a bachelor's degree in education and a master's in psychology.  She helped found the National Women's Political Caucus in 1971.  President Obama called her the "godmother of the civil rights movement" before she died in 2010.

Here are some of her words from a speech she gave at the first Scholarly Conference on Black Women in 1979: 

I had to say what it meant to black women that we were a part of the whole civil rights movement, that we were a civil rights organization, really, under the leadership of women. And that we had had a major hand in that whole beginning with the significant male leadership. . . Because as women, we could not see our children and our youth struggling and have them on the outside of our effort. . .

But when you ask me the question about race and sex, I want to add something else that I saw recently in a poster. And that poster was a woman who had two chains; she was chained down with two very heavy pieces of stone, with chains on her legs. And the heading underneath was "Double Trouble." And the idea that it reflected was, take one away – one said "racism" and the other said "sexism" – take one away and she is still tied down. Take the other away and leave that one, she's still tied down. The only way she will make it: they both have to be eliminated.

Ella Baker 

Ella Baker helped Martin Luther King, Jr., organize the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1957, and became its executive director. She also ran a voter registration campaign called the Crusade for Citizenship. She was the catalyst behind the creation of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), which assisted student activism in civil rights throughout the South.   She was involved in the formation of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party in 1964 and was one of the little-noticed women leaders of the March on Washington. 

Ms. Baker's speech to a conference of student protest groups in Raleigh, North Carolina-- the conference that led to the formation of the SNCC-- was entitled "More than a Hamburger"  and focused on how sit-ins at lunch counters were only the beginning of what would become a sustained movement.  Though the speech was not recorded, here is a portion of how she reconstructed the event in her personal notes:

The Student Leadership Conference made it crystal clear that current sit-ins
and other demonstrations are concerned with something much bigger that a hamburger or even a giant-sized COKE. 

Whatever may be the difference in approach to their goal, the Negro and white students, North and South, are seeking to rid America of the scourge of racial segregation and discrimination - not only at lunch counters, but in every aspect of life. In reports, casual conversations, discussion groups, and speeches, the sense and the spirit of the following statement that appeared in the initial newsletter of the students at Barber-Scotia College, Concord, NC were echoed time and again: 

“We want the world to know that we no longer accept the inferior position of second-class citizenship. We are willing to go to jail, be ridiculed, spat upon and even suffer physical violence to obtain First Class Citizenship. By and large, this feeling that they have a destined date with freedom, was not limited to a drive for personal freedom, or even freedom for the Negro in the South. Repeatedly it was emphasized that the moment was concerned with the moral implications of racial discrimination for the "whole world" and the "Human Race." This universality of approach was linked with a perspective and recognition that "it is important to keep the movement democratic and to avoid struggles for personal leadership."

These are by no means all of the women who should be remembered.  Evelyn Lowry (who just died last September at the age of 88), Patricia Stephens Due and her sister Priscilla Stephens Kruize, and Myrlie Evers are among the other heroines who should be commemorated for their dedicated sacrifice and leadership of the Civil Rights Movement at its inception.

And the best thing we can do to honor all of them is to recognize that the issue of civil rights for African Americans is far from resolved.

Please check out this article on the By Their Strange Fruit blog to see how systems of racism are still ingrained in American society. and this article to see how basic civil rights are still being abridged in our culture.   Pastor Jonathan Brooks also has an article this week on Red Letter Christians called Ok, White Folks, here's how you can really help!

Black History month is about seeing the perspectives and hearing the voices of those who have been marginalized in American history because of race.  Let it be a catalyst to also hear the voices of those who are marginalized because of race today.  I firmly believe this is part of what the kingdom of God is all about.

Forgotten Women in Church History: Jerena Lee (1783-1860?)

Jerena Lee was the first female African-American preacher and evangelist in the United States.  Born in New Jersey in 1783 to free but poor black parents, she traveled in her lifetime over 2300 miles and preached nearly 200 sermons to gatherings of men and women, blacks and whites.  Everywhere she went the power of her preaching overcame the considerable prejudices of her era against both her sex and her race.

Most people today have never heard of her.

Though not a slave, Jerena Lee was separated from her parents at the tender age of seven, becoming a live-in maid for a white family.  She didn't see her own family again until she was 21.  In her early 20s she was converted to Christianity through the preaching of Richard Allen, founder of the African Methodist Episcopal Church.  When she was 28 she married a black preacher, Joseph Lee, who died only a few years later, leaving her to raise two small children on her own.

According to the pamphlet form of her autobiography, which is available online, Ms. Lee experienced a "call to preach the gospel" several years after she had become a Christian, but before her marriage.  She described it like this:

[O]n a certain time, an impressive silence fell upon me, and I stood as if some one was about to speak to me, yet I had no such thought in my heart. - But to my utter surprise there seemed to sound a voice which I thought I distinctly heard, and most certainly understand, which said to me, "Go preach the Gospel!" I immediately replied aloud, "No one will believe me." Again I listened, and again the same voice seemed to say - "Preach the Gospel; I will put words in your mouth, and you will turn your enemies to become your freinds." [sic] 

At first I supposed that Satan had spoken to me, for I had read that he could transform himself into an angel of light for the purpose of deception. Immediately I went into a secret place, and called upon the Lord to know if he had called me to preach, and whether I was deceived or not; when there appeared to my view the form and figure of a pulpit, with a Bible lying thereon, the back of which was presented to me as plainly as if it had been a literal fact.

When Ms. Lee told her pastor, Richard Allen, that she felt called to preach, he responded that "our Discipline knew nothing at all about it-- it did not call for women preachers."  Jerena Lee felt a certain relief, but she also "found that a love of souls had in a measure departed from me; that holy energy which burned within me, as a fire, began to be smothered."

Nevertheless, Lee submitted to Rev. Allen and did not try again to preach.  Instead she married, birthed two children, and was widowed.  Eight years after her initial call, she was in church listening to the minister (Rev. Allen, by then a bishop, was also present) when the call came again:

But as [the minister] proceeded to explain [give the sermon], he seemed to have lost the spirit; when in the same instant, I sprang, as by altogether supernatural impulse, to my feet, when I was aided from above to give an exhortation on the very text which my brother Williams had taken. 

I told them I was like Jonah; for it had been then nearly eight years since the Lord had called me to preach his gospel to the fallen sons and daughters of Adam's race, but that I had lingered like him, and delayed to go at the bidding of the Lord, and warn those who are as deeply guilty as were the people of Nineveh. 

During the exhortation, God made manifest his power in a manner sufficient to show the world that I was called to labour according to my ability, and the grace given unto me, in the vineyard of the good husbandman. 

I now sat down, scarcely knowing what I had done, being frightened. I imagined, that for this indecorum, as I feared it might be called, I should be expelled from the church. But instead of this, the Bishop rose up in the assembly, and related that I had called upon him eight years before, asking to be permitted to preach, and that he had put me off; but that he now as much believed that I was called to that work, as any of the preachers present. These remarks greatly strengthened me, so that my fears of having given an offence, and made myself liable as an offender, subsided, giving place to a sweet serenity, a holy joy of a peculiar kind, untasted in my bosom until then.

Leaving her children in the care of her mother and other family members, Ms. Lee began to travel and preach, even going into slaveholding states, where many slaves walked miles to hear her and then walked all night afterwards to return to their plantations before being missed.  Consulting no man and guided only through prayer and the invitations she received, she preached her way across the United States and Canada. Prejudice and resistance to her preaching was overcome by the power of the Holy Spirit over and over again throughout Jerena Lee's preaching career.  Here is one representative example:

L. W., a respectable brother from Chillicothe, had never heard a woman preach, and was much opposed to it. An appointment was given me, and when I went into the desk and commenced reading the hymn to commence the worship, he looked at me a while, then got up and went out and stood until I had nearly got through the hymn, and then he came in, when I asked him to pray for us but he refused. I prayed myself, after which I took my text, and felt much liberty in speaking in the spirit indeed. And after meeting he came and shook hands with me in the spirit of a Christian, and next day he came and confessed to me his prejudices had been so great, so much like his father, that he could not unite with me, but now he believed that God, was no respecter of persons, and that a woman as well as a man, when called of God, had a right to preach. He afterwards became a licensed preacher, and we parted in peace.

Lee's autobiography also details her arguments justifying her calling:

O how careful ought we to be, lest through our by-laws of church government and discipline, we bring into disrepute even the word of life. For as unseemly as it may appear now-a-days for a woman to preach, it should be remembered that nothing is impossible with God. And why should it be thought impossible, heterodox, or improper for a woman to preach? seeing the Saviour died for the woman as well as for the man. 

If the man may preach, because the Saviour died for him, why not the woman? seeing he died for her also. Is he not a whole Saviour, instead of a half one? as those who hold it wrong for a woman to preach, would seem to make it appear. 

Did not Mary first preach the risen Saviour, and is not the doctrine of the resurrection the very climax of Christianity - hangs not all our hope on this, as argued by St Paul? Then did not Mary, a woman, preach the gospel? for she preached the resurrection of the crucified son of God. . .

If then, to preach the gospel, by the gift of heaven, comes by inspiration solely, is God straitened: must he take the man exclusively? May he not, did he not, and can he not inspire a female to preach the simple story of the birth, life, death, and resurrection of our Lord, and accompany it too with power to the sinner's heart. As for me, I am fully persuaded that the Lord called me to labor according to what I have received, in his vineyard. If he has not, how could he consistently hear testimony in favor of my poor labors, in awakening and converting sinners?

Jerena Lee disappeared from public life at the age of 66, having ended her preaching career and completed and published her autobiography.  The date and place of her death are unknown.  But I can't help thinking of Acts 10:9-48, where Peter was shown in a vision that his understanding of God's work had been too limited, and that he must not call the Gentiles unclean or refuse to associate with them, for God's Spirit could fall on them as well as on Jews.  Peter had to let the evidence of the power of the Spirit overcome his understanding of the "biblical" way he thought things were supposed to work.  He couldn't deny that despite what looked like the "plain meaning" of the Scriptures that only Jews could be God's people, the Spirit of God had fallen on a bunch of uncircumcised Gentiles.

I remember a former pastor of mine once saying something similar after visiting China in the early 1990s. When he had seen the congregations and heard the preaching of several different young women (all of whom said they were called into ministry, and through whom many people's lives had been changed), my pastor said, "Who was I to argue with God?  I could no more deny the truth of their callings than I could deny the truth of my own."

In a time and place bent more strongly against her than is even conceivable today-- a time and place where black people were considered inferior, and black women even more so-- Jerena Lee walked in power from the Holy Spirit that could not be repudiated.  To Christians and non-Christians, leaders and laypeople, white and non-white, men and women, free people and slaves, she spoke with authority the call to repent, believe, and live a holy life. As she wrote:

[B]y the instrumentality of a poor coloured woman, the Lord poured forth his spirit among the people. Though, as I was told, there were lawyers, doctors, and magistrates present, to hear me speak. . . the Lord scattered fire among them of his own kindling. The Lord gave his hand-maiden power to speak for his great name, for he arrested the hearts of the people, and caused a shaking amongst the multitude, for God was in the midst.

The only way around it is to forget it ever happened.  And we've done a pretty good job of that.

But the time has come to remember Jerena Lee.

I'm not saying Ms. Lee was perfect.  I'm not saying she was right in every doctrine or that she never acted unspiritually.  But I am saying God chose her-- and He never lets imperfections bother Him when He chooses a man, so why should imperfections disqualify a woman?

But if the Bible is really "clear" that God forbids all women everywhere to ever teach or exercise authority over men, then when God chose Jerena Lee and sent her out on her own, without even a "male covering," He acted in contradiction of His own word.

Either that, or a "poor coloured woman" who loved God with all her heart, brought people to Christ by some unholy power.  But didn't Jesus have something serious to say to those who believed the same thing of Him?  Matthew 12:26-28.

What if God actually acted exactly in keeping with His own word?  "God chose things the world considers foolish in order to shame those who think they are wise. And he chose things that are powerless to shame those who are powerful." (1 Corinthians 1:27, NLT version)

Maybe what's really clear is that church hierarchies and the gatekeepers of doctrine sometimes think they're wise when they're not, and hold onto power when they shouldn't.  Maybe God can and does do things that just don't fit into restricting, limiting "biblical" boxes, and when we read the Bible that way, we're doing Him and ourselves a disservice.

Let's let the witness of Jerena Lee speak to us once again.  The gifts and callings of God are for all.

----------------------------

Resources:

Pamphlet version of Lee's Religious Experience and Journal, published online

University of Minnesota's Voices from the Gaps

PBS's Africans in America Resource Bank

PBS's God in America

Susan Ditmire's History of Cape May County, New Jersey

Daughters of the Church by Ruth Tucker and Walter Liefeld, pp. 259-60.

Racism, Colorblindness and Me

"Stop staring!  What's the matter with you?"

I was about six years old, living in a smallish town in Colorado.  One Sunday afternoon we went to a park in a nearby larger town.  An African-American family had also brought their children to the park, and they were playing on the children's play equipment.

My eyes were riveted.  I couldn't look away.

I had never seen black people in person before. Only on TV.

I don't remember now whether my mother hissed those words, or if I said them to myself.  "Be colorblind," she had always told me.  "We don't look at people according to their race.  We simply see people."

I must be a racist, I thought to myself.  I had only seen black people on TV before.  These people looked strange, exotic, different.  I couldn't stop seeing their race.

I felt miserable and ashamed.

It was, I think, sometime in 1969.  The Civil Rights movement was in full swing, and my parents-- white-skinned, white-collar people living in the Rocky Mountains in a house my dad built himself-- were against Jim Crow laws and very supportive of the protests happening in far-away cities.  But where we lived, there were no black people anywhere in sight.

Later, when I was in high school, there were a few African-American kids in my school.  They were immensely popular, considered "cool."  I was far down on the social scale.  They never noticed or spoke to me.

When we moved and I went to college at the University of Oregon, I finally had the opportunity to get to know some African-American students.  The strangeness finally fell away, and I relaxed and could be natural around my new friends.  Although the campus ministry I went to was coercive and controlling, it did have this strength-- it actively sought out people of all cultures, and it was probably the most integrated church in town.  I lived in a big sorority house with kids who were African-American, Chinese, Indonesian, Latino.  I began to see that the incident when I was six had been pretty much just a normal, childish response to a new thing.  I wasn't racist after all.  I had learned to be "colorblind."

And that's how I saw myself for about the next 25 years.

Nowadays I live in a smallish town in Oregon where there are very few people of color. The largest minority group here is Latino, but we don't see very many even of them.  Most black people in town are here because of the college.  When they graduate, they don't stay here.

I always thought it was because there weren't enough of the kinds of jobs they wanted.

But recently I decided it wasn't right for me, as a Christian egalitarian, to speak out only for women in the way I've been doing. Because simply by concentrating on the concerns of women like me, in the churches and communities I know, I am by default excluding women of color.

Because Christ calls me to speak out for the marginalized and disenfranchised, and not just for the group I belong to.

Because though I lack male privilege, I have white privilege and a host of other privileges.  So I need to listen to and learn from people unlike myself, and then speak out for them too.

Because a few years back I began to understand that being "colorblind" wasn't enough.

Eduardo Bonilla-Silva's 2003 book Racism Without Racists explains:

Color-blind racism. . . explains contemporary racial inequality as the outcome of nonracial dynamics. Whereas Jim Crow racism explained blacks' social standing as a result of their biological and moral inferiority. . . instead, whites rationalize minorities' contemporary status as the product of market dynamics, naturally occurring phenomena, and blacks' imputed cultural limitations.  For instance, whites can attribute Latinos' high poverty rate to a relaxed work ethic. . .  

[C]ontemporary racial inequality is reproduced through "new racism" practices that are subtle, institutional, and apparently nonracial. . . And the beauty of this new ideology is that it aids in the maintenance of white privilege without fanfare, without naming those who it subjects and those who it rewards. . . Thus whites enunciate positions that safeguard their racial interests without sounding "racist." 

In other words, just because we aren't using racial epithets or promoting racial stereotypes, doesn't mean we're not, consciously or subconsciously, participating in subtler forms of a more modern racism.  As Bonilla-Silva states:

Relying on questions that were formed in the Jim Crow era to assess white's racial views today produces an artificial image of progress [and] . . . a rosy picture of race relations that misses what is going on on the ground.

This is why people like me, living in areas where we are privileged to never have to deal with racial issues directly (because of the lack of integration of our communities), can think racism is largely a past issue, rapidly becoming obsolete.  We would never, and we know of no one who would, use the n-word or deny housing to someone based on race.  So race just isn't an issue any more, or if it is, it's only down in those Southern states, right?

But isn't it time I asked myself why, after all these years, my city and most of my state remain so white?  According to this data, Oregon's population is 86.6% white-- 17th highest in the country.  And it is 37th in the nation for black population.

I decided to look a little bit into my state's history.  The Oregon History Project states that the Ku Klux Klan had a large presence here in the 1920s-- "one of the strongest state Klans in the country"-- largely because

[t]he Klan philosophy of “100 percent Americanism” rested primarily on three attributes: belief in a philosophy of white supremacy; adherence to Protestant or “American” Christianity; and the superiority of native-born Americans. Given Oregon’s long history of racial exclusion and the fact that almost 90 percent of the state’s population in the early 1920s was native-born, white, and protestant, Klan organizers had little trouble enrolling new members.

Wait-- Oregon is historically racially exclusionist?  Yes, very.  According to 7Stops online magazine, Oregon was intended by white settlers from the start to be a racially exclusive state:

Even in its earliest incarnations, the Oregon Territory did not legally allow slaves to be brought into the state. This law, though, had little to do with abolitionism; in fact, the first governor of the state of Oregon held a decidedly pro-slavery stance. Outlawing slavery was, in effect, just a way of keeping African-Americans out of the state. An article in the Oregonian on Portland’s lack of racial diversity quotes Darrell Millner, professor of black studies at Portland State University, as saying: “Conventional wisdom at the time was clear… If you don’t have more than one race, then you don’t have any racial problems.” For working class or poor whites living in Midwestern and southern states in the mid 1840s, free blacks represented a threat not only to their job security, but also their social standing, as “white trash” was often placed on a rung lower than “black” on the social ladder. . . .

Oregon enacted several laws in an attempt to curb the influx of free blacks. There were exclusion laws to keep any new “negroes and mullatos” from entering the territory, and a law called the “Lash Law” that mandated that every black in the territory be lashed every six months until they left. When Oregon adopted its constitution, one of the amendments was an exclusion law, making it the only free state in the union to include an exclusion law in its constitution. In the 1860s the laws were reduced, and African-Americans, Chinese and Hawaiian immigrants, and multiracial people were allowed to live in the state for a $5-a-year fee, although they were not allowed to own property. [Emphases added]

I don't think my children learned any of this in school.  I know for a fact that race relations was not part of the curriculum in Colorado schools when I was growing up.  But the fact remains that my current home state has a long-standing history of hostility to minorities, and this deep-seated historical attitude almost certainly contributes to the lack of welcome minorities, and particularly black people, undoubtedly still feel today. If you then add modern policies like urban renewal that favors white development at the expense of the very few traditionally black neighborhoods, it's no wonder that cities like Portland have actually seen their diversity decrease in recent years.

It's seeming more and more to me that unless I start actively engaging with this issue and listening to the voices of those who don't look like me, I'm part of the problem rather than part of the solution. I don't want to be racist or to contribute to racism.  But good intentions aren't enough, as detailed by the Christian racial reconciliation website By Their Strange Fruit: Christianity and Race in Today's Culture:

Our modern racial paradox is that our society is filled with profound differences based on race, yet few claim to even see race at all.

This is perhaps the most dangerous form of racism. Because we refuse to acknowledge its existence, we are helpless to combat it. Racism is allowed to run rampant because we deny the reality of its strength.

As a Christian who knows my own sinfulness and relies on the abundant, freely-given grace of God, I needn't be afraid to face my unaware and unwilling participation in the status quo of systemic, institutional racism-- or even the deep-rooted, unwitting biases I may have-- but instead to trust in Christ's hand in my own as He leads me further into the ways of His upside-down kingdom, where no one clings to power but instead lays it down for the good of others.   The first thing for me to do is learn to listen well as a person of privilege.

I commit myself now to do that.  White readers, will you join me?

Because being colorblind is not enough.