97 YEARS AGO

“97 YEARS AGO”

            Caroline and I have been visiting on Minnesota’s North Shore with our good and long time friends Dee and John Cole Vodicka.  For a Southern boy like me, it is a wild and rough place with its sheer cliffs down to huge Lake Superior. A storm also stirred up Lake Superior more than usual, so it seemed like the powerful Pacific Ocean to me. I did learn why it is called “Lake Superior” – it is bigger than all the other Great Lakes combined.

            An article in the Minneapolis Star Tribune reminded me that this past Saturday was the 97^th anniversary of the ratification of the 19^th Amendment that gave women the right to vote.  The newspaper article indicated that a celebration would be held because it is believed that a South St. Paul referendum on August 27, 1920, on a water bond was the first election where women cast the vote after the 19^th Amendment passed.  Although women could already vote in some Western states and in some municipal elections in the USA, the water bond referendum in South St. Paul seems to be the first one after the 19^th Amendment passed.  It was for an upgrade to the water system, and with the vote of the women helping the community, the referendum passed. 

            As I think about rights for women, I am reminded that we have elected a president who considers women to be only objects for him to grab and to use. I am also reminded that part of the reason that he won the presidency is that he had a very competent woman opponent, and that we are all still afraid of having a woman in power over us.  Statistics show that a majority of white women voted for Donald Trump and against Hilary Clinton, although the vast majority of African-American women voted for Hilary Clinton.  From the white male point of view, we were already mad that we had an African-American man as president for eight years, and we certainly were not ready to have a woman as president after that, especially a highly competent woman.

            As I think over the long sweep of our history, I give thanks for all the women and men who worked so hard to obtain the right for women to vote.  I also recall that it is a complex issue, with many of those who fought for the vote for women refusing to work for black and native women to have the right to vote.   I give thanks for people like Ida Wells who fought so hard for the right for all citizens to vote, regardless of gender or skin color or economic status.

            I’m also aware of the continuing power of patriarchy in my own life.   Whenever I see a woman, my first thought is not to wonder what her story is or whether she is a community organizer or a home organizer or both.  My first reaction is whether she is attractive or not.  I have been so well trained by the patriarchy that this principality still holds sway over me.  I can say that I no longer judge the value of women because of how they look, but it is still a factor in my perceptual apparatus.  I must grind on this power daily, and it speaks to me again of those insightful words in Ephesians 2:2 that I am captive to the “power of the prince of the air.”  This idea that men are superior and that the only value of women is that they are property and sexual objects for men  - this value was taught to me by both men and women who loved me and whom I loved.   That is one of the reasons that it is so difficult to eradicate in my life and perceptions.  I am grateful to the many women and men who have taught me that there is another way, especially the  primary witness my spouse and partner Caroline Leach.

            I am grateful that this issue of the value of women as partners and equals is very much in the public square.  I hope that this issue will not fade from the discussion until it is very well established that women are indeed equals in human status and partners in community power.   As I have discovered in my own life and in the lives of others, it will take all kinds of witnesses and struggles to make it so:  we are in a battle for our lives. 

WHOEVER HAS TWO COATS...

“WHOEVER HAS TWO COATS….”

            We are up in Chattanooga today at Caroline’s old home place in order to get a better view of the eclipse.   The lead story in today’s Chattanooga paper is about Nearest Green, a person held as a slave.  It is now acknowledged by all that he taught Jack Daniel to make the now-world-famous whiskey, but Mr. Green never got any credit or any money for it, nor have his descendants.  And that brings us to the second part of the blog on reparations.    

            In these days when we acknowledge the white supremacist roots of Donald Trump and his base, it may seem strange to talk about reparations.  When we’re wondering when the white supremacists will start shooting their guns that they carry so defiantly, it may seem far-fetched to even broach the idea of reparations.  Yet, I’ll take for my model the words of John the Baptizer in Luke 3 when people ask him how they can get right with God.  He tells them: “Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none (3:11).”  It is a recognition of the complicity of those who are comfortable in establishing the poverty of those who are poor, no matter what the economic system is. 

            In our capitalistic system, especially, this is a powerful call, because much of the wealth of the United States was built on slave labor.  As we saw last week, legal slavery in the US did not end until 1965 (except for those in prison – the 13^th Amendment still allows slavery for those who are incarcerated).  So all of us are wrapped up in this system – the idea of reparations is not just about “ancient ancestors,” as one person put it on Facebook.  The idea of reparations goes to the heart of the matter of the continuing power of race in America – those of us who are comfortable make money from it.  All the tortured faces in Charlottesville, all the shouts of “blood and soil,” all the weapons – these are designed to maintain the idea of white supremacy, so that the goods and energies of the system can flow to those at the top.  And, yes, some of those same white people in the white supremacy movement are unable and unwilling to discern that they are pawns for Trump and many of his cronies.

            Reparations would involve monetary payments to American people (and their descendants) held as slaves.  It is not a new idea.  Indeed, after Union General William Sherman captured Atlanta and began his march to the sea, he issued special field order #15 in January, 1865, confiscating 400,000 acres of coastal land in Georgia and Florida, giving out 40-acre plots to people formerly held as slaves.  It held for awhile, until it was rescinded by new President Andrew Johnson in the fall of 1865.

            This is a long and difficult process, and it is beyond the scope of this blog to go into much detail.  For those interested in it, begin with Ta-Nehisi Coates’ article “The Case for Reparations” in the June, 2014 issue of The Atlantic.  You can also see my article “Whoever Has Two Coats” in the February-March issue of Hospitality.  Randall Robinson’s book “The Debt” also goes into depths of this issue.

            The climate is not great for this idea currently, but it is time to begin this necessary step.  I want to suggest two small steps.  If you attend a place of worship, consider encouraging and pressuring your leadership to seek to offer floors of income to people held as slaves or their descendants.  When I was pastor at Oakhurst Presbyterian, we provided such a monthly income floor for five families whose forebears grew up in slavery and who still suffered the consequences.  We were blessed to have generous donors who understood the call of John the Baptizer for reparations.  There are many problems and many issues in this process, but the bottom line is that it is a biblical call.

            Secondly, it is time now to seek to amend the US Constitution to change its “three-fifths” designation for humans held as slaves, so that they will now be recognized as the 100% human beings that they are.  This would require a discussion about why the “three-fifths” clause made it into the Constitution in the first place.  The short answer is that my white Southern forebears wanted to have their cake and eat it, too – they wanted to deny the humanity of those people held as slaves, but they wanted the political power of their numbers.  So, those human beings held as slaves counted as 60% human in calculating the numbers to be represented, and the white Southerners were able to strengthen their political power in the new nation.  A new amendment would help us think about and reclaim the vision of the Declaration of Independence that all {men} are created equal.  Begin thinking about and talking about this amendment, and contact your political representatives.   This movement is at the heart of the matter – “whoever has two coats…..”

YOU SHOULD GIVE HER THE CAR!

“YOU SHOULD GIVE HER THE CAR!”

            When Inez Giles and I started doing workshops on racism in the mid-1990’s, one of our first efforts was a series of workshops organized by Clergy and Laity Concerned of Atlanta. This group was founded in 1965 to oppose the Vietnam War, and it was at a CALC national meeting that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, first opposed the Vietnam War in public.  It no longer exists on a local Atlanta or national level.  The demise of this peace and justice group resonates now, as we watch the decline of the mainstream American church.  Without the lifeblood of peace and justice flowing through the heart of the life of the church, we eventually dry up, as we are doing now.

            At the end of the first night of those CALC workshops, an older white woman came up to us, and speaking to Inez, she said: “I have a problem that I want to get you advice on.  My husband and I have a colored maid, and when I drive her home, I let her sit in the front seat because I want to acknowledge that we are equals.  But, when my husband drives her home, he makes her sit in the back of the car.  He and I argue about it a lot, but I can’t get him to change.  What should I do?”

            Inez replied: “You should give her the car!”  The woman was so astonished that she said nothing for a long while, and then she replied:  “I can’t give her the car.”  Inez replied:  “Then you won’t solve your problem.”  The woman walked away, looking saddened and chastened.  I was reminded of the powerful rich man who once asked Jesus what he should do to find life, and Jesus replied that he should give away all his possessions and follow Jesus.  The rich man turned away with sadness (Mark 10:17+).

            As I watched the white supremacy gathering in Virginia over the weekend, I was reminded of how strongly those of us who are classified as “white” cling to that central definition of our identity.  It is no surprise that white folks have reacted so strongly to the election of Barack Obama as president, even going so far to elect the quintessential white man as president, Donald Trump.  Every time there are minor gains for people of African descent in our country, the white reaction is harsh and strong.   Whether we are young and right wing as this weekend’s demonstrators were, or whether we are older and liberal as was the woman who talked with Inez and me was, the importance of being white remains powerful and seems to be essential to us.

            In the current atmosphere of white supremacy re-asserting itself publicly, it may seem naïve to talk about reparations, but I want to examine it briefly and look at it more next week: “you should give her the car.”  The word “reparations” comes from the same root as the word “repair,” and its root meaning is to restore something to its original state or relationship.  In regard to “race” in the USA, this process would involve not only monetary payments but also a public acknowledgment of the cause of the brokenness of the relationship, i.e. the idea and the enforcement of white supremacy in American culture, including and especially the marriage of slavery and race in our history.

            In regard to reparations, a main complaint from those of us classified as “white,” is that slavery ended in 1865, over 150 years ago.  So, how can we possibly address those issues from so long ago?   Fortunately, people like Doug Blackmon in his book “Slavery By Another Name” have reminded us that legal slavery did not end with the 13^th Amendment to the Constitution.  It was re-established, especially in the South, under the names of “segregation” and “Jim Crow,” but it wasn’t called slavery for obvious reasons. 

            Doug’s helpful suggestion is that we re-name this period in American history, beginning in 1877, “neo-slavery” in order to get closer to the political and institutional dynamics that actually existed.  With this new definition, he feels that slavery did not end until 1945, but my sense is that it did not end until 1965 with the passing of the Voting Rights Act.  And, of course, it still exists in the 13^th Amendment for those held as prisoners – need more explanation for the kindergarten-to-prison pipeline?

            The revelatory nature of this re-orientation to 1965 is that almost all of us know people who were held in slavery or their direct descendants.   While we’ll explore this more next week, let’s allow this idea to sink in:  slavery did not end in the USA until 1965.  We should give her the car.

GOD INTENDS HEALTHCARE FOR ALL -- YES, SHE DOES!!!

GOD INTENDS HEALTHCARE FOR ALL – YES, SHE DOES!!!

            This week’s blog continues on the subject of healthcare as filtered through the 3^rd and 4^th chapters of Acts.  As we saw last week, through the power of God, Peter and John channel both healing and curing to a man who has been crippled from birth.  It is an amazing story, and the Lukan author of Acts lets us see the joy of the man and the astonishment of the people in the Temple, as they see this “unclean” man welcomed into the community.

            Not everyone is pleased, however.   The political and religious leaders do not believe that God intends healthcare for all.  They prefer to believe that God should ration healthcare out only to those who are deserving, and of course in their belief system, they and their allies are the “deserving.”  So, rather than celebrating this miraculous healing and curing, they do what the powers always do – they arrest Peter and John and threaten them with torture, a little water-boarding in the name of God.  After a few days in jail with no bail, Peter and John are brought before the court. 

            The judge tells them that they will be granted probation on the condition that they stop talking and acting like God intends healthcare for everybody.  In the past, Peter has yielded to this pressure.  On the night of the arrest of Jesus, he denied that he knew who Jesus was, even as he strained to hear what was going on in the home of the high priest.  Here, however, the Spirit has moved in Peter and in John – they tell the judge that while they recognize his civil authority, they cannot agree to the conditions of the probation – they must continue to speak about and act on what they have seen and heard.  It is the second miracle of this long story – first the man is healed and cured, and second Peter and John now become bold witnesses to the truth that God intends healthcare for all.

            In today’s political climate, this story resonates throughout the corridors of our hearts and the halls of power.  The four gospels all testify that the majority of Jesus’ actions are healing and curing.  There is no one – and I mean no one – who comes to Jesus who is not healed and/or cured by him.  We see evidence of Peter’s healing in this story.  Mary Magdalena, the PRIMARY witness to the resurrection, is healed of seven demons.  And Paul, the originator of the idea of the “urban” church, has a dramatic healing on the road to Damascus.  God intends healthcare for all because we are all in need of healing and curing. 

            One of the arguments against this universal healthcare is that such a system would mean rationing of healthcare, but that rationing already exists strongly in our current money-based system.  Those with access to money can get healthcare – those without have a LONG wait or get no healthcare at all.  So, the issue with universal healthcare is that the rationing will be spread to all of us instead of falling on those who have little or no money.   It is striking to me that in this story in Acts 3 & 4, the crippled man asks for money, and Peter’s response is that he has no money to give him!  BUT, Peter indicates that he can share with him the power of God to provide healthcare for all.  And Peter and John do that.  It is the first public act of the church, to believe in and to act for the idea that God intends healthcare for all.

            So, how can Christians be against universal healthcare?  The answer is the same as the answer to the question:  “How can Christians hold people as slaves?”  We have believed the American propaganda that money is the center of life and that life is an individualistic enterprise.  We often are like Mary Magdalena at tomb of Jesus in John 20 – we are so captured by the power of death that we cannot recognize the risen Jesus standing right in front of us.  The task of the church on the issue of healthcare for all is to help ourselves and to help others to hear our names being called, just as Mary heard her name called in that tomb of death:  “Mary.”  When she heard her name, her eyes were opened, and she ran to tell the other disciples that she had seen the Lord, that she had been healed yet once again.  May that happen to us too, so that we may be the witnesses.