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What do I mean by 'whiteness?'

7/28/2020

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I didn’t encounter the word ‘whiteness’ until I was a senior in college. Just a year before that encounter, I was openly racist to a fellow student, a story I told  in a previous blog. That blog was about me narrating my own formation in whiteness, a formation I wasn’t even aware of. I thought of myself as a good, compassionate, kind person who treated everyone the same, and I was. I grew up around great people in a great church, I have a kind family, I received a good education, I had black friends, and I was taught to treat other people like I wanted to be treated. However, there was another formation I had undergone and forces present that were subconsciously undermining my efforts to be a good person in this world. 

By the time I had graduated from divinity school, I had probably heard the word ‘whiteness’ defined over twenty times, conversed with several professors and peers about it, and taken several courses where it was a central topic, but it was only toward the end of my seminary career that I first thought, “I think I might be able to articulate this concept to someone else.” This word is hard to understand because it does not originate from our traditional sources: the bible, the church, and theology. It is speaking a language with which we are  unfamiliar.

Whiteness has to do with all people. When we talk about whiteness, we are not talking about the color of anyone’s skin. We are talking about the ways people are formed to live in relation to one another. Whiteness is a name for the ways we have been conditioned to think about ourselves and others in relation to race, and it affects people of all skin colors. It is a way of thinking and living to which all people are susceptible. So, whiteness is also broader than our own personal experiences of race. Whiteness is a way to name those invisible forces of formation we are not always aware of, which create systems that we oftentimes don’t even see but participate in nonetheless. Systems that impact our communal decisions on where we live, where we go to school, where we go to church, what neighborhoods we value and which ones we don’t, and how wealth and services are distributed.

‘Whiteness’ is not a reference to skin color, and it is bigger than personal experience. When I talked last week about “dismantling whiteness,” I was not condemning people with white skin, claiming that having white skin makes someone a sinner, or asking for an apology from people with white skin for having white skin, or stating that everyone with white skin is racist. Trust me: I am as white-skinned as they come. When I was a teenager, my brother and I had a lawn mowing business. One day it was particularly hot, and I was sure to wear a t-shirt while we mowed. The problem was I wore a white shirt. After 8 hours of mowing, I got home, took my shirt off, and found that I had a sunburn under my shirt. That’s as white-skinned as it gets. 

A related question to the conflation of whiteness and white skin, is the question of whether or not God made us the way we are. Didn’t God make me with white skin, brown skin, etc.? Yes, God made each of us exactly the way that we are, skin color and all, and we are each precious in God’s sight. We hear that truth put beautifully in Psalm 139:13-14, “For it was you who formed my inward parts; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; that I know very well.” We know that since God made each of us we are God’s beloved creatures and, like we heard this past Sunday from Romans 8, “nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” We might even say we could add “skin color” to Paul’s list in Romans 8:38-39a, “I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor skin color, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Having white skin is not a sin. It is equally important to say that having any color of skin is not a sin. God’s love and forgiveness are not skin-dependent, and it is because God loves us that we have to take an honest account of our history and how that history impacts our present. Race has been used in the past to alienate, persecute, and belittle people of color, and that past continues to impact our present and the world we live in. White Christians have used and abused Scripture, especially Genesis 9:25 and the curse of Ham, for centuries to defend slavery and invalidate the humanity of black people, saying black skin was a sign of sin. These past realities continue to impact the present. The conversation about whiteness, then, is a conversation that hopefully leads us closer and closer toward an embrace of the common humanity we have in Jesus, and allows us to better understand and articulate how we have been formed, and how we might have accidentally distorted the Gospel along the way. 

The purpose of talking about whiteness is to ask ourselves hard questions about things we do not often have to think about. How did I come to live in the physical place I live, with people that look very much like myself? How did my neighborhood, especially if, like me, you live in the suburbs, come to exist in the way it exists? Why do large parts of our communities continue to live segregated lives? Why is the economic divide between white and black people and families so wide in our country, even after the abolition of slavery and the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1965? When we talk about whiteness, we are not talking about skin color, we are trying to get to the bottom of these very elusive questions. As Christians, this points us to much more important questions: How does our Communion with Jesus actually impact how we live in the world? How does our Communion with Jesus move us towards compassion for those we have trouble understanding? How did my church come to be and look the ways it does? How was I taught to read the bible? How was I taught to think about myself in relationship to God?

I know last week I said I was going to do a series on the story of our faith. Last week’s blog, which you can see below, was about the Canaanite woman, who comes to Jesus begging for her daughter’s life. I used this story to talk about how, at first, Jesus’ back is to us, the gentiles, but, by the Holy Spirit’s drawing, life with God is opening up for gentiles through Jesus. I said, “Jesus does not belong to us; we belong to Jesus.” This radical inclusion and love and welcome is our story. I’m also telling this story because it’s crucial for us as we engage in conversations about race. I wanted to pause that series for a week, though. I thought it might be helpful to give some clarity about this concept called ‘whiteness’ I’ve mentioned in a lot of my blogs because of how confusing the concept can be and the questions it raises. 
​

I hope this blog keeps open or opens up lines of communication as we all dream and work for that world of love, joy, and intimacy with God and each other we desire.
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Our Story: Part 1

7/21/2020

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This past Saturday I got to listen in on a Zoom call that an organization called DurhamCares organized. The meeting’s topic was “Racism: The History of a Problem,” and Willie James Jennings, my professor in seminary, spoke. If you have paid attention to anything I’ve said in my 3.5 years at North Raleigh, then you have probably heard me say Dr. Jennings’ name and pass on to you something he taught me. Toward the end of the hour-and-a-half long call, Dr. Jennings gave three suggestions on how to engage and begin to dismantle whiteness in our churches right now. The first way is to tell the real story of our faith, and for the next three blogs, that is exactly what I’m going to do.

I told the story of our faith a couple of sermons ago when I preached on Jesus sending out the disciples. His first instruction was “Do not go anywhere among the Gentiles.” That could be half of the one sentence summation of our story. I want to start, though, with the story of the Canaanite woman in Matthew 15 because this story helps us realize how we have imagined and read ourselves wrongly in the biblical story. 

Jesus is leaving a place and heading toward Tyre and Sidon, which is a coastal region known for its wealth and port-like atmosphere, if you know what I mean. Tyre and Sidon are recipients of God’s wrath and judgment in the Old Testament (see Jeremiah 25:17-22, for example). As Jesus is walking toward this region--which is strange in its own way because Tyre and Sidon is Gentile country (Is this Jesus going to get the lost sheep of the house of Israel?)--a woman(!), a Canaanite(!!) came running up and shouting(!!!) for Jesus to heal her demon-possessed(!!!!) daughter. The exclamation points are all the ways that this woman has no business being around Jesus. These two should have nothing to do with one another, but this woman takes upon her lips the words of Israel’s faithful: “Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David.” This plea coming out of a Canaanite woman’s mouth is absolutely crazy. She speaks of the need and hope of which only Israel has spoken. She comes to the place where only Israel belongs: before God. She assumes the position of worship that only Israel practices: on her knees. She is doing what ought not be done by someone like her. 

Jesus and the disciples know her actions and words are extraordinary. Think about what Jesus does. This woman begs for help for her daughter and Jesus turns his back to her! That is the beginning of our story of faith. We are those who came running to Jesus, and he turned his back to us. We asked for help, and he turned the other way to help those for whom he was sent. Jesus does not belong to us. We belong to him, but not yet, not first. The disciples just get mad at her, “Send her away, Jesus!” 

The woman begs again, but Jesus will not be deterred. He says, “It is not right to give to the dogs what is meant for the children.” Jesus says that. Jesus calls a woman a dog. Jesus ignores her plea and then outright denies her. Again, she’s not asking for money or possessions. She’s asking for her daughter’s life, and Jesus says no. Again, Jesus says no. This woman, though. She keeps pressing. Still on her knees she says, “Yes, Lord, but even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from the master’s table.” Talk about boldness! This woman will not accept Jesus’ no to her, and now Jesus turns toward her and says, “Woman, great is your faith!” There is shock in Jesus. There is learning going on in Jesus. Even a Canaanite woman can have faith? Yes, even a Canaanite woman. Jesus learns and opens up to the Spirit’s desire and love, which is a desire and love that will not accept the separation of Jew and Gentile. The way is opening up and Jesus is turning toward a Gentile and saying “Yes.” This is our story. 

We have not told ourselves this story, though. We have read ourselves as the disciples. When we read the story of the Canaanite woman, we read ourselves as the disciples standing there with Jesus asking, “What are we going to do with this woman, Jesus? Get her out of here!” We see ourselves standing over this woman, who is on her knees, looking down on her in superiority. When we hear Jesus talk about the children’s food, we hear him talking about us. We think our seats are at the master’s table. We think we are God’s chosen people, inheritors of great faith. 

That is not who we are, and that is not our story. 

The Canaanite woman is our mother. She tracks our movement into life with the God of Israel. She begs not just for her daughter but for us, too. She shows us our real story: we are outsiders, those who do not belong, running to the God of Israel, begging for help, taking on our lips the faithful words of Israel, falling on our knees, and asking for what does not belong to us. We are guests, unwelcome ones at that. Yet, the way opens by the movement of the Holy Spirit who will not yield. Jesus learns.

You might be asking, “What does this have to do with understanding and dismantling whiteness?” This story is necessary for dismantling whiteness because forgetting this story of radical inclusion, of our gentile existence, is the engine inside of whiteness. We have bypassed Israel and made ourselves the chosen ones, the masters, and whiteness is the drive toward mastery. 

What would it be like for us not just to remember but to live as the question, not the answer? What if we entered each interaction and engagement not as teachers but as students looking to learn? What if we saw ourselves as guests instead of hosts? That imagining and living out our story of radical inclusion will help us get there and help us begin to address and dismantle whiteness in our church and community.

Peace,
​Brandon

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Weeds

7/15/2020

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“I got caught in the weeds.” This phrase has circled around in my mind this week because of the parable we will read this Sunday for the gospel lesson. 

This is a phrase most of us are familiar with, right? Getting caught in the weeds. It means getting lost in the small details of an issue or a problem that solutions can seem impossible. 

In my experience, learning about race and racism can become a point of getting lost in the weeds. I mean, just think about all the topics that we have covered in the few weeks we have focused on race: real-estate, economics, land, history, labor, education, personal histories, geography, whiteness, American history. That’s only scratching the surface. That doesn’t take into account all the other small details that each one of us engaged in this work have encountered along the way. Even when you get into the weeds I’ve listed, you start encountering other weeds: guilt, anger, cynicism, hopelessness, etc. 

Take, for example, a book I’m reading right now. The first chapter starts with defining whiteness, but it engages history, labor, colonialism, and geography just to name a few. The second chapter focuses on issues of race and racism as it applies to Indigenous Americans. So, there I’m reading about culture, education, and geography. Again, that’s just to name a few. The book moves on from there to how race and racism becomes a global export. One chapter focuses on language complications between missionaries and the Tamil people of India, and how Tamil concepts of family, clan, and class got mixed with colonial concepts of race, meaning skin color. The book will deal with race and racism in Latin America and, ultimately, how racism morphs beyond a white-black binary. 

Whew. The weeds.

Take, for example, the COVID-19 pandemic. I don’t think many of us thought that we would spend time thinking about scientific studies on air droplets and their lifespan in an indoor environment. We get caught up in the weeds of daily schedules. Can I get an “Amen” from the parents of young children out there? There might be no better example of “getting caught in the weeds” than what our school administrators are going through right now. All the different plans, all the different schedules. Who goes to school when? What classes are available? What about AP? How do you keep young people who haven’t seen their friends in months from hugging one another? How do you gently communicate the necessity of social distancing and mask-wearing without sounding harsh and mean-spirited?

Whew. The weeds.

The interesting thing in Jesus’ parable is that the farmer says to let the weeds grow. Now, I might be taking some interpretive license here, but letting the weeds grow means that the people out there in the fields have to pay attention to them. It means they have to spend time in the weeds until the harvest. If they’re watering the wheat, then the weeds are receiving water too. If they’re treating the soil, then the weeds will receive the same nutrients as the wheat. 

What I’m saying is that spending time in the weeds is not a bad thing. Spending time in the weeds is part of the process of learning and growing. Spending time in the weeds is necessary to prepare for the harvest. Anyone who has spent hard hours on hands and knees weeding a garden, though, knows that spending time in the weeds is difficult. Sometimes it can feel like you might never get out of the weeds. 

It’s like when we were driving back to Durham after our quick trip to Oklahoma. Eighteen hours, and that’s if you really push it. Each mile marker we pass becomes its own weed. Time slows down. 

Me: “We have to be about 4 hours down the road, right?” 
Tayler: “We’ve only been driving an hour and a half.”
Me: [sighs heavily].
Addi: “I want a snack.”

The weeds are part of the destination, though. They are part of the harvest, part of the garden, part of the trip home. We can’t grow tired of the weeds. We need to be aware of the long, complicated history of race and racism in America not just because it impacts other people, but because we will learn that we are also caught in a system and products of a system that we did not choose for ourselves. It’s not for our good, either. 

So, do not be discouraged. Get caught in the weeds, and keep the harvest in mind. 
​

Peace,
​Brandon

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Time

7/7/2020

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I’ve been thinking a lot about time since last week. I’ve been thinking about time because I’ve been studying the parable of the sower in Matthew 13 (our text for this Sunday). 

There’s two very personal feelings about this parable that have to do with time. First, give it enough time and any soil can become “good” soil. When I read the parable of the sower, I can’t take my mind off of the first three soils: hard, rocky, and thorny. No gardener or farmer would just leave soil in that condition. Any gardener or farmer worth her salt knows techniques and methods to soften soil, to remove rocks, and to withstand weeds and thorns and other pests. It just takes time. Second, I empathize with the sower. Her success rate with growing would not land her in the batting order for the Durham Bulls. She’s hitting about .250, which saying that’s not very good is an understatement. But I empathize with her because I see the comparison in her work of sowing seed and my work as a pastor. It often feels like a lot of sowing and not much reaping, but the sower just keeps on sowing seed. She knows that given enough time there will be a harvest. She has to work the soil. She’s not a farmer of seed but of soil. She listens to the soil, she sees what it needs, and she feels how it’s damaged. Give it enough time, and that soil will become good. She has her work cut out for her, though. 

I think time and perseverance are the keys. Soil won’t become good overnight. You can’t make compost overnight. If the farming metaphor isn’t working for you, then think about diet and exercise. You can’t lose weight or gain muscle overnight. It takes time and perseverance. 

You can’t become antiracist overnight, either. Like I said in last week’s blog: I’ve been on this journey for 7 years, and sometimes I feel like I’ve just begun. It takes time and perseverance. Since Derek Chauvin killed George Floyd, we have gathered as a community for a prayer vigil, the Christian Education Committee has discussed how to educate the congregation on race and racism, the Session has discussed our congregational response, Lisa preached a five-part sermon series on race and racism from the personal to the systemic, we participated in a 21-Day Race Equity Challenge, I’ve preached and blogged about race and racism from the personal to the systemic, we’ve focused on race and racism in the Summer Sunday School videos, in Sharing God’s Story @ Home, and a couple of times in the children’s sermons. 

That’s a lot, but it has only been 6 weeks. We are just beginning, and we have only scratched the surface. This is where time and perseverance enter again. The de-formation and deconstruction process we are in takes time. We are like hard, rocky, thorny soil that needs the time to become good soil. We are like the farmer who needs the time to work the soil, to sow seed, to try again, to work some more, to sow some more. There are plenty of reasons to disengage with the work we have done for six weeks. We can harden our hearts, revert to cynicism, become angry, and the seeds of justice will sit on the surface as the birds snatch them up. We can grow tired and fragile of the challenges and pain of learning about our own complicity in systems of injustice. We can get stuck in guilt, and the seeds of justice that have begun to sprout in our hearts will wither away. We can retreat into our silos, hold tight to our possessions, and be paralyzed by the anxiety of interrogating where we live, our money, and our wealth, and the seeds of justice will be choked out. 

Talking about this farmer and her sowing reminds me of another parable Jesus told about a tree that would not bear fruit. This tree lasted for several seasons but never once produced anything. The farmer tried all the tricks he knew, but the tree would not bear anything. Finally the owner came to the farmer and said, “Cut this tree down.” The farmer, full of hope and knowing that time and perseverance can do a lot, asked the owner, “Give me one more shot. Let me put manure around the tree. Let me try one more time. If it doesn’t work this time, I’ll cut it down myself.” 

There is still time. There is time to work, to persevere, to learn, to have conversations and ask questions, to become soft, absorbent, malleable, to remove the rocks, and to hold back the thorns. 
​

I hope we persevere because we have the gift of time. I want this blog to encourage you to keep going and to persevere in this work. We may not see a harvest for a while and for a time it might seem like we’re not getting anywhere, but let’s hold on to the hope the farmer has. It’s a hope in God’s promise that there will be a harvest. It might be thirtyfold, sixtyfold, maybe even a hundredfold, but there will be a harvest.

Peace,
​Brandon

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    A Blog by NRPC Pastors

    Rev. Lisa Hebacker, Pastor
    Rev. Brandon Melton, Assoc. Pastor

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