Race in America
June 1, 2008
The Reverend Anne Felton Hines
“I wish…I could remove all the bars that still keep us apart…” we sing.*
It has been well over a decade now since O.J. Simpson was found “not guilty” of murdering his ex-wife and her friend. The trial was held over the course of a summer, and since I was on vacation, I watched much of it. I don’t remember now if I was surprised by the verdict. What I do remember is the huge discrepancy between the reactions of white and black Americans to the verdict – whites being shocked and outraged, and blacks celebrating it as long-awaited justice. Two days after the verdict, Jonathan Tilove wrote in the San Diego Union-Tribune, “There may have been no single moment in American history when the gulf between black and white Americans was so visibly and audibly apparent.”
Now, almost 13 years later, we may be witnessing once again, just as clearly, the gulf of which Tilove spoke. This time, the canvass on which that gap is projected is the controversy surrounding the preaching of the Reverend Jeremiah Wright, and his connection to presidential candidate Senator Barack Obama. But while the circumstances are very different, the realities of the divide are just as real as after the O.J. verdict, and the need for a serious national conversation about race just as urgent. But where and how do we begin?
Senator Obama attempted to open the conversation by delivering a speech called, “A More Perfect Union,” in which he addressed the history of racism in this country, and named the anger and frustration of both black and white Americans. It was an incredibly honest speech, I thought – forthright, respectful of the feelings of both African Americans and European Americans, and full of hope.
The speech was so profound, in fact, that I was sure it would put an end to all the talk about Jeremiah Wright. But I was wrong; I was really wrong. No matter how much Senator Obama rejected his pastor’s remarks, the press and the other two candidates insisted on bringing them back up – as if the notion of “guilt by association” used during the days of McCarthyism were once again fair game.
Of course, it didn’t help that the good pastor found new avenues – an NAACP meeting and a forum on the National Press Club – through which to express his perspectives – with as much “in your faceness” as we’d seen from his pulpit. But he also appeared calm and objective in an interview with Bill Moyers, where he explained his theology and preaching style – and we saw none of that on the news.
Nobody pointed out that Rev. Wright belongs to a religious tradition that gives its clergy “freedom of the pulpit,” just as UUism does. We clergy are expected to “speak the truth…as we understand it,” whether we think our church members will agree with us or not. We are tochallenge those who sit in the pews – to occasionally cause some discomfort! And it is unfair to expect our members to leave the church every time they disagree with something we’ve said.
Nor did anyone make much of the fact that John McCain had actually sought the endorsement of Rev. James Hagee – a minister who called the Catholic Church “the great whore,” who said that God caused Hurricane Katrina because New Orleans held a Gay Pride Parade, and who believes that God sent Hitler to “deliver the Jews to Israel.” He is an angry, hate-filled human being – the antithesis of what Jesus taught; and yet all Senator McCain had to do was say he didn’t agree with Hagee, and the whole issue was dropped – though McCain has more recently disavowed Hagee’s support.
There has been a double standard when it comes to Rev. Jeremiah Wright; as Bill Moyers said: “White preachers are given leeway in politics that others aren’t. Which means,” says Moyers, “it is all about race….Wright’s offensive opinions and inflammatory appearances are judged differently….”
African American theologian Cornel West once wrote: “To engage in a serious discussion of race in America, we must begin not with the problems of black people, but with the flaws of American society – flaws rooted in historic inequalities and long-standing cultural stereotypes.”
Had we been shown anything more of Rev. Wright’s sermons and speeches than hand-picked sound bites, we would have learned that this is exactly what he does – he exposes the “flaws” of our society, so that they can be addressed and overcome. The editor-in-chief of “Crisis” magazine, Jabari Asim, contends that, “Wright is able to eloquently and thoroughly lay out the history of the black Christian tradition in the United States…. emphasizing the black church’s long commitment to liberation, transformation and reconciliation, which Wright has called a ‘non-negotiable doctrine.’”
Had we been shown more than one or two sound bites, we would know that when Rev. Wright said, “America’s chickens are coming home to roost,” he wasn’t saying that with glee, or in support of terrorism. He was, in fact, quoting a white American Ambassador interviewed on Fox News, who was saying that with all the violence that this country has perpetrated against Native Americans, against Africans brought here for slavery, against innocent people in Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Iraq, and so forth, we should not be surprised when it’s turned back on us. “Violence begets violence,” said Wright. “Hatred begets hatred and terrorism begets terrorism….A white Ambassador said that…whose eyes are wide open, and who’s trying to get us to wake up and move away from this dangerous precipice upon which we are now poised….”
Had we seen more than a couple of sound bites of Rev. Wright, we would know that when he cried out “God damn America,” he was preaching in the style of the great Jewish prophets of old – Isaiah, Amos, Jeremiah, and even Jesus – who would list all the sins of the government, and then condemn – or “damn” – them for those sins. And always, always, it was in order for the governments to turn around, and serve God by serving those who were oppressed.
If we were to hear more than media sound bites, we would learn that Rev. Wright preaches in the tradition of liberation theology – specifically Black liberation theology – where the Bible is read and interpreted through the experiences of the marginalized, and where God is known as being on the side of the oppressed.
In his interview with Bill Moyers, Rev. Wright said that members of Trinity Church – who are largely among the marginalized and the oppressed – come to church on Sunday “for encouragement to go back out and make a difference in their world….to not just talk about heaven by and by, but to get equipped and to get to know that we are not alone in this struggle, and that the struggle can make a difference.” He said that they come to be reminded that “we serve a God who comes into history on the side of the oppressed;…a God who cares about the poor;…. Because that same God says I’m with you, and I’m with you in the struggle.”
And had we been shown more than sound bites, we would know that Rev. Wright doesn’t agree with everything Louis Farrakan says – certainly nothing that would pit one religion against another. But he does admire the work that Farrakan has accomplished in the African American community, especially for young African American men who have had no reason to hope; and for that reason, he refuses to completely denounce the man.
But we haven’t been shown more than sound bites. So most of us come away thinking that Rev. Jeremiah Wright is full of disdain for America, and is preaching hatred and violence to the members of his church. And because Barack Obama knows how powerful those sound bites can be, he little by little has chosen to join the cacophony against his former pastor. Bill Moyers said that he’s never seen anything like “this wrenching break between pastor and parishioner.”
And yesterday, the Senator took the final step and withdrew his membership from the church because of a sermon delivered there by a guest preacher – which just feels like one of the saddest moments of this presidential campaign – and one of the most unjust. Imagine if any of you felt your job could be threatened by something that I, or even a guest speaker, said from this pulpit!
Moyers declared that, “All the rest of us should hang our heads in shame for letting it come to this in America….”
Rabbi Michael Lerner, founder of the Network of Spiritual Progressives, has said that the “real culprit” in this controversy about Jeremiah Wright “is the media, and its systematic distortions of the political process in the United States….We must say No,” he suggests,” to this kind of stupid and quite evil media.”
Yes, we do need to say “No” to this kind of journalism. But I don’t think we can simply sit back and blame the media, because they will present to us what they think we want to hear. Television and print journalism are only going to push the stories they think will sell – and they know their public well.
The question I think we need to ask ourselves is: Why do sound bites of an audacious black minister preaching “God damn America!” sell more than that same minister preaching passionately about the love of God for all people? What draws us over and over to images of that preacher blatantly suggesting that “America’s chickens have come home to roost,” rather than that same preacher – in that same sermon! – admonishing his congregation that “violence begets violence,” and that revenge is never the way to salvation?
Why did almost all of us find it so easy to immediately condemn Rev. Wright?
Where do we begin a conversation about Race in America? We begin it with an honest examination of ourselves – especially if we are a white American. Do we hold fears of people who look or speak different from us? Do we make choices based on those fears – about where to live, what schools our children will attend, where we go to church?
What are our assumptions about African Americans, Latinos, or others who are “not like us?” What stories do we tell ourselves about them? For example, it is not uncommon for white Unitarian Universalists to suggest that the reason we shouldn’t fret about the lack of African Americans or Latinos in our churches is that “they tend to be Christian,” and therefore wouldn’t be attracted to our faith. I would ask how many of you were at one time Catholic, or Methodist, or Baptist, etc. Why would we assume that a Latino Catholic, or a black Methodist or Baptist, would be any less inclined to seek a liberal faith than we once were?
“I wish you could know what it means to be me….”*
We begin a conversation about Race by listening to the experiences of those who have been the victims of racism in this country, whether indirectly through the slavery or oppression of their ancestors, or directly through their personal experience. We listen with open minds and heart, seeking not to deny their experience or to argue, but to simply understand.
We begin a conversation about Race by trusting ourselves and each other enough to risk sharing our own experiences – our fear, our anger, our disappointment, but also our hope.
And we begin a conversation about Race by acknowledging the sins of this country – the early violence towards Native Americans, the enslavement of Africans, the marginalization of people-of-color throughout our history. Rev. Ken Collier spoke here a couple of weeks ago of his own family’s involvement with slave ownership, and he called on us to “work for atonement and reconciliation.” It is never too late to begin that work.
Our Unitarian Universalist movement has struggled with the issue of Race and racism for many years now – in part because we’ve learned of the shameful instances in our history of exclusion towards people of color, and in part because we recognize that the lack of people of color in our congregations and in our professional ministry cannot be attributed solely to theological differences. We must come to terms with our past and with our present. My hope is that we will have this conversation here at Emerson – not just today after the service, but in the weeks, months, and even years to follow. It is where both the challenge and the hope lie. And it is where the God of Love and Justice will be standing.
In his speech to the nation, Barack Obama said: “We may have different stories, but we hold common hopes; we may not look the same and may not have come from the same place, but we all want to move in the same direction – towards a better future for our children and for our grandchildren.”
May we have the faith and the wisdom and the courage to take that journey – so that we may all “know how it feels to be free.”*
Amen.
* From Hymn #151, “I Wish I Knew How”
© 2010 Anne Felton Hines. All rights reserved.
