Agape.
Love. Unmerited Love. Unmerited acceptance. Everyone’s worth and dignity seen and
respected. Grace. Feeling loved. Feeling accepted. By a divinity, by another person, by humanity. Regardless of who you are, how you look,
where you are from, who you love, how you embody your gender. Regardless of what you do or don’t do. Regardless.
Just for existing. At every
moment, you are beloved.
Have you ever felt loved and accepted just for existing? Not because of something you have done. Perhaps someone has treated you that
way. Perhaps you helped a stranger. Perhaps you felt a wash of unmerited grace
and love when something worked out in your life when you didn’t earn it or
deserve it. Perhaps you felt the touch
of grace when you saw overwhelming beauty in nature, feeling a part of creation
or divinity, accepted as part of the whole just as you are. I hope you have. Do you think that’s an isolated
experience? A privileged experience.
You already know that world there is full unfairness, racism,
oppression, injustice, hatred. People
who experience those, especially those who experience those systemically,
routinely, who are traumatized, hurt and killed by unfairness, racism,
oppression, injustice, hatred may have a difficult time feeling unmerited love
or grace or acceptance in their hearts.
Our Unitarian Universalist Principles call us respect the worth and
dignity of every person, giving voice to that respect through compassion,
acceptance, and with acts and systems of justice. How we do this will vary from person to
person. We are called to love and accept
everyone, but particularly those in need, those treated unfairly and unjustly.
We do this because of our Unitarian Universalist heritage, because we seek to
live by our Unitarian Universalist values/Principles, because we believe in
right actions in the face of the evils of the world.
I mentioned something in our last Social Justice meeting,
that I want to share with you today. A
woman called me a few days after Tyre Nichols’ death. She said she was looking at the UU Miami
website to see what she could do in response to his death and was surprised
that UU Miami didn’t offer any information about any anti-oppression actions
she could take, nor did our website mention any action this congregation is
taking, in response to his death. I was
left somewhat dumbfounded and a little embarrassed. You will notice in the Social Justice
Committee email I put out a week or so ago that the committee is seeking to
work with a Black church or organization that is active in social justice, so
that we could join our efforts with theirs.
Specifically, to let Black organizations take the lead in racism and
police violence issues as this is the population most directly impacted by
these issues. The Social Justice Committee, and I’m sure other members of this
congregation, want to support them, attend their rallies, and consider how we
can better understand their perspective on the issues. Why support their perspective? Why not just head out on our own to do some
good old social justice work? Because
our role is not to be White Saviors, swooping in with the best of intentions
and taking over. We seek to honor the
Black community’s worth and dignity by aligning our efforts to the efforts they
are already making on their own behalf.
This method of interfaith, transracial work seeks to dismantle structures
of white supremacy while addressing the effects those structures have on the
targeted population. And so the Social
Justice Committee is actively seeking Black Community leadership and offering
our time and energies in support of the initiatives they have identified as
actionable.
A week or two ago, I received my weekly edition of Sightings,
a publication of the University of Chicago Divinity School. The article in this edition was called
“Should We Watch Videos of Racialized Police Violence?” By Zachary Taylor. Zachary is a White Ph.D. student in religious
ethics at the University of Chicago Divinity School. He asks “what the moral value of our witness
is. Why should it matter, morally, that Americans bear witness to this horrific
display of police violence that led to the death of a Black fellow citizen? And
how can we bear witness to Black suffering in ways that avoid its
commodification [in other words converting human, social or cultural value into
market value], and exploitation?”
I find it problematic when the newscasters often show us some
horrible event as a teaser in the broadcast to in essence whet our appetite, so
we will stay tuned. Later in the broadcast they’ll lead the story with
something like “please be warned that the images in this video might be
disturbing.” Too little, too late, they
have already shown us the disturbing images 5 times before their warning. So
what purpose does it serve? To give us a
head’s up in case our attention has wandered away? To increase the market value of the
incident? It is so easy to be numb to
the violence because we are inundated with it, often without warning. And yet Taylor’s theological article was
encouraging me to watch these disturbing videos as an act of bearing witness to
racism and oppression and police violence so I won’t become numb to it, so that
I can combat society commodification of it, so that I don’t succumb to the
images with society’s default setting of exploitation. Am I “morally” called to watch the
exploitation of people of color, of marginalized communities as a form of
bearing witness to the problems in our society?
It is easy to feel helpless and even hopeless as a witness. As I read the article I wondered if any of
the unmerited acceptance and love I show to my fellow beings makes any real
difference in this world so full of hate and violence.
Taylor goes on to suggest that bearing witness to these
videos can plant the seeds of change within us, and can lead to action. To do something in the world to have a
positive impact. Rallies, petitions,
protests, grassroots organizing, something concrete to try to make a
difference, to stem the rising tide of oppression, to try to effect
change. He writes: “we may watch these
videos so that we do not become desensitized to Black suffering, especially
when it is a result of state-sanctioned violence. Just as there is a concern
that repeated exposure to Black suffering and death may inure (white) audiences
to racial injustice, there is, equally, a concern that it is all too easy for
white viewers to turn their heads and avert their eyes to the horror of
racialized police brutality.” I have to
admit he is right; it is easy for me to get angry about what is happening to
others, and then return my privileged life
People of color and marginalized people can’t just turn their heads and
walk away from the trauma, abuse, oppression they live. I can take breath between the racism and
oppression I witness on TV or the internet, without worrying about what might
happen to me when I drive my car in white neighborhood, what might happen when
a police officer asks to talk to me. I
don’t have an ever-present, underlying concern about being injured or even
killed by those who abuse their power when they “serve and protect.” Can bearing witness to these videos be a way
to express unmerited love and acceptance of people who are different than me?
Finally, Taylor reflects on Moral philosopher Jeffrey
Blustein’s thoughts on witnessing these videos. “Blustein observes that injustice not only
typically results in physical or material harm (or even death, as is often the
result of police violence), but also communicates to victims that their lives
and interests matter less than those who perpetuate injustice… In response to
this harm, bearing witness ‘symbolically asserts the moral status of the
victims, their coequal membership in the moral community, by giving them and
their suffering a voice.’ In this view, the moral value of bearing witness to
Tyre Nichols’s suffering lies in the symbolic restoration of the status Nichols
was denied—that of a human being with dignity.”
The denial of worth
and dignity is not the Unitarian Universalist way. So yes, I am willing to watch these videos as
a witness to restore worth and dignity to a person who has had it removed, who
has been abused and treated as an object or somehow less than those who have
more power! These victims of radicalized
police brutality have inherent worth and dignity. They deserve, simply by virtue of their
existence, to be treated with compassion, justice, equity. No-one should be physically or emotionally
abused or much less killed for a traffic stop, for being in the wrong
neighborhood, for asking for help. Many
of us in this congregation are automatically treated with more worth and
dignity because of the color of our skin. Those of us who are heterosexual and
cis gendered are more likely to be treated with more worth and dignity in this
culture than people who don’t fit into hetero-normative standards. Is that fair?
Is that just? No, it is not. And yet that is the reality of our
culture. So, what do we do as Unitarian
Universalists? What can you do?
Each of us as individuals and all of us as a community can
commit to being the change we seek in the world. I am committing to bearing witness to videos
of police brutality? How? By not just letting those images wash past me, but by
being fully present and fully aware of what I am witnessing. By actively connecting what I’m witnessing to
my Unitarian Universalist Principles and Values, and exploring where there are
intersections, intersections that in turn might lead to concrete actions. I will continue to work for justice and
equity in human relations. The UU Miami
Social Justice Committee and all of you can bring forward ideas about how this
community can engender effective, tangible change. Like we did by rallying for Black Lives
Matter a few years ago. All of us can
seek to develop relationships with communities of color so that our community
can join with communities of color as we work toward the goals they themselves
have identified on critical needs. We
can treat all people with worth and dignity not because they’ve done something
to earn it, but simply because they exist.
Looking them in the eyes, talking to them with respect, honoring and
trying to understand their perspectives.
These may not be easy things to do, but as Unitarian Universalists,
these are the kinds of life-affirming actions we are called to do.
Please keep in mind during this Black History month, and
really, at all times keep in mind, that we are called to be allies to people
who are trying to rise up on the shoulders of ancestors whose names they do not
and probably will never know. Whose
stories and traditions were erased as they, as enslaved people, built this
country. Whose economic progress has
been restricted and whose very lives were threatened if they tried to succeed
or thrive. Please open your hearts and
minds to the stories of the African Americans who are part of the history of
this country, even if it makes you uncomfortable. This too is how we can embody unmerited love,
this is a way we can all move toward deeper connection with and more
understanding of those who need us with them as we work together to eradicate
racism and oppression in this country.
May it become so.
No comments:
Post a Comment