Against Racism and Oppression: June 2006 Archives

I wrote about the St. Louis arch celebrating Westward expansion and the Louisiana Purchase as a "symbol of genocide."  In a comment to that same piece Fausto writes "I'm sure our own "famous UU" TJ didn't have genocide in mind when he bought Louisiana or commissioned Lewis and Clark, but the fact remains that in the way things came to pass, genocide became an integral element of the whole package."

When governor of Virginia, Thomas Jefferson stated: "If we are to wage a campaign against these Indians the end proposed should be their extermination, or their removal beyond the lakes of the Illinois River. The same world would scarcely do for them and us." When he became President he had a standing army to wage his campaign of extermination and during his administration many of the nations were eliminated on the Atlantic side of the Eastern Mountains.  His administration then waged war against the people indigenous to the "near West" beyond the Appalachians.  Then he "bought" the West from France (whose claim to the land was based on the theology of the Christians Crusades (non Christians have no rights a Christian is bound to recognize.)

Did Jefferson mean it?  His whole life reveals an Enlightenment gentleman, curious about the new science, opinionated about the project of a propertied persons' democratic republic, who was openly racist, genocidal,  grandiose, and patriarchal.  The Louisiana Purchase was intended as a way to provide opportunities to his people (White People) and "extermination" of the same final solution to the native people west of the Illinois River.  The word genocide didn't exist in his vocabulary, but his "extermination" policy was very real, very intentional, and very calculated.  The West he envisioned would include slavery.  His writings make this clear, and when the senators and representatives in congress representing the Northern states tried to restrict slavery in the West he was alarmed and spoke of dissolving the United States.

Did Jefferson mean genocide?  He didn't consider Africans and Native Americans to be fully human, so enslaving them and exterminating them did not bother his conscience.  At least he does not share any self criticism for his words or actions in his writings, or any agonizing that as a result of his policies and practices hundreds of thousands of people were burned to death, shoot to death and starved to death, and hundreds of thousands were held in degrading slavery with their families ripped from them and all the fruits of their labor taken for the enrichment of generations of white people.

Unitarian Universalists speak of our continuing work against our own institutionalized racism.  We insist that racism is not just bad attitudes held by bigots (who are of course are not Unitarian Universalists) but built into the way this nation was built on conquest, plunder, and slavery and has subsequently evolved its institutional arrangements of power.  We see an example of this in our own practice.  Jefferson is sanitized and served up as a "famous UU" by Unitarian Universalist religious educators and clergy rather than presented as a morally questionable and politically contradictory example of Unitarian origins in the Enlightenment elite.  By doing this and allowing this to be done in our name we are perpetuating racism and contributing to holocaust denial.

Here is an example of what we must do more often.

An adult UU shares with me his impressions of GA and asks me what I think about the GA.

I tell him that it is apparent to me that we still have much work to do about racism, that again this year there was insensitivity and arrogance on the part of white Unitarian Universalists toward people of color. I share that adult people of color tend to be more accustomed to this kind of behavior on the part of well meaning, but clueless white folk, but that the youth of color are outraged that Unitarian Universalist adults could come across as arrogant, imperious, culturally incompetent, and/or oblivious jerks.

He opines that the problem with racism at General Assembly has been overblown.

I assure him that the problem is real and experienced, and results in pain among people of color and youth of color that undermines their confidence in Unitarian Universalism. In that we are a faith that proclaims "deeds not creeds" that proclamation creates an expectation that we might try to walk our talk. (I know it did for me as a Unitarian youth, but I soon came to realize that the vast majority of pew sitters were not faithful Unitarians, they came for intellectual stimulation not transformation.)

He offers the observation that the youth of color at General Assembly dress like they were in a street gang. I am taken aback by his characterization of our youth's dress. I know many of the youth by name, I have know several of them since they were children. I know their parents. The parents include UU ministers, Trustees, Congregational leaders, and the youth appear to me to be dressed like middle class youth dress when they are being hip, which is not at all like street gangsters. I reply that I know the youth and I disagree with his judgment of their attire, but perhaps making the distinction between youthful attire and street gangs requires some discernment and recognition of distinctions. (I am trying to be persuasive and not come across as dismissive.) He concedes that I might be right, and shares that Black youth make him nervous.

I am reminded that five centuries ago when the Europeans first encountered the Africans and the Native Americans they concluded that these "strange" people were promiscuous because they didn't wear clothing ("save for their privies") in the summer time.

Youth and the culturally marginalized must learn to dress "right" or they won't get any respect!

Some youth and young adults of color from the DRUUM YAYA website. (If you see the gang colors please email me and help me out.)

Today was the Service of Celebration of Ministry, which honors the ministers who have served for 50 years and 25 years. David Parke respresented those who were ordained in 1956 and Laurel Hallman represented those who were ordained in 1981. David was a church historian and his presentation was very much like a history lecture. I found David's sermon informative but Laurel's was much more engaging. There sermons will be avaiiable in an audio format soon.

The annual meeting of the Unitarian Universaiist Minister's Association followed immediately after the Service of Celebration. The Executive of the UUMA decided to feature a discussion of an important topic as central to the meeting, rather than reports from various exec members. In my opinion in worked, the meeting was much more interesting than the hearing from each portfolio on the exec.

I led a collegial conversation on the Special Review Commission in the afternoon. I will write more about that at another time. The afternoon was finished of by the Berry Street Conference, which was addressed by Bill Schultz, former UUA President and former Chief Exec of Amnesty International. That address was powerful and profound, but I will need to come back to it later as well.

Must run.

The Gateway Arch is a St. Louis landmark. "The great Arch has been the region's international symbol since it opened in 1965 to honor President Thomas Jefferson and the Louisiana Purchase" which houses the Museum of Westward expansion.

The Native people had already been pushed West by the settlers on the East Coast when Jefferson "bought" the West from France. Now the new United States felt it had a license to take the land and bring a final solution to the indigenous population. Most of the wars the United States fought were against Indians, but we don't talk about that in school.

Gertrude Edge of Columbia, South Carolina writes in response to "UU Bookstore has Christian Voices:

"We are looking for a book to use for a book discussion on Liberal Christianity. I am thinking about using "Mere Christianity" by C.S. Lewis. Any other suggesitons?"

Asking a UU minister to recommend one book is cruel,  I have lots of titles in mind.  I recommend Christian Voices in Unitarian Universalism: Contemporary Essays for example.  I especially recommend

"Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time : The Historical Jesus and the Heart of Contemporary Faith" (Marcus J. Borg) and that will be my one "liberal Christian" book.

C.S. Lewis is no liberal.  I think he is worth reading, but he is a conservative Christian.

I should note by way of disclaimer that I am a radical in my Christianity, a liberationist.  Liberal Christianity as I understand the movement teaches that Jesus is Christ as Teacher of Individual Moral Virtue.  That is what I was taught in Unitarian Sunday School.

For me fifty years later,  Jesus is Christ the Liberator.  I believe we live in a world ruled by "the powers and principalities" of domination and violence and the resurrected Jesus is embodied in the intentional communities that witness justice to the oppressed, inclusive love to all, and non violence in their collective lives and in the lives of their members.  Some of my best friends are liberal Christians, but I have found that we have different priorities.  I can preach the liberal's Jesus when I have a bunch of liberals in the congregation, but I try to talk about how Jesus pushed the limits of propriety, and challenged the way things were (and are.)  So I preach a radicalized liberal Jesus.

For a good radical Christian book I like Walter Wink's  "Transforming the Powers: Peace, Justice, and the Domination System" (Fortress Press)

As a Unitarian Universalist I have a religious humanist understanding of the Christian "revelation" and tradition.  Jesus witnessed the "God of Justice and Love."  Those who experience his good news have a revelation of the divine.  I do not need any other "nature" than this one that is itself divine.  I believe that the arc of the universe bends toward peace, justice and love between all creatures.  So with the religious humanists, I am content with one miraculous cosmos and need no super nature.  Jesus was born a man, and he died as a man.  But he rose as a Church and that Church constantly needs people to come forward to witness the gospel that he embodied.  I do not believe any "Christian denomination" institutionalizes the Church,  the Witnessing Church exists wherever two or three are gathered together "in the name of Jesus."  (Jesus means Healer in Aramaic, to gather in his name is to gather "to heal.")

Any liberal Christians want to speak for liberal Christianity?  Got any books that you think a study group should read?

Back then the Christian right had a notion about what God intended a family to look like. and they legislated against interracial marriages.  My family was legal in Massachusetts, but not in Texas.

"But today in history, on June 12, 1967 the Supreme Court struck down state miscegenation laws prohibiting interracial marriages as violations of the 14th amendment which guarantees equal protection under the law.  In June of 1958, Richard Loving and Mildred Jeter had married in Washington D.C. Upon return to their home state of Virginia, the couple was arrested, convicted of a felony, and sentenced to a year in jail. Their appeal led to the decision."

quote from Peace Buttons email.

One of the ways our religious community has limited itself in recent decades is letting the anti christian prejudices of ex Christians become a Unitarian Universalist norm.  This has cut us off from our own liberal religious heritage, from profound Unitarians and Universalist thinkers and activists that created the defining characteristics of what we now call Unitarian Universalism.  Who are the Unitarian Universalist Christians?  Read this book and begin to understand the UU Christianity is not behind us,  rather the richness of our historic faith tradition continues to inform us today.

Christian Voices in Unitarian Universalism Contemporary Essays
Kathleen Rolenz, Editor

The bookstore says: "Fifteen personal stories from laity and clergy alike show what it means to be a Unitarian Universalist Christian today. These men and women arrive at their faith by many paths--influenced by the Bible, Jesus Christ Superstar and even the Bernstein Mass.

Here is a fresh and much-needed look at UU Christians, who, for decades, have kept the work and spirit of Christianity alive in our liberal religion. Rolenz is parish co-minister of West Shore UU Church with her husband, Wayne Arnason. Foreword by Carl Scovel. (Skinner House) 2006. 144 pp. ISBN: 1-55896-506-8

This looks like an important book.  How can our theology incorporate conquest, murder and mass exploitation by our own ruling elite?

"The American Empire and the Commonwealth of God: A Political, Economic, Religious Statement" (David Ray Griffin, John B., Jr. Cobb, Richard A. Falk, Catherine Keller)

From the publisher's statement.  "Four distinguished scholars here level a powerful critique of the rapid expansion of the emerging American empire and its oppressive and destructive political, military, and economic policies. Arguing that a global Pax Americana is internationally disastrous, the authors demonstrate how America's imperialism inevitably leads to rampant irreversible ecological devastation, expanding military force for imperialistic purposes, and a grossly inequitable distribution of goods--all leading to the diminished well-being of human communities. These four prophetic voices--three Christians, one Jew--persuasively indict the American empire as being diametrically opposed to divine values and powerful enough to threaten the purposes of God."

Harvey Cox writes:  "I am convinced that this is an enormously urgent and important book. It not only represents the best of current theology and political wisdom, and accurately interprets our present desperate situation, but it also provides the basis for an authentically religious response to the end-time Armageddon "Left Behind" insanity that seems to be capturing the popular religious imagination. It builds on the finest new biblical scholarship in viewing the scriptural setting the Reign of God against Empire, but also suggests how all the religious traditions can - and must - contribute to an unprecedented civilizational transformation. I plan to use this book in my own teaching and to commend it to everyone I know. I only wish it had appeared ten years ago."

Cultural appropriation is when the people of one culture find some activity or artifact of another culture useful and adopts that activity or artifact into their own culture. 

This may or may not be ethical.  For example, the Hopi consider their religious ceremonies to be sacred, and would prefer that others not appropriate them.  We "misappropriate"
when we take something that another people have stated is not available for appropriation,  even if we do not hear their protests.  Other Native American Nations believe that it is a good thing when European background Americans learn from Native peoples.  But they do not want to see what is borrowed misused, or distorted.

I found this quote that may guide our appropriations:

Our first task in approaching another people,
another culture is to take off our shoes,
for the place we are approaching is holy.
Else we find our ourselves treading on another's dream.
More serious still, we may forget that God was there before our arrival.