I've Never Been Self-Sufficient

I've never been self-sufficient.

When I was in my mothers womb, I wasn't.

When I was born, fed and nurtured, I wasn't.

As I grew and grew up and went to school, I wasn't.

Good teachers helped me along the way, recognized my potential,
and did kindly things, challenging things, to shape my character.

In grade school, high school, college and seminary.

Great women and men, who, for whatever reason, came to my
side to help me along the way.

In all of this, I've never been self-sufficient.

The love of my life, my wife, has stood by me.
Cried and laughed with me.
Walked with me, run with me.

I've never been self-sufficient.

In ministry, every paycheck came with the hope, faith and love
of so many Presbyterians who shared a vision of Christ and
gave enough to support me and my family, as well as the church
and its mission.

Now in retirement, I enjoy Social Security and my pension: both
of which are mutual along with many others who've made the
journey of life and reached these years.

Have I ever been self-sufficient? Never.
And never will be either.

In the end, it's likely that some kindly nurses and doctors
will see to my needs.

Family and friends will tell me of their love.
And help me along the way to the end.

And when I die, others will handle my body
and dispose of my material remains.

I will live on for awhile in memories.

My breath will return to the sky.
My body to the earth.

And the earth and sky will hold it all.
All that I've been.
And will hold it with love.

I've never been self-sufficient.

How One Looks at Poverty

One can look at poverty in the United States and blame the poor as victims of their own failures, inadequacies or general lack of "get-up-and-go." 

It's handy to do this, because the observer is conveniently slipping off the hook of responsibility - the kind of human, humane, responsibility that sees the deep connections between the poverty of many and the systems of the few. And that's the rub. Even a marginally successful person, if telling the truth, will have to admit to many "lucky breaks" and "free lunches" all along the way, as the system tilted favorably toward them. 

To understand poverty, from the inside, is to see how profoundly the system fails millions of Americans; not only failing them, but fighting them. And if one is on the wrong side of the system, all the spunk in the world won't work. All the drive that human beings possess naturally to make something of life will fail, and in the end, the system we presently have condemns millions to poverty. 

Some blame the poor, wash their hands of it, and walk away with a peaceful soul, thanking God for their blessings and quietly patting themselves on the back for their "success." 

Others look at the system and see how irrational and hateful it is. How evil it is, and work to transform it - transform the system, yes; but transform the soul of the nation, and the soul of those who wash their hands and congratulate themselves for what they have. 

To be devoted to this transformative work brings great satisfaction, but also the disapproval of many. 

How people look at poverty is the great divide in human history.

Cunning Tricks and the Privatization of Our Schools

This morning, I turned, happenstance, to Mark 14.1-2:

It was two days before the Passover and the festival of Unleavened Bread. The chief priests and the scribes were looking for a way to arrest Jesus by stealth and kill him; for they said, “Not during the festival, or there may be a riot among the people.” [NRSV]

The Common English Bible has a bit more bite to it:

It was two days before Passover and the Festival of Unleavened Bread. The chief priests and legal experts through cunning tricks were searching for a way to arrest Jesus and kill him. But they agreed that it shouldn’t happen during the festival; otherwise, there would be an uproar among the people.

As I read through the passage, given what I heard last evening from Diane Ravitch about American Education and the full-tilt effort of "reformers" (read corporate interests) to take over education, I found myself considering "the rich and the powerful" of Jerusalem and how they hated Jesus, and did everything they could to undo him, because the message of Jesus was for The People and their children.

In similar fashion, the rich and the powerful of our day are doing everything they can to undo American Public Education - with a cunning strategy -  spinning endless hoaxes about "just how bad things are," and telling American "we can rescue our children if you will only turn them over to us and our corporations."  

The large audience last evening [October 2, 013] at CalState Northridge was huge and enthusiastic, and gave me hope for the future, that maybe, just maybe, there might be a coming revolution in America, when The People finally realize what "cunning tricks" have been used by the rich and the powerful (read chief priest and legal experts) to destroy American Education - to turn our children into nothing more than worker-bees to compete in international markets.

But worker-bees are not we need or want - we want American Citizens who can think critically and be an informed electorate, and serve wisely on school boards and town councils (the last thing the rich and the powerful want).

And, btw, good citizens will always be good workers, able to compete in the international markets. But good citizens will also be able to see cunning tricks for what they are, and with sound legislation and wise politicians, craft laws that serve all the people all the time, with fairness and dignity for all.

Let's not forget that the rich and the powerful of Jerusalem made headway in their cunning and succeeded in destroying Jesus, at least for three days. And to this very day, the rich and the powerful plot his death again and again, because they hate him and his populist message.

The rich and the powerful always behave in this manner - nothing new here. 

Because the message of faith, hope and love, is always a threat to them, and though, for a time, the message may be killed and buried beneath a heavy stone sealed by the powers-that-be and guarded by their armies, those stones are always rolled away, and the message of hope rises again from the dead, to bring liberty to the oppressed and sight to the blind [Luke 4].

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Diane Ravitch's latest book: The Reign of Error

Click Here for her Blog.

The Voting Rights Act - Where It Failed!

Lyndon Johnson addressed Congress after a group of civil rights workers were attacked in Selma. For Johnson, all of this had to end, and the South needed a new beginning, and what better beginning that to open wide the doors of voting rights - something so essentially American, so right and so very good for the whole of the nation.

He said, among other things:

 "I speak tonight for the dignity of man and the destiny of democracy. The command of the Constitution is plain. There is no moral issue. It is wrong to deny any of your fellow Americans the right to vote ... it is all of us who must overcome the crippling legacy of bigotry and injustice. And we shall overcome."

Later in the year, August 6, 1965, the Voting Rights Act became the law of the land.

It's evident that an enlargement of voting rights brought into the political process many who were previously denied the right.

And changes have been made.

But with the SCOTUS challenging the central tenet of the law, we've seen Southern States enacting all kinds of restrictive laws to shrink the voting roles once again.

What we see in all of this is a failure, a sad failure, of the South and its White Elites, to change their attitudes. For many of them, white supremacy is still the dream, the goal, the right of the White Race. The Civil War is still being fought, and the humiliation of loss and defeat stings the Southern Soul.

Granted, the Southern Soul is found in lots of places - like the Central Valley in CA and parts of PA - but if migration patterns are noted, what we find in other parts of the nation is often rooted in Southern Migrants who took with them their racial views and religious sentiments.

Beginning in West Virginia

Ever since my first pastorate (1970-71) in the coal fields of Southern West Virginia, I realized that Christianity and justice belong together, that Christianity has the wherewithal to deal with economic questions and the power to challenge the powers-that-be.

Yet, I also learned, that American Christianity, under the Reformation notion of "salvation for eternal life," has been used to quiet people's unrest in the present order by offering them a sop for some future joy.

For those who lived in the powerful regions of the nation, with large homes and shiny cars, enjoying fine choirs and eloquent preachers, this was a convenient kind of Christianity. They, too, would be going to heaven, but, in the meantime, they were at liberty to enjoy the fruits of their labors - that such fruit was plucked out of the mouths of babes and out of the hands of sweat-drenched workers was of no account to them. Perhaps this is what God ordained.

These experience and observations have been the energy of my theology and sociology throughout my ministry. A Christianity that has the power to do something and chooses not to, opting for some sort of "inner peace with eternal hope" is no Christianity at all. And it's no wonder that most of the Western World, where this kind of Christianity has had the greatest influence, is rejecting it. And it can't happen soon enough.

Exposing the Demon

Perhaps I'm unusual, as many have said, or just plain odd, or slightly out of kilter, or full of myself and taken with my own nonsense.

But I find myself profoundly disturbed by the old demon of racism. It still floats around in my life, in spite of my conversion many years ago while at Calvin College, when this little white-bread boy suddenly had the Spirit of God break into my disheveled world to reveal the heart of darkness plaguing me - a heart inherited from family and culture and a religion that did nothing about it. Blacks in America didn't exist for me, except as stranger and threat, and in the church, existed only as "natives" in missionary churches across the seas.

Racism is as America as apple pie and motherhood - it shapes our gut reactions in ways we can hardly discern.

A less-than-perceptive-soul suggested that I was feeling white guilt. No, just honesty about the way I was reared, and the journey away from it.

I thank God for two of my professors who opened windows of understanding for me, and throughout the years, so many good people who have opened up the deeps of faith for me.

Maybe I'm nuts ... could be ... but my heart breaks for this nation, and right now, given the sensible and faithful who strive for a better world, and the horrible reactions of the far-right, i don't know the outcome.

While I might hope and pray for something better, history doesn't offer a great deal of hope for nations drunk on the wine of Empire - Revelation 18 says it well. Yet there are miracles, and things happen. Britain ended the slave trade and American ended slavery and women got the vote. But it's the soul that counts, and in some places of this nation, the values of the Old South remain intact, firmly rooted in culture and religion. The Southern Strategy of the GOP is all about distraction and obstruction. If they can't their way, they'll at least see to it that no one else can get anything either.

The demon of racism is alive and well in our culture ... and why wouldn't it be? It's been our traveling companion since the first white folk step ashore and claimed this land as their own. Denial only gives it strength and adds to the delusion.

Repentance and prayer weaken it ... honest reflection and historical knowledge expose it.

We can confront the monster; it'll never fully go away, but we can seriously weaken it, with resolve and a personal promise to confront it within our own lives.

The Other Guy's Racism

Millions of White Americas continue to deny the reality of their own racism, quickly turning to the fact that "blacks are racist, too." No one disputes that. Racism is inherent in human DNA - original tribal loyalties, and all that.

The question here is bigger and more serious - that of power. Where's the power? And it's always been with the White Establishment. It's not directly about racism, although it is, but about the power, and who has it, and who doesn't.

African-Americans have lived for centuries with limited social power - the city of Detroit, how it redlined neighborhoods, made it impossible for Blacks to secure loans; the post office routinely aided whites to secure jobs and made it virtually impossible for Blacks; and then rammed freeways through Black Neighborhoods. Is there a Black Family anywhere in the South who doesn't have a lynching in their family story?

When Whites get preachy about "the other guy's racism," and that "the media isn't fair," then I know, absolutely, that I'm reading a racist.