This “White Lies” series of posts will describe my personal journey in becoming aware of issues regarding racism and social injustice. I am gearing these posts toward western, white evangelicals, as this is the category I fall under. Please keep a few things in mind. 1) There’s a good chance you are not going to agree with me on everything (and that’s okay!), 2) My goal is not to humiliate or shame anyone, but to possibly inform, which in turn might bring about lament, and then incite action, and 3) Just because something is socially/politically “trendy” or a “hot button issue” does not give us the right to dismiss it as propaganda (from the left or right). Neither does it negate the possibility that it is indeed a legitimate issue. We have a responsibility as Christ-followers to examine everything through the lens of scripture. With those things said, let’s dive in.
The first time I remember noticing racial differences, I was 4 or 5 and my mother took me to a McDonald’s playground. I remember seeing a black girl playing on the playground and immediately wondered if it was okay to play with her. I even asked my mother, who assured me it was fine. I grew up in Western North Carolina and there were not many people of color, so this circumstance would have been unusual.
I also remember that there was a full-blooded Cherokee Indian man that went to our church and at carnivals or church events, he would wear Native American clothing complete with a feathered headdress. My sister and I were terrified of him when he wore those things because of how Native Americans had been portrayed on TV shows and movies we had seen.
The second time I remember noticing racial differences was in elementary school. I learned about how we (as white people) took land from Native Americans and made them move to reservations. I remember feeling ashamed of being a white person. When I brought it up to the (white) people in authority around me, I was met with defensiveness and something like, “That was a long time ago. There’s nothing we can do about it now.”
That message stayed with me a long time. The message that, though many white people might agree that certain social injustices in the past were wrong, they are paralyzed or unable to do anything about it’s lasting effects on our country today. Many whites also do not want to see that there is still social injustice that is the direct result of past social social injustices. Many would like to believe that with the end of the Civil War or the Civil Rights movement, systemic racism also ended. There is also a difference between “seeing” and “acknowledging”. Many white people who see the social injustice around them, refuse to acknowledge it.
For me personally, acknowledging the social injustice around me meant I had to then reconcile it with my own views, choices and lifestyle.
Growing up, I heard lots of comments like “I don’t understand why black people are still angry and act like we owe them for something that happened 100 years ago!” or “I’ve never owned a slave!”.
And since my social groups (church, school, extra-curricular activities) were primarily white, that message was never challenged.
The summer between my 8th and 9th grade year, my family moved from Western North Carolina to Upstate South Carolina. While only about an hour’s drive, the cultural difference was alarming for a mountain girl. I honestly don’t think I knew what “name brand clothing” was before I moved. However, part of that may have been my age. There were also many more people of color. In some cities, the population of white/black came close to 50/50. In my North Carolina town, there were many migrant workers from Mexico, but whites were still the majority by far.
Strangely, I don’t remember noticing the difference in the ethnic ratio. There was a time when I used the fact that I often don’t notice someone’s “color” as proof that I am not racist, as if racial blindness equates to racial equality and unity.
Again though, my social circles were primarily white. Therefore, noticing was a choice.
Also, at this point, I still believed that there was equal opportunity. You know, because we live in America. And our country was founded on freedom. And we all have certain rights. The idea of meritocracy. That our level of success is determined by our personal choices, drive, and determination. The problem is, when people do not have equal opportunity, the choices they make, how hard they work, and how determined they are to succeed, does not give them an equal shot at success.
I know I am already starting to step on some people’s toes. If I had read what I am writing now only a few years ago, I would have already been qualifying my ways of thinking. If this is you, please give me a fair shake. Hear me out.
I was raised Southern Baptist. And I’m not hating on Southern Baptists at all. For the most part, I had wonderful teachers and pastors that grew me in Christ. But, I have to confess, sometimes it was hard to see the line between being an American and being a Christ follower. I’m not saying that this was because of my family or any particular person. It’s just that culturally, the two were closely linked.
We had patriotic church services and, as a small child, I would see men that normally were void of emotion, with tears in their eyes as the American Flag was carried down the center isle in the sanctuary. I didn’t understand this of course. Patriotism was confusing. I didn’t know how to be thankful for freedoms that I had never had to live without. I had also never really had to sacrifice a loved one or things about my lifestyle during wartime.
Gratitude and support for our troops and honoring those that have served and are serving is certainly important and I am in no way trying to diminish that!
But the more I heard and saw, the more I became aware of the idea that “We are blessed by God because we are Americans”.
Why? Because America was founded on religious freedom.
The idea that our victories in wars were because “God was on our side”.
Why was He on our side? Because we were founded on biblical principles.
And yet, perhaps not initially, but eventually, we were okay with our government moving over 100,000 Native Americans to reservations. I don’t have to tell you how, in the process, many of them died and many of those who did not die, their descendants now struggle with poverty, alcoholism and other things.
So, essentially, we took away another groups freedom so that we could have ours.
But many people still maintain that we are under God’s blessing as Americans, because of the initial principles of the founders of our country.
I recently read an article written by a black columnist named Cedric Lundy. He talked about how many white Evangelicals blame the horrific things that occur in our public schools today on the fact that corporate prayer was removed from schools. The implication being that when we decided to “leave God out of school”, God removed His “blessing” or “support” of the school system. Which also implies that God was supporting and blessing before that. He brought up the fact that prayer was taken out of schools in 1962. Right in the midst of the Civil Rights movement.
His point was that the theory of God removing His blessing is based on the assumption that God was okay with segregated schools (which indicated that certain people He created were not as worthy or valuable as others and therefore should not be in the same classroom and do not need/deserve the same funding and resources), but taking corporate prayer out of schools was the “straw that broke the camels back”.
I do not pretend to know the mind of God. He can certainly bless who He wants to bless. But when I look at the decisions our country has made made over and over again to devalue human life, life that God created and pronounced good, I wouldn’t be so quick to claim God’s support. Maybe that’s just me.
If you are a white person reading this, chances are you are really uncomfortable, angry and/or defensive. This response is called “white fragility”.
white fragility- discomfort and defensiveness on the part of a white person when confronted by information about racial inequality and injustice.
These feelings often lead to actions such as withdrawing from a conversation, physically leaving a space, or closing out the tab on this blog post.
One of the things I have learned as a white person is that we have to build up our emotional stamina. For me, once I started to see some of the injustice around me, it turned my world upside down.
It was hard to take 30 years of thinking a certain way, (believing that there is equal opportunity for everyone, assuming that we have an impartial justice system etc.), and then reconcile it with the things I was seeing and hearing around me.
This temporary upheaval caused me to first want to withdraw, and then it made me angry and ashamed. I was ashamed of how gullible and blind I have been. It was/is easy for me to be angry and impatient with white people who still don’t see.
But I pray for the grace to extend grace, because when I allow myself to verbally attack others and treat them with disrespect, that means I am more concerned about how high I can get on my “soap box” than I am about perpetuating real, lasting change. I’m bringing glory to myself instead of God.
The same is true if I were to allow the fear of losing friends to cause me to remain silent on this topic. I would be desiring glory for myself (in the form of popularity and relationships) instead of prioritizing God’s glory.
I have never been “into” politics. The more I learn, the more I realize that I cannot pick a side. That is a hard position to take. It puts me in a place of being too “liberal” for one group and too “conservative” for another. Therefore, I cannot place myself under a label or party. Only under the authority of God and what He says in His Word.
I hope this post has been at the very least, bearable. If you are reading this, you have made it to the end of my first post on race. Which means you didn’t walk away or stop listening. I commend you. I am praying that God would open our minds and hearts to see the unbiblical patterns of thinking that have taken over so much of the white Evangelical culture. I pray that we would allow our worldview to be shifted and our perceptions challenged, so that we can begin seeking our role in social justice and reconciliation.
“For the LORD your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who shows no partiality and accepts no bribes.” -Deuteronomy 10:17
If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, “Love your neighbor as yourself,” you are doing right. But if you show favoritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as lawbreakers. -James 2:8-9
When a foreigner resides among you in your land, do not mistreat them. The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the LORD your God. – Leviticus 19:33-34
New Mercies 