17 As (Jesus) was setting out on a journey, a man ran up and knelt before him, and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

18 Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone.

19 You know the commandments:

‘You shall not murder;

You shall not commit adultery;

You shall not steal;

You shall not bear false witness;

You shall not defraud;

Honor your father and mother.’”

20 He said to him, “Teacher, I have kept all these since my youth.”  21 Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said, “You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” 22 When he heard this, he was shocked and went away grieving, for he had many possessions. (Mark 10:17-22 NRSV)

This rich man in Mark’s story could be my neighbor from the suburbs. He’s a good person insofar as he obeys the commandments on an individual level. He has not murdered, raped, stolen, lied in court, or ripped off anyone personally, and he is an obedient son, both to his parents and to his cultural heritage based on his diligence in abiding by the commandments. He could also be me. I may know the Lutheran tradition well enough to intellectually concede that I am not ‘good’ but I live scrupulously and frugally. I support the right causes that empower more people and include more people in what it means to be the church. I am pro-women, pro-LGBTQ, pro-people of color, pro new ways of being church, pro-differently abled people, pro-multi-tradition dialogue. I am pretty good!

And I could be all this things with never having to address a central part of who I am that I have always been and will continue to be as long as I live. I am white.

When Jesus encounters this man, he identifies one central thing that keeps him from the Kingdom. As a reader who is white I am beginning to inhabit this text by finding there my whiteness.

This ‘one thing,’ whiteness, confers on me many possessions. (See Peggy McIntosh’s Invisible Knapsack article for an outstanding, quick resource.) I receive many gifts from looking white and being received as a white person. For example, I worked at a Halloween City in a suburb for an October and on a busy day my coworker asked if people were putting the money right into my hand. I said, always. I watched them do that, he said, and I put my hand out and still they slide the money on the table. When people engaged me as a person in a white body they conferred trust upon me, and my coworker, in a black body, was degraded by the refusal to place money directly in his hand.  A small example from a myriad.

My experience of discovering myself to be white carries a disappointment akin to the man in Mark’s Gospel. When I began to discover more elements of ‘white privilege’ in my own reflection and narrative, I felt angry, lied to, ashamed, guilty, a broad range of things. Discovering myself to be white has been a process of loss, dismay, and, as I grow, horror. I remember distinctly a moment when I felt this loss, a ‘rich, white man come to Jesus’ moment like Mark 10. I was driving listening to Ta-Nehisi Coates read Between the World and Me on my CD player when he expressed and demolished with his words a sense of being onto which I’d continued to cling.

I am convinced that the Dreamers, at least the Dreamers of today, would rather live white than live free. In the Dream they are Buck Rogers, Prince Aragorn, an entire race of Skywalkers. To awaken them is to reveal that they are an empire of humans and, like all empires of humans, are built on the destruction of the body. It is to stain their nobility, to make them vulnerable, breakable humans. (143, Between the World and Me, New York: Spiegel and Grau 2015.)

I have been brought up all my life to believe I am a or the protagonist in some story, and the revelation is that, no. Insofar as I am white, I am not a protagonist. To use another movie/pop-culture analogy like Coates, I cannot be Neo. Insofar as I believe myself to be white I am in a warm bath in the Matrix by which life is sucked out of black bodies to power a world that is safe and happy for white people.

The temptation at this point would be to walk away disappointed: to discover what is true and real and then to select stay in the dream, to take the blue pill, keeping with analogies from the Matrix.  If I, as many white people do, take this option of enjoying whiteness and holding onto its Dream and its possessions, then I, like the man in the story, walk away disappointed from true community and discipleship. Like the rich, young man who encountered a Rabbi who could teach him to inherit life eternal, I could hold tightly to my goodness, my protagonism, and my many possessions which come from being white. Then, like him, I would rather live in the Dream than free.

But what did the man do next? With the Gospel’s characteristic reticence, Mark does not tell us. The story moves onto Jesus and his disciples, who are alarmed by this encounter. Perhaps the man sulked about this and forgot all about Jesus. On the other hand, perhaps he went home and inventoried all his things and had a hard conversation about what he truly needed and what he could let go of.

Obviously whiteness cannot be sold or let go of, but its effects can be noticed and addressed, if it is defined not as a color of skin but as a hoard of possessions. Whiteness can be inventoried and a white person can go through the painful process of awakening from the Dream. My encounter with Coates’ text left me disappointed, but it also urged me to continue an on-going inventory of what it means for me to be white, recording my possessions. My Grandpa would always say that the GI Bill was very good to him. I later learned that this incredible government handout was administered locally so that many black World War II veterans were kept from this benefit by Jim Crow-inspired government workers. My block was safe because my community would mobilize against the ‘wrong kind of people’ moving in. I can remember hearing someone proudly announce they ‘got rid of’ the group home on our block. I go back through these stories not to shame the people involved, like my grandpa, but to note the places where I inherited wealth and power that was denied and, as Coates reminds us, plundered from other people. Slowly, I am beginning to find new ways that I can relate to my possessions and to the version of reality and history I have inherited.

Even so, this process feels shameful. Encountering the riches of my whiteness has had a stifling effect on my voice and at other times has induced me to speak defensively. I have caught myself speaking ‘prophetically’ to other white people as a means of justifying my own righteousness over theirs and as a way to avoid the shame of believing I am white. Jesus, however, does not shame or vilify the rich, young man. He looks at him and he loves him immediately with no further qualification. Holding him in loving regard, Jesus identifies the ‘one thing’ that keeps this man from the freedom he seeks and he asks for him to let it go. As a white interpreter of Scripture, I find forgiveness in this moment. Jesus loves this man whether or not he can follow through. The only thing keeping him from freedom is his willingness to live inside the prison of his own making because it feels easier and more beneficial.  He can be forgiven, literally ‘let go’ from trying to be rich, an identity built on other people’s backs.

In the same way, can I be forgiven from believing I am white? Can I undergo the process, extended by Jesus, of letting go of my shame along with my many possessions so that I might relax into a love that I do not deserve? As a white follower of Jesus and a white theologian, the teaching and the experience of the forgiveness of sins is something I need more than ever. Can this ancient symbol, so central to the Lutheran tradition, be renewed once more with the particularity of its implications for people of European descent who believe they are white? And if we truly ask for and accept such letting go, what possessions of ‘whiteness’ will be let go each year as seek the Kingdom? This may sound like or even be an impossible task for us white folks, but Jesus anticipates this fear too. “For God, all things are possible.”

Bio

Chris Hanley is the pastor of Glenwood Lutheran Church in Toledo, Ohio. He first received Anti-Racism training from Crossroads at a Lutheran Volunteer Corps Orientation in Washington DC prior to an LVC year in Wilmington Delaware (09-10). He received an MDiv from the University of Chicago’s Divinity School while cross-registering for classes at LSTC, and he interned at Trinity Lutheran Church in Bradenton, Florida. Following this internship, he completed a chaplain residency at Advocate Lutheran General Hospital. In each of these communities, he has attempted to find a self-consciously white and Christian voice through stumbling, writing, listening, and being mentored.

“Sweet dreams.”Uttered almost like an extension of bedtime prayers, whispered and spoken with a gentleness intended to comfort, these two words invoking the gift, “sweet dreams.”

In 1963 on a national stage, a 35-year-old Martin Luther King, Jr. was about to take his seat when Mahalia Jackson urged him go further. “Tell them about the dream. Tell them.” Two months prior to his historic sermon at the march on Washington, Dr. King had spoken passionately begun to speak of his dream for our country. It was in Detroit that King began to echo the refrain, “I have a dream.”

It is the perspective of some, looking back, that Dr. King was not sure about sharing, there in Washington, the outline of what the dream called for. Without the urging of Mahalia Jackson, “tell them about the dream” what has been heralded as one of, if not King’s most memorable sermons, would have ended quite differently.

Dr. King reminded those gathered for the Great March on Detroit in 1963, that we were standing about a hundred years from the Emancipation Proclamation, dismantling of legalized enslavement of Africans in the United States. King lamented that one hundred years later the Negro in America was still not free, “But now more than ever before, America is forced to grapple with this problem, for the shape of the world today does not afford us the luxury of an anemic democracy. The price that this nation must pay for the continued oppression and exploitation of the Negro or any other minority group is the price of its own destruction. For the hour is late. The clock of destiny is ticking out, and we must act now before it is too late.”

There are many who now remember very little of Dr. King’s historic sermon beyond, “I have a dream.” In that sermon, both in Detroit and in Washington, he spoke of an urgency that was demanding  that we as a nation move with intent and purpose, and an energy “an anemic democracy” could not and cannot render.

In the three years that followed, Dr. King, his messages and the movement became clearly more unaccepting of any notion of gradualism. His writings from a Birmingham jail were gathered to become the basis of his book under the title “Why We Can’t Wait.”

As he spoke more openly about the intersectionality of poverty and the pattern of poor people being pitted against one another by the manipulative hands of empire, the more he lost favor with European Americans who had once at least claimed to be allies. King’s speaking against the global injustices of war and poverty were met by powerful voices insisting that he stay in his lane.

In 1967 in an interview with NBC news correspondent Sander Vanocur, Dr. King spoke of the dream he preached about in 1963 now becoming in many ways a nightmare. By 1968 when he ventured into the hostility of Memphis Tennessee to stand in solidarity with striking sanitation workers, he spoke not so much about the dream but resolutely about “the difficult days ahead.” Surely it remains even more evident that “we cannot afford the luxury of an anemic democracy.” We are well within the challenge of the difficult days King envisioned, that demand of us more than superficial notions of cross cultural relations and justice only on the terms of brutal empire.

Our beloved prophetic drum major never abandoned the sweet dream.

Action Item
April 4, 2018 marks 50 years since Reverend Dr Martin Luther King was assassinated. The National Council of Churches, an umbrella organization of mainline Protestant, historic black and Orthodox denominations, is leading “Act Now! United to End Racism.” People of faith will come together on April 4th to commit to realizing Dr. King’s dream to resolve to end racism. Events include an April 3 ecumenical service at a Greek Orthodox cathedral, an interfaith prayer service and rally on the National Mall on April 4, and a lobby day on Capitol Hill on April 5. Visit the National Council of Churches Facebook page to learn more : https://www.facebook.com/nationalcouncilofchurches/.

Bio
In August 2014, Pastor Starr began work as ELCA Director for Ethnic Specific, Multicultural Ministries and Racial Justice Team of the ELCA–after serving as Director for African Descent Ministries  since 2009. As a pastor /teacher he takes great delight and special joy in helping to lift up and engage the gifts and talents of people of African descent and others, celebrating their capacity for building a stronger church and a better world to the glory of God through Jesus Christ. He was awarded an honorary doctor of divinity degree from Trinity Lutheran Seminary in Columbus Ohio. Pastor Starr and his wife Judith have two adult children and two grandchildren. He is the first of seven children born to Albert and Eunice Starr of Durham, N.C.

Sermon delivered to the Lutheran Center, Chicago, IL December 13, 2017

Text: Mark 1:1-8; Isaiah 40:1-11; 2 Pet 3:8-14. 2nd Week of Advent

Grace and peace to you from God our Father and form our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen

I love to tell the story of unseen things above, Of Jesus and his glory, of Jesus and his love.

I love to tell the story, because I know ’tis true; It satisfies my longings as nothing else can do.

This is one of my favorite traditional church songs. I wouldn’t do it at a church service full of young people.

The Spanish translation doesn’t have the same emphasis. It says:

Grato es contar historia del celestial favor,

de Cristo y de su gloria, de Cristo y de su amor.

Me agrada repetirla, pues se que es la verdad;

y nada satisface cual ella mi ansiedad.

It’s like saying, “it is nice to tell the story.” I love its emphasis in English.  I love to tell the story

There is a person in this very building who firmly believes that “ministry is about relationships” so he starts almost every public speech with the following statement:

“Relationships, relationships, relationships.

Ministry is about relationships.

Relationship with God, relationship with one another, and relationship with the community.”

And I agree with him, not only because relationships are in the heart of ministry, but also because it’s very true when it comes to our Global Mission work.

Oct the 2^nd was my very first day in this position. So RMP (Rafael Malpica Padilla, E.D. of Global Mission for the ELCA) took me out to lunch; We all know who RMP is, don’t we? Sorry Rafael, I’m piking on you. My friends, in this building, we have a reputation about the use of acronyms. After two and a half months, I’m still working on them.

Anyway, Rafael took me out to lunch, and at the end of our conversation he told me: “At the end of the day, the work of Global Mission (GM)  is not about what we can teach or the financial resources we can share, but it is about the relationships we develop with our companion churches.”

 I do believe in the importance of relationships. In Fact, as we, people of GM, are having this week our “2017 In-House Week” we went out yesterday to bowling, not only as an opportunity to have some fun and relaxation but most importantly as a chance to develop relationships among us. Jesus’ ministry is based on the development of relationships with those people he would encounter.

However, I also believe in the importance of telling the story as we do ministry. That’s why I love the song I love to tell the story. In this sense, ministry is about relationships, but also about telling the story.

During this time of Advent, John the Baptist with all his prophetic and messianic identity came to tell the story. He came to tell the story of one who was coming after him to baptize with the Holy Spirit, the one who came down to show us God’s love and mercy.

During this season everyone and everything tell the story: from the Christmas tree, the lights and poinsettias to nature, music, food, business, and of course churches. Even the traditional Mexican posadas and the rosca de reyes (circular bread).

Mexican and many other Latina American countries celebrated yesterday the Virgin of Guadalupe Day on December, 12,  “Today is the feast day of the Virgin of Guadalupe, one of the most important religious holidays in Mexico. The story of her appearance to the indigenous peasant, Juan Diego, is the story of God’s love for the poor and oppressed. May she inspire us to that same kind of love today” (Facebook post from my friend Heidi).

Since everyone and everything tell the story of Jesus and his love; please allow me to tell you a little a story of conviction and commitment:

As a Salvadoran, I had the privilege of being baptized by Father Rutilio Grande, confirmed by Archbishop Oscar Romero, and ordained by Bishop Medardo Gomez. Those who are familiar with the Salvadoran history know what I’m talking about.

Oscar Romero was archbishop of San Salvador from 1977 to 1980. He was assassinated while celebrating the Eucharist in the chapel of the Divine Providence Hospital on March 24 of 1980. The day before his assassination he pronounced the following words, as a calling to the army in the middle of a cruel civil war:

“The law of God should prevail that says: you shall not kill. No soldier is obliged to obey an order counter to the law of God…. We want the government to seriously consider that reforms mean nothing when they come bathed in so much blood. Therefore, in the name of God and in the name of this long-suffering people, whose laments rise to heaven every day more tumultuous, I beseech you, I beg you, I command you in the name of God: stop the repression!” (Mar 23, 1980).  

So, the story we need to tell is the one that shows God love and mercy, on one hand, but also that of God’s demand for peace and justice.

It is the story of a God who “has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble.⁵³ He has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty.” (Luke 1:52-53).

It is the story of a God who does not tolerate rejection, marginalization, racism, violence and bigotry.

John the Baptist came to announce the coming of the Son of God, but also to call for repentance, conversion and transformation of all structures that promotes suffering and death.

So, my brothers and sisters, ministry is about relationships, it’s about telling the story, and finally, it’s about commitment.

We are a baptized people committed to following Jesus, committed to edify the reign of God and its justice.  In the middle of a reality of political unrest in our country, we need to call for accountability and respect. In the midst of threats and drums of war, we need to call out for peace and justice.

And in our own house, as Christians who claim to be Lutherans and heirs of the reformation we need to honor the principle of being a reformed church always reforming.

Many things need to be reformed in our lives, our church, our country and in our world. As ML King said: “I look to a day when people will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.”

During this season of advent, I invite you to be intentional in developing relationships, in telling the story of Jesus and his love, and in reaffirming our commitment of working and fighting for a better world for our people, the people of God, and for  generations to come. Amen.

Jaime Dubon is of Salvadoran origin. He has served in different capacities: as congregational pastor in El Salvador and within the ELCA, and as Assistant to the Bishop and Director for Evangelical Mission in the Florida-Bahamas Synod. Currently he serves as the ELCA’s Global Mission Area Desk Director for Latin America and the Caribbean

The Church Response to HIV Stigma

In 2016, I had the privilege of representing the ELCA on the global scene as a member of the International AIDS conference delegation in Durban, South Africa. Throughout the conference, it was encouraging to hear how much has been achieved in the global response to HIV/AIDS.   During the two-day pre-conference, it was exciting to learn how the World Council of Churches (WCC) is responding to the fight against HIV/AIDS globally.  WCC supports and partners with leaders, practitioners and organizations reflective of many faith traditions to eliminate the epidemic of HIV/AIDS. The WCC is also intentional in providing a platform for PLWHA (People Living With HIV/AIDS) to safely and openly share their journeys.   One such story involved a Lutheran pastor living with HIV. He was silenced by his church and salary withheld because of his positive HIV status.   The touching testimonies from PLWHA, encouraged me to solemnly reflect on the challenges that remain in eradicating this global epidemic. One key question continues to permeate my mind.  What more can the ecumenical body do to stop the spread of HIV/AIDS, with specific focus on the chief agents’ stigma and discrimination against those living with or affected by HIV/AIDS?

HIV related stigma and discrimination is counter to the purpose of the church in witnessing for Christ. The church is called to love and care for the neighbor as Christ commissioned. To care for the neighbor, one must understand the stigma associated with HIV/AIDS.  In some communities, HIV/AIDS was thought to be linked to sexual disobedience or promiscuity.  Many churches reinforced a biblical narrative of pain, suffering, and death as punishment for disobedience or a consequence of one’s wrong. Thus, blaming and shaming PLWHA.  However, the message of the gospel is to love your neighbor as yourself.

During the conference, many communities shared their approach in breaking stigma and discrimination to learning, education and accompaniment. The role of the church in mitigating the impact of HIV has expanded beyond preaching the message of love.  Churches are partnering with communities to include local leaders, healers, church members, and community based groups in providing accurate information on the facts about HIV; especially considering the modes of transmission, testing and treatment. Access to accurate information and a gospel message of compassion, churches can play a major role in ending the stigma of HIV/AIDS. Today, a growing number of churches are working to encourage a message of love, hope, support and dignity for people living with HIV.   

Bio

A baptized and confirmed Lutheran originally from Liberia, West Africa. I serve as Council Vice President of Peoples’ Community Lutheran Church (PCLC) DE-MD Synod, Region Eight Representative of the African Descent Lutheran Association (ADLA), and HIV/AIDS Awareness Project Coordinator – PCLC. I currently serve on the ELCA Young Reformers Cohort, an alumnus of Elisha’s Call, ELCA Delegate to the International AIDS Conference (2016) and a member of the Association of Liberian Lutherans Living in the Americas (ALLLIA). I am student at the University of Maryland University College, Majoring in Cyber Security.

My fervent prayer is a world where People Living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA) are no longer consider threat to society and incarcerated, rather embraced without fear as fellow humans needing love and compassion. This is something dear to me, and is evidence by my partnership with the DE-MD Synod, the ELCA Strategy on HIV/AIDS, the Black AIDS Institute and the Maryland Department of Health – office of Faith and Community based organizations. I also envisioned that, we as a community of believers, can help to ultimately seal the achievement and privilege gap that currently exist.

To learn more about ending the stigma of HIV/AIDS, view the ELCA’s repository resource link below :

http://download.elca.org/ELCA%20Resource%20Repository/ELCA_Strategy_on_HIV_and_AIDS.pdf.

On Tuesday, October 31, rostered ministers of the Saint Paul Area Synod & Minneapolis Area Synod, ELCA joined together in commemoration of the 500th Anniversary of the Reformation. The theme for the day, Turning 501, we examined the question, “What Does the Church Need to be Passionate About As the Reformation Turns 501?” Six speakers from across this synod – theologians, professors, artists, & even a former bishop – challenged us to approach this question through a new lens and with wider scope. I , Rev. Jen Collins from the Saint Paul Area Synod was one of those six speakers. Having recently attended and completed the Transforming White Privilege (TWP): A 21st Century Leadership Capacity training in Chicago with other ELCA affiliated members, this laid the groundwork for reflection and envisioning the answer to the proposed question. “What does the church need to be passionate about?”

You see, I am a Latina who grew up in the southwestern desert in Albuquerque, New Mexico and has since then traveled all over this nation. Minnesota being my home since 2010 where I’ve attended seminary, met my now husband and have the most incredible daughter. We have a wonderful array of culture and heritage within our small family which is why I am so passionate about sharing my story and adding my colorful voice to the sea of many white ones within our ELCA church.  Being “Lutheran” is more than whiteness.

An answer to a question:

Greetings to you my family in Christ.

I am so elated and on fire to share with you a vision I believe the church should be passionate about as us Lutherans turn 501.  We just celebrated on Sunday this the Reformation- the congregation I serve had 12 young people stand before the community and affirm that God chose them- that they are the next set of reformers to help us shape God’s church.

We though. Those of us here and in our communities, are reformers too! When I was ordained just a couple of years ago, I was taking on two calls at the same time. My half African American, half Latina daughter, Faora blessed our lives. Faora was just barely a month old when I became a mother and a pastor. These calls have been intimately intertwined and have changed everything- the past couple years have been challenging in both my roles. The world’s climate has not been a breeze– if anything it’s been an ever-changing storm. I’ve have never felt so much heart ache – too many black bodies, night clubs and concerts, immigrants, refugees, #allarewelcome, hurricanes, #metoos, fake news, #hatehasnohomehere and most days I don’t even want to know what’s next. I pray that my African-American husband makes it home, I pray my family or others- are not harmed, judged, persecuted, marginalized just for the shade of skin God has gifted us.

God has shaken me, I’m now woke; meaning – I have been made aware of internal and external injustices constructed and uplifted by individuals, systems and institutions. I’ve been thinking and rethinking for myself, woke to the injustices my multi-ethnic family has endured. It is my prayer that the Lutheran Church, that the whole church of God becomes woke and stays woke to the racism and privilege that our- yes, our Lutheran Church has allowed to cultivate in the pews, in our seminaries and in the pulpit. We’ve reinforced stereotypes and limit who is “Lutheran” and who is not. We keep making cultural assumptions which continue to advantage some groups and disadvantage others.

In 501, we should be passionate and strive for EVERY member of the church to be aware of and respect all the voices in the room, not just the most evident or numerous.

We have a need, an urgency and commitment to God and our children that when we say, we are the ELCA Lutheran Church it means we are about the Reformer who changed it all- Jesus. The Word became flesh- a colorful, wonderfully made brown body, a middle eastern Jew that God embodied. Jesus is not a white savior- is not a dusty blonde with flowing locks, not a white European! Our mighty reformer, Jesus challenges us – invites us to tell the right story not a white story. To re-frame the narrative so, the whole church can honestly be welcoming, where ALL God’s people are valued, beloved creations. We are the church in 501. Germans- Swedes- Norwegians- White Europeans are not the only one’s who write the narrative about what it means to be Lutheran!

Jesus shows us we are to reform the world so children- black, brown, indigenous are not seen as less than, second-class, dangerous or a commodity to be used. We NEED to speak – We NEED to stop being silent. We need to be the beacon of hope this world needs. Luther said- “our office involves much toil and work, many dangers and attacks, and in addition to little reward or gratitude in this world. But, Jesus will be our reward, so long as we labor faithfully.” Being silent for fear of backlash, intimidation, ignorance, loss of employment at the utterance of “Black Lives Matters”- Taking a knee- support of LGBTQIA community – anything deemed “political” – not talking, that is being unfaithful to the gospel.

Will we just have to wait another 500 years to consider reforming?

Now is the time. Did Jesus wait? Jesus rocked the boat- stretching the imaginations of God’s people from the beginning and still this day as Lutherans enter 501. Do you see it- Jesus schooled sin, death and the devil to keep setting the marginalized, and demonized victims FREE.  Jesus pardons the prisoners and crosses ethnic and cultural lines, so people will SEE. Jesus changes lives- every life is SEEN, every life – every shade of flesh is VALUED- RESPECTED-DEEMED BEAUTIFUL- filled with Grace! Every life is worth the cost– Jesus endured being slapped around, insulted, assaulted, named “criminal” and led off to the cross- to breath his last breath but not for a loss.

Jesus endured for us – body and blood for us. Jesus rose for us- THIS IS GREAT, REFORMING, LIFE-CHANGING NEWS! We respond because what Jesus has done! We are reformers- called, gathered and sent by the Spirit- she helps us bring hope, love and life to a broken and sinful world. So that one day as Dr. King envisioned, my daughter, will not be judged by the color of her skin but by her heart, whose she is, as was dreamed just some 54 years ago.

 In 501, let’s Reclaim Jesus. Reform Lutheranism. Renew Hope. 

This is my passion and NEEDS to be our passion. This work is HARD and challenging but if we do not do the deep and investigative work within ourselves and with each other – then we aren’t being faithful to the gospel. We all – people of color and white folks have got to open ourselves up to talk productively about racial equity, take ACTION to address whiteness- the dominant culture narrative, privilege and the consequences. It is a goal to utilize this TWP Leadership Capacity to accomplish the ideas stated above. This program will be a monumental tool for our Synods, churches and communities. Let’s keep moving forward in 501 – be motivated!

#Reformation501 #DecolonizeLutheranism #Blacklivesmatter #TransformingWhitePrivilege

Bio: Katrina Buchanan, a native of Erie, PA, and a graduate of Robert Morris University in  Pittsburgh, PA, is the current Lutheran Volunteer Corps volunteer serving in Chicago, IL, as the ELCA’s Justice for Women program assistant.

On August 15, 2017, the ELCA released a statement confirming its commitment to confronting racism and anti-Semitism in response to the events that took place in Charlottesville, VA, during the “alt-right” rally.

Shortly after the release of the ELCA’s statement, Justice for Women program director Dr. Mary Streufert asked me to take it a step further by putting together a report on the rampant sexism that the alt-right espouses, especially found in the comments made about Heather Heyer in the wake of her murder. I knew this is what I wanted to do for my service year with the Lutheran Volunteer Corps (LVC), but I wasn’t prepared for how emotionally taxing the task would be.

Although I tried to stay objective and detached, it was impossible as I read through hundreds of ad hominem attacks on Heyer and those who sought to protect mourners at her funeral. I scoured social media, various news sites, and the websites of the groups in the alt-right to try to get a better idea of what the alt-right is, why it exists, and why it’s dangerous on multiple levels. My disgust deepened as I researched background information about the various organizations and groups, women’s roles in the movement, and how these groups view and treat women.

I’ve struggled with how I’ve wanted to write this personal reflection on researching that report. As I wrote my report, I grappled with feelings of incredulity, hatred, despair, anger, and sadness. I understood why, but still couldn’t accept that such things could not only exist, but also flourish. More than two months later, I still haven’t found peace in this struggle, but I think that’s the point. As we say in LVC, I have to do the internal work so that I can do the external work.

There isn’t an easy answer to this question of how to create unity where hatred, prejudice, and intolerance is so deeply ingrained. As I flounder to find the words that I need, the words of the prayer of Saint Francis come to me instead, which is how I will leave you:

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace:

where there is hatred, let me sow love;

where there is injury, pardon;

where there is doubt, faith;

where there is despair, hope;

where there is darkness, light;

where there is sadness, joy.

O divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek

to be consoled as to console,

to be understood as to understand,

to be loved as to love.

For it is in giving that we receive,

it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,

and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

Amen.