We have entered into the group of readings known casually as the Bread of Life Discourse in the Gospel of John. We are in the year of Mark, but Mark’s Gospel is too short to fit properly into the Liturgical Year as it has been designed. Therefore, we jump to the Gospel of John which has more than enough material since John was, to be blunt, very wordy. In addition, the Gospels will take a little excursion into the Gospel of Luke before coming back to Mark because the Feast of the Assumption falls on a Sunday (August 15) this year. Finally, we will return to Mark on August 29th. I explain this because I am never happy when we leave Mark, as Mark is my favorite Gospel: simple, direct, unadorned with explanations and hyperbole. Mark’s portrayal of Jesus challenges me to reflect on how I am living out my Christian vocation in the world, whereas John’s Gospel gives me lots of excuses.
I was struck once again by the words of Jesus spoken in the Gospel reading (John 6:24-35): “This is the work of God; that you believe in the one he sent,” and “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst.” They are at once beautiful and inspiring, and exclusive and imperial because of the way that the body of Christians has chosen to interpret and use them over time: All we have to do is believe because we know the one true God.
Walter Brueggemann’s words in Tenacious Solidarity: Biblical Provocations on Race, Religion, Climate, and the Economy are reverberating through my thoughts this week. Brueggemann is challenging the Christian Community to consider the ways in which Christendom both created and perpetuated the concept of white supremacy through its understanding of being chosen and exceptional. To be chosen means by definition that others are not chosen. To have had an experience and hold knowledge of the one true God makes a pretty good case for being exceptional with the result that the exceptional can dominate those who are not chosen and exceptional – generally, the non-white, non-Christians. Without reading Brueggemann’s entire work, it might be determined with my brief words that he is not Christian, but that would be far from true. Rather, he is a Christian who challenges those who follow Jesus to reassess the way that we have taken words from Jesus, or put words into the mouth of Jesus, in order to pursue or maintain a privileged position in the world.
Part of my personal work for this past year of lockdown, which looks like it is yet to come to an end, has been to immerse myself in understanding how America got to a place where white supremacy is not only openly expressed in the 21st century, but is found to exist quite comfortably among believing Christians who see themselves as the inheritors of the chosen people, and a people who have a lock on the truth to the determent of all other peoples and faiths. A major part of my work has been to grapple with “white culture.” Like any number of people of European descent, I have often thought that Americans have no culture. When I began thinking of cultural diversity I thought of bright patterns, great music, ethnic foods, and traditions and rituals that are other than what I experience on a daily basis. White culture to me was expressed with hamburgers, football games, fireworks, and big noisy cars – none of which are currently part of my daily life. I worried about cultural appropriation – adopting clothing or hair styles that come from a culture different than my own – when in fact I did not really like much of the styles etc. that seemed connected to America even though on a daily basis, that is what was in my home: jeans, t-shirts, tennis shoes and hair scrunchies.
Recently however, I was given a tiny glimpse of my native culture from the lens of an “other,” and that glimpse has begun to churn within me. It is a glimpse that resonates in the words that Brueggemann uses when he speaks of exceptionalism, ‘chosen-ness’, and the superiority that has become attached to the Christian worldview. It came during a racial justice conversation that included former and present public officials as well as ministers, businesspeople, and social workers. The group is mixed race, mostly white but including a high enough percentage of people of color to encourage honest racial dialogue. The topic was justice as it relates to policing.
After a presentation by the day’s speaker, an Oregon representative, who spoke of the work of the legislature to enact laws that would positively effect or reform policing, like no longer accepting military surplus (hooray!), a lively discussion ensued via Zoom out loud and using the chat room. The conversation started with how to make changes within police training, qualifications, hiring, and oversight to ensure public safety, then began to drift into how as a society we need to address or minimize traumas that prevent people from doing their jobs in a way that promotes the safety we desire. The traumas that came up first were combat experience or domestic violence since these traumas are not conducive to peaceful law enforcement officers, but new traumas were quickly recognized, hunger, poverty, the lack of housing, medical or mental healthcare, and poor schools. These are traumas that can push people into lives of crime, social alienation, and disorder.
We were clearly talking about a cultural shift, a shift toward a kinder more people centered culture that understands and works to provide for the needs that people have.
I remembered from my studies that there was another moment when the dominant culture of America stood at a crossroad facing the many social ills that damage people and society. In the 1800’s as new people were coming to America, and the nation expanded, the problem of people not behaving as employers and social elites wanted them to behave became more problematic. Immigrants were bringing different ideas about what was acceptable, the need for obedient laborers was imperative, and there was no place for misfits. There was an opportunity at that crossroad to begin addressing the social problems that allowed some people to thrive while others failed. It would have meant embracing all people as worthy of dignity and consideration. The other option was to view those who failed as substandard and unworthy of the great American project. Taking the second option was easier though it meant using force to make people conform to the norms of the dominant culture and expecting people to fit in regardless of their individual stories, wounds, or gifts. That of course is the road that was taken, and policing was the tool that society used to maintain control and allow the exceptional people, the real Americans, the worthy chosen, to continue to thrive. The history of policing is about controlling ‘the other’.
A black minister speaking at the end of the racial justice conversation that I referred to, told us that he was humbled to be present as white people spoke with honesty about the problems within white culture.
To say that God is known by many names and comes to different cultures or ethnicities in ways that they can understand does not mean that the God we know is not the only God. It means that God is bigger, more complex and inclusive, than we can possibly imagine.
At last, I have seen the culture I am part of.