What IF we took each other seriously?
Check out the Substack: https://bosanders.substack.com/
or the FB: https://www.facebook.com/BoSanders.public.theology
Let me know your thoughts!
People with no children play an important role in our future, communities, congregations, and families. #social #relational #identity #politics #family
I would like make something available to you that I hope you find helpful.
This is a ‘workshop on whiteness’ that I developed in 2015 and then updated a little bit last year. PDF: Whiteness Workshop Sanders
If you are interested in learning more about race and specifically the issue of whiteness then I want to be here for you during this important time in our nation’s history.
Let me tell you who I am looking for. Let’s say that there is a whiteness spectrum that goes from Level 1 (white normative – pull your pants up, speak English, don’t give your kids weird names) to Level 10 (Woke AF) then here is how I map that spectrum.
Level 2: not racist but snarky and defensive (they can say the N-word but we can’t?)
Level 3: I want to say Black Lives Matter but doesn’t All Lives include black ones?
Level 4: I get that people are upset but …
Level 5: Can’t we all just get along?
Level 6: Something is really wrong isn’t it?
I am looking for people who are at Level 2, 3, 4, or 5 and want to move to level 6.
- If you don’t know what POC stands for.
- If you get told to ‘check your privilege’.
- If you don’t understand how race could be a ‘construct’.
- If you think that bringing up race is racist.
Now, if you are more advanced than I am (Woke AF) then I bless you on your journey and say, ‘you know the work that you need to do – get busy – we need you in the struggle’.
Also, if you are Level 1, I am not sure I can help you. That doesn’t mean that you can’t be helped – only that I am not the person to help. It is too close to some bad experiences I had when I was younger and I don’t tend to have the best reactions.
If, however, you are at Level 3 (I want to say that Black Lives Matter) or Level 4 (I get that people are up but …) or Level 5 (Can’t we all just get along?) then I would like to make myself available to you.
I offer you a couple of things:
- Read this Whiteness Workshop (35 pages) and keep track of any questions, concerns, or objections that you have.
- Invite a friend or two to do this exercise with you.
- Email me any questions you want to ask but don’t feel like you can without getting in trouble.
- Let me know if a phone call would be preferred and we can set that up.
email: anEverydayTheology@gmail.com
You may be thinking, “can’t I just ask a person of color that I know?”
Please don’t.
It is not their job to educate us white people or carry our emotional burden. Communities of color have their own work that they are doing right now. Educating ourselves about issues of race and specifically whiteness is our labor right now.
So, if you are intrigued but what I am offering and would identify yourself as within the window on my whiteness scale, then I would truly love to be a resource for you during this time.
I am preparing to lead a 3-month book discussion of The Church of Us vs. Them by David Fitch for the adult Sunday school at my church.
My plan is to pair the chapter in the book with a different book, school of thought, or historical movement. Some of these include The Argument Culture by Deborah Tannen, The Peaceable Kingdom by Stanley Hauerwas, and the Anabaptist tradition.
Here are the 7 conversations that I hope will come up in the next 3 months:
- The church is supposed to be an alternative way of life – a prophetic and subversive witness to the world – that critiques the ways of the world and provides an alternative way of being in the world. She works best as a minority position within the larger culture and is not designed to be in charge or in control of culture.
- Neither the Republican or Democratic party can fix the problem of society. The Democrat and Republican parties are two sides of the same flawed coin. They are not the solution to the problem – they are manifestations of the problem.
- The church is not a middle way between these two camps (compromise) but it supposed to be a third way (alternative) to their ways. What we call ‘the church’ is so saturated with both Empire and consumerism that it is completely impotent to confront the ‘powers-that-be’ – which crucified the Prince of Peace (as a scapegoat) – and these powers continue to make life worse for most of humanity.
- The American ‘church’ is in bed with the systems of this world that reinforce racism, sexism, poverty, and militarism – 3 of those 4 things Martin Luther King Jr. called the ‘triplets of evil’.
- There is a way of living, which Jesus modeled for us and taught about, that leads out of the muck-and-mire we find ourselves in and opens up the hopes and potential of a different way of being in the world. That is the good news of the gospel (evangel).
- The church has the potential (capacity) to be the most beautiful and profound vehicle (venue) for unleashing human flourishing and peace. She does this by resisting evil, acting in love, and advocating for those who are vulnerable or on the margins.
- The kingdom (or kin-dom) of God is actually within reach but the church has compromised and been corrupted by being in alliance with Empire and the systems of this world. What we call ‘church’ is a shadow of what is supposed to be. Us vs. Them thinking is a symptom of that disease.
Here is a quick video (5 min) to introduce the topics:
Let me know your thoughts, questions, and concerns.
Our Left – Right politic divide creates problems for understanding and living in God’s love.
God loves us AND them.
I have been thinking about Identity Politics in the Gospel of Luke.
Identity Politics are great for politics – everyone should bring their whole humanity to the table and should vote according to their social location.
While Identity Politics are great for politics, it is not great for community.
It exposes that the Left is just the inverse of the Right – and neither is the gospel.
The gospel of God’s love transcends and even subverts our current political divide.
Check out the video and let me know your thoughts.
Conflict Case Study: 2nd Amendment, Abortion, Voting, Police
This is a follow-up to last week’s Conflict Culture.
5 elements to each:
1) Individualism
2) Remnant Structure
3) Technology
4) Intensity/Amplification
5) Trigger
2nd Amendment
- Individual: gun owner
- Remnant: militia language and muskets
- Technology: Assault rifles and militarization
- Heat: 24-hour coverage of mass shootings
- Trigger: ‘don’t politicize’ in wake of shooting vs. government taking guns
Abortion
- Individual: choice of woman v. unborn child
- Remnant: essential understandings of gender, sexuality, and
- Technology: sonogram, pregnancy tests, in vetro fertilization, sperm banks
- Heat: echo-chamber media (not able to see other side)
- Trigger: Roe v Wade, appointment of Supreme Court justices
Policing Strategies
- Individual: unarmed black men v. a ‘good’ cop
- Remnant: policing practices originated in Jim Crow South
- Technology: cell phone videos, body cams, riot gear, militarization
- Heat: echo-chamber media (not able to see other side)
- Trigger: access to national media provides constant new stories
Voting:
- Individual: popular vote v what does one vote matter?
- Remnant: electoral college and gerrymandering
- Technology: Russian bots, Facebook, Citizens United, PACs
- Heat: Argument Culture, Echo Chamber, Social Media
- Trigger: Hanging ‘chads’ in Gore v Bush, Popular Vote
What issue would you like to explore with this 5-part tool?
We live in a ‘Perfect Storm’ for conflict and chaos that seems to have no end or hope for resolution.
5 Elements come together
- Individualism (consumerism) –
- Remnant Structures – fragments of previous eras
- Expanded Scope – oversized beyond our understanding
Those 3 create a perfect storm. But the heated environment provides a 4th element that intensifies the problem
4. Water Warmed by Media – 24 hour news and social media
These self selecting platforms create a confirmation bias, which can become an echo-chamber, which morphs into a feedback (distortion) loop when the volume is turned up too high.
The 5th and final element is a ‘spark’ that triggers the :
5. Alienated from the power to change it. Fight against resignation
In the video below I use 3 test cases: 2nd Amendment, Abortion, Policing strategies.
I may make a video just detailing those 3 and adding our voting crisis.
For more:
You are free to disagree with me.
And that is the beauty of this issue.
You are free and you disagree.
Welcome to America.
Three things I would like you to consider:
- America is founded on protest
- Protestants are the largest group in America
- The national anthem is too special to sing at every game
America is founded on protest. The founding fathers were literally protesting things like ‘taxation without representation’ and the divine right of kings.
Protest is baked in the American bread – it is embedded in the DNA of our nation.
So kneeling during the national anthem is the perfect time to do so and it honors the ideals that this country is based on. The timing is part of what makes the protest so poignant. It would be so much less powerful if players knelt during the first commercial time-out.
In fact, seen in a certain light, kneeling is probably the perfect way to honor this aspect of our rights as Americans. By one definition, Kneeling is a basic human position where one or both knees touch the ground. It can be used:
- as a resting position
- as an expression of reverence and submission
- as a mark of respect
- during childbirth
Protestants are the largest group in America. It always shocks me when protestants demand conformity and control. Look no further than our name to see that we are born in protest. The entire enterprise is based on the individual’s conscience. [1]
Martin Luther famously said, “here I stand and I can do no other”. An NFL player might say, “here I kneel and I can do no other”.
If you are a white person in America, you should defend player’s rights to kneel no matter how much you disagree with the timing or the message they are trying to convey about policing practices in minority communities. That is what freedom is all about.
The national anthem is too special to sing at every game. I love the singing of the national anthem at big events like the Olympics. That makes sense because the athletes are representing their country. I have never understood why we need to sing a worship song to America before we play baseball or football.
I stopped singing the national anthem before non-national games when I was an athlete living in Canada. At first, it was because I was not Canadian. Then I became a dual-citizen but it had stopped making sense to me.
I do honor the singing of the national anthem before USA Soccer matches – that makes sense because the players are in the red-white-and-blue. I swell with pride when the anthem is played after an athlete wins a medal at the Olympics.
Singing it before every single sporting event seems inappropriate. Let’s save it for international games and make it truly special.
Of course, you are free to disagree.
[1] Nerdy sidenote: the same can be said for evangelicals, fundamentalists, charismatics, and pentecostals, who call someone ‘heretical’ or claim ‘orthodoxy’. You might want to go to your nearest Orthodox church (they are very welcoming actually) and ask the man in charge what he thinks of your modern take on Christianity. Spoiler alert – you are not orthodox.
Last week on the Peacing It All Together podcast, Randy and I talked about ‘the call for civility’.
Next week at the church’s pub-chat, the topic is the same.
Randy and I came up with 3 ideas about this and I want to reflect on them here.
First, it is important in ‘The Argument Culture’ (as Deborah Tannen famously called it) that we don’t prioritize policing people’s tone or vocabulary. Yes, we don’t want to inflame the situation and make it worse… but policing tone is not our highest priority.
The bigger issue is committing to stay at the table. Part of problem right now is that people can tune each other out, turn the channel, unfriend or mute voice they don’t agree with. Our self-selecting news feed becomes an echo chamber and bubble.
Staying at the table even when things get heated is an important first commitment.
Second, humanize – don’t demonize those with whom you disagree. A gift (or grace) that we can give our fellow members of the human race is to spend our time and energy imagining them as more fully and faithfully human. It is a dangerous thing when we make people into non-human things like monsters and animals.
Third, if push comes to shove (as they say) make sure that you punch up and not down. Focus your critique and concern on those who have more resources and influence than you do. Don’t take swings at those who are marginalized or disadvantaged.
Use your voice, your influence, and your resources for those who have less access to influence, fewer resources, and less power than you.
Is there any that you would add to our 3 suggestions?
Bo Sanders: Public Theology 