Deconstructing Church

On this day, I sit and reflect on why we need to pull out Racial Justice as a single thread. Social Justice as a whole is our reason for being as followers of Christ, after all.

Yet who can look back over the furore surrounding Jarel Robinson-Brown in recent weeks and deny a discourse around race, justice, society and faith is sorely needed; this is why we need a focus on racial justice God. Spirit, rain your wisdom down on us.

I look at my nephew and niece, beautiful mixed-race English children, and know their treatment will not aways be equal to their same-race English cousins; that is why we need a focus on racial justice God. Spirit, rain your wisdom down on us.

I consider my almost-teenage son’s peers from non-white ethnicities. The different experiences they share with my boy, the cruelties of the world he has newly experienced through their stories. How their mothers may feel when their sons leave the house compared to how I feel; that is why we need a focus on racial justice God. Spirit, rain your wisdom down on us.

I look to all the other needs in society, the calls for justice for those with disabilities, those in the lgbtq+ communities, those in poverty, and so many more. I see the intersections with race and other needs and I weep for my complicitness in the society which empowers me over others purely because of how I was born; that is why we need a focus on racial justice God. Spirit, rain your wisdom down on us.

In this prayer, as in everything, I acknowledge my ignorance and ask for increased understanding. Jesus, teach me as I sit at your feet, not the blue eyed white man of my childhood stories but the brown Nazrene Jew of my learned experience. Give me more exposure to teachers of other ethnicities and cultures so I may know more of their context and hold tight to less of my own. And in everything, may I discern more of you, share more of you and draw closer to you.

Amen

Peace be with you