An Introduction from Pastor Robyn Hartwig
From the January 6 Congressional Committee hearings to the Supreme Court decisions on abortion and guns, there is so much unfolding in the life of our nation right now. As our country prepares to celebrate Independence Day on July 4, I will be turning over the sermon time to you on July 3 and inviting your own perspectives on the theme of "I Have a Dream" from Martin Luther King, Jr. Specifically, I invite all of us to consider:
How might you describe God's dream or your dream for our country?
As you consider this dream, what gives you hope and what weighs heavy on your heart?
Understanding that Christian faith calls us to civic engagement for the common good, are there particular ways you feel called to help realize this dream?
As we each consider our own perspectives, Pastor Janet Parker offers her reflection below.
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“The Spirit of our God is upon me:
because the Most High has anointed me
to bring Good News to those who are poor.
God has sent me to proclaim liberty to those held captive,
recovery of sight to those who are blind,
and release to those in prison—
to proclaim the year of our God's favor.”
Luke 4:18-19
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When I read Jesus’ “mission statement” in Luke, I see the contours of God’s dream for human society. I see Jesus’ vision of the kin-dom of God, the beloved community he came to inaugurate. In today’s terms, I read this passage to mean building a society of social, economic, and racial equity, where Black Lives Matter, mass incarceration ends, people’s basic needs are met, and oppressed groups are liberated and secure. And I would extend this vision to include the full and equal participation in self-governance—democracy—as the law of the land. I believe Jesus would be on board with that!
From the time I was born until 2016, I felt pretty confident that our nation was making slow if uneven progress toward these goals. Even after the 2016 election, I clung to faith that we would self-correct and return to our more typical pattern of two steps forward, one step back progress towards a more just society. However, the events leading up to and following January 6 and the Supreme Court’s recent decisions dismantling established voting rights and women’s rights have shaken me to the core. Now, I realize that I have been woefully naïve about the fragility of our American democratic experiment and the inherent flaws in its foundation. I am deeply worried about the survival of democracy as we know it, and about the basic freedoms and safety for anyone who is not a cisgender, straight, Christian, white male. This is what literally keeps me up at night.
But if the last couple of years have taught me anything, it’s that I constantly need to interrogate my assumptions. For example, why was I able to assume for most of my life that the American story was largely one of slow, uneven but inexorable progress towards “a more perfect union?” And why am I so quickly liable to feel demoralized and despairing when powerful, entrenched forces threaten to sweep away hard-earned gains and turn back the clock?
I am slowly realizing that these assumptions and feelings are a sign of my unrecognized white privilege, a symptom, I might even say, of a kind of “white fragility.” Because Black folks are not surprised when white supremacy rears its ugly head and scores victories, or when domestic terrorists launch attacks, or even when whole branches of government are taken hostage by regressive forces and their rights are stripped away. And while they no doubt feel anger and fear when this happens, they know that despair and inaction are not an option. For Black, Indigenous, and other People of Color, hope is not a feeling; it’s a spiritual discipline—a practice of choosing to act for a better world.
Some Black leaders I am now listening to—Dr. Peniel Joseph and Rev. William Barber II—are calling our era “The Third Reconstruction.” The First Reconstruction, after the Civil War, brought great progress and real political power for Black people, but Southern whites violently dismantled it by the end of the 19th century (Jim Crow) and it took more than fifty years for the Second Reconstruction to break out—the Civil Rights era with all its achievements. Then, the marriage of the religious and political right at the end of the 1970's began rolling back these gains until the Third Reconstruction began with the election of President Obama.
With each period of progress for African Americans, a strong backlash has followed (Make America Great Again!) The difference this time is that White progressives are finally aware that our democracy and our rights are at stake too. And this time, women, LGBTQIA folks, environmental activists, and people of color are more aware that all oppressions are interconnected—all stem from an ideology that believes white, cisgender, heterosexual Christian men are created by God to rule family and society. These things give me hope: our increasing awareness of our intersectionality and the incredible resilience of Black, Brown and Indigenous struggles for justice. And above all else, my faith that God’s Spirit is the wind in the sails of every movement bound for freedom land.
In this moment of national crisis, I am struggling with the best way to deploy my energies. I feel pulled in several directions. I feel called to keep “doing my own work” when it comes to anti-racism education and to look for ways to engage in the issues I care about with “rainbow coalitions” or what William Barber II calls “fusion coalitions.” I also know that I have skills I can offer as a Christian ethicist and pastor to help ground our activism in our faith and defuse the hatred arising out of our polarizing environment. I’d like to find more targeted and effective ways to offer these gifts.
Whatever I do, I am committed to careful power analysis and to making sure the means match the ends—because otherwise we’ll just replicate the same unjust power arrangements in new forms. I hope to connect with many of you to hear how you are feeling called to respond to our current crisis; perhaps together we can find our way toward not just preserving, but strengthening our democracy.
-- Janet Parker
