Day 10: On Privilege

The experiences that started and ended my day were somewhat disparate.

This morning, I had to go into work (school) for a few hours. The school is reviewing new student applications for fall admission and there are two Saturdays in February when applicants come to the school for observation and testing. Lead teachers facilitate these observation days. I was paired with a first grade teacher and we were charged with seven first graders for the morning. This was, perhaps needless to say, my first time doing anything of this sort. Young children applying to school is a totally foreign concept to me, at least in my own upbringing and in that of most people I know. But I was quite impressed with these kids and their ability to play and test-take so naturally in this odd situation in which they are taken away from their parents for a couple hours, sent off with a group of strangers (children and adults) and made to write their alphabet and cut and paste pictures in sequence. All for a spot in a private school classroom. I can't help but wonder about the conversations parents must have with their children before a morning like this one. How do you prep a child for that? Do you prep them for that? I am not sorry to admit that this kind of thing wasn't my experience--I'm thankful that it was not. All the same, I wish only the best for these children and look forward to perhaps teaching some of them next year.

So, that's experience 1. Experience 2 was a documentary screening at Eastside called Traces of the Trade. It is the story of one woman and a group of her relatives who explored their family's involvement in the slave trade by traveling from Bristol, RI, to Ghana to Havana and back again.. The historical discoveries they make and they experiences they relive lead to, of course, the question of, "so what do we do now?" The film moved toward issues of racial reconciliation in the United States today and how we might grapple with our past in order to heal our present and shape our future. While this documentary presented an overwhelming array of topics worthy of discussion, many of us present at the screening were affected by the question of privilege. There was a scene at the end of the film when the family members had gathered together for conversation after their journey. Out of about 10 people seated at the dinner table, only one had not attended an Ivy League school. One of the men who, like his father, was a Harvard grad, repeatedly claimed that his admission to Harvard was not based on family or privilege but on work ethic. In our discussion after the film, the group almost unanimously saw this as one example of the blindness many people have to their own (white) privilege. There was so much more than hard work that affected this man's college trajectory--social location, family resources, quality of primary/secondary schools attended, etc. What about those who do not have these privileges? Are they truly given equal access to a school like Harvard? To any college  or university?

Of course, as this morning's experience shows all too well, I am in the business of nurturing and grooming the children of white privilege. And despite the change of perspective I've taken on my job recently (as described in my post a couple days ago), I cannot ignore the fact that I teach in a school that serves a very particular demographic and focuses primarily on making itself and only itself better. That is a culture in which I don't think I can healthily dwell for a long time. My career, my life's work, will be elsewhere, I feel sure of it. It seems, though, that I have decided to ignore the tension and dwell there for a time. I am left questioning, yet again, whether that is okay--whether it is okay to spend a season immersed in white privilege when there is so much more in the world to work for than a self-perpetuating system. What am I perpetuating by staying put?

Of course, films like this one raise many questions that quickly become overwhelming and have the capacity to render us incapable of any action because there seems to be simply too much injustice and too much work to be done. Our conversation shifted into the industries of modern slavery, and it is chilling and somewhat numbing to consider how almost everything we use/wear/eat/buy has some association with production involving unfair wages and/or slavery. Yet inaction cannot an option. The challenge, I believe, is in determining the small steps one can take towards justice--as one friend described tonight, it is important to decide each day to take one small action of change, to do one thing that will shift the tide of justice in the world. Asking oneself each morning, what is it I can do today to live more justly? To walk more humbly?

Day 9: On Questioning

In my classroom, I keep a question box on the bookshelf. My students know to write down any unanswered questions (from class, from church...anything remotely related to the subject of God/religion/Bible) on a slip of paper and drop it into the box. Before the next time I see them, I write an answer in return. The purpose of the box is two-fold, the first of which being that I can redirect tangential but important questions to the box and therefore stay on-task during a lesson. More importantly, though, the box is my chance to interact individually and directly with my students by responding to the deep spiritual questions that many of them harbor. I love engaging my students' real questions--I love that they are willing to ask difficult things and I love both the challenge and the ministry of answering.

Here's an example from today:

"How do we know God is real when so many other religions could be right, and [how do we know] there can be only one religion that can be right because if there was several, someone in the Bible like Joseph would write in the Bible, 'it is not just one religion that's right, there are millions that are right.' PS-I need this answer as soon as possible."

Y'all, my kids are asking this kind of stuff! 10 years old and thinking about inter-religious issues! That gives me such great hope for these children as individuals and as a generation of (faith) leaders. The boy who asked this question will not be content to let anyone else dictate what it is he is going to believe or support or rally behind. He wants to know why for himself.

My goal of nurturing critical thinkers is one of the things that I am most sure about in my teaching (with my older students particularly). If my students leave my classroom with nothing else, I want them to feel emboldened to ask deep questions--of the Bible, of religious tradition, of themselves.

What a deeply sacred thing I am privileged to be a part of as my student seeks an answer to this question My prayer is that I might answer faithfully. So, what would you say to him?

----

Then, of course, I do get the occasional question that reads more like this:

"Hi, ok next week can we watch the rest of the movie and where do you buy your clothes?"

Day 8: On Perspective

This week has been a surprisingly good one. Might have something to do with the fact that there are only four work days that make it up. But I also think I feel better after unloading what I did in yesterday's post--both in writing and also in conversation with my supervisor. Putting those thoughts out in the universe have somehow given me some peace and clarity about what it is I'm doing. I feel like I might have finally started to climb out of the rut I have been sitting in for the last month or so. I am trying to change my perspective and begin to enjoy again the work that I do. To find joy in it.

For example, today I created the outline of a boat with masking tape on the rug in my classroom. Two classes of four year olds climbed aboard and we told the story of Jesus calming the storm (rain stick and wind/thunder sound effects included). Now, granted that is a little silly and absurd, but given the right perspective, it also kind of awesome. The kids had fun. I had fun. They understood the story by stepping into it.

Today I also started a new unit with my fourth grade classes on Psalms. For the past two years, during Lent, I have taught an adult Bible study on the psalms of lament and on the ways in which these psalms can be used as a point of access to the sufferings of Jesus and to our own human condition. Since my fourth graders are studying the Hebrew Scriptures all year anyway, I decided to adapt this Lenten study to their age level by letting this be our primary means of studying the psalms. This morning, after teaching the first fourth grade class, I realized how much I truly love this topic. I suddenly considered the possibility of writing it down someday in more systematic fashion...i.e., letting it be the inaugural edition of a Beth Moore-esque empire of b-stud curricula I will one day pen (one of my many life plans). It feels really good to believe so strongly in something that you are teaching. And it is a good reminder for me to note that everything I'm teaching to my kids, be it through an imaginary boat ride or an in-depth look at the darkest of psalmic prayers, everything I teach (despite myself, more often than not) can be a point of entry for these children to know God and themselves a little better. And that may not be world-changing. And there may be more important work to be done--that I could be doing. I don't doubt that one bit. But I do have my whole life to discover what that is and to go do it. For now, this is where I am. I am so thankful and privileged to be the teacher of all 300 of those stinkin' kids I see each week. And there is some good being done in it. Perhaps a great deal of good for some. This is the perspective I want to maintain.

Day 7: On Community

This morning, in a one-on-one department meeting-turned-confessional, my supervisor asked me if I was happy with my job. I opened up to her about some of my first-year struggles at the school where I work. It felt good to get some of it off my chest with a person who is within the same community and has the additional wisdom and insight of years of experience there. What challenged me about our conversation is this tension I have between wanting to be a part of my workplace community while not wanting to be a part of it because I find it unhealthy. I want to be a part of it because it is where I spend much of my time during the week, and because I value people and collaboration and relationship. Yet I have grown increasingly wary of the worldview this community promotes and the people who so clearly live within that mindset that I want to push against.

I’ve talked with a number of friends and confidantes about how I feel at odds with the culture of this school. I think that has to do with its geographical location, the demographics of the population it serves (which in many cases is also that of its employees), and its identity as a private school. This is not a world with which I’m familiar, and it’s been a difficult culture to break into as a first year teacher. What I’m questioning is, how much do I want to break into it? How much effort do I make to nudge my way in? The real question is this, why should I change myself to fit in with a place and a people that I would otherwise avoid? That sounds really harsh, but, quite frankly, I’m not into the exclusivist, elitist, narcissistic mentality that permeates this place. I don’t even want to pretend to be someone like that (and even if I tried, I know I would fail), nor do I want to promote that kind of living and lifestyle. Everything about it seems to run contrary to kingdom living, which I am far from “having down” but am at least on a lifetime journey of working toward. With my students, I’m doing my best to offer the proverbial yeast of the kingdom that subverts these dominant patterns of thinking and living, but with myself? Staying true to myself and not “playing the game” has led me to feel rather isolated. I miss being in a place where community is valued and people aren’t afraid to share real, mature conversations. I miss being in a workplace with people I love, even when personalities grate against one another or disagreements are had.

It does make me wonder, though—the other communities in which I have been and am currently involved, are these truly inclusive communities, or do I just “fit the mold” in those places, whereas I don’t at work? And in those communities that feel so healthy and good to me, who might be feeling left out? I’d like to think that no one is made to feel that way within the communities that I proudly call my own, and I think of myself as someone who works hard to include everyone. Yet I do want to acknowledge the capacity of all communities (and the people that make them up) to foster in-groups and out-groups. Hopefully my negative experiences of community at my current workplace will lead me to work even harder to build healthy, inclusive communities in the places where I do thrive.

But, the pressing question is, how do I make the most of the workplace in which I find myself? It is what it is (one of my favorite quips), and I’m going to be here for a little while, at least. I’m definitely not going to be untrue to myself in an attempt to befriend people who don’t really like me (and the feeling is mutual), but I also don’t want to be a standoffish bitch or self-isolating loner. It’s hard when being yourself, which in my case normally does enough in the way of making friends (i.e., being friendly, kind, a good listener), has proved somewhat futile. It all has felt very adolescent, a place where you feel pushed to be someone you’re not in order to fit in with people who will probably reject you anyway. I don’t want to play those games. I’m a 27 year old woman, for goodness’ sake. Perhaps my most productive moves will be to work harder to cultivate relationships with those people who are kind and genuine here. They certainly are present at this school, and too often I allow the negative experiences to cloud my perspective on the people here as a whole. I could do better at investing in those relationships that show potential. I know there has come a point when I’ve wanted to stop trying at all because I’ve been so wearied by it all, but I know I need to push myself past that and find the good that is here.

At the end of this reflection (rant?), I must give pause to say how much I deeply love and cherish each of you that I call friend. You make my days so rich and I am so thankful to share life with each of you, in small ways and in big ways. When I have hard days at work because people are mean, I look forward to the renewing community of fro-yo dates, one-on-one conversations over coffee or beer, girls’ nights, small group meetings, lunch after church, heart-to-hearts and soul-searchings. I could not get through this thing called life without you, and I am so thankful to know that I can expect something better than crappy community because I know genuine community exists. Thank you for upholding my faith in the loveliness of people and in the capacity people have to truly care for one another. 

Day 6: On Jesus' Lament over Jerusalem

Last night, I visited a small group meeting with friends from a previous church. I used to attend this group more regularly before I started working at Oakhurst and became involved in a fellowship group there. Thankful to be among good friends, I was also reminded of the importance of the lectionary cycle. We discussed together the story from Luke 13 in which Jesus laments over Jerusalem. At first read, this is a fairly strange text. It’s not one that is particularly memorable, nor is it easily understood. I struggled with it initially, and at first rather resisted pulling for myself something meaningful from it. Herein lies the value of reading (and preaching) based on the lectionary—a text that I would have otherwise passed over became the focal point of a group discussion and proved to be quite a fruitful passage. I was thus reminded also of the value of conversing over the biblical texts—multiple perspectives add much value and insight to challenging and straightforward texts alike.

The text: (NRSV)

At that very hour some Pharisees came and said to him, ‘Get away from here, for Herod wants to kill you.’ He said to them, ‘Go and tell that fox for me, “Listen, I am casting out demons and performing cures today and tomorrow, and on the third day I finish my work. Yet today, tomorrow, and the next day I must be on my way, because it is impossible for a prophet to be killed away from Jerusalem.” Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing! See, your house is left to you. And I tell you, you will not see me until the time comes when you say, “Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.” 

We have here an odd little exchange between the religious leaders and Jesus. The Pharisees prod Jesus with a veiled threat of death, and Jesus responds rather snappily. It’s somewhat startling to find the insult of “fox” in Jesus’ speech; here we have the righteously indignant Jesus who liked to flip tables and curse unsuspecting fig trees. To Herod the fox, and more pointedly to his Pharisaic messengers, Jesus offers another foretelling of his death. He speaks strangely of his ministry that will happen for the next two days, which on the third day will be finished, or, as rendered in the Greek, will be perfected. Again, he (or, more properly, Luke) repeats the three day motif, this time referring more directly to the propensity of Jerusalem, the holy city, for killing prophets.

He weeps for the city, as so many of his prophetic forebears did, and for the people it represents. Then we have this beautiful image of the mother hen, the second animal metaphor in the passage. Jesus as hen contrasts sharply with Herod as fox. And despite the warm, feathery pleasantness of this image Jesus offers, the truth behind it is that chickens (read—us! The Pharisees, the people of Jerusalem) resist the comfort and protection of the hen’s wings. As Ashley (last night’s discussion leader) described, chickens tend to scatter when mama tries to shelter them from the rain. And though their downy feathers absorb water while a hen’s feathers repel it, they know nothing better than to scamper about freely, soaking wet and alone.

As Ashley described these poor chicks who just don’t know what is best for them, I was reminded of my Ash Wednesday discussion with my fifth grade students last week. I asked them if they knew from where Ash Wednesday ashes typically come—and most of them did: from Palm Sunday’s palms. But fewer of them could articulate why this is a traditional practice (and fairly so, it’s a difficult concept). My best description of it was this: that using these celebratory palms in is a reminder of the cycles of life—birth and death, joy and sorrow, forgiveness and penitence. The Palm Sunday ashes also allude to the capacity that lies within each of us to love and to hate, to worship and to crucify. My students understood, of course, that we can make both good and bad decisions, that we are people who are neither perfectly good nor perfectly bad. Burning the triumphant palms into penitent ashes reminds us of our humanness, our imperfections, our hypocrisies. We at once can see the merit of drawing under the wings of Jesus, our mother hen, while also desiring the freedom of running free in the rain, no matter what discomfort or harm it will bring to ourselves.

And isn’t it something that Jesus weeps for the very city—the very people—that will soon take his life. He mourns their rejection, their blindness to the greater truth that his resurrection will reveal. The persecuted one laments the persecutors. I believe he weeps for us still. We are too stubborn to see the one God has sent, still. The good news, of course, is that we will get to see Jesus with fresh eyes on Easter morning, once again given the same chance, like the people of Jerusalem so long ago, to see what it is we are foolishly missing as squawk about in the rain.  

Day 5: On Re-prioritizing

I had the day off today, so I have no excuse for it being 10:20 (bedtime!) and I'm just now sitting down to write this blog entry. I had, of course, good intentions to write it earlier...but then didn't. I think I'm realizing this project is going to be a little harder than I thought. I am actually going to have to work to make changes in my daily schedule to have time to write. Today, I had plenty of time. Sure, I had things to do--errands, church work, small group, exercise--but I didn't use the free time I did have productively.

I think I'm still in a post-grad school rebellion phase where if I don't "have" to do something, then I'm just not going to do it. I'm going to read, or waste time on the computer, or doze in front of CNN while making a grocery list. I need to rediscover the intrinsic motivation of prioritizing the healthier, self-edifying, productive behaviors over the lazy and relaxing ones.

Tomorrow, a lectionary reflection--promise! And I still have several stories from my students piled up from last week that I haven't yet shared (involving sharks and zombies, among other things). Better blogging to come--this discipline will get better!

Sunday re-post #1: God Our Mother

Today's Sunday re-post is brought to you from February 23, 2010 (I struggle to believe 2010 has already been three years ago!). This is one of my favorite entries from my first year of seminary because it captures, with the fresh excitement of new insight and possibility, that moment when I first encountered a theological idea that has since grown and developed into something that is foundational to my understanding of God--namely, that God is not a man and our male-saturated religious language is both idolatrous and potentially harmful. Language and words are so powerful, and what we say has deep implications for all those who hear it--especially in something like liturgy that is repeated and internalized. I have enjoyed the process of rethinking the language that I myself use (and am thankful to be in a church where gender-inclusive language for both God and collective humanity is intentionally spoken and sung). As a religious educator, I know the most consistent lesson I can offer my students is to speak with intention about who God is. It is fascinating, though, to hear even the youngest of my students (3 year olds at St. Martin's) call God "man." At times, I am exasperated with how innately ingrained this image of God seems to be--it is a true testimony to the pervasiveness  of patriarchal language and imagery within our culture's religious imagination. If I can influence even ONE student to consider God as something more than just "He," I will consider the endeavor well spent--and not because I just want to be some bra-burning feminist who rages against the patriarchal machine for the sake of it, but because I want my students to know a God who is bigger than anything we can understand or imagine. I want my students to know that God is not limited by gender or family roles, God is not contained by our metaphors or explanations.

And now, the original post:

"God Our Mother" --February 23, 2010

This weekend, in the middle of a two week discussion on God and gender in my 'Images of God' class, I attended church on Sunday morning at Haygood UMC, which is where I'll be serving next year for my contextual education internship. As we progressed through the traditional elements of the service--the Apostles' Creed, the doxology, the gloria patri---I was starkly aware of the proliferation of God-language as father. I mean, this should have been pretty obvious (even in the title of one...gloria patri = dead giveaway) and this is the language that I've always heard and been perfectly comfortable with. But it's funny how focusing on the overuse of masculine language for God in classroom theorizing will immediately highlight the reality of it in practice. My question on Sunday was why? There's no real reason for the creed to say, "I believe in God the father, maker of heaven and earth" instead of, "I believe in God, maker of heaven and earth."

Where does this imagery come from? Certainly it's legitimate--I'm not questioning that. Jesus called God, "father,"  and in our traditional Trinitarian understanding, God is father to Christ the Son. Yet a deeper look at biblical imagery will certainly reveal a God that is not all male. For just a few examples, consider Wisdom-Sophia, consider the maternal imagery of second Isaiah, and of course consider both male and female as the imago Dei in the creation account.

The key point is this: all these images for God are just that--images, metaphors. God is beyond comprehension, beyond definition, beyond gender. When we assign these roles to God--father, mother, and so on--we are only trying to conceptualize the inconceivable. The danger comes in focusing too heavily on any one of these images. Recall the second of the ten commandments: you shall not make for yourself an idol. What else are we doing when we focus exclusively on one image of God, which is, again, a mere means for representing the divine--what else are we doing but creating an idol? God is father, yes, but not just that. God is so very much more. We are limiting God by calling God only father. It is an idol of our understanding, of our tradition, of our patriarchy.

I willingly admit that I have trouble with this. I am extremely comfortable with calling God, "father" and have never had problems with imaging God as male. I find it challenging to picture God as female, to call God, "her" or "mother." But it is this very discomfort that awakens me to my own idolatry of God as male and challenges me further to enlarge my understanding of God, to draw closer to the holy mystery by exploring other metaphors and images of God.

The practical question is this: how, as a future church leader, can I bring this notion into a congregational setting? You can't just up and pray in front of a roomful of unsuspecting parishioners  "God our mother" or repeatedly drop "She" as the divine pronoun. I think it would be healthy for us to get to a place where we do feel comfortable making those adjustments, but you can't make such a drastic shift without losing everyone in the process. Pushing these boundaries of our understandings of the divine can't happen overnight. I wonder where to start though--I imagine it will be in one-on-one conversations or smaller group discussions. There's plenty of things I would want to do if I were to go home and plan/lead a service at my home church, but I might be chased out with torches and pitchforks and dropped into the lake with a stone around my ankles. We discussed this particular challenge at a recent religious education retreat I attended, and one solution is called innovative traditioning. You've got to start with what people know, and then tweak it.

I may not probe too deep into this next issue right now (I've got OT midterm studying to do that I've been expertly avoiding thus far), but another big part of this discussion is how exclusivist male imagery for God has become oppressive and subordinating to women. We are cast as the 'anti-image' of God and cannot know fully what it means to share in the divine being if God is father. I do not think this is a biblical intent, but it has certainly become a historical reality. And while we explore different metaphors, images, and language for the holy mystery, the divine other that is God, I hope, too, we can return to Scripture and look at it with new eyes, with the lens of patriarchy removed, and find in its pages a God who deeply cares about all people, not just white males. I say this because a couple of weeks ago, someone in our class suggested wishfully that we should just rewrite Scripture as a means of correcting these gender imbalances. It was almost funny how my body instinctively reacted to this proposal--I got hot and my face turned red and I had to take a few deep breaths! I don't think we're in any place to rewrite what has been given us. We just need to start treating it as the holy word that it is, instead of as an instrument of exploitation and oppression.