All I Know, All I Know, Love Will Save the Day

I confess, a little bit of a stretch during #RepentingOfRacism while giving up "white" entertainment, we allowed it because the main character is black and incredible, (Jahi Diallo Winston is a glorious young actor, though the writers and producers are, indeed, all white...)... but we checked out Everything Sucks on Netflix. It's 90s high school nostalgia for the two of us, complete with one character's die-hard love for Tori Amos.   Yes, completely set in a mostly white suburban high school, which is, yes, similar to the high schools Darcie and I attended.

But...one scene has Jahi re-enacting 90s music videos, and he referenced this one. I had forgotten all about this song, and Yvette and Josh know how much this fit right into the lessons I re-learned this week:

All I know, all I know is love will save the day.  Thank you Des'Ree.

#AntiRacismForLent Week 1: Entertainment and Representation

This week, we focus on entertainment, and representation, and why it matters.  We ask how and what we choose to spend our "fun" money on, for those of us who have that in our budgets...

If you think this is trivial, or that we should be "beyond" it, consider how much entertainment you watch, listen to, consume, stream, and consider how that shapes your understanding of the world: both yourself and how you view "others."

Why do you think the way you do? How have you come to think that way? If you tend to live in mostly or all white areas, work in mostly or all white companies, how else do you form your concepts of other cultures?

And thank you Rissa Long for sharing this with me, too:

#AntiRacismForLent, Day 4

The #HabitofJustice on this #DialogueDay is to engage in at least 15 minutes of discussion with another white person regarding what you've learned about yourself this week. What is one behavior or attitude which you are committed to change? Pay close attention to your own implicit biases, especially ones that frame people of color in negative ways, and how a system that favors white people over everyone else has made your life more comfortable. 

Here I am discussing week 1 with Lauren Grubaugh

For more on Repenting of Racism for Lent, click here.

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#AntiRacismForLent is being facilitated by Maddie Joy​, Luke Arthur​, Lauren Grubaugh​, Daniel Russell​, Matthew John Schmitt​, Meggie Anderson-Sandoval​ and Lydia Lockhart​ as sparked by an idea from Andre Henry​. We invite you to join us in action and in conversation. Keep up with the daily habits of justice on the #RepentingOfRacism For Lent Facebook page, linked above.

#AntiRacismForLent Day 2

For today’s #HabitofJustice, we invite you to find a comfortable position, take a few deep breaths, and watch this video: Author Jen Hatmaker On Raising Black Kids In America: 'This Is On Us ...

Having watched Jen’s story, we invite you to enter into prayer, noticing:

- What moment was most life-giving or hopeful for you? Speak to God about this moment of consolation. Listen to how God might be seeking your attention. What might God be inviting you to be, do or change?

- What moment did you find most upsetting or concerning? Speak to God about this moment of desolation. Listen to how God might be seeking your attention. What might God be inviting you to be, do or change?

Write these reflections down to carry with you into the rest of the 40 days.

For more on Repenting of Racism for Lent, click here.

***
#AntiRacismForLent is being facilitated by Maddie Joy​, Luke Arthur​, Lauren Grubaugh​, Daniel Russell​, Matthew John Schmitt​, Meggie Anderson-Sandoval​ and Lydia Lockhart​ as sparked by an idea from Andre Henry​. We invite you to join us in action and in conversation. Keep up with the daily habits of justice on the #RepentingOfRacism For Lent Facebook page, linked above.

#AntiRacismForLent:Day 1

A Daily Prayer to Practice Anti-racism at Lent


God our Creator,
We affirm that You have made all people in Your image,
Instilling us with dignity,
Calling us good.
You created us in a beautiful array of colors,
Each one, fearfully and wonderfully made.


God, in overt and subtle ways, we have been taught a lie:
The lie of white supremacy.
The lie that white lives matter more than other lives.
This lie denies Your image In our non-white brothers and sisters.
We confess of consciously and unconsciously falling prey to this lie.


Eternal God, we confess the sins of our ancestors,
Ancestors who built systems to enrich and empower themselves
On the backs of millions of people of color.
They carried out genocide against indigenous peoples.
They enslaved Africans.
They used and abused immigrants.
The list of injustices goes ever on....


God, we confess to actively and passively maintaining a system that sins.
It denies healthcare to the needy,
Incarcerates at a profit,
Unjustly shoots precious lives...
When any of Your children suffer, our souls suffer too.


We confess that we fear the cost of following You, O God:
If we stand up for justice,
Our reputation may suffer.
If we stop ignoring cries of injustice,
We will lose the illusion of innocence.
Ending our sin of ‘no action’ means we have to get to work.
To ‘take up our cross’ is painful.


And so, God of Justice, we come to You.
Reveal to us our blind spots.
Surface our unconscious preferences.
Give us the courage to withstand honest self-examination.
Give us the strength to fight for change that relieves suffering and provides fairness.
Give us Your vision of the community You designed us to become.


This Lent, God of Mercy and Hope,
convict our hearts, stir our spirits, transform our minds.
May this transformation create a ripple that lasts beyond this season.
May it extend beyond our personal lives and into our communities.
May we be agents of Your liberating work in the world.


Amen.

(Articulated by Lauren Grubaugh)
For more on Repenting of Racism for Lent, click here.

#AntiRacismForLent

Friends of European Descent with skin the same color as mine: Andre Henry wondered, amidst his Facebook community, if white people might take on the task of educating other white folks about undoing systemic and overt racism: why it matters that we do this, what kinds of attitudes to work on adopting, and tangible steps that can be taken. For the next 40 days, several colleagues from seminary and I will be devoting time to this challenge, calling it #RepentingOfRacism and #AntiRacismForLent.

We very much hope you engage, attempt, question, wrestle, pray, and open your hearts to actively fighting the impacts of ongoing racism in your consciousness, in your conversations, in your financial decisions, in your choices of entertainment, in the moments you find yourself where you know something is just wrong.

樂樂樂 I wonder if I know any white people that would take on the following challenge for Lent. Every day for 40 days,...
Posted by Andre Henry on Saturday, February 10, 2018