HOW CAN I FIGHT RACISM?
September 2006
for the Collect, publication for St. Thomas Episcopal Church,
Medina, WA
I attended a small liberal arts college in Michigan, a school that drew students from tiny country towns and also from Detroit and Grand Rapids. In the spring of my sophomore year, racial tensions erupted quite suddenly into a brawl involving 70 people.
I was never clear about what caused this brawl. According to the online encyclopedia Wikipedia, it involved a lovers’ spat, a misinterpreted confrontation, and escalating issues between a mostly white fraternity house and the campus’s black fraternity.
Whatever the cause, the consequences were huge. Most of the school’s black students took their final exams via mail, saying they felt unsafe on campus. Students staged protests, and within weeks, the Board of Trustees passed a vote of no confidence in the college president, who stepped down.
This was an eye-opening experience for me. How many of the players involved would admit to being racists? No, most of them – both black and white – were well-meaning individuals who simply didn’t know how to handle the situation. Racism seeped in like a sinister, demonic force, through hidden cultural assumptions and communication breakdown.
That was when I started to learn about the realities of white privilege and cultural power dynamics. And I learned, for the first time, that not being a racist is only the first step.
On September 21-23, St. Thomas will team up with All Saints, Bellevue, to host an anti-racism training called “Holy Transformation: Creative Use of Power in a Changing World.” The tools offered at this workshop are exactly the things I could have used as a college student on that spring day in 1992.
Our trainer, the Rev. Eric H.F. Law, will outline skills for ministry in diverse settings, lead us through theological reflection on how to live the Gospel in a multi-racial society, and present models and strategies to aid us in our ministries. We will also hear a welcome address from Bishop Suffragan Nedi Rivera and share a multicultural dinner buffet that Friday night.
Everyone is welcome to register, and I especially recommend this training for all St. Thomas ministry leaders. The cost of the workshop is $50, but financial aid is available. As the workshop begins on a Thursday afternoon, it may mean taking some time off work. If you can spare the time, do it!