Ken Sehested
Invocation (on the third anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine). —“A City Under Siege,” in solidarity with Ukraine, composed by Elijah Culp, text from Psalm 31: 21-24
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In remembrance of Malcolm X
(He was assassinated on 21 February 1965.)
There was a period of years, decades ago, when I experienced a crippling sense of personal shame and social despair when realizing my own complicity in systemic racism. The shame wasn’t because I had enslaved anyone; or had committed blatant acts of racial animus.
It was because I realized how clueless I was. And if I was this clueless in this regard, chances are I was equally clueless about a whole range of other forms of unconscious bias.
Simultaneously I feared that the same applied to larger society, that we as a people were also structurally complicit, trapped in a naiveté that prevented us seeing the truth about our wounded history that continues to color current behavior.
There came a time, though, when, in quick succession, I came across quotes from three of my heroes that bore me up from the sloughs of shame and despair. Not to make me innocent, but to allow me to be responsible, able-to-respond, freed from humiliation’s disabling power to move forward with courage and perseverance for the work of repair.
The first liberating quote is from James Baldwin, writing in “My Dungeon Shook: Letter to My Nephew on the One Hundredth Anniversary of the Emancipation.”
“There is no reason for you to try to become like white people and there is no basis
whatever for their impertinent assumption that they must accept you.
The really terrible thing, old buddy, is that you must accept them. And I mean
that very seriously. You must accept them and accept them with love.
For those innocent people have no other hope. They are, in effect,
still trapped in a history which they do not understand; and
until they understand it, they cannot be released from it.”
The second quote is from Maya Angelou.
“Forgive yourself for not knowing what you didn’t know before you learned it,”
and
“Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.”
Finally, one from Malcolm X himself.
“Don’t be in such a hurry to condemn a person because he doesn’t do what you do,
or think as you think. There was a time when you didn’t know what you know today.”
Each of these are grace notes, hopeful disclosures, stemming from the pivotal word embraced by people of faith: Repentance is not for punishment but for the power of beginning again. Not with a clean slate—we will ever bear our scars. And certainly not as a one-off occasion: Penitential living is a daily commitment and a lifelong process.
But the goodness of the Good News is that we can begin again, we can orient ourselves and our society toward the holiness which radiates neighborliness, restoring right relations and just kinship and social policies, knitting together the warp of Heaven with the woof of Earth.
Only by such grace-impelled, hope-provoked work—and it is laborious, sometimes sweaty, difficult, persevering, frustrating work—can we be saved.
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In Latin America, a common liturgical ritual is to name a salutary person who has passed but whose memory is a source of inspiration and resolve that animates the present, someone who is a guiding light and is seated among our “cloud of witnesses.”
Join me in saying Malcolm X: Presenté!
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Last week I drove several hours to attend the memorial service of a remarkable human being, one I never met. Rev. Nelson Johnson died earlier this month. His name is not listed in the familiar cast of renowned civil rights leaders. But in Greensboro, NC, and among a certain class of human rights activists, he is legendary.
The historic episode for which he is primarily known is the 3 September 1979 “Greensboro Massacre ,”a bloody confrontation between a group protesting the existence of the Ku Klux Klan. As those marchers were assembling, a gang of fully-armed Klan members arrived.
Within minutes the conflict escalated from shouting, to fist fighting, to gunfire. Five were killed and dozen others injured, including Johnson. He and his wife later founded the Beloved Community Center which, still today, engages in a wide variety of justice, peace, and human rights advocacy.
Importantly, after years of the city’s ignoring this brutal history (the police were present but did not intervene until the gunfire ended—Klan members were exonerated), Nelson formed a “Truth and Reconciliation Commission” to investigate the history, interviewing dozens of witnesses, and concluding that the Greensboro police bore the brunt of responsibility.
Rev. William Barber—some would say the best preacher in our country—gave the eulogy in the memorial service. It was more like a revival than a eulogy. You can watch Barber’s extraordinary homily at this link beginning at 2:32:54. I cannot commend it enough.
Join me in saying Nelson Johnson: Presenté!
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Hymn of resolve. “I only ask of God / That I am not indifferent to the pain, / That the dry death won’t find me / Empty and alone without having done enough.” —English translation, “Solo le Pido a Dios,” performed by Mercedes Sosa. Originally written and performed by Argentinian musician Leon Gieco in 1978, this song is an anthem that was widely used throughout the social and political hardships and civil wars across Latin America, particularly in Argentina and Chile.
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My Cuban friend Samuel Rodriguez Cabrera is not someone many here in the US know. And it’s a stretch for me to call him a friend; more like acquaintance, greeting each other in my several visits to Matanzas. It was 2016, after Trump was first elected as president, that he mentioned to my (very good) friend, Stan Dotson, that Trump would be our country’s chemotherapy: “Either it’s poison will kill you; or will remove the cancer with which your country suffers.” Or something close to that. With the next election, many thought, well, maybe we’re cured. But ’24 said otherwise.
Samuel was a deacon at his church, Primera Iglesia Bautista, a founding member of the Kairos Center, a ministry for the arts, liturgical renewal, and social service sponsored by the church, and served as its chief social worker in its poor neighborhood. His funeral was last week.
Join me in saying Samuel Rodriguez: “Presente!”
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Word. Before the end of Black History Month, watch “Backs Against The Wall: The Howard Thurman Story” (2019, 56-minute film).
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Call to the Table
Come now to this table, all who hunger and thirst for justice,
and all whose hungers are not so clear, but have still led you here.
Come all who weep now, as well as those who are numb and long to feel anything again.
Come all who love and trust in the goodness of God,
all who are leaning on the grace of Jesus Christ,
all who are saying a bold and willing Yes to communion in the Spirit . . .
and all those whose faith is shot through with doubt and fear and confusion.
Come and draw near to One who risked drawing near to us,
despite our own mixed up motivations and simmering hostility,
and even our smug self-righteousness.
When we draw near Jesus, we draw near one another
to live in thanksgiving, and to abide in forgiveness.
—Rev. Stan Wilson, co-pastor, Circle of Mercy Congregation, Asheville, NC
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Benediction. “In the midst of pain, I choose love / /In the midst of pain, sorrow falling down like rain, / I await the sun again / I choose love.” —“I Choose Love,” Lindy Thompson & Mark Miller, performed by Voces Aged. The song was written in response to the 17 June 2015 mass murder at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, SC.
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