Walking a Mile

The first steps to overcoming racial prejudice

The insensitivity (at least) and downright racism (at worst) displayed from political and religious leaders in recent days has challenged all of us. Maybe rethinking how we interact by intentionally caring about the experiences of others can help. That doesn’t come easy, though.

When I first felt called to Christian ministry in my late teens and early twenties (it took me a bit to finally say “yes” to what I sensed God wanted me to do!), I thought I knew a lot about pastors and about ministry. I had been in church since before I could remember. My brother and I had sung in front of church people (and others), since my pre-teen years. I had been a “guest speaker” and a church musician. However, the first day in vocational ministry — literally the first day — I recognized that I had much to learn, and it gave me a deeper appreciation for those pastors I had heard and observed during my childhood and teen years.

When I first got married, my wife and I had already begun talking about being parents. Thankfully, we shared similar values and goals in regard to raising and caring for children. We also knew some things about psychology, communication, and boundaries through both our (short) life experiences and our academic training. I am sure that in my first pastorate, which covered the first five years of our marriage when we didn’t have children yet, I had even preached biblically-based sermons on parenting. Then, our first child came along after just over five years of marriage. After some late nights, near panic-attack moments, lots of prayers, lots of tears, and just doing the best we could, we both discovered we still had much to learn about parenting. Even when our second came along four years after that, we hadn’t quite gotten things down perfectly. To be honest, I am not sure we ever got it perfectly, but we learned along the way, from interactions with other parents (including our own), from training, and from experience.

For the first thirteen years of my life, I lived in a part of East Texas that was about 65% African-American in population, with a growing Hispanic community. My dad was a policeman (later Chief of Police), and because of that, and because the town was quite small, I felt I had an idea of what it was like to be a person of color. After all, I did have friends and teammates and fellow-musicians who were Black and Hispanic. We played football in the yards of each others’ houses, attended the same schools, and interacted with each others’ parents. Then, when I moved to the sprawling metropolis of Dallas/Ft. Worth, in a suburb with limited diversity, my interaction with people of other races and cultures was still there, but I heard and saw a different aspect of their experience as true “minorities” in a community. It struck that in East Texas and in the larger Dallas/Ft. Worth area, regardless of the population make-up, people who looked like me (White people) held most of the positions of power.

Even later on in life, as I studied social ethics, the Civil Rights Movement, and South African apartheid in my academic life, all while pastoring in one of the more ethnically diverse neighborhoods of Dallas, I began to recognize that I knew much less than I thought about the challenges of diversity and specifically the challenges faced by our brothers and sisters of color.

While I could not experience racial diversity in the way I could parenting, I found that if chose to intentionally try to see through the lenses of others by listening, asking questions, and authentic interactions, my sensitivity toward the experiences of those from cultures and races different from my own became a true education. More than that: It became a source of inspiration and appreciation.

As these personal interactions, along with my pastoral experiences and exposure to key writers, theologians, ministers, and other leaders in diverse communities, increased, so did my willingness and passion to approach others with respect and compassion, instead of with “fear of the other.”

While it is true that, like everyone, I struggle to understand and relate sometimes, I do know that listening intentionally, exploring with an open heart, and seeking to grow in my own understanding of others through genuine relationships has changed my life for the better. This change has, at times, brought about shared outrage when political, religious, and business leaders (among others) say or do something intentionally racist or biased. It has also brought about shared joy when a person or group is recognized after years (sometimes centuries!) of being deprived of a voice.

Finally, this growth in grace is allowing me to read the Bible differently, and by differently I mean, more accurately (in my opinion)! The Bible seems to be written not from a position of power or privilege, but through the eyes of people who, without God’s intervention, would have no voice at all. Jesus came not in splendor, with the full force of the Empire behind him, but as a nearly overlooked kid from an overlooked village in what at that time was considered an unimportant part of the world. God keeps reminding us that God’s work is best seen through those who, because of lack of population, status, or power, are oppressed.

This God comes along and says to those of us who in the majority, those who exert power by minimizing those who are different from them, and those who simply play on the fears of the unknown: “Not so fast! Blessed are those who are put down and disregarded and discriminated against, because I hear them. And if I hear them, I will respond to their cries!” (This is a paraphrase of many places in the Bible, including the Beatitudes in Matthew 5 and Luke 6).

Though God loves everyone, God shows Himself most often in the Bible as, to quote James Cone, “The God of the Oppressed.”

As a person who has nearly always lived in the “majority” as far as population goes, it really helps me and challenges me and humbles me to hear that. It makes me want to listen more carefully to those whom others in the majority may overlook or even discriminate against. The old saying about “walking a mile in someone else’s shoes” helps to understand them better fits here, but it is not always practical. I can’t really know in my own experience exactly how someone from another race or ethnic group feels growing up in a nation that hasn’t always had the best track record in regard to race relations. But, I can listen. I can take opportunities like Black History Month (February) to listen more closely. I can pray and repent when needed. I can speak up for others and speak out as needed. Maybe this will continue to increase my faith in God’s story and encourage someone else along the way.