(Community Matters) Is the American Dream about a house, a car and two chickens in the pot OR about peace, health, happiness and enjoying equitable opportunities? Do most see Senator Obama as a black man or as a muti-cultural American with whom we can all identify?
Several members of our church (St. James Episcopal) gathered today to discuss Senator Obama’s march 18 speech on race delivered in response to the initial Reverend Wright controversy. We launched by watching a video of his speech, many following along reading the NYTimes transcript.
If you haven’t watched the speech in its entirety, I certainly recommend it. Or read the transcript here.
Our good friends, Rev. Bill Adams and Judge Lora Livingston, facilitated the session attended by 60+ people, all but a handful, St. James’ members. This session follows two others held during the last two years and organized around Eric Law’s book, The Wolf Shall Dwell with the Lamb: A Spirituality for Leadership in a Muticultural Community.
The community of St. James Episcopal is muticultural and inclusive. Founded in the 1940s by six Episcopal African American families not allowed to worship at St. David’s, today the church is approximately 40% black, 40% white and 20% brown. When Steven started attending 19 years+ ago, he was one of a handful of white members. By the time I joined 10 years later, there were probably fifty or so white members. Today, there is also a sizeable GLBT presence and many mixed race families (either through child adoption or interracial marriage).
We’re proud of our multicultural, inclusive community, and we have to work hard at it. Maybe 8 years ago, we met for prayer & discussion sessions every week for 12 weeks working through the increased visibility of gay/lesbian couples. We have been working on race and cultural identity issues forever, especially in the last few years as growth among whites has surpassed that of black members.
Some of the lines that most stand out from Senator Obama’s speech on race:
- this campaign – to continue the long march of those who came before us, a march for a more just, more equal, more free, more caring and more prosperous America
- a story that has seared into my genetic makeup the idea that this nation is more than the sum of its parts – that out of many, we are truly one
- the comments that have been made and the issues that have surfaced . . . . reflect the complexities of race in this country that we’ve never really worked through – a part of our union that we have yet to perfect
- most working- and middle-class white Americans don’t feel that they have been particularly privileged by their race
- it’s a racial stalemate we’ve been stuck in for years
- what we have already achieved gives us hope
- [providing opportunity] requires all Americans to realize that your dreams do not have to come at the expense of my dreams
Helpful discussion by all followed the video. Conversations about limitations of the lens through which we see others’ experiences – our own lens and experiences altering (or distorting) the perspectives we ascribe to others’. Much conversation about how radical listening and the development of trust are required to see on the other side.
Identity politics. I asked black members of today’s conversation to share their perspective of Obama’s candidacy. Wide range of responses from Obama as an MLK-like, prophetic figure, to anger that I focused on his black ethnicity when he’s one-half white. Also, the perspective that his color doesn’t matter, it’s his words. I wasn’t able to delve deeper into the perspective that solicited anger.
I loved today’s gentle and calm perspective of a woman I don’t really know but who called me last week to learn more about my involvement in the Obama campaign. Today she noted that there’s a little bit of all of us in Obama – says people connect with different parts of him. She advised us to pay attention to the little bits that make up his whole.
A recollection about reading Scott Malcomson’s One Drop of Blood: The American Misadventure of Race on the importance of race in USA national identity. And, specifically recalling discussion that whites’ fear loss of their race – given the predominance other genes in progeny.
Also discussion about the American Dream, whether today’s definition is an environmentally unsustainable one focused on material goods or a global one focused on peace, health & happiness.
I left more confused than when I arrived. I don’t understand calls for color blindness or for not seeing Obama as African American. I agree what he says is what’s most attractive. And, I believe the idea of electing a black president – the best candidate among all in the field no doubt – is hugely appealing to a great many Americans. I believe his race doesn’t matter to some African Americans. And, I believe it matters to most.
Community Matters 