March 12, 2017
How do you arrange for the entire body of Bishops from The Episcopal Church to engage in the difficult task of examining and looking more deeply into aspects of racism? You catch them when they can’t get away. Twelve hours of conversation and learning afterwards I am resurfacing at the House of Bishops in Camp Kanuga, North Carolina. The genius of the present approach to tackling racism is to connect it with the lifelong work of the Spirit of God to reconcile us with God, each other and the earth. Racial reconciliation is a vital part of the formation of humanity into the Body of Christ. It is a fruit of the Cross through which God was reconciling us to Godself, and an outcome of that is the restoring of our relationships to one another in our racial diversity.
We learned that in the era beyond the outcomes of the civil rights struggles and of desegregation, modern racism manifests itself as we try and attach non-racial justifications for ongoing racist activities. If further attention is not paid, it is only a matter of time before old fashioned racism raises its ugly forms again. This work of racial reconciliation is ongoing, life-long formation, and it is an integral part of following Jesus, who is as much concerned about our ability to access His transforming love and demonstrate it in our relationships across diversity as He is about other aspects of our life.
I am finding an excellent companion to my time in Kanuga in the book I am reading by Jonathan Sacks, Not in God’s Name: Confronting Religious Violence. My other Lenten book (this one on Kindle) is Rowan Williams, On Augustine, and again I am being reminded of the lifelong project of becoming what Jesus has made access for us to be. I am getting a deeper sense of that restlessness of which Augustine speaks that does not end until I fully rest in God. And even then, and this is my new insight from the reading, that resting is still an active participation and eternal seeking even as I rest in God, if I am understanding him correctly.
Our facilitators for the sessions have been Valerie Batts of Visions Inc., Heidi Kim and Bill Kondrath. The latter will be known to Iowa clergy because he presented to the Clergy Retreat last year. So, some of his work in emotional messaging as it relates to racial reconciliation was familiar. The invitation to shift from monoculturalism to pluralism, from the melting pot to the salad bowl imagery for racial reconciliation was also familiar, and at the House of Bishops there should be no surprise that some clever souls want to know who or what is the salad dressing. Too heavy a hand with the dressing and every salad ingredient tastes the same.
What I saw in a new way was examining the elements that make up excluded or targeted groups of people, and the included and non-targeted groups. Even acknowledging my identity with people of color through my marriage and so through my own children, there were not many places to hide from the privileges afforded me from a myriad of non-targeted inclusions, the fact of being a bishop as significant as anything else. Being from an English working class background is my most targeted experience, even though again that has been dressed up through education, some language adjustment and learned social behavior.
The House of Bishops were being taken through a process that is being introduced to the Church at large on April 4th, the anniversary of the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. Entitled “Becoming the Beloved Community” it seeks to include our growing ability to be racial reconcilers within the spiritual formation of following Jesus. The learning to which we were introduced has a multifaceted purpose because it also offers several layers of resources for holding difficult conversations in our polarized society. For example, one simple and yet often difficult suggestion was to go to meet and talk with someone with whom you may starkly disagree, rather than follow the common response of avoidance.
All of this brought to mind the question of where are we as a Diocese in the area of racial reconciliation? I realized that since Diocesan Convention 2015, we have been working quietly and steadily on this. Let me rehearse what came to mind.
In the summer of 2015, we received the resolution from General Convention to engage in efforts of racial reconciliation, in particular to stand in solidarity with local AME churches after the shootings in Charleston South Carolina. We used a litany written by a Bishop of the AME Churches in our Diocesan Convention Eucharist in October. At the same time, a few of us filled a table at the annual NAACP Summit in Ames on aspects of prison reform and its impact in the African American community of Iowa. We also walked with predominantly black churches in the Waterloo area on the Jericho marches to honor victims of gun violence and pray for peace in the neighborhood.
The Board, in its early meeting in 2016, took up Racial Reconciliation as its focused theme out of the several issues raised at Convention for Indaba, based on prominent themes from 2015 General Convention. Also in January 2016, the Diocese hosted several sites for the Trinity Institute conversations on Racial Reconciliation and a conversation group developed from that experience, regrouped in the summer at the Ministries Retreat. Out of that, a discussion on reparations blossomed as resolutions were being prepared for Diocesan Convention. Another Indaba was held at 2016 Convention specifically on issues of racial reconciliation and from that we are preparing to host the film “Traces of the Trade” at Ministries Retreat as well as hold a course that explores key distinctions for understanding race and racism. We will apply these concepts – weave them – into an awareness of our personal, familial, regional, and Church stories of race – naming old harmful stories, and cultivating new ones.
Meg Wagner and Susanne Watson-Epting have picked up the work from the various conversations after the Trinity Institute Conference, and received a grant from The Episcopal Church to explore the start-up of a racial reconciliation community, possibly based at Old Brick in Iowa City. Young adults of the Diocese in Des Moines are beginning to hold their own gatherings to explore what racial reconciliation means to them.
It is clear that in our usual organic way God has been taking up our desires and helping us connect on this issue. I cannot say whether the components of the upcoming TEC project The Beloved Community will be what we have just undertaken as bishops through Visions Inc., but if so I imagine it will be a good resource for us to utilize in the racial reconciliation emphasis of our spiritual formation.
It is not an easy subject matter for any of us. There was plenty of wriggling, resistance and avoidance over the past three days. I believe that it is something we need to place in our important action quadrant. It is also an urgent tool for these times and it will be important to take time to be responsive and not reactive.
In the peace and love of Christ,
+Alan
The Rt. Rev. Alan Scarfe, Bishop of the Diocese of Iowa
