Disturbing Words

As easy as it is for those of us who are white to look back and say, "That's a terrible statement," I grew up in a very segregated South, and I think that you have to cut some slack. And I'm going to be probably the only conservative in America who's going to say something like this, but I'm just telling you: We've got to cut some slack to people who grew up being called names, being told, "You have to sit in the balcony when you go to the movie. You have to go to the back door to go into the restaurant. And you can't sit out there with everyone else. There's a separate waiting room in the doctor's office. Here's where you sit on the bus." And you know what? Sometimes people do have a chip on their shoulder and resentment. And you have to just say, I probably would too. I probably would too. In fact, I may have had ... more of a chip on my shoulder had it been me.

- Mike Huckabee, offering his perspective on the preaching of Rev. Jeremiah Wright. (Source: MSNBC)

I greatly appreciate what the Reverend Governor Huckabee has to say about the recent furor over Senator Obama and, more specifically, what his former pastor Reverend Wright has said in the past. Too often the sling and arrows have come from those who most probably should hold their tongues because they cannot possibly understand the context from which Rev. Wright speaks.

The fact that above piece of wisdom comes from a middle-aged, white, evangelical, conservative, Republican from the South is beyond ironic unless one also keeps in mind the context from which Huckabee speaks. Growing up in the segregated society, where Jim Crow was at least out in the open (a constant criticism of southerns past and present about high minded hypocrisy of white, mostly liberal northerners who "benefited" from an even more segregated society but where far to "polite" to admit it) people from Huckabee's generation have seen both the best and the worst of their southern traditions. They have seen separate washrooms and drinking fountains, and they have also witnessed Afro-Americans hold prominent position of power and responsibility in communities where their fore parents struggled to be treated as human beings. In short, many southerners "get" the transformative power of resurrection, where a new creation springs forth from the dead chrysalis of oppression and sin.

They also know too well that while Jesus' resurrection was an immediate, cosmic event, for humans on this side of the grave such change takes time. The lingering effects of mistrust, prejudice, and hatred take some time to get out of the system. No one understands this better perhaps than those who worked and still work in the trenches of the churches, both white and black.

To be honest, Rev. Wright is correct when he points out the deficiencies in much of our society. "The Dream" that another black pastor from the South envisioned is not here--not yet. We have some work to do before "people will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of the character" as Rev. Dr. King once preached. Oddly enough (at least to some), much, if not most of that lingering work needs to happen in the northern states, not the southern. Politically, for instance, southern white voters seem much more inclined to vote for African American candidates than it appears many northern whites are willing to vote for a black candidate (Obama's numbers among Ohioan and Pennsylvanian white men is one indication of such hesitancy).

Huckabee's pastoral comment is a call to remember the context from which people speak as well as the importance of dialog with them about what they say and what they think. I know some "more experienced" feminists, for instance who also carry chips on their shoulders from battles of yesterday. They have experiences that I cannot possibly completely understand, and they have the scars to show for it. At times, all I can do is listen to their pain. I have spoken to what I would call second and even third generation feminists who are just as mystified by the polemics of their older sisters. They haven't walked the same journey, they haven't seen the same things, they can't fully experience what was past.

So perhaps with such pioneers veterans of the struggles for equality and justice, we can understand that some chips may still remain on their shoulders and spring forth from their speech. In so many ways, we benefit from their courage and sacrifice in ways we cannot fully fathom. They are the Jeremiah's (the Old Testament one) of our society, cranky prophets who have undergone the battles for righteousness and justice. Their words are often hard to hear and they don't often win a lot of friends. But to the people who understand the sting of oppression and injustice, who still feel the inequities of our society each and everyday, their serve as lights in the darkness.

I may not agree with everything that Rev. Wright preaches. Some of it disturbs me. But I am also disturbed by those who dare to suggest, as did Senator Clinton just recently, that parishioners bear some responsibility for what their pastors preach (what a scary thought for the people that hear me on a regular basis as well as their pastor!). I do feel that they have a right to be heard since they speak from their experience--a journey that I can only obliquely imagine. We also have a need to heed the prophets, to test what they say with the words Jesus gave us, and to prayerfully consider and prayerfully work towards a society that Rev. Dr. King envisioned, will one day fully live up to the founding creed of our nation that all people are created equal.