More on Oscar Grant

Hey everyone. This is a post I put up on the PSR website. You can read it here, or www.psr.edu (there). The question I responded to was: What is the appropriate role for a seminary or local church when an incident such as the recent slaying of Oscar Grant occurs?

Here it goes...

Social activists of the secular variety bring resources and commitments of their own to the streets. Religious activists and communities who enter this conversation from different places should locate themselves in the story of their particular tradition in order to interpret & respond to the murder of Oscar Grant through a hermeneutic of faith. Religion (when practiced at its best) offers public witnessing, story, symbol, confession, lament, dialogue, litany (like the one Ada Renee posted here), ritual, memorializing, memory & meaning making, contemplative practice, social support, moral frameworks and pastoral care. These are the things our professional roles afford us. They are gifts and should be used responsibly and wisely. We have a power invested in us as faith leaders—for better and worse—that cannot go unchecked. Whether we will it or not, persons in our communities see clergy as spokespersons and representatives for/of G-d. (Of course there are exceptions to this “rule” and people the world over who would rather not ever see a religious leader. However…) It means something for clergy to show up at protests, court-houses, crime-scenes, jail cells, etc. It means something(s) significant. Our showing up often signifies G-d’s care for the world. It initiates G-d’s touch upon the pains of (ruptured) human flesh and the grieving of families who now face a future without their lost loved one. Our professional presence, especially when we are dressed in religious garb, testifies to the relevance of our religion’s story to the on-going perpetration of violence on racialized/sexed/gendered/etc bodies. People need to see the clerical collar, see the stole, see the preaching preacher on the footsteps of city hall. It sends the message that we care about life, that G-d cares about life and if nothing else, we are willing to be with people in their suffering. With these things in mind, what about...

--Standing, marching, writing letters and crying out with the Oakland dissenting citizens and national protestors?
--Articulating publicly (in and out of pulpit) that the sanctity of life was mocked, dismissed and interrupted in the murder of Oscar Grant by Johannes Mehserle?
--Calling out and bringing attention to the tax-funded, institutionally implicating nature of this crime and to question retributive “justice”, “protection” and “freedom” that ideologically support the killing of civilians by armed “service” persons (past and present, domestic and abroad)?
--Contextualizing this current event by naming the history of police brutality in America in general and white-on-black violence/murder/lynching in particular?
--Again in light of this recent tragedy, looking at, learning from and confronting the social construction and lived realities of racialization(s) as they play out in individual lives, families, communities, neighborhoods, institutions, and “nations?”
-- Confessing the pained presence of G-d at Calvary and the pained presence of G-d on the BART platform on January 1st where Mr. Grant’s life was taken?
-- White people confessing the necessary conversion of our hearts still unrealized and highlighted by Mehserle & co’s actions?
--Holding up the tragedy that both Grant’s daughter and Mehserle’s daughter (among others close to the victim and perpetrator) will wrestle with for the rest of their lives?

There’s more. We have building space and educational programs to offer those mobilizing themselves for activism. We have experts (about legal issues and people’s rights for instance) sitting in our pews. We have access to technology and mass communication lists for coalition building. We have space for people to lament in song, prayer and silence. We have training in pastoral counseling to offer the bereaved. I could keep going for days, but I hope the reader gets my point. There’s so much faith communities (seminaries, local churches, denominations, etc) can do. Could we, even for a second, deny that Mr. Grant’s death and the social pain swirling through Oakland (and far far beyond) warrants these gifts/resources that we’ve earned and learned through the privilege of advanced theological education? I don’t think so.

Perhaps in response to Monica Joy’s question, it’s important to deeply search ourselves for the reasons we’re exuberantly ready and willing to employ and deploy these elements in response to some social catastrophes (like Prop 8 and the Immigration Criminalization efforts in 2006) and not so quick to use them in response to other crisis, in this case Johannes Mehserle’s murder of Oscar Grant. I suspect the answer to Monica Joy’s question will be different for each person willing enough to truly ask themselves or prod into their assumptions about what’s worthy of activist attention and what’s not. I for one, having made many mistakes both in ignorantly speaking about and not responding to issues of race, find the task of searching my own participation in racism extremely painful. And in putting my own self out for a second, I’ll admit I usually speak out of ignorance or stay silent when I should speak because I’m scared of getting “it” wrong or offending someone. It’s a people-pleasing thing, totally ego-based and it sucks. But what sucks worse is ducking out of the search & call process completely and thereby allowing the entire plague of white denial and disengagement to use me as a tool in this already hurting society. Regardless of the reasons for mistaken behavior, I point us back to Wade’s comment: “avoidance only leads to further frustration of justice.” As a religious leader, how can I call forth a racially-focused repentance from my flock/patients/colleagues, if I’m not willing to look at (hard, long, and faithfully), name, confess and ask forgiveness for my own racism? Avoiding the personal discomfort certainly blocks growth and reconciliation, but I also think there’s a danger in staying in the personal domain too long. The individual or inward search should not suffice as an appropriate response in total. Sometimes, at the heart of individual reform efforts, there’s a narcissism and myopia that forgets about the greater community. (Or as Jeffrey Kuan said to me last weekend “Sometimes all we do is talk.” Touche.)

Where is the social action? I’d like to see a PSR administrator of faculty person weigh in here. Certainly they have “invested power” of sorts that could be tapped in response to the killing of Mr. Grant. But I wonder if student mistrust of administration and faculty has so disenfranchised folks over the years that faculty and administration are reluctant to join us in activist conversations and activities. Or what about hearing from PSR alumns doing advocacy and local church ministry in the Bay Area--do you have something for us to hear/think about/pray over?