Interrogating the Prejudice Within

During our Ash Wednesday service, we read an episode from Luke’s gospel regarding Jesus’ journey toward Jerusalem. The most direct route from Galilee to Jerusalem would go through the region called “Samaria.” Samaritans were part of the broad Jewish faith, but with some significant uniqueness, and there was a long history of mutual suspicion between Jews and Samaritans. Still, it was not unusual for Jews to travel through Samaria and to stay overnight along the way. When Jesus sent messengers ahead of him to find accommodations in Samaria, the Samaritans refused to let him stay, because he was making his way to Jerusalem. I don’t understand all the particulars of the Samaritans’ refusal, but we all know quite well the dynamics at play. 

 We know borders. We know the tensions that arise between “us” and “them.” We know the power that “landowners” have over “trespassers.” We know historic mistrust. We know how to perpetuate stereotypes. We know tribalism and xenophobia. We know what it means to view someone else as “other.” While we don’t know the particular history and culture at work between Jews and Samaritans in this story, we know the dynamics of the story all too well. 

 

During our Ash Wednesday service, we each received a small slip of paper with the word “Prejudice” printed on it. Prejudice: literally to pre-judge. It is a way of holding a framework that shapes our expectations, blinds us to exceptions, and offers confirmation bias to our presumptions. In other words, 

 

Prejudice is something that we all hold. We like to imagine that we’re not prejudice, and I’m sure that we make anti-prejudicial choices often. But prejudice goes far beyond the likes of Bull Connor, the Police Commissioner in Alabama who used firehoses and dogs to attack civil rights marchers. It is a part of the human condition of sin. It is part of our biology and psychology, as we are born into a particular family with particular features that speak a particular language, follow particular habits and worship (or don’t worship) a particular god. We are wired to observe and be shaped by that environment, part of which is to “learn” how to conduct ourselves, how to relate to others, how to protect ourselves, and so on. When we do, we also develop a sense of what is “normal,” and, behold, it is us. Once we establish that we – our ways, our faith, our leanings, our sexuality, our gender identification, and so on – are “normal,” we have the basis on which prejudice is fixed. 

 

When we began planning Ash Wednesday, Sue-Ann Wichman and I came up with the idea of putting the word “prejudice” on a slip of dissolvable paper, and as an act of confession, to put our paper into the baptismal font and watch it disappear. However, after ordering the dissolvable paper, we ran a test and discovered that the paper will indeed dissolve (some), but the ink and therefore the word “prejudice” sticks around. And then, quite by accident, I discovered a new parable in the font. Prejudice will not magically disappear when we confess our sins and turn to God for forgiveness. Prejudice has staying power; it sticks around. But the assumptions, the certainties, the opinions on which we carry our prejudice can be dissolved by the waters of baptism. That allows us to reframe our prejudice and to “pre-judge” everyone we see as a beloved child of a gracious God. 

 

What a beautiful possibility for our Lenten journey. Will you take a moment and watch this video. It’s only 90 seconds long and is best if you view it in silence. You can find it here. 

 

Mark of St. Mark

Prophetic Spirituality and Lent

 Friends,  

The season of Lent begins next week, starting with our Ash Wednesday service at 6:30pm. It will be a very tactile service, and I do not think you will want to miss it. This weekend during worship you will receive a brochure with lots of information about the season. This year we are using materials from an excellent resource called A Sanctified Art. Here are some highlights: Our theme is “Everything in Between: Meeting God in the Midst of Extremes.”  Each week, we will reinterpret binary oppositions as polarities and explore the tension of living between them, instead of choosing one or the other. Each Monday I will upload a Text Study video on the forthcoming weekend’s biblical text from Luke. Then, each Wednesday at 10:00am we will have and record a discussion of the text. Each week our Faith in Action and my Friday Extra will link to a something called “Visio Divina,” a contemplative practice of a guided meditation on the week’s Scripture beginning with an artistic presentation of it. And, a devotional from A Sanctified Art is available in hard copy (in the church office) or digitally, which you can obtain by contacting the church office here. 

 

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For the last month, I’ve been writing about “scapegoating,” as well as a subset of scapegoating that I have coined, “monsterizing.” Scapegoating has a long history as both a religious ritual (such as in the 16^th chapter of Leviticus), and a strategic practice by those in power (such as with Caiaphas in John 11:50). Any time we hear political, religious, or community leaders begin to identify and vilify a particular group of people, we ought to be wary of this tendency. And it is a practice that crosses over political and religious identities. For every politician that Scapegoats George Soros and his left-wing money, there is a politician singing the same song but substituting “the Koch brothers” as the right-wing villain. Scapegoating has been and will be with us for a long time, because it is an effective way of raising money, garnering votes, galvanizing support, or rallying troops. I have been writing about Scapegoating and Monsterizing as we lead up to the season of Lent, because I believe this season offers us an opportunity to explore how Scapegoating and Monsterizing affect us, both prophetically and spiritually. 

 

For many years, prophetic speech was the province of a few persons called specifically to that work. Since the Day of Pentecost, when God’s Spirit was poured out onto all believers - across genders, ages, ethnicities, and languages - the Christian church has been called to be a prophetic community, where we have the role of proclaiming the Word of the Lord in our moment. And, as the prophetic Christian community, our prophetic voice reflects the liberative good news to the poor, such as Jesus proclaimed in Luke 4:16-20. In other words, every believer is endowed with God’s Spirit for the purpose of proclaiming God’s good new to the poor, the stranger, the imprisoned, the sick, and those oppressed by evil. That good news comes in the forms of economic justice, immigration justice, carceral justice, as well as the provision of physical and mental healthcare. Actions can range from volunteering, to advocating, to letter-writing, to protesting. During the season of Lent, by focusing on the polarities in which we live, rather than oppositional binaries, we want to find ways to speak prophetically to the injustices of our world, without resorting to scapegoating or monsterizing those with whom we disagree. It is hard work, but it is our work.

 

Spiritually, we can only be this prophetic community if we are open to our own tendencies to buy into scapegoating and monsterizing. With confidence in God’s love for us, with the power of God’s call on us, we have the courage to explore, discover, and confess our participation in dehumanizing others, downplaying ideas that do not match our own, considering those who disagree with us as either “stupid” or “evil.” The Lenten journey for a prophetic community is the spiritual discipline of remembering that we do not struggle against flesh and blood, but against powers at work in our world, such as scapegoating and monsterizing, which we can only overcome through the power of love. This kind of spirituality does not come easily. It is a “discipline” in the deepest sense of the word – a deliberate, God-driven journey of unlearning old habits and taking on new ones. 

 

Lenten disciplines – whether giving up alcohol, walking the labyrinth weekly, fasting, learning to practice the visio divina, or setting up a family “cussing jar” – are means by which we dedicate this season to being aware of God’s presence in our world and being responsive to it. I hope and pray that this season will be a time where you find your spiritual discipline and your prophetic voice. 

 

Mark of St. Mark 

 

p.s. Many of you asked about the “Golden Rule” poster that we displayed during worship last week. It is a product of Scarboro Mission, a Canadian Catholic organization. You can order one in the US from the Interfaith Marketplace by clicking here.