A Church on the Edge, by Rev. Michael McGee

A Church on the Edge, by Rev. Michael McGee, June 14, 2009

        A couple of months ago the team ministers along with Bob Griffith, our music director, Bea Ann Phillips, our children and youth choir director, and two leaders in our church, Shaida Johnston and Barbara Johnson, participated in a conference called, “Worship On the Edge.” We met at the Middle Collegiate Church in New York City, which is a dynamic, multicultural, liberal Protestant congregation. We attended excellent workshops, like the one titled, “When the White House Has a Black Family: Is Your Congregation Post...?”. And the worship services were joyous celebrations with different styles of music and stirring sermons by the young, charismatic, African American minister, Jacqui Lewis, who had people, black and white and brown, gay and straight, Yuppies and street people, on their feet and “Amening.”

        We learned that Middle Church is the oldest continuous Protestant Church in America, but when they called a young, white, Midwestern minister in 1985, only twenty-seven people were in the pews. Reverend Gordon Dragt decided to open their doors to the rich diversity of the surrounding East Village community, making the worship services welcoming to everyone, while feeding the homeless and empowering those who thought they had no power. The church underwent an enthusiastic revival as people poured through the doors.

        Rev. Jacqui Lewis now leads this “church on the edge” and she helps other leaders to do the same. Her message is that to be on the edge is to be on the boundary of now and not yet, on the edge of what is possible. And what is possible? Becoming a Beloved Community where all races, all ethnicities, all sexual orientations, are welcome to work together to build a better world.

        Some people may think we’re already in a post-racial age now that a black family is in the White House, but it’s apparent that’s an illusion when the first Hispanic woman nominated for the Supreme Court is called a racist for commenting that a Latina judge could make wiser rulings than a white man about race and discrimination cases, and when she is accused of “not necessarily” being smart though she graduated summa c** laude from Princeton and went on to get a law degree from Yale. Those accusations make it clear that Rush Limbaugh and Carl Rove are the ones who are IQ challenged.

        We’re certainly not in a post-racial age when a crazed man opens fire in the Holocaust Museum. We’re not in a post-homophobia age when the California Supreme Court refuses to protect the rights of gay people to be married. And we're not in a post-hatred age when Dr. Tiller is murdered in his own church for providing abortion services to women. In fact, we have a long road ahead of us friends if we’re ever to get to the Beloved Community. In the meantime, we must live on the edge.

        But the edge is not a bad place to live. What I saw at Middle Church was a model for multiculturalism that helped me to realize how joyful this journey can be. I loved worshiping with such a rich diversity of people, as we do when we celebrate Dr. King’s birthday with Mt. Zion Baptist Church and Our Lady Queen of Peace Catholic Church. And I yearn to do it more often.

        And yet being on the edge is not an easy place to be, is it? When you're on the edge, you get a great view of all the possibilities on the horizon, but you can also see that it's also a long way down. Think of the times in your life when some great possibility was before you, but you were fearful that your first step would take you off a precipice.

        Our church seems to be on an edge, not knowing if we are beginning a new stage of vitality and growth or about to fall flat on our faces. This is not the first time we've been on the edge of the unknown. When the young people who founded this church over sixty years ago opened the doors wide to those who were alienated from traditional religion and a politics of paranoia and a culture of racism, they must have felt like they were standing on an edge, taking a big chance that their dreams could be illusions. When our early members fought against McCarthyism and intolerant fundamentalism and segregation, they were standing on the edge, not knowing what the repercussions would be.

        Standing on the edge is our story, and when you sit in one of our rickety pews – that were around during those times -- you become part of this story of risk-taking and welcoming. That story continued when this congregation decided to open its doors even wider by becoming a Welcoming Congregation, intentionally welcoming gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered people into our church. We knew that gay people were ostracized from most religious communities, as well as condemned by society, and that they needed a church where they could feel safe and at home. And so we trained ourselves in gay issues, we listened to the stories of gay people, and though it wasn't easy for some, we opened our hearts and wove a web of welcome.

        Now the story continues. In the last few years we have been opening our doors wider to people of color. I can't tell you how many times I've heard the question, “Why are so few people of color here?” when our church is so progressive. My answer is that it's because we haven't invited them. Simply saying that anyone can walk through our doors is not an invitation. An invitation requires that we look people in the eyes and tell them that they are warmly welcome here, that we want to hear their stories and learn from their experiences, and to know their pain and to stand with them.

        I'm thankful that President Obama has challenged us to carry on a dialogue about race in our nation. And I'm proud that we have been doing just that in our congregation for the ten years I've been here. It's not an easy conversation to have whether you are white or a person of color. It means struggling with our deepest values, our personal experiences, perhaps even our guilt and shame. But I believe it's a necessary conversation for us because how we deal with multiculturalism and racism and homophobia is a deeply religious issue.

        This conversation has been a painful one for me personally. I grew up in an extremely racist environment, born and raised in the south, attending all white schools, with a father who voted for George Wallace very time he ran for president. I adopted those racist attitudes as a boy, but my mind and heart were opened by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and his followers. When I heard his stirring words and witnessed his sacrifices, along with so many others, it felt like a hard shell had broken inside of me so that my humanity and compassion could finally break through.

        I have become less of a racist over the years, but I know vestiges still remain, and I try to be aware of them. And I try to wear a lens that helps me to be aware of what it means to be white in a society where people of color are less valued. I’ve struggled too with being a man in a society where women are less valued, and to be heterosexual in a society where gay people are less valued.

        And sometimes I’ve had to get new prescriptions for my lenses. Many white people who went through the civil rights movement tried to become colorblind to the differences of skin color. We believed that by seeing our commonalities rather than our differences, we could bring about racial equity. In fact, our DNA is 99% identical and most of the 1% that is different relates to our gender rather than race. We are one race, the human race.

        Now we are asked to be aware of our differences as well as our commonality. People of color are claiming their identity with pride, just as many of us claim our identities as men or women, gay or straight, Unitarian Universalists, or more precisely as humanists, Christian, Jewish, pagan, Buddhists, Unitarian Universalists. This is a place where no one has to leave their identity at the door.

        And the people of color invite the rest of us to celebrate our white identity. Uh-oh! What identity? Some of us have trouble celebrating an identity that is so laden with prejudice and violence, and yet there is much to celebrate in the white culture: arts, science, literature, spirituality, and much more. The challenge is to be proud of our white culture without devaluing the culture of others.

        Then there's the terminology that's so troublesome for some. White Allies sounds like a return to white supremacy, though it's actually white people struggling against racism. People of color sounds too much like colored people, which we were taught is a negative label. Then there's anti-racism and anti-oppression, which seem so anti. And white privilege is so guilt ridden.

        But as Mahatma Gandhi told us: “Power, privilege, and position are great resources. Use them well. Do not become attached to them; for when we do, we begin to lose our moral fiber.” So let's not get hung up on words friends because the words are not nearly as important as the stories. We need to hear each other’s stories and trust them. This is why the ministers asked three people of color to give “I Believe” statements for these past three Sundays. I want to thank Shaida Johnston, Stephanie Weber, and Gary Bogle for taking the risk of sharing their stories; I know it wasn't easy.

        By sharing our stories we learn to see how the world looks to someone whose experiences are different from ours. When a person of color or a gay person tells us that it’s painful being in our congregation, we need to listen and accept that, even if we don’t understand. We may be blind to the obstacles that are all around us for a person who is different than our norm.

        It’s as if a person who is differently-abled came to our church, and there was a set of stairs leading to the front door. For people of color it may be more subtle, like not seeing anyone of color on our staff -- other than the custodians -- though our new youth coordinator, Sana Sanid, identifies as a person of color. You may have noticed that not one of our three ministers or our music director or administrator are people of color, but we are committed to seek diversity in future positions.

        At our Congregational Meeting today you will hear about the strategic plan for the future of our church. It's an exciting and challenging one that will not be easy to accomplish, but I believe we can. I believe our biggest challenge in the future is become a “Church On the Edge,” a church that works towards being multicultural and multi-ethnic because if we can't do that I fear that we will end up one of these days with the same 27 people in our pews as Middle Church in 1985. We live in a multicultural, multi-ethnic world, and our church needs to not only reflect that world but to help us and our society to live in it as creatively as possible.

        The path to doing that is to become a relational congregation. This will be a major goal of our church this coming year and beyond, and it means essentially that we will learn how to relate to each other in a more caring, honest, and respectful way. The key is to share our stories with each other, not just where you were born and your professional and family, but what you believe and how you’ve lived out those beliefs, how you’ve been hurt and healed, and the purpose of your life.

        There are many ways to do this sharing, including our covenant groups. But another way is to simply ask someone you would like to know better or to understand better or to learn from to sit down and have a conversation. In the relational church, this is called a one-on-one, and there’s nothing special about it except that these conversations skip all the superficialities of weather and gossip and go straight to sharing who we are and who we want to be. We will know we are truly a relational church, as well as a multicultural and multiethnic church, and a welcoming congregation, when most of our members are involved in this kind of personal and transformational conversation.

        Yes, soon the day will arrive when we will be:

        ...a relational congregation where people share their stories freely with each other;

        ...a multicultural, multiethnic church that welcomes all who need our message of love and justice;

        ...and a Beloved Community that celebrates all identities and diversities within our walls and our world.

        Soon the day will arrive, and in the meantime let us continue on this joyful journey together!

        Do I hear an Amen?

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