Righteous Action

Posted on August 12, 2017

So, I am sitting here listening to the people in my house. I am angry at the scenes I am seeing on the news from Charlottesville, VA. There is violence around which ultimately stemmed from the decision to remove a statue of a long-dead Confederate general.

As with everything, there are thready, spidery and wound together paths which lead from that decision to today. I am angry that people do this, but I am also angry that I am able to choose silence. It is not fair.  There are many things where this is true. I can sit quietly and set a point in my head at which I will intervene. If someone starts throwing insults, threats, gets out a weapon, hits someone – at one of these points, I can tell myself, I will intervene, I will say something, or call 911.

I am not in Charlottesville, but each and every day there are people around here who choose to treat other people as less important because of race, gender, sexuality, health or economics. The television is on and we are looking at “those” people, meaning the KKK extremists. We are hearing news stories on social media which we need to Google to prevent furthering our own utter outrage (and which are, so far, untrue).

The problem here is not just me, but it is me. At every point where using, or refusing to use, my own voice becomes oppressive to others I am not living into God’s vision for me. There are people whose ideas which I find repugnant. It is not, ever, Christian, to claim that some people have more worth than others, because of anything at all, skin color included.

I can say this, every time I hear it, I will say this. White Supremacy is not Christian. It is not a part of God’s vision for the world.

I can check my facts before I speak. I can look at the humanity even of the people whose opinions I find so sickening. I can’t fix every ugly word or mean action – but I can engage in the world in a deliberate and careful fashion.

Most of all I can stem my anger from a wild and dangerous reaction into a more careful and Righteous Action. Capital letters because, if God can hold anger, then God is angry too.