Thank you to Allie Spillyards NBC5‘s for the chance to sit down and process yesterday’s terrible shooting.
“Community and Compassion.”
If you’ve been at Kessler Park United Methodist Church any time in the past few months, you’ve heard me say something similar.
If you’ve heard me preach at all since 2016, you’ve heard me say we’ll be fighting against the forces seeking to divide us for the rest of our lives.
Basic decency and respect of migrants should not be a political thing. But it has certainly become this, over the past several decades, as the lives of migrants are used as political footballs.
But, make no mistake, migrants have been demonized and Otherized for decades now.
In countless ways, we are being pushed and groomed by social media and our reactive culture to see “The Other” as less than human.
Yes, this also includes members of law enforcement. Indescriminatly firing at them means the shooter no longer sees them as human, either. But that all of this is more like some sick video game. We not only fail to see ICE Agents as human, we fail to see anyone in public service, from judges to the clerk at the DMV. They’re just cogs...just a number...just an “Other” in our way, or making our lives difficult.
The system harms THEM, whether they see it or not.
And our faith demands we name that dehumanization as well.
All of this is corrosive.
Because, this is not a game. This is real life with real life consequences. When I said we all need a step back, I am suggesting we first need to recognize each other as human beings. Or, as we clergy said in our faith leader statement yesterday:
That we are ALL made in the “the image of God.”
That doesn’t mean we condone violence. It also doesn’t mean we excuse unjust policies of our government. We name them, and we work to change them.
But it DOES mean we won’t have a society at all unless we can again first see each other as “human,” and not simply some “Other.”
Jesus lifted up the poor and needy, AND Jesus welcomes the Roman Soldier. That’s because Jesus understood both as dehumanized and victimized by Roman Power.
We are in a similar time.
That will take community and compassion.
We can advocate for our positions.
We can stand for justice.
We can lift up the marginalized.
And we can support public service that truly serves all the community, not divides it.
But be sober minded, here: This is all HARD WORK. Especially in an increasingly reactive and divided time of conflicting messages, and bad actors who benefit from the division.
For those of you who speak and act, from a position of faith, keep the faith.
PRACTICE your faith, daily.
Show up at a faith community like you’d show up at your gym. It’s not just an analogy. It’s that good and healthy habits take time, effort, and development.
If you’re in Oak Cliff, join us at KPUMC.
Be with real people in the real world.
Just seeing actual humans, spending real-world time with them, has never been more important.
Rinse, repeat...
Rinse, repeat...
Rinse, repeat...
