A Lament for Racial Justice

I have been out of the pulpit the past two weeks, and there have been some deep sorrows in the larger world, and I am sorry I was not here to speak about it.  There have been multiple instances where people of color have been killed by white police officers without repercussion.   I feel a deep sorrow for  Michael Brown and his family who was shot dead in the street in Ferguson Mo.  I have a deep sorrow for the loss of 12 year old Tamar Rice in Cleveland who while playing with a toy gun, was shot by a policeman within two seconds upon that officer’s arrival on the scene.  Clearly a preventable death based on fear. 

Lastly the most blatant, this week authorities in New York, did not press charges in the death of Eric Garner, which was filmed, and from the video clear, that he was attacked by police using an illegal chokehold. Again, certainly a preventable death. The truth is there are many many many more, but these are just the most egregious that make the news.I am not here today to argue the facts of each of these cases, some are complex, some seem more simple to me, and I will talk more about theses issues and the issue of systemic racism in January. 

Today though,  I am here to share a lament with you.

I lament for the lives that were cut short needlessly,

I lament for a government that feels the best way to work with the community is to become a

            police state with military weapons.  

I lament a system that lacks transparency and accountability. For this there is a deep sorrow in

            the loss of our freedoms in light of all these tactics.   

I lament a system that starts with the assumption of fear and guilt upon meeting people of color.  
I lament the system where poor people are in an environment that offers few opportunities.

I lament the system that in light of all of this, continues to gut public education which will allow

            even less opportunity.

I lament the system that sometimes leaves no other recourse but violence.  Martin Luther King wrote “When there is a rock hard intransigence or sophisticated manipulation that mocks the empty handed petitioner, rage replaces reasons”  

Now I grew up in a neighborhood in New York City which police officer’s lived and it was a very racially charged environment.  Most of the officers I knew were good people trying to do a difficult dangerous job as best as they could. When my neighbors house was being robbed in the middle of the day, I was right outside when the robber tried to escape, so we put out a call in the neighborhood, Soon doors in the neighborhood opened and officers came running,  chasing and capturing the intruder.  I remember this clear as day from my childhood.  Parents telling us to get inside, as we continued to chase the robber around the neighborhood through back yards and fences. In fact, the police saved the intruders’ life at the hands of my neighbor who was more than a little pissed off when he caught him.  So I am not here to vilify police officers. There are many many good caring police officers.  But that does not excuse bad policing when it happens. And I can tell you that throughout our country many people of color do not feel safe and secure when they encounter police.

I have a deep sorrow, a sorrow for our country that seems to be waking up to the disparity of power and wealth and opportunity, and instead of seeking justice, many in our country continue to live in fear and impose oppression against that which they fear. Now I know the Quad Cities is not New York, Cleveland, or St. Louis. I think that’s why many of us like it here.  But we are not without our own  faults.  I encourage you to read the profiling report compiled by the Davenport Civil Rights Commission.  We must remember what affects the world affects us. Let us not blind ourselves to world around us.  We as a nation have deep wounds that still needs to be healed,

it is the wound of slavery,

the wound of Jim Crow,

the wound of discrimination,

the wound of racial profiling

the wound of consistent harassment of people of color,

the wound  of the school to prison pipeline,

the wound of poverty,

it is an open wound of ongoing racism that has become systemic in our society, and if we do not heal this wound, if we do not heal each other, that wound will fester and grow, and destroy us all.  We can not hide from this. Let us continue to educate ourselves, let us continually listen to what our brothers and sisters of color have to say about the circumstances of their lives, which trust me, most of us cannot even imagine, And let us be allies to people of color in their struggle for peace liberty and justice.