Dive Deeper: Power, Protest, and Pentecost

This morning I woke up to see a clip of CNN reporter Omar Jimenez being arrested on Live TV, pop up in my newsfeed. This is just the latest in a complex and complicated week. While I am not condoning violence, the response of protestors to everything that is happening (including the murder of George Floyd by police) makes sense to me. When your community members and families and friends keep being overtly murdered by the powers and principalities as well as covertly murdered by systems and institutions emotions will be expressed in a big, wild, bold, and sometimes destructive manner. That is how we respond to murder.

As my good friend Polly posted:

I’m clearly not pro-violence. I am pro- revolution. For Christians, this Sunday marks Pentecost, when the fire of the Spirit transforms the people. What if...? 

Lyrics courtesy of many friends who are recalling Les Miserables. 

Do you hear the people sing?
Singing a song of angry men?
It is the music of a people
Who will not be slaves again!
When the beating of your heart
Echoes the beating of the drums
There is a life about to start
When tomorrow comes!

Pentecost or as I always say "Wear Red Day", is the culmination of the 50 days of the Easter Season. (How I have been more deeply connecting with faith during Covid-19 will be another post at some point)

Pentecost 101: The apostles were celebrating when the Holy Spirit descended on them. It sounded like a very strong wind, and it looked like tongues of fire. The apostles then found themselves speaking in foreign languages, inspired by the Holy Spirit. AKA the time when The Holy Spirit showed up.

Right now is a time of revolution, and I know from history how revolution is never painless, and revolution never turns out exactly as anyone planned, but I understand I am living in a time of revolution. To my friend's What if ... from above.

• What if we heard and felt and understood the pain of others? 
• What if whites truly acknowledged the pain and suffering and death we have caused to others?
• What if we deconstructed all our institutions and rebuilt them without systemic racism and sexism?
• What if we began anew?
• What if we paid penance for the unexamined systems and institutions we have been apart of?
• What if the below were things that people of every race and creed and background and belief could do without the fear of being killed/murdered?

Things that I, a white person, can do without fear of being killed:

I can go jogging (#AmaudArbery).

I can relax in the comfort of my own home (#BothemSean and #AtatianaJefferson).

I can ask for help after being in a car accident (#JonathanFerrell and #RenishaMcBride).

I can have a laptop (#StephonClark).

I can leave a party to stay safe (#JordanEdwards).

I can play loud music (#JordanDavis).

I can sell CDs (#AltonSterling).

I can sleep (#AiyanaJones)

I can walk from the corner store (#MikeBrown).

I can play cops and thieves (#TamirRice).

I can go to church (#Charleston9).

I can walk home with Skittles (#TrayvonMartin).

I can hold a hairbrush while leaving my own bachelor party (#SeanBell).

I can party on New Years (#OscarGrant).

I can have a normal traffic ticket (#SandraBland).

I can legally carry a weapon (#PhilandoCastille).

I can break down on a public road with car problems (#CoreyJones).

I can shop at Walmart (#JohnCrawford).

I can have a disabled vehicle (#TerrenceCrutcher).

I can read a book in my own car (#KeithScott).

I can be 10 years old walking with our grandfather (#CliffordGlover).

I can decorate for a party (#ClaudeReese).

I can ask a question to a police officer (#RandyEvans).

I can cash a check in peace (#YvonneSmallwood)

I can take out my wallet (#amadouDiallo).

I can run (#WalterScott).

I can breathe (#EricGarner).

I can live (#FreddieGray).

ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!

#BlackLivesMatter

(copied and pasted, feel free to do the same)