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Michelle L. Torigian

Tag Archives: Syrophonecian woman

Shedding My White Naiveté

18 Monday Aug 2014

Posted by mictori in Current Events, Life, Pop, Pop Culture, Religion, Social Media, Television

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Canaanite woman, discrimination, East St. Louis, Ferguson, Jesus, Missouri, race, race relations, racism, St. Louis, Syrophonecian woman, white flight, white privilege

St. Louis – Maps of racial and ethnic divisions in US cities, inspired by http://www.radicalcartography.net/index.html?chicagodots (Bill Rankin’s map of Chicago), updated for Census 2010. Red is White, Blue is Black, Green is Asian, Orange is Hispanic, Yellow is Other, and each dot is 25 residents. Data from Census 2010. Base map © OpenStreetMap, CC-BY-SA Map of By Eric Fischer (Flickr: Race and ethnicity 2010: St. Louis) [CC-BY-SA-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons

I am white.

I’m not sure that lends me to give my opinions on what is going on in Ferguson, MO.  Yet by living in the St. Louis area throughout my entire childhood and having conversations about race and reconciliation inside and outside of seminary classrooms, I have some passionate thoughts on the subject.

If you live in the St. Louis area as I did in my childhood and throughout college and seminary, you notice that many areas are either white or black.  While there are a few integrated communities, it seems though each race has their designated space to live.

My first residence was in East St. Louis for the first three months of my life.  My parents moved closer to my dad’s work in Belleville.  My grandparents, who lived in my first residence, stayed there for another decade.  Based on what I remember when visiting them, they may have been the only or one of the few Caucasian families still in their neighborhood.

I remember people often talked about this fear that the people of East St. Louis were going to “move up the hill” to Belleville.  People continued and still continue to move farther away from Belleville’s West End because of this fear.

I’m guessing other areas of St. Louis experienced white flight similar to this.  Is it because people assumed racial minority equaled dangerous?  Or did people continue to hold on to their racism from the 1960’s?

When I entered seminary in my thirties, my friends of color would talk about their fears of living in Webster Groves.  I couldn’t understand.  To me, Webster Groves was this safe suburban community filled with large homes and prestigious schools.

But that wasn’t the experience of my friends.  One told me “I couldn’t go running at night.  I just can’t do that – someone will think I did something wrong.”  She told me that our black classmates and friends feel that they would be pulled over by police based upon the color of their skin.  And then she said something to me that really opened my eyes: “I can’t fully be a whole person in Webster Groves.”

When you live in privileged areas, only some people are given the rights of being made in God’s image.  Others have to embrace a lesser form of personhood.

Hearing the words “white privilege” for the first time made me completely uncomfortable.  As a woman I don’t feel extremely privileged.  Sure, I may not be as privileged as another white person based on my gender or socioeconomic group.  There are times that being a woman does not make life easy – especially when it has to do with bodily safety.

But I am privileged beyond what I will ever realize.

I can drive in suburbs and never wonder if I will be pulled over because of my skin color.  I will be treated with greater respect at stores.  People will not assume I will cause trouble because I am white.

Some time later, I took a class on race and reconciliation.  There was one day where the conversation became extremely heated.  The pain of what was happening in predominantly black neighborhoods and the discrimination to our sisters and brothers all over St. Louis was expressed very explicitly that day.

That day still remains at the forefront of my memory, especially when watching these events unfold in Ferguson.  I recognize the pain as many march on the streets.

From all of these conversations, it was like I took the “red pill” in the movie The Matrix.  I can’t unsee the systemic racism that exists in our communities.  The flame of justice and peace that was ignited in seminary continues to burn brighter within my soul as I watch news reports of North St. Louis County.

All I can assume is that these acts of protests, riots and looting stem from this deep systemic pain.  As a white person, I can’t accurately represent their pain.  But from the gift of many conversations, I know it’s there, and they have every right to voice their deep anguish.  When people face discrimination, violence, a disproportionate number of incarcerations, lack of quality education programs as well as adequately-paid employment options, food and basic needs, there’s less hope in their communities.

As a Caucasian, I can tell you that we don’t experience what minorities and marginalized people experience.  All we can do is try our best to point to injustices that linger in our communities.

What I’m writing here is intended for a primarily white audience — to share my story of privilege awareness.  As Caucasians need to start to do our best to see it from a different angle… not from our comfy suburban coves or up on hills away from “those people.”

When a family of color moves into our neighborhood, let’s not contemplate moving to a “whiter” area.  Let’s invite our neighbors over for coffee or dinner and begin to build the relationships.  When you see the looting on TV, don’t just focus on that one piece of the situation.  Instead, focus your eyes on the people who are trying to pray over the communities and lead communities to peace.  Listen for the people who are trying to bring all sides together for dialogue, and join those conversations.  Notice the people who are trying to stop looters and clean up the messes a few hands have made.

And let’s spend some time with our friends of various background.  Maybe we’ll hear the deep pain that resides within them from discrimination.

These are baby steps, but we need to start somewhere.

I believe it was a matter of time before this happened to a community in St. Louis.  The people of color in St. Louis have been living in pain that many of us will never understand in our lifetimes.  As a white person, I don’t know how to support them as I should, and I know I will fall short.

I will continue to make mistakes.  You will continue to make mistakes.  We’re human.  But how can we be better the next time?

When we misspeak and return to our privileged ways, we need to stand back up and continue to try to bring about God’s kingdom of peace and justice.

And I will say this: I don’t want to hear that the people who are expressing their anguish should be “whipped,” and please stop calling them “those people.”  They are part of all of us – part of the Body of Christ, part of God’s creation.  No matter what our color, we’re made in God’s image.

Yesterday, the lectionary text was Jesus encountering the Canaanite woman (Matthew 15).  Her ethnicity and set of beliefs led Jesus to group her with the “other.”  She called Jesus out on his moment of discrimination, and he changed his view of her and his process of ministry to those outside of the Jewish faith.

Let’s be like Jesus, the one who taught us how to set aside our prejudices and love our neighbors unconditionally.

 

 

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Something Greater – A Sermon on the God Who Expands Outside of the Box

04 Monday Mar 2013

Posted by mictori in Current Events, Life, Pop, Pop Culture, Television

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God, Isaiah 55, Makers, PBS, Social Justice, Syrophonecian woman, Women's History Month, Women's Ordination, Women's Rights

Image0255This sermon was delivered on March 3, 2013 at St. Paul United Church of Christ, Old Blue Rock Rd, Cincinnati.

During this past week, I watched the PBS documentary Makers: Women who make America.  Watching this program was a great way to usher in women’s history month which started on March 1.  This program documented the transitions, achievements and rights that women have accomplished in the past 60 years.

Did you know there was a time when women were not allowed to run in marathons?  I never realized the story of the 1967 Boston Marathon when Katherine Switzer signed up and ran the race.  Women were not allowed at that time to run in the marathon, and the race director tried to physically pull her out of the race.  Instead, she continued to run.  The men running along side of Katherine were so excited to see her in that race.  The call of God stirred inside of her, got her on that path and kept her running.  Because Katherine followed her call, more races became available to women.

As I continued to watch this documentary, I never realized how many limitations there were on women sixty or seventy years ago.  Sure – so many women were called by God to stay at home and take care of their children full time, a truly important and beautiful vocation.  But, there were so many women who were called elsewhere, maybe in the workplace or as social activists, other valid and genuine calling.  But sixty years ago – society frowned upon that.  As this documentary showed, jobs were primarily open to young, single women before they were married.  There were segregated help wanted ads – one list for men and one for women.  And jobs for African American women were even more limited – mostly to maids.  All of this opened my eyes to a world that I never had to live in, even though, now, I’m one of these women called outside of the box.

Maybe there are still small limitations here and there, but today women can honor the direction that God is calling them without society saying a definite no.

We’ve locked God in a box and have a very limited view of the Divine working in the world.  Even when society is becoming more relaxed, there are those of us who sell ourselves short even when we are being called to something greater.

I also realized that I was holding myself back in my younger days, not seeing that God’s dreams was bigger than human dreams.  During my senior year in high school, I gave a speech that would shock all of you right now: it was on “why women shouldn’t be pastors.”  Yes, looking back, it’s very ironic.  I’m sure I probably used the text from 1 Timothy 2 – that women should be silent in churches.  After taking various speech, acting and debate classes over the years, it was the only time I received a C on any speech.

In 1991, even I didn’t think it was possible that I could be a pastor.  I had squished God inside of a very small box.  As God’s ways are bigger than my ways and God’s dreams bigger than my dreams, God got the last laugh on that one.

By the time I was in my late twenties, my mind had not only changed about female clergy, but I could also tell that God was starting to call me in that direction.

But women clergy is still kind of something new in our culture.  While women really started becoming pastors in the seventies and eighties, I’ve had people tell me that they’ve never met a female pastor before.  It’s a joy to be a testimony on the still-speaking God in our world.

Reflecting upon this scripture today, I kept wanting to focus back on two particular verses: Isaiah 55:8-9 “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the Lord.  For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”

What we often see are two opposing viewpoints using God.  Some would tell me that God’s ways are not my ways and I shouldn’t be a pastor.  They would quote the same 1 Timothy 2 text that I used in my high school speech to quiet me.  But what if God doesn’t take sides and God wants everyone’s voices to be heard?  What if God wants women to be pastors?

When I look at whether a group of people should have rights, I don’t just quote scriptures that limit them – whether it’s women, or racial minorities or when others have a different sexual orientation.  I personally base my ethical frame with these principles in mind: Is there Justice where everyone has the same rights and the same way to achieve?  Are all people being loved as we would want to be loved?  Are we giving others the same dignity we deserve?

I often think that if we are afforded certain rights, shouldn’t others have the same rights as we have.  People who are older or younger?  People who are gay or transgendered?  People who celebrate their faiths in other ways?

I also remember the scripture of the Syrophonecian woman that used her voice to stand up for her own dignity.   Even when Jesus felt limited by what people deserved love and grace, God was working through the voice of this woman to show a greater way of living.  And Jesus changed his mind.

I think about Mary Magdalene.  According to John’s gospel, she was the first follower asked to spread the good news of resurrection.  Yes, according to this gospel, it was a woman.  I think about Acts 2 and how women are called to prophesy.  I think about early church leaders like Phoebe and Lydia.

What great things are God calling us to?  What kind of world is God seeing that we can’t see?  Women can stay at home if that is where God is calling them.  Women can go into the workplace if God is calling them there.    Likewise, if a man is called to be home while his wife works, that is fine too.  Men can be nurses and secretaries like women can be doctors and CEOs.  There is something greater than our societal limits: it’s God’s call.

And many say that I’m being disobedient by standing up here today and being in this pulpit.  Even my 18 year old self would say that.  But what I didn’t realize at 18 was that God was bigger than a few Bible verses.  That God called both men and women into the pulpit and to teach in various contexts.

Women and minorities have had visions for years, vision and dreams that God has called us to.  But why do we hold back the dreams of others by holding back their rights?  Why should humans limit when God has called?  How does the Church still limit what God has called?  When we limit people we limit God’s action in this world.

For many of us who have felt limited by the church or a few doctrines or for those of us who have limited ourselves, we deny ourselves nourishment of social justice that everyone deserves.  Years ago, nourishment was denied when American society had separate water fountains or lunch counters or help wanted sections.   We have forgotten that all of us deserve these great things because we are ALL made in God’s image and that God’s ways are bigger than our ways.

It’s true that humans often place God in a box and sometimes it is done to control other people.  We, as individuals and the Church, can no longer place God in a box.  God is in all and around all and always present.  God is the God of resurrection and new starts.  And God will find a way to burst out of the box that we put Him… or Her… in.

In what ways is God calling you to new areas?  What kinds of things have you been called to – even though society still has certain expectations?  The God of great thoughts and dreams will walk with us as we follow our great call, leading us in new places that have been closed to us.

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