Blog

Statement Regarding Gun Safety & Gun Legislation

12/20/2019

In light of the recent debate over whether counties should become 2nd Amendment Sanctuary Cities and or Counties, the Charlottesville Clergy Collective, a group of interfaith clergy in the Charlottesville area, pledges to do the following:

Advocate at the local and national level for laws that prevent or reduce gun violence. This includes promoting universal background checks on all gun purchases and ensuring all guns are sold through licensed gun retailers. Our clergy members will advocate against laws that would increase the presence of guns in public places such as schools and houses of worship.

Connect with, and support, those who are directly impacted by gun violence. We will use our time, talents, finances, and physical presence to create a Charlottesville community that welcomes all people, and strives to keep them safe and fully included in our common life.

Draw attention to the issue of gun violence in our culture and make the prevention of gun violence a regular part of our conversations and prayer time. We further pledge to educate ourselves and our community and to frame this issue in a worshipful theological context.

Rev. Dr. Alvin Edwards
President, Charlottesville Clergy Collective

Conversations toward Reconciliation - Part 3

10/30/2019

On Tuesday, October 29, 2019, the Charlottesville Clergy Collective organized the third "Conversations toward Reconciliation" dinner gathering. It was hosted by Unity of Charlottesville. Over 125 people from 23 different faith communities attended the event.

Reverends Don Lansky and Patricia Gulino Lansky, Co-Pastors of Unity welcomed us and offered a prayer to begin our time together.

Apostle Sarah Kelley, Pastor of Faith, Hope, and Love International Healing and Deliverance Center, led in the singing of "Reach Out and Touch, Somebody's Hand."

Rev. Dr. Michael Cheuk, Secretary of the Charlottesville Clergy Collective, gave an overview of the work of the CCC and a recap of previous "Conversations toward Reconciliation" gatherings.

Rev. Dr. Brenda Brown-Grooms spoke about her shift in thinking about white people in relation to her call to serve as Co-Pastor of New Beginnings Christian Community in Charlottesville.

Rev. Albert Connett of Olivet Presbyterian shared the shift in his thinking about justice in housing for African Americans and how that shift led to his advocacy for this issue in our community.

Participants around the table shared ways in which shifts in thinking and action for racial justice and equity by reflecting on these questions:
a) what can we do in our personal relationships to address racism and increase racial equity
b) what can we do in our faith community to address racism and increase racial equity
c) what can we do in the communities in which we live to address racism and increase racial equity

Apostle Sarah Kelley concluded our gathering by leading us in singing "This Little Light of Mine," and Rev. Dr. Liz Emrey adjourned us with a closing prayer

Interfaith Service - Testimony of Rabbi Tom Gutherz

8/13/2019

REMARKS AT AUGUST 12, 2019 INTERFAITH SERVICE
Rabbi Tom Gutherz /Congregation Beth Israel /Charlottesville, Virginia

I’ve been asked to share some reflections on the impact of August 12, 2017
on the Jewish community in our town. Most Jews in America today are here
because they, or more commonly, their ancestors, were refugees escaping religious persecution, often pogroms or genocide. Most of us carry these family stories,
and especially for first- and second- generation Americans, these stories were related
to us directly by those who experienced them, by our parents or grandparents.

We were raised to believe that America was a kind of promised land. Not a place
where all anti-Semitic attitudes would be completely absent, but a place where organized anti-Semitism, aided and abetted by the institutions of government and society, would not occur in this land of liberty and freedom.

Most of our community has experienced garden-variety antisemitism: the pennies thrown on the floor, insensitive words that convey some unpleasant attitude or some unflattering idea about Jews or Judaism. And many of us grew up with some name-calling: Kike, Hebe, Yid. But by and large the public expression of hatred towards Jews was thought by us to be a thing of the past.

And then came August 12, in Charlottesville.

Since that weekend two years ago we have had to have certain kinds of conversations with our children and our friends, that we never had before. Trying to explain to them: Why do people hate the Jews so much?

The Unite the Right Rally here was a public coming-out ceremony for a movement
that had been steadily organizing itself in the corners of the dark web, where Jew-hatred is glorified and amplified. Where the names of Jewish journalists, activists and public figures have their names bracketed with the three parentheses to signify “JEW.”

Before August 12, we did not pay much attention to this. We, like many of you, were surprised that when the Klan came to town—the Klan, whose very existence is a visceral reminder of racial terror for African Americans--and most of the signs they carried were anti-Semitic.

And we did not fully understand why the people who came here, ostensibly to protest the removal of Civil War hero statues, were chanting: JEWS WILL NOT REPLACE US”
And maybe some of you still do not know.

The reason is this: that for many on the alt-right, hatred of Jews is a part of the glue
that holds together the white supremacist worldview. This movement has cut and
pasted classic anti-Semitic tropes into their version of “the Great Replacement
Theory.” According to them, the Jews, not being truly whites and certainly not Christians, work secretly for the demise of the white race.
This myth of sinister Jewish power is what motivated the shooter at the Pittsburgh synagogue last year. He blamed HIAS--the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society--for
being behind the invasion (his words) of immigrants at our border. So he went to a synagogue to murder some Jews.

The story of HIAS and Pittsburgh is a personal one for me. My father Joseph was
born in Poland in 1924. He lost his entire family in the Holocaust. By the time he
was 20 years old, every single person who he knew growing up, every family member and friend, with one or two exceptions, was murdered because they were Jews.
They were victims of a society that whole-heartedly embraced these same theories of racial supremacy, that believed in worldwide Jewish conspiracies. My father survived. HIAS brought my own father to America in 1950, and helped him to settle in Cleveland Ohio, where I was born.

The thought that Nazi ideas are avidly discussed on the internet and neo-Nazi insignias proudly worn on our streets, makes the Jewish community uneasy. We feel that the ground is shifting, though we do not know exactly how. We are uncomfortable about being suddenly cast into the public eye. And though we are grateful for all the expressions of support we received from so many of you in this room, our synagogue
has gotten used to security measures that we never felt were necessary before. There
are moments of fear, when we see or hear about some unusual activity.

But together with our fears and uncertainties, we are also aware that Jews as a community have been embraced in a unique way by this country. Barriers that once restricted our admission to neighborhoods, universities and or organizations have mostly disappeared.
We are no longer shunned as marriage partners, as was the case only two generations ago.

I’ve told you part of my father’s story. And yet I am also aware that when he arrived
in this country, and settled in Cleveland Ohio in the 1950’s, there were certain neighborhoods he could live in, bank loans and jobs he could get by virtue of the fact
that he had been designated as white, or kind of white, in America’s either/or racial lens.
I and many in our Jewish community--the ninety percent of our community
who are not Jews of color--enjoy privileges that were not available, and still are not,
to African Americans and people of color.

We know that for every synagogue shooting, there have been dozens of attacks on African American churches and communities. And we know that much white supremacist violence is directed at Muslims and, as we saw just last week in El Paso, at the Latino community.

I had known about the violence of racism and its history in our country.
But on August 12 I, and many of you, saw it and felt it in a different way.
I may have been surprised by my exposure to the depth of the hatred and
the violence of white supremacy in this country, but African Americans have
always known it. It is as much a part of their life, of your life, as the air we all
breathe. And havin seen and felt that, I think, imposes a special obligation on
all of us.

So I have a lot of questions that need to be answered:

Why did I not feel that violence?
Was I too optimistic about the things I saw changing?
Too complacent about the pace and efficacy of those changes?
Why did I not know the history of the statues that are one block away from the synagogue, that I pass every day? Why did I not have the curiosity to find out?
Shame on me!

And what else is there that I just do not want to see?
And what is at stake in my not seeing?
What will I have to give up, to support, to change, in order to contribute to undoing
the racial injustice that some are fighting so hard to maintain?

Many of us in our town have made the commitment to answering these questions.

Part of what changed for me on August 12, was a realization that I needed to change
my way of thinking about racism in this country. That I needed to understand that
it is not just about what is in my heart or my mind. But to understand the structures
it has built: economic, educational, political, and social; to understand its tenacity, its violence, its legacy. How it has shaped almost every aspect of the world we live in.
As well as its near invisibility to me as a white person.

My generation of Jews, born after the Holocaust, was raised under the slogan “merbr Again.” This was presented to me, and perhaps to many of you, as a “lesson” of the Holocaust. It its narrow meaning, this lesson translates to this: that Jews must take seriously the words of those who seek to harm us. We have learned that history does not only go forward. It can go backwards as well.

But I understand “Never Again” in a much larger way. “Never Again” means
that on account of my personal history, on account of what I and my community has experienced, on account of what all of us here in Charlottesville have experienced,
we have a special responsibility to be vigilant about racial and ethnic hatred
and injustice wherever we see it. And to look for it, to ferret it out, when we do not see it.
To understand clearly how it works, and to look for ways to dismantle it. To be a resister and not a bystander.

The Jewish tradition teaches: You are not obligated to compete the task
But neither are you free to desist from it. Each of us must find that way that
we can best contribute to this task.
I am so grateful for those of you in this room who have taught me, and continue to
teach me. I am learning. We are all trying to learn. And I believe we will all find
our way forward together

Interfaith Service - Testimony of Rev. Dr. Jill Duffield

8/13/2019

CCC Interfaith Service, August 12, 2019
By Rev. Dr. Jill Duffield

In order for me to share the impact of August 12, 2017, I need to go back in time first. It is June, 2015. I am in South Carolina, a state I called home for nearly 20 years. It is June, 2015 and I am living in Columbia, South Carolina, the state capital, the one where the Confederate flag flew defiantly on the state house grounds from 1961 until July of 2015. On June 18th I wake to the news of the shooting at the historic, Emmanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina. The evening before, at Mother Emmanuel, nine people, including the pastor, had been murdered in cold blood while attending a Bible study, the shooter was a young man, a white supremacist, who wanted to start a race war, a young man, it will be revealed, who was raised in a white, mainline, Protestant church just down the road from mine. In other words, a white supremacist so virulent that he killed nine African American brothers and sisters in Christ, in a church, during a Bible study, after he was welcomed by them and sat beside them for an hour and waited until they bowed their heads in prayer to execute them. This man was raised in a church not unlike the one that raised me and not unlike the one I serve. How, I lamented, could this happen?

I grieved with my adopted state and wrapped in my protective white privilege, resting in the secure bubble of my white safety, wrapped in the rarified ignorance of my white obliviousness, I thought: This is an evil, horrendous, exceptional event.

Never mind that in that same state on the campus of the flagship public university sits the Strom Thurmond Fitness Center, a huge edifice on the corner of what the builder says is “the fourth most active intersection in South Carolina and not far from the state capital.” It opened not in the 1950’s or 60’s or 70’s or 80’s or 90’s but was dedicated in 2003.

Never mind that during the transatlantic slave trade about 40 percent of enslaved Africans brought into the country passed through Charleston Harbor.

Never mind that when I asked my African American colleague in that wealthy, storied, Southern city to write something a year later, in the wake of yet another police shooting of an unarmed black man, he said, “And just think - America and the world sat glued to the television in dismay again last night over yet another senseless death. My head and heart worked all night to keep the lid on my outrage as seemingly… the life and spirit of a black male has 0 value.”

Despite all of that and SO MUCH MORE, I was naïve enough, because I could be, to be surprised by racial prejudice, to be largely unaware of centuries of systemic and structural racism, and subsequently shocked by the insidious, ever present and growing white supremacy not only in this country but in white Christianity.

How utterly sinful of me. What an affront to the One Body of which I am a part, the Body that is to be so united and connected that it hurts when others hurt and weeps with those who weep.

Three years ago, I moved to Charlottesville and began to get acclimated: UVA has grounds, not a campus, Thomas Jefferson is everywhere, Vinegar Hill was once a thriving, predominately African-American neighborhood that was destroyed in the name of so-called urban renewal.

I followed the statue debate, heard the KKK was coming, got connected with the Charlottesville Clergy Collective and prepared for that mid-August weekend of two years ago.

As we met and made plans, I thought some of our group were alarmist about the potential for violence. How utterly sinful. What an affront to the One Body of which I profess to be a part, the Body that is supposed to be so connected that it knows intimately the pain of any member of it.

On August 12, I donned my stole and went to the sunrise worship service in this very space. I sang and prayed and was moved by the preachers and energized by the crowd and I marched and then took my place at First United Methodist and waited and watched and was shocked, sinfully shocked as the day unfolded, because I had the privilege of being shocked, the luxury of not subjected to the daily threat of violence or centuries long structural discrimination codified in policy and enforced by terror not only episodic but calculated, pervasive, systemic and baked into our infrastructure and institutions, all of them, including the one I serve.

God forgive me, It took the weekend of August 11 and 12th, in this historic, storied city from which liberty for all supposedly sprung, to remove the scales from my eyes, only then did I recognize that the tragedy at Mother Emmanuel was not a horrific outlier, it was emblematic of our past, representative of our present, and a loud bell weather of our future.

I owe an apology to my African American siblings and my Jewish, Muslim and Hispanic ones, too, because resting in my privilege, I not only allowed, but through my inaction and silence enabled and therefore participated in the hate that would erupt into deadly violence, again and again and again.

Historian of race and religion, Jemar Tisby, writing to white Christians, warns: “Sin in the form of white nationalism crouches at the door of every congregation.”

In the wake of August, 2017 and Pittsburgh and Poway, Christ Church and Gilroy and El Paso, I must confess that white nationalism does not only crouch at the doorway of every white congregation, but all too often worships in its pews and preaches from its pulpits.

It is not enough, however, to confess, I, and my fellow white Christians, must repent and repentance requires not just an openness to being transformed by God, but a willingness make tangible, earthly amends, to do all that is on our power to repair the damage our action and inaction have wrought.

My faith tradition is one in which we are taught that every person is a beloved child of God.

We are told that God desires life, and life abundant, for everyone.

We are reminded over and over again to work for justice and stand on the side of the oppressed.

We are admonished that God will judge us based on how we treat those being marginalized and hurt in our world.

We learn that the most basic and important tenet of our religion is love of God and neighbor…and yet…

All to often we, those like me, live as if our Lord came to bless our heritage, bolster our unearned benefits and baptize our entitlement rather than trouble the waters and upend all that robs others of their God-given dignity, humanity, and worth.

God forgive me, it took August 12, 2017 with torch carrying neo-Nazis and semi-automatic wielding militias and Confederate flag wagging white supremacists and van loads of organized, vitriolic slogan shouting alt-right nationalists to see, really see, the truth of not only our history, but of our present reality of hate against others who do not look like me, and therefore don’t have the luxury of my heretofore willful ignorance and deadly complicity.

I am truly sorry and I humbly repent and that means working for real change: personal, systemic, structural, in every arena of our life together, until that day when truly we are ONE beloved community, with liberty, justice and not just equality, but equity for ALL.

"Navigating Troubled Waters" - CCC Interfaith Service

8/13/2019

The Charlottesville Clergy Collective thanks all who participated, attended, and supported the Interfaith Service, Monday evening, August 12, 2019, held at First Baptist West Main St.

We celebrated the resilience of this city. We were inspired and challenged by the testimonies. We were uplifted by song. We prayed for guidance and for the Lord to make things right. We departed with a renewed commitment to act on behalf of love and justice.

You can also read the testimonies given by
Rev. Dr. Jill Duffield and
Rabbi Tom Gutherz

Photo credit: Michael Cheuk

Below are links to local media coverage of the Interfaith Service.

Charlottesville Tomorrow:
https://www.cvilletomorrow.org/articles/unity-days-interfaith-service-reflects-on-2017-and-looks-forward/

NBC 29
www.nbc29.com/story/40908469/cville-area-people-gather-together-in-prayer-at-interfaith-service

WVIR NBC29 Charlottesville News, Sports, and Weather

CBS 19
www.cbs19news.com/content/news/Faith-leaders-join-together-for-Aug-12-service-538648931.html

Cville Sing Out!

8/12/2019

On Saturday, August 10, a Charlottesville Sing Out was held at the Sprint Pavilion as part of the city's "Unity Days" initiative as we approach the second anniversary of the white supremacist rally.

Photo credit: Michael Cheuk

Conversation with Jonathan P. Walton

6/4/2019

Jonathan P. Walton is an area ministry director for InterVarsity Christian Fellowship‘s New York/New Jersey region. He previously served for ten years as director of the New York City Urban Project. He writes regularly for Huffington Post, medium.com, and is the author of three books of poetry and short stories.

Jonathan talks to Michael Cheuk about his book, Twelve Lies That Hold America Captive: And the Truth That Sets Us Free.

Additional resources recommended by Jonathan:

2030 Calling: Here is a vision video of what we're hoping to do by 2030.
Emotionally Healthy Activist: I would LOVE for a group of folks in Charlottesville to do the pilot of our emotionally healthy activist course. Total it will be 8 sessions.
Podcasts: you can search for IVED on i-Tunes and check out our podcasts or click here.

Originally published (with transcript) at
http://michaelkcheuk.com/conversation-with-jonathan-walton/

My Experience Fuels My Fight for Racial Justice

5/29/2019

"The constant subtle mistreatment has been a catalyst for me. It has given me the determination to stand firm and endure hardness," states Apostle Sarah Kelley, Pastor of Faith, Hope and Love International Healing and Deliverance Center at our "Conversations for Reconciliation" gathering, May 23, 2019.

“Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in Thy sight, O Lord, my strength and my redeemer.” Psalm 19:14

Good evening, again my name is Sarah Kelley. I have been the Pastor of Faith, Hope and Love In’tl Healing and Deliverance Center for almost 35 years and have been in the Ministry for Forty years. I am the wife of Raleigh C. Kelley Jr. in which we celebrated our both Anniversary on May 8th. We were blessed with a son and a daughter, the son has gone on to be with the Lord, three grandsons and 12 great grandchildren.

Quite naturally I cannot tell my whole life story. So I shall share portions.

I was born in Charlottesville Va. 78 years ago and have lived here most of my life. From the age of two, I was raised by my Great Grandmother, whose parents had been slaves. Quite naturally her upbringing caused her to have a slave mentality which has passed down through our generations.

She cooked three meals a day, seven days a week, for many years at the Dolly Madison Inn, which no longer exist. Plus, she took in Washing and Ironing, which at that time was without a washing machine, but a tub and scrub board, and no electric iron.

After observing her hard and unappreciated work, I promised myself that I would never, ever, be subject to that abuse.

My first memorable experience with injustice, (one of many), was at the drinking fountains at the Trailway Bus station here in Charlottesville. I was five years old. My great grandmother and I were headed to Atlanta City for a short summer vacation.

At that particular time in my life, the water fountains were separated by race. As a child, I did not understand differences. I saw the sign over a small, filthy looking water fountain that said “Colored Only” and a sign over a large, clean, luxurious water fountain that said “White Only”, but as a child I thought it meant the water was white and the other was colored.

Even though the Colored people's fountain was dirty, I took a few sips of the warm, almost hot, water because I wanted to taste "colored water”. Afterwards, I stood on my tiptoes at the shiny clean fountain and proceeded to drink the cool, tasty water. The next thing I knew, I was being yanked and spanked by my great grandmother and being cursed at yelled at by the ticket agent, bellowing “Get Out” of the bus station. Sadly, I did not know why my great grand had spanked me, neither did I know why the ticket agent was so angry.

I had innocently tried both water fountains because I wanted to taste and see the kind of water that was “color” and water that was "white”. Quite naturally they tasted different, but they looked the same. It never changed colors. I did not know, nor did I understand racism.
While having to wait in the sun outside the bus station, my grandmother told me why she had spanked me. I felt totally angry, as well as, puzzled, to why I was not good enough to drink from the beautiful fountain. I believe that is why I don't drink much water today, white or colored water.

The one thing that she made sure of, because she could not read or write, was that I would learn to read and write. She had me tutored at the age of three. I started in the first grade at five years old and finished twelfth grade at the age of 16.

During the years of Massive Resistance, here in Charlottesville, my granny sent me to live with my mother in Washington D. C. because she did not want my education interrupted. Although, I still ended up in an All White School, the experience was milder than what was going on in Charlottesville, Va.

At the age of eighteen, my husband and I got married at my Father-In-Laws home that was on Irving St., here in Charlottesville, in the Vinegar Hill area, where Urban Renewal was enforced.

He owned a beautiful five bedroom home, in which he built, but it was torn down along with other black homes and businesses due to the supposingly, Urban Renewal. It displaced many black people. I was so distressed about my father-in-law's injustice, because he did not receive a fair price for his lovely home.

It was my desire, at the age of 18, to be a Registered Nurse, but UVA in the late 50's, was not receiving blacks in the Nursing program. In the late 50's, they did open the door for black LPN's, who worked in a less appreciated positions. I finally entered the UVA LPN training program in the early 60's. Thanks be to God, that at the beginning of this year, 2019, UVA recognized the Black LPN's and made us Alumni members and UVA also recognized me, as the First African American to complete the Chaplaincy program.

In many situations, I have either been the First Female, the First African American or the First Female and African American.

The constant subtle mistreatment has been a catalyst for me. It has given me the determination to stand firm and endure hardness.

I just have to mention that my heart is broken and continues to break for my husband, who from an early age wanted to be a fireman. He served in the Air Force as a fireman. But when he was discharged from the Military, with hopes of pursuing this career, his color kept him from being hired. Blacks were not being employed as firemen at that time. That rejection crushed him, but it made me even the more determined to stand for justice and equality for all.

I have vowed that the slave mentality that had been planted in my forefathers mind was not going to rule my life. That mentality of discounting self and one another, was one that also persuaded the African American people to not trust one another, therefore pitting one against another. The remnants of that mentality still exist today, causing us, as black people, to not freely support, and build up one another. It has also caused us, at times, to even hinder, rather than help each other to progress.

Quite naturally, over the years, I have seen and experience injustice at the public libraries, swimming pools, cemeteries, on buses, streetcars, trains, elevators, in theaters, waiting areas, restrooms, schools, housing and sadly, even in Churches,

It has caused me to look at what is wrong and try to figure out what I can do to make it right.

"Speak up for the people who have no voice, for the rights of all the down-and-outers. Speak out for justice. Stand up for the poor and destitute”. Proverbs 31:9 Messenger.

“Little children, let us not love in word or talk, but in deed and in truth”. 1 John 3:18 ESV

~ Apostle Sarah Kelley

Why I Showed Up

5/29/2019

"I must claim my own culpability in benefitting without protest from an unjust history that continues to abide in the present moment," says Rev. Liz Hulme Adam, Pastor of Tabor Presbyterian Church, at our "Conversations toward Reconciliation" gathering, May 23, 2019.

In one episode of the Brady Bunch, Marcia Brady can only get through her speech to an auditorium of people when she imagines them all in their underwear. I thought that might be a good idea for me tonight. To get through this. The second-to-last thing I want to be doing is speaking to you. The last thing would be standing in front of you in my underwear, which is a bit what this seems like to me.

There are many ways to tell one’s story, and what we leave out can be as important as what we include. One way I could tell my story is to see life as a series of denial boxes, and the chapters would describe opening those boxes; until, when I’m dying, I can say I’ve opened all the denial boxes.

My husband moved twice for me, then we moved twice for him, landing in Virginia fourteen years ago. I remembering thinking, that’s THE SOUTH, like it was another planet altogether. I hadn’t spent time in the south. I forged my identity as more of a northerner — MD, DC, Rhode Island, Cape Cod in the summer. It wasn’t until August 12 of 2017 here that I remembered a part of my past I had forgotten. When I returned home from that day in Charlottesville, my husband wanted to know why I was adamant about going. I ended up writing an essay of sorts, to myself, really. This is what I wrote. I called it Why I Showed Up.

In my blood runs the complexity common among many Americans. I come by way of Italian, German, English and Irish immigrants. There’s some French mingled in, too. [I recently heard a story from my mom’s mom, Italian Catholic, about living in DC as a little girl and the KKK had a cross-burning rally at night; she said she was worried her family could be next. My dad’s people were a lot of Irish Catholics, making their way, too, with little means. My maternal grandfather was the WASP of the family, Protestant and proper in every way.] My kids are half Turkish; their paternal grandparents came to the United States in the late 60s.

One day during my adolescence I asked my grandfather questions about our ancestry. He brought me a scroll-like document and unrolled it. It belonged to one of our ancestors from Maryland. More precisely, the document called itself Joseph Harding’s “Inventory of Goods and Chattele,” dated 1779. It listed “Goods” such as: a dutch oven, rifles, blankets, and livestock, with detailed descriptions of each item written in hard-to-read cursive. Then, my unsuspecting eyes moved to the bottom of the last page to find the names of people, with significantly less description.

1 Negro Man, Anthony, 28 years old
1 Ditto, Man, Walter, 20 years old
1 Ditto, Lad, Bennet, 15 years old
1 Ditto Wench, Suk, 25 years old
1 Ditto Boy, Charles, 6 years old
1 Ditto Boy, Harry, 4 years old
1 Mulato Boy, 9 years old
1 Negro Wench, 60 years old

The list resumes with a few more items, presumably the goods used by those listed.

On the far right side of the document, beside every inventoried entry, was a value.

The value beside Anthony was 45. The value beside Walter was 50. The value beside Bennet was 45. The value beside Suk was 40. The value beside Charles was 25. The value beside Harry was 18. The value beside the unnamed “Mulato boy” was 15. The value beside the unnamed 60 year-old woman was 3.

Disoriented and incredulous about what I was reading, I looked up the page to decipher hard-to-read script. I could make out the description of a horse, valued at 37.

I attended the inter-faith worship service at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Charlottesville on the evening of Friday, August 11, 2017. People gathered in light and love to celebrate what unites and binds us as Americans. A pastor friend leaned over to me near the end of the service to show me her phone - she got word that over 200 people were outside the church with torches. Soon after the benediction we were told to stay put; the church was in lock-down.

On Saturday when taking to the streets arm-in-arm with friends and strangers, singing “This Little Light of Mine,” and “We Shall Overcome,” I wasn’t there only as a clergywoman. I showed up because I am responsible as a human being for correcting what’s wrong; I am responsible for reclaiming space contaminated by hate and beliefs that harm. Mine was also a presence of penance, for that which I’ve inherited and still struggle to face.
[That] Saturday in Charlottesville I witnessed viciousness in the eyes of my fellow Americans — hate in aggregate, armed. I saw Americans outfitted as militia, with armor meant for war. I saw women bloodied by men who threw them to the ground and bashed their heads into pavement.

And I must claim my own culpability in benefitting without protest from an unjust history that continues to abide in the present moment. We are trying to form a more perfect union as Americans. We do so by remembering our past without whitewashed nostalgia. I am remembering Anthony, Walter, Bennet, Suk, Charles, Harry, a “Mulato boy” and a 60 year-old woman who didn’t get named in an “Inventory.” I marched and sang and showed up for them, and those they loved, and their stories that didn’t get recorded. It’s the least I could do.

As a Christian, I also showed up for Jews. Jews taught me about Tikkun Olam — world repair. We are to repair the world. We participate in Tikkun Olam through acts of kindness, and by protecting those at a disadvantage. Too many of my Christian predecessors failed our Jewish brothers and sisters throughout history. Hurt them, killed them. Then, we used our sacred texts to justify or ignore the Holocaust. I am responsible as a pastor to say so.

When I look back at the past I wonder how I would have responded in times that called for risky intervention, for the defense of those who needed defending. Would I have defended the Armenian, would I have protected the Gypsy, would I have stood up for the Jews? Our current climate gives us a chance to test the question, “How would I have responded?”

It is our time to respond.

~ Rev. Liz Hulme Adam

Learning about Racial Justice as a Racial Minority

5/29/2019

"Even as a 12-year-old, first-generation immigrant, I was already fully conditioned by whiteness," says Rev. Michael Cheuk of the Charlottesville Clergy Collective at our "Conversations for Reconciliation" gathering, May 23, 2019.

I was born in Hong Kong, and my family moved to US in 1973 in anticipation of Hong Kong reverting back to the Republic of China in 1997. In my desire to assimilate, I neglected my own language and culture in order to be accepted in white society. I still remember being taunted in elementary school…”Chinese, Japanese, dirty knees, look at these...”

In Shreveport, we lived in a declining middle-class, integrated neighborhood...my parents sold their house in that neighborhood in 2001 for $10,000. We never had any problems with our black neighbors. Yet, one summer evening, we heard a knock on our front door, a black man whose had broken down and just needed a phone to call for help. Yet we pretended we weren’t home...and waited quietly until he left for another house.

Looking back, it is so clear to me that even as a 12-year-old, first-generation immigrant, I was already fully conditioned by whiteness, sharing the same thought patterns of fear and distrust of black men who were literally our neighbors. I might not have hateful thoughts toward blacks, but I harbored implicit bias against people of color. Years afterwards, I wrote a devotion on the Parable of the Good Samaritan, comparing my family to the Levites and the Priests, who encountered a neighbor in need and intentionally ignored him, and walked on our way on the other side of the road.

Growing up, I willingly allowed the white culture to mold me into its preferred image of the model Asian immigrant...smart, hardworking, always smiling, and not making waves. When you hear me speak, you probably won’t hear a Chinese accent, and that confuses people sometimes. When I told an acquaintance that I grew up in Shreveport, Louisiana, his eyes lit up with recognition and said: “Oh, so you’re Cajun!”

I am not a Cajun...but am I an Asian? It was in college that I first encountered big groups of Chinese peers. They invited me to their clubs, but I didn’t join. I identified more with whites.

Looking back, I have benefited by assimilating into white culture. I have a BA from Rice University, a Masters of Divinity from Southwestern Seminary, and a doctorate from UVA. I haven’t been discriminated from housing or jobs. I distinctly remember asking the Farmville Baptist search committee whether they thought it would be a problem for them to call a Chinese pastor. They assured me it wouldn’t be a problem, and for the most part, they were right. However, I do remember a church member telling me that he had a hard time understanding my sermons because of my Chinese accent. So I guess there’s always one in every crowd! :)

Farmville is the seat of Prince Edward County, the county that closed its public schools for five years (1959-1964) and diverted tax money to establish a white academy. Some Farmville Baptist members supported that move. Another church member serving on city council opposed it, and he paid a big social price. Later, the church erected an informal policy of not allowing blacks to be on the property. And in 1969, it led to the arrest of Civil Right protesters, including the Rev. J. Samuel Williams Jr., an activist and pastor of Levi Baptist Church in Farmville. In my time in Farmville, I befriended Rev. Williams and offered a public apology to him at a Symposium on the Prince Edward School Closing. I was able to do that and not get fired because I had several church members who had my back. Even so, I did not have the courage to lead Farmville Baptist to officially examine our own history, to have congregational conversations around our racist policies, and to reveal stories that we had spent decades hiding and denying from our communities and from ourselves.

During my time at Farmville Baptist, the church partnered with several black churches in town for meals, for pulpit exchanges, for Easter services, and even joint Vacation Bible Schools. We were anxious to show the community just how much we’ve changed. We told people how we now had a black couple as members, how we now welcomed black people into our space, to eat our food, to sing our hymns, and to read our liturgies. We were happy that these exchanges took place at Farmville Baptist. But if we’re honest with ourselves, we should have also admitted that we were much less open to attend events at black churches as guests. My members told me that black worship services were too long, too loud, too different than what we were used to. But at least we could tell ourselves that we’re welcoming, that we have black friends, that we weren’t racist. And yet, I’m deeply grateful for the members of Farmville Baptist for helping me learn and grow as a pastor -- not only in my church, but also in my community. And I know they -- like me -- have continued their journey of growth.

It was only after coming back to Charlottesville, that I began to learn that undoing racism it’s not just about being nice to one another. It is also about dismantling the racial power dynamics in our systems, institutions and culture that privilege white people.

Through conversations with other faith leaders within the Clergy Collective, I’m learning that “church integration” isn’t the goal of our work. We can have congregations “integrated” with diverse races, but once worshippers leave our buildings, black people still experience the disparities of worse education and health outcomes, of lower employment rates and salary incomes, of higher rates of arrests and incarceration. In fact, in our dangerous and oppressive white supremacist society, black churches may be the only place where black people feel safe to cry out their sorrow, to sing their joy, to dance with the movement of the Spirit, to be free from the shackles of an European understanding of time or propriety. It is with this understanding that I say, “Thank God more white people aren’t worshipping in black churches. Because if we did, we might very well ruin a good thing for black people!” Sunday mornings will remain the most segregated hour of the week as long as our society is unjust and oppressive for blacks and people of color.

Having said that, during these past years, my wife and I have had the privilege of worshipping in black churches, of going into their space, eating their food, singing their songs and NOT reading any liturgies! We have been welcomed with open arms and with gracious hospitality. I’m learning that instead of asking black people to come to our churches, or even to events like this so that they can “teach” or “perform” for us, we should, with their invitation, simply show up humbly to their places, where they have the power, where they have control of whether or not they want to speak about their experiences. In the meantime, we have the responsibility for teaching ourselves about the “black experience,” learning about our own racial history through books, internet resources, podcasts, workshops, and so much more. Black people are NOT at our beck and call to teach us about what we could and should learn for ourselves.

And I still have so much to learn, so much to grow. I’m grateful for the patience and good humor of my black brothers and sisters who have allowed me to show up again and again in their lives to experience their strength, their wisdom, their resourcefulness and their resiliency. My journey of learning and growing is not over, and I'm grateful for the company of any other pilgrims along this path.

Thank you for listening to my story.

~ Rev. Michael Cheuk