Seeing Trees

by Chris Paige

preached at Tabernacle United Church on April 22, 2001
Mark 8:22-26 (Psalm 61:1-5)

They came to Bethsaida. Some people brought a blind man to Jesus and begged him to touch him. He took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the village; and when he had put saliva on his eyes and laid his hands on him, he asked him, “Can you see anything?” And the man looked up and said, “I can see people, but they look like trees, walking.” Then Jesus laid his hands on his eyes again; and he looked intently and his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly. Then Jesus sent him away to his home, saying, “Do not even go into the village.” -- Mark 8:22-26

This past August, I attended an event called Witness Our Welcome or WOW 2000. It was a gathering of the “welcoming churches” movement – organized by several of the Protestant groups that advocate for the inclusion of LGBT people in our churches – More Light Presbyterians and the Open and Affirming program of the UCC were two of the organizers, along with the Methodists, the Mennonites, and several others. This was the first event of its kind where we gathered across denominational lines in this way. There were over 1000 people attending the program which lasted several days.

Tabernacle supported me in going as a representative of this church. In return, I agreed to bring back something about what I learned and experienced there to share with this congregation. That’s part of why I’m here today. And when the council approved the funding, I imagine that they expected me to come back and talk about homophobia and heterosexism, or the state of the movement. And I could do a warm, fuzzy pat-us-on-the-back sermon about that – we do have a lot to be proud of here. Or perhaps I could do a more challenging, get you moving, there’s work do, let’s fight the good fight sermon. And that would be worthwhile also in its own way.

But it wouldn’t be honest. Not because those themes weren’t a part of my experience. But because the biggest, most life-changing thing I learned at the WOW conference had to do with racism and white denial. For the first time in my life, I think I really began to understand how racism has shaped how I am in the world as a white person.

You see, I have a lot of experience talking about what it means to be a woman and a lesbian and a queer in a sexually oppressive culture. I’ve wrestled quite a bit with understanding my own marginalization. But as a white person in a racist society, I have almost no experience talking about what it means to be white. That’s something about being privileged that’s really different from being marginalized. By and large, I just don’t notice my privilege. That’s part of the privilege – the being able to take my identity for granted without any self-examination.

When I talk about being marginalized, it’s empowering – finding my voice, standing up to be counted, coming out of the silence. But when I talk about being privileged, it’s unsettling and scary in a very different way. It’s one thing to say that I (or another marginalized person) deserves better. It’s somehow quite different to talk about how I (or another person of privilege) somehow deserves less. Or that we have a responsibility to actively deal with our privilege. Somehow liberation is just a lot more romantic than accountability.

In the last 30 years, the language of marginalization has increasingly become a part of mainstream white American culture, in ways that I suspect it hadn’t been before. In places like Tabernacle, we talk pretty comfortably about the disenfranchised, the poor, the oppressed, prejudice, discrimination, stereotypes, protests, press conferences, movements, civil rights, equality, solidarity, and struggling for justice. There’s quite an extensive vocabulary of marginalization and liberation.

And for me, this vocabulary is like the village in the Gospel story today. It’s a place that’s familiar – where I have plenty of reference points. I know pretty well how to get around. But outside of my village, I’m like the blind man. When I begin to reflect on white privilege instead of just racial oppression, I lose my bearings quite quickly. I barely have any vocabulary to work with. I mean, let’s see. There’s: privilege, responsibility, accountability, guilt.

My concern for racial equality is still there. But all of a sudden , I don’t know where I am or how to find my way around any more. I know almost nothing about how racism and white privilege have affected and shaped my life, my story, my self image, my view of the world. I just don’t have the words or the understanding.

Shifting my focus to my own white privilege instead of the racial oppression of others definitely moves me into unfamiliar territory. It’s outside my normal village and someplace I would never go on my own. But my experience at the WOW conference helped me to make that shift – out of the familiar and into the wilderness where I have begun to find new vision.

On the opening night of the WOW conference, there was a racial incident during an ice-breaker. It was an incident that most of us – most of us white folks, that is – hardly noticed. No one used the “N” word or any other racial slur. There was no coercive racial segregation. And no physical violence. It was “just” the silence of certain voices being ignored.

Now, I was vaguely aware of it when it happened. Mostly through a sense of discomfort that something was a little out of whack. An awareness of tension in the room. Tension that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. And that I didn’t quite know how to name or address. I noticed the tension, but it didn’t rise into my consciousness as something in need of followup in any way.

About 36 hours later, on the morning of the third day, a young woman took the microphone. Apparently, she had lobbied the organizers hard to get this 5 minutes to express her grief about that first night and the conference so far -- and it had taken a day and a half for them to fit her in. Squeezed her in. Into those distracted minutes between breakfast and morning worship when people are mingling and eating and waking up and arriving late.

In those 5 minutes that she was given, she expressed her sense of alienation. She talked about her pain and frustration in attending the conference as one of a handful of people of color, surrounded by a overwhelming majority of white people. And as she expressed her experience, she was actively interrupted and confronted by white people from the audience.

She proceeded to issue an invitation to further dialogue at a caucus time later that day. But when she left the stage, she was followed. By more white people. White people who wanted to argue with her and confront her and defend themselves and assert their innocence. And apparently many or most of the people of color attending also followed her out of the main event space. People of color, who -- I suspect -- didn’t feel safe or supported or heard by their white sisters and brothers in the “welcoming” movement.

Of course, I didn’t notice. I didn’t notice them leave. You see, I’d been one of the white people in the crowd clapping for her. We gave her a standing ovation -- in appreciation of her courage, I think.

Or perhaps because we’ve been well trained that you clap after seeing a good performance. I think it might have been easier to react as if it were a performance – easier than it would be to sit in the emotional tension and confusion of what had just happened. It would have been harder to sit in the dissonance and the conflict. The conflict between our own self-understandings as good white liberal church activists and this woman’s bold assertion of a deep racial divide between and among us.

So, after we clapped, I found my seat, finished the orange juice I’d carried in from breakfast, tried to let go of the discomfort, and directed my attention to the worship leader and the singing of songs. I wanted to get back to the village where I knew my way around. We sang nice multicultural songs with Hawaiian or Native American words. I can’t remember which anymore, but it felt good to be back in familiar territory and able to breath again, leaving the wilderness of the tension and conflict behind.

I certainly didn’t consciously think to myself “Oh good, the people of color have left. Now I can relax and enjoy what I came here for.” But that is what happened. It was not my intention to disregard or patronize or minimize this woman’s sharing and the experience she was offering for our consideration. But that is what happened.

Later in the day, as I listened in the dialogue time that she had invited us to. As a relatively small group of us, listened to each other share their experience of the event so far, I learned that many if not most of the people of color had left the room after that early morning moment. Some had spent quite some time in confrontation in the outer hallway, with the white folks who were arguing with their experience – while I was back in the conference hall singing multicultural hymns and feeling comfortable again.

And maybe some others went out and got coffee someplace where they could talk freely, without white arguments, white defenses, and white deflections -- probably while, I was sitting in a plenary session nodding my head that yes, we must fight not only against heterosexism, but also against racism and other forms of oppression.

And maybe some went to their rooms to cry – or scream – or to pack their bags to leave for home. Because I think that’s what I might have wanted to do in their place.

I don’t actually know what they did while I sank back into the oblivion of my white privilege. And I don’t deserve to know. What matters to me, is that I didn’t notice. I couldn’t see it. Wouldn’t see it. Somehow, I’d learned not to see it. And the little bit that I did notice, I sat through in silence. I tried hard to put it behind me. And it was not only a public silence, but a private silence. Since I tried not to think about it. And I tried not to feel about it.

An emotionally charged disconnect over race had occurred and been publicly acknowledged. The acknowledgement of that experience had been resisted, invalidated, patronized, and essentially sent from the room. And I hardly noticed. Even though it was right there in front of me.

I was like the blind man who couldn’t see. Or maybe I could see the people moving, but they seemed like trees. And I was confused. My vision was just a little too blurry for me to make out the details and recognize what was really happening. So I remained quiet. I went on with the day’s events without questioning what I had experienced, why it felt awkward, or why I had no framework for understanding it. I just went back to my village, where things were familiar.

I was missing something -- only I didn’t even know it. I didn’t know enough to go looking for Jesus -- to go looking for healing. It took someone else’s invitation for the process to begin. And that healing process finally began when someone took my hand and walked with me away from my village, away from my comfort zone, and started pointing things out to me -- started pointing out the hard realities all around me that I had learned to ignore.

And it was confusing. I saw people, no trees, fuzzy trees, trees walking like people… I’m still not sure what all I’m seeing from day to day, but it’s uncomfortable and strange. I’m beginning to see my own white privilege and a deep, deep racial divide. And it’s really unnerving to be this far from my village, and aware of such a need for healing.

The hard thing about being white is that we just don’t notice it. My vocabulary for understanding privilege is finally starting to grow. Although I have to admit, it’s still something of a mess to sort through. It includes words like: Silence, Denial, My best intentions, Silence, Oblivious, Numb, Clinging to my innocence, Silence, Disconnected, Resistance, Silence, Silence, Silence.

I’m beginning to see the things I’ve learned not to notice, and to feel the things I’ve learned not to feel. Racism is an integral part of my life, clouding and obscuring my vision on a daily basis – preventing me from seeing the world clearly. But I’ve started a new journey. A new coming out journey. It’s a journey of breaking silences. Another journey of following Jesus and relying on God’s grace and my companions on the journey, instead of my own wisdom as I seek healing and liberation.

I’d like to invite you to join me in this journey. In my opinion, the biggest weakness of the LGBT welcoming movement today is the dominance of white privilege within it. I’d like to invite this congregation to become as well educated and outspoken about racism as it is about heterosexism.

Racial tension is on the rise in this country. And we need to be able to speak to that reality. I see the people, the fuzzy trees, and they’re moving all around us. They are moving in the national elections, in Florida. In police violence in Cincinnati and a variety of other cities. They are moving as close by as the Copy Center at the University of Pennsylvania, where Tabernacle United Church has a standing account.

We need to come out about racism. We need to find the words to talk about it -- about how it looks in the 21st century and about how it looks in our own lives. We need to talk openly and vulnerably with one another, to talk honestly and lovingly with each other. We need to look deep and hard at ourselves.

And if we do, it will change us. It will definitely take us out of our comfort zones, but that’s where Jesus is waiting for us. May God give us the wisdom and courage to follow.

Amen.