most hopeful

Never before have I screamed as loud, or as often, in my own home when I am the only human in the building as I have in the last week plus.

And my throat is sore.

And it’s been the last 48 hours where I’ve realized my rage is in many ways turned inward. I’m angry with myself. I’m angry for my cowardice. I’m angry for the ways I am able, as an upper-middle-class white male, to have the language of sorrow without the reality of risk when it comes to issues and conversations of race, religion, politics, and power.

So when I scream, knees bending and legs falling to the nasty kitchen floor multiple times, night after night, I’d like to accept that I’m mostly screaming at myself. I’m furious, heartbroken, exhausted, and… and… but I’m screaming alone, in a home by myself where no one can hear and no one will expect it.

Perhaps that’s why shooting a force of voice and growl and tears and volume from a deep place seems like something that should help, but doesn’t.

And it hasn’t.

It has not helped.

And while the art of blaming someone else is a craft I’m quite skilled at and perhaps am spiritually gifted in, I am feeling more sharply tonight that I am ultimately falling into tears on the dirty tiles of the kitchen floor with guttural screams yelling at myself more than anyone else.

So I would like to apologize.

Friends of mine who talk to me in the flesh ever, whether occasionally or often, are not offered the luxury of wondering how I think or feel about certain issues, causes, people, politics, etc. I learned many years ago that I am or can be a quite exhausting friend in these ways.

I’m okay with that.

They know it. Because they know it, I’m argued with sometimes. Sometimes, often really, I am intentionally NOT invited into conversations about issues of race, policy, poverty, wealth, religion, power, justice, politics, etc. because I’m going to be “that guy” and there’s really just no time for that.

I’m okay with that too.

So why the apology?

I’ve still been lying. That’s why. I’ve been sitting next to you in church and I’ve been trying to be as quiet as possible because I don’t want to upset YOU by speaking out about your hatred toward some other group of human beings. You won’t call it hatred, you will call it holiness or doctrine, which you and I have both known is nonsense but it’s appropriate in these parts so you are used to people nodding and not saying anything.

So I’m sorry I didn’t say anything.

I’m not sorry to you, by the way. You were fine all along. But you were operating within a ‘spiritual world’ in the US south that allowed you permission to think God was on board with your racism and sexism.

And I’m sorry about that.

I am very, very sorry.

Not sorry to you. I’m sorry to every man or woman of color, every man or woman of the lesser, whether gay or poor or, hold your breath for the worst yet, any “liberal” man or woman.

I am very, very sorry. To you, black woman. To you, gay man. To you, “liberal woman” or “crazy-leftist” man.

I am very, very sorry. I’ve been able to slide past these comments of hatred from bishops, small group members, elders, choir members, church founders, big donors. Since I’ve been able to stay under their radar, I’ve been able to stay quiet.

But you’ve died.
But you’ve been starved.
But you’ve been hated.
But you’ve been ridiculed.
But you’ve been badmouthed.
But you’ve been called less-than, other-than, not-than.

And since I could slide by,
I’ve been hoping to find ways to
cleverly
wisely
cautiously
gently
speak to the issue without losing my place of privilege.

For that, I apologize.

But apologies can be as
empty as
using tear-gas to take a photo-op
in front of a church building
holding a Bible
that says I’m running away from
the kingdom of God.

So I am sorry.

To my sisters and brothers of colors,
to my sisters who love sisters
and my brothers who love brothers,
to those who are living and finding beauty in ways they’ve been told
can’t be honored by the God of
beauty and the God of
choosing power in those who are told they do not belong…

to you,
I am sorry.

But my apology runs the risk of emptiness
just as my association with ‘good’ runs the risk of being co-opted
if I’m not willing to be excluded with you for simply honoring your belonging.
When you are excluded, I’ll take it as an invitation to us both.
I won’t slide by anymore.

So I’m done fitting in under the guise of thinking
I might be of more help ‘from the inside.’

I’m struggling with going to church,
because too many of those in the church feel too safe spewing hatred at you.
They now spew hatred at me.
If you can’t be a part of my ‘church’
then I cannot either.

If you cannot be treated with dignity and justice and respect from the church,
then I cant be a part of that ‘church’

I’m sorry it’s taken me this long;
I’m sorry it’s taken me an unacceptable amount of time.
I’m sorry it’s taken me far more than 8 minutes and 46 seconds.

To the elderly man and woman who spew hatred on social media
to entire worlds of people different from themselves,
if you are what my church is,
then I am not a part of this church.

To the put-together professor, homemaker, clergy, banker, or lawyer,
if you are not willing to put your name next to the implications
to lives of those of color, of poverty, of immigration status, of sexuality…
then you are letting me know that you are not willing to put your name with me.

I won’t need you to leave.
I won’t try to get rid of you.
I’ve learned over the last 30+ years that churches don’t do that well.

I’ll go.
I’ll consider it an honor to move toward the margins
and find a home there with those
honored by God for the mere fact that you
in your confusion
have decided aren’t as worthy as you.

dear pastor,
dear professor,
dear choir member,
dear youth minister,
dear uncle,
dear cousin,
dear family friend,
dear deputy sherrif,
dear part-time cop,
dear best friend,
dear food delivery dude,
dear banker,
dear retired doctor,
dear retired teacher,
dear lawyer,
dear neighbor,
dear student,
dear …
dear…

I’ll be calling you
and writing you
because I’ve not been telling you the truth about
what I’ve heard you say and what I’ve seen you do.

I’ve been too gentle as you’ve been racist.
I’ve been too silent as you’ve been hateful.
I’ve been too self-protective as you’ve been granting benefits.
I’ve been too grateful as we’ve been blindly privileged.

I’ve pretended my gentleness, silence, self-protection, and gratitude
are part of a longer, wiser, more cautious game.
They’re not.
They are only part of cowardice.
I should have told you.
I should have told myself.

I’m sorry I’ve waited this long,
in an attempt to save something for myself
while it continues to cost the lives of others,

So

I’ll be calling you
and writing you.

I want to make sure we have the chance to talk it through.
I want to make sure you are given the space to tell me I misunderstand your stance.
But tiptoes won’t be walked on around you and your answers anymore.
You’ll be asked to speak it clearly
because the lives of too many people have been lost
while I’ve been trying not to put you on the spot.

If that means whatever I thought you and I shared together,
I’m sorry for just now realizing that I’ve been playing a game all this time.

For that I’m so, so, so very sorry.

And it can’t happen anymore.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. They’ll learn what it was all worth to begin with.

djordan
Pine Tree Drive

Children in cages.
Babies in barns.
Bassinettes in the rushes.
Infants in mangers.
Kings as refugees in tent cities.

And while the facts are always true,
the lies are always powerful.

And the narrative built on lies makes clear:
there’s no room for the dark-skinned baby boy,
whose parents are doing their best,
to follow the laws of the empire
while raising a child in light of the goodness of the kingdom.

So hardship, anxiety, and finally the gift of birth
is met with “no room,” “no space,” “no acceptance,”
on this side of the cage,
the barn,
the rushes,
the mangers,
the tents,
the wall.

+++

But also,
the women and men
who do everything to
show them,
tell them,
hold them,
say their names,
tell their stories,
and promise to them
by actions
embraces
laughter
and the locking of knowing eyes,
that they are loved.

One face of one child,
on any and every side of
any and every
wall,
law,
race,
religion,
possesses the image
of the Divine
in all the
perfectly fashioned ways
that
can
change
the
world.

You are dared to look in the eyes
of any child
born on any side
of the rich man’s  argument
and say he is not
fit to be the king of the universe.

And he is [
obviously]
remarkably]
unquestionably]
stunningly]
perfectly]

good.

So obviously,
acceptance, room, space, or not,
thanks be given to God.

djordan
Pine Tree Dr.

I generally skip the first few pages of new moleskins. I think my early, unattended ‘logic’ suggested I come back to address the initial page when I knew exactly what should be penned to shape the rest of the pages to follow. It was as if the beginnings seemed so crisp that to ink them wantonly would at best fail to live up to first page standards––or at worse would render less than in all the other lined pages to follow.

So blank it was.

And blank they remained.

For nearly two decades back, every journal I’ve ever owned still bares blank pages hiding any hint they were ever used; a couple of turns later reads the actual first entry.

The first entry three pages in can be found with its own strike-throughs, misspellings, and coffee blots.

Today I started a new Moleskin for the first day of the new year.

On the first page.

djordan
Pine Tree Dr.

The copper bar top engraved with stunning rings
stained, overlapping, spreading, uncleanable
resisting the wipe-away desired by those in power.
They speak of conversations
some flavored with fear and trepidation
some with lust and the shadow of caution
some with hubris and the needs of the small

but some speak of thick laughter and deep honesty
of finding similarity beyond surface of geography, of system, of class,
Bent rather similarity of heart, of experience, of longing, of hope

These rings stained into this copper bar top
may very well speak,
at least quietly or in a half-sure whisper,
to the promise of connectedness
in the work
in the struggle
in the pain
in the insecurity
in the embarrassment

and also to the promise of connectedness
in the work
in the triumph
in the resilience
in the honesty
In he camaraderie.

We find ourselves in the honesty
of another
of anothers
And we realize that while the
narratives are so often laden with the
arsenic of loss, of trauma, of despair,
of finales and of failings and of fallings,
they are also laden with the
lace of humanity, of hopefulness, of possibility
of collegiality and of curiosity and of connectedness.

So we take a moment,
between knowing deep belly laughter
and knowing deep gutted tears
to honor the reality that
we
are
not
alone.

So even the person sitting quietly with book and drink
looking down at the stained copper bar top knows
he is part of a conversation and a community
whose reach is as much in the present as it
has ever been in the past or will be in the future.

Cheers.

djordan
Seattle, WA