The Racial Divide: Owning the Problem

I grew up attending a public elementary school where all my classmates were White.  There were ninety-seven members in my graduating class from Lutheran High School East, they were all White.  All the while I was living in a city that had a sizable and growing black population.  I went off to college and attended Concordia Teachers College where there were over four hundred in my graduating class; all of them were White.  Concordia was located in the Chicago suburb of River Forest, an all-white community.  We regularly journeyed into the City of Chicago, which was then as it is today, one of most ethically and racially diverse cities in the country. 

Over the years I served four different Lutheran Churches, all of them 100% White.  I taught in a Lutheran High School that while there was some diversity it hardly reflected the community where we were located.  In retirement I have continued to worship in communities where I am surrounded by people who are like me.  My context hardly reflects the ethnically and economically world that I live it. 

When I look at what is happening in our country right now, I have to admit that I am the problem. 

I spent a week in Minneapolis last summer attending the National Lutheran Youth Gathering.  I did a lot of walking and exploring.  It was easy to see that Minneapolis, like every other city in the country is an economically divided community.  Blocks away from the fancy restaurants, bars and food trucks were homeless encampments.  It was very obvious that law enforcement was strategically located to protect us from venturing into and seeing “other side” of Minneapolis.

 

 An article in this morning’s New York Times enlightened me to the extent of the problem. The gap in median income between Whites and Blacks in Minneapolis is the largest in the nation.  The average White household in Minneapolis has an income of $85,000, compared to $42,000 for Black households.  That is a greater disparity than in New Orleans, Cleveland and Chicago, cities that we normally associate with an economic divide.

The reality is that I must acknowledge my role in creating the problem.  My own silence and lack of action has contributed to the racial divide.  It must begin within the communities where we live and worship.  As Christians we must rise up and become voices that seek to understand and minister to the needs of people.  Until we do, we can only expect more rebellion and violence.  The love, compassion and grace of the Savior is the only thing that can heal this festering wound.