Silence is Deafening

I would not sit silently by and watch YOUR children being torn away from you and locked in cages or sent far away.

I would not sit silently by and watch YOU get murdered by law enforcement.

I would not sit silently by and watch YOU work in unsafe conditions.

I would not sit silently by and listen to someone verbally abuse YOU.

I would not sit silently by and listen to someone tell YOU to go back to where you came from.

I would not sit silently by and let YOUR children be bullied into suicide or extremism.

I would not sit silently by and listen to them tell YOU to just get over it.

I would not sit silently by and listen to lies and conspiracies being spread about YOU.

I would not sit silently by and let them lock YOU up for fleeing your home and seeking safety.

I would not sit silently by and allow them to feed YOU poisoned food and water.

I would not sit silently by and let them house YOU in sub-standard housing or no housing at all.

I would not sit silently by and allow them to denigrate and dehumanize the Imago Dei in YOU.

I would not sit silently by and let YOU continue to think this is not for YOU, too.

These things that I would not do for YOU, I will not, am not doing for US.

Original Sins

Black Lives Matter protest march, 5-31-2020, Yakima, WA.

I hear it said often and from different sources: “Slavery is the original sin of this nation.” I 

wholeheartedly agree that slavery is a truly evil sin, absolutely, but I don’t believe that it was the original sin of this nation. If you want to talk about which evil action taken by European colonizers was the original sin, you would want to look at genocide before slavery to begin with. It is what paved the way for the enslavement of Africans. But I would argue that even genocide wasn’t the original sin of those who first stepped foot on these lands. Their sins were originally greed and racism and those sins, most insidious and far-reaching, are what led to genocide of millions of Indigenous people of these lands and then to the enslavement of those remaining Indigenous people and the Africans stolen from their homelands. Stolen people brought to stolen lands.

Names of slaves on a memorial at the Whitney Plantation.

 Since the first moments white Europeans set foot on these already fully inhabited lands, in what is now known as North, Central, and South America, those sins of greed and racism have permeated and guided not only those early actions/sins/crimes/beliefs hundreds of years ago but were embedded in the very foundation of the nation we know as the United States of America, and these evils continue to thrive throughout this nation today. They may have changed shape and be called by different names now, but make no mistake, slavery and genocide are fully operational today. The evidence is there right before our eyes for all to see, though most choose not to.

It is there in our “criminal justice” system.

It is there in the epidemic of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls.

It is there in the child welfare systems.

It is there in our supply chains that feed the insatiable capitalistic system.

It is there in the attacks on our necessary natural resources.

It is there in the foundation of this nation and the systems built on that foundation.

It is there. It is here.

Until this country, firstly, recognizes these sins of greed and racism and how they have and continue to negatively affect every aspect of our systems and communities, primarily Indigenous, Black, and migrant/immigrant communities; secondly, acknowledges and confronts these sins openly and honestly; and, thirdly, repents and laments of these sins, we will never heal, we will never change, we will never progress, we will never see true justice and sacred lives, mainly of people of color, will continue to be ended prematurely and unjustly. We must confront these ugly painful destructive truths. We must repent of our actions, our silence and complicity, our ignorance, our greed and racism. We must lament the pain we have caused. We must change within ourselves and change these systems. Greed and racism have been integral parts of the foundation of this nation but healing and change, love and true equality, can be our lasting legacy. 

After all . .. 

Street art, Bangkok, Thailand.