Sunday Musings - June 27, 2021
Grandma Fannie reminds her children “We have all sinned and fall short the glory of God.” (Paul’s letter to the Romans, 3:23) or “You are getting too big for your britches.”
This week I was particularly aware of the tenuous relationship with fear that many of us continue to have. Of course, I know this is nothing new. We have a long history of being fearful of those we designate “the other” or of being designated as “the other”.
In this country it is no secret that we have a history of systematic racism, sexism and other forms of oppression - of convincing ourselves that our self-worth has to be built on the backs of others. Yet, at the same time, we want to be considered people worthy of respect and love. Thus, if someone says that “Black Lives Matter” we may hear “White lives do not matter.” It is very clear that the assertion that Black Lives Matter is in response to the history of treating the lives of black people as if they do not matter or they matter only in so far as they serve the needs of white/Caucasian people (white males especially). The real issue seems to be that our ego strength is so weak that many of us cannot accept that we have directly or indirectly benefited from the ongoing history of racism. We become fearful that others are saying we do not matter. It seems we can only think in terms of dualities; of a hierarchy of importance or worth. It has to be either/or. It cannot be both.
The fierce objection to the teaching of what has euphemistically been termed critical race theory seems to be grounded in this fear. Talking about systemic racism, gender bias and other “facts” of our history seems to be heard as a threat to treat the white man as badly as he has treated others. It is not surprising that legislative bills prohibiting the teaching of history of racism/white privilege also outlaws the teaching of the history of gender as a social construct.
Related issues are much in the news: the unequal distribution of wealth or rather the fact that many must live in abject poverty in order for the 1% to steal much of the financial wealth, using a environmental and social destructive amount of the resources while paying a smaller percentage of taxes and sometimes no taxes; the very profitable firearm industry and promotion of the use of firearms to protect “stuff”; the belief that stuff equals worth and has equal or greater value than the life of our brothers and sisters whose “stealing” from those who legally steal is criminal.
I am not defending stealing. I am suggesting that if you want to stop illegal stealing then one should stop legal stealing of money, opportunity and worth.
One cannot deliberately create an us/them system and then expect “them” to be grateful for the crumbs thrown out in the snow.
If we deconstruct racism, sexism, homophobia, or other forms of oppression we cannot hold on to an us/them mentality.
It is noteworthy that many of the brothers and sisters who are so fearful of such deconstruction are the same individuals who will attend worship services and mouth the words of Paul and other prophets such as Grandma Fannie. When Grandma Fannie says “You are getting too big for your britches.” she was not referring to the fact that in fact, as children, we might have been too poor to quickly replace the britches which were flood pants - too short for the growing legs. It was her down home way of teaching the lesson she had heard in church or read in her well-worn bible, “ We have all sinned and fall short the glory of god.” The greatest sin for Grandma Fannie may have been self-righteousness - a forgetting of the fact that we are all equally human and, thus, equally deserving of Grace. Many other teachers before and after Jesus would teach the same lesson which their students may have heard without hearing. The primary message of that teacher, Jesus, who, for some was/is God incarnate, was Grace is the birthright of all. Despite the fact that religious leaders, in all their humaneness, attempt to divide brothers and sisters into the deserving and undeserving; into the saved and unsaved, the message of equality and equity is clear.
This is the paradox. We are all human. We make grave mistakes, have flaws and shortcoming, are wonderful, hurtful, silly, wise, funny, mean, and loving. Despite sophisticated programs such as excel and numbers we cannot construct a scientific system of measuring the relative worth of each of us; a system for assigning a point value to all the ways we uplift each other as well as the ways we hurt each other.
Grandma Fannie reminds us: “It is okay to admit that we have our moments of being too big for our britches. It is okay to be the humans that we are. Glory, hallelujah we have all sinned and fall short the glory of God. We all deserve Grace. We all have a place at the table.”
Written June 27, 2021
Jimmy F Pickett
coachpickett.org
Grandma Fannie reminds her children “We have all sinned and fall short the glory of God.” (Paul’s letter to the Romans, 3:23) or “You are getting too big for your britches.”
This week I was particularly aware of the tenuous relationship with fear that many of us continue to have. Of course, I know this is nothing new. We have a long history of being fearful of those we designate “the other” or of being designated as “the other”.
In this country it is no secret that we have a history of systematic racism, sexism and other forms of oppression - of convincing ourselves that our self-worth has to be built on the backs of others. Yet, at the same time, we want to be considered people worthy of respect and love. Thus, if someone says that “Black Lives Matter” we may hear “White lives do not matter.” It is very clear that the assertion that Black Lives Matter is in response to the history of treating the lives of black people as if they do not matter or they matter only in so far as they serve the needs of white/Caucasian people (white males especially). The real issue seems to be that our ego strength is so weak that many of us cannot accept that we have directly or indirectly benefited from the ongoing history of racism. We become fearful that others are saying we do not matter. It seems we can only think in terms of dualities; of a hierarchy of importance or worth. It has to be either/or. It cannot be both.
The fierce objection to the teaching of what has euphemistically been termed critical race theory seems to be grounded in this fear. Talking about systemic racism, gender bias and other “facts” of our history seems to be heard as a threat to treat the white man as badly as he has treated others. It is not surprising that legislative bills prohibiting the teaching of history of racism/white privilege also outlaws the teaching of the history of gender as a social construct.
Related issues are much in the news: the unequal distribution of wealth or rather the fact that many must live in abject poverty in order for the 1% to steal much of the financial wealth, using a environmental and social destructive amount of the resources while paying a smaller percentage of taxes and sometimes no taxes; the very profitable firearm industry and promotion of the use of firearms to protect “stuff”; the belief that stuff equals worth and has equal or greater value than the life of our brothers and sisters whose “stealing” from those who legally steal is criminal.
I am not defending stealing. I am suggesting that if you want to stop illegal stealing then one should stop legal stealing of money, opportunity and worth.
One cannot deliberately create an us/them system and then expect “them” to be grateful for the crumbs thrown out in the snow.
If we deconstruct racism, sexism, homophobia, or other forms of oppression we cannot hold on to an us/them mentality.
It is noteworthy that many of the brothers and sisters who are so fearful of such deconstruction are the same individuals who will attend worship services and mouth the words of Paul and other prophets such as Grandma Fannie. When Grandma Fannie says “You are getting too big for your britches.” she was not referring to the fact that in fact, as children, we might have been too poor to quickly replace the britches which were flood pants - too short for the growing legs. It was her down home way of teaching the lesson she had heard in church or read in her well-worn bible, “ We have all sinned and fall short the glory of god.” The greatest sin for Grandma Fannie may have been self-righteousness - a forgetting of the fact that we are all equally human and, thus, equally deserving of Grace. Many other teachers before and after Jesus would teach the same lesson which their students may have heard without hearing. The primary message of that teacher, Jesus, who, for some was/is God incarnate, was Grace is the birthright of all. Despite the fact that religious leaders, in all their humaneness, attempt to divide brothers and sisters into the deserving and undeserving; into the saved and unsaved, the message of equality and equity is clear.
This is the paradox. We are all human. We make grave mistakes, have flaws and shortcoming, are wonderful, hurtful, silly, wise, funny, mean, and loving. Despite sophisticated programs such as excel and numbers we cannot construct a scientific system of measuring the relative worth of each of us; a system for assigning a point value to all the ways we uplift each other as well as the ways we hurt each other.
Grandma Fannie reminds us: “It is okay to admit that we have our moments of being too big for our britches. It is okay to be the humans that we are. Glory, hallelujah we have all sinned and fall short the glory of God. We all deserve Grace. We all have a place at the table.”
Written June 27, 2021
Jimmy F Pickett
coachpickett.org
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