Sunday Musings – May 20, 2018
Building a friendship
I am in Sapulpa, Oklahoma visiting my sisters and some of their family today. On Thursday, I flew into Oklahoma City, rented a car and drove to Canton, Texas near Dallas where my brother and his wife live. My sisters, Bonnie and Pat, and Bonnie’s husband, Carl, had already driven down from Oklahoma. We visited until Saturday afternoon and then drove back here. I will fly back to Pittsburgh tomorrow.
While we were visiting another school shooting happened – in Texas this time – a royal wedding took place, and violence continued in homes, workplaces and between countries. No matter what any of us are doing or not doing life show up. Sometimes it seems as if in this day of instant and continuous news reports it would be easy to become discouraged about the future of us humans. Yet, there are always moments of beauty and love. As was true even in the death camps, moments of friendship, music and art are always available.
I was thinking of that fact this morning when I started listening to this week’s podcast of On Being with host Krista Tippett. This week, May 17, 2018, her conversation was with Derek Black and Matthew Stevenson. Some readers may know Derek Black as the godson of David Duke and the son of the man “who founded the web’s first and largest white power website. Black spent the first two decades of his life as an enthusiastic aid to his family’s activism, running a political campaign, a radio network and organizing conferences.”
When Matthew was at college he hosted a weekly Sabbath dinner in his dorm room. He decided to invite Derek and let his friends know that they were not to verbally criticize or attack him. For two years Derek joined Matthew and his friends for Sabbath dinner at which they visited and discussed a variety of topics but not “the topic” of Derek’s white nationalist beliefs.
Two years is a long time to allow the ingredients of a friendship to meld together. Few of us have that sort of patience and, yet, this story confirms what most of us intrinsically know and what research tells us. Name calling and otherwise attacking each other does not lead to mutual education or the ability to hear each other. Derek eventually came to a place where he was able to “listen” to how he was misusing statistics and other information. Eventually, he was able to renounce the views of white nationalism which had seemed so set in stone to him.
There have always been those who are determined to approach each other as humans who are no different despite religious and political labels they have inherited and/or adopted. Palestinians and Jewish family have sat together for many years. Many African Americans and white nationalists have sat together and taken care of each other for years without affecting their public political and even religious views.
We know how to move toward peace. It always begins with the patience to build something solid based on what two or more people have in common.
Even though I am very intentional about not treating others as labels I can be very inpatient with others and with myself. I can easily focus on wanting to change the viewpoints of others rather than what we have in common and learning from each other.
As Derek and Matthew both point out speaking out against hate, injustice and all forms of violence is often necessary and powerful, but only when done in love and with enormous humility.
Today I will remind myself to listen with love, humility and patience.
Written May 20, 2018
Building a friendship
I am in Sapulpa, Oklahoma visiting my sisters and some of their family today. On Thursday, I flew into Oklahoma City, rented a car and drove to Canton, Texas near Dallas where my brother and his wife live. My sisters, Bonnie and Pat, and Bonnie’s husband, Carl, had already driven down from Oklahoma. We visited until Saturday afternoon and then drove back here. I will fly back to Pittsburgh tomorrow.
While we were visiting another school shooting happened – in Texas this time – a royal wedding took place, and violence continued in homes, workplaces and between countries. No matter what any of us are doing or not doing life show up. Sometimes it seems as if in this day of instant and continuous news reports it would be easy to become discouraged about the future of us humans. Yet, there are always moments of beauty and love. As was true even in the death camps, moments of friendship, music and art are always available.
I was thinking of that fact this morning when I started listening to this week’s podcast of On Being with host Krista Tippett. This week, May 17, 2018, her conversation was with Derek Black and Matthew Stevenson. Some readers may know Derek Black as the godson of David Duke and the son of the man “who founded the web’s first and largest white power website. Black spent the first two decades of his life as an enthusiastic aid to his family’s activism, running a political campaign, a radio network and organizing conferences.”
When Matthew was at college he hosted a weekly Sabbath dinner in his dorm room. He decided to invite Derek and let his friends know that they were not to verbally criticize or attack him. For two years Derek joined Matthew and his friends for Sabbath dinner at which they visited and discussed a variety of topics but not “the topic” of Derek’s white nationalist beliefs.
Two years is a long time to allow the ingredients of a friendship to meld together. Few of us have that sort of patience and, yet, this story confirms what most of us intrinsically know and what research tells us. Name calling and otherwise attacking each other does not lead to mutual education or the ability to hear each other. Derek eventually came to a place where he was able to “listen” to how he was misusing statistics and other information. Eventually, he was able to renounce the views of white nationalism which had seemed so set in stone to him.
There have always been those who are determined to approach each other as humans who are no different despite religious and political labels they have inherited and/or adopted. Palestinians and Jewish family have sat together for many years. Many African Americans and white nationalists have sat together and taken care of each other for years without affecting their public political and even religious views.
We know how to move toward peace. It always begins with the patience to build something solid based on what two or more people have in common.
Even though I am very intentional about not treating others as labels I can be very inpatient with others and with myself. I can easily focus on wanting to change the viewpoints of others rather than what we have in common and learning from each other.
As Derek and Matthew both point out speaking out against hate, injustice and all forms of violence is often necessary and powerful, but only when done in love and with enormous humility.
Today I will remind myself to listen with love, humility and patience.
Written May 20, 2018
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