The Heart of Racism: A Recap

A little over a week ago now, InterVarsity hosted an event on campus at SLU called "The Heart of Racism." If you've been keeping up with recent posts on this blog, you'll know that the issue of racism has been a pervasive and brooding presence on our campus over the past several months. My students and I have been talking as a community on Monday nights about the best ways to respond to this issue as followers of Jesus. We started with some Proxe Stations back in March that functioned as interactive surveys where SLU students could come and voice their opinions about issues of injustice in the world and on campus, their contributions to the problems, and even possible solutions to injustice. We were able to share the truth about Jesus coming to bring reconciliation between both humans and God and between people groups as well. We saw that students on SLU's campus are very aware of the deep hurts in the world - from sex trafficking in East Asia to violence in the West Bank to racism on their own campus, SLU students are well-informed. However, what they fail to realize is that the brokenness of the world starts with the brokenness in each individual human heart - that broken systems are made up of broken people. They don't see that all of the money and education and awareness in the world won't fix the problem. A broken solution cannot mend a broken system. As followers of Jesus, the only one able to mend broken systems, we knew we needed to find a place to give voice to the inadequacies of human solutions and to the full reconciling power of the Gospel.

On April 12th, InterVarsity partnered with SLU's Black Student Alliance to put on an event called "The Heart of Racism." We invited Elizabeth English, the Missouri Area Director of InterVarsity, to come and give a powerful talk centering on the idea of racism as an individual sin issue that infiltrates society. A few of us had heard her presentation back at our Spring Break project in March and knew it would be a welcome and much-needed alternative perspective to the dizzying array of panel discussions and heated debates that had engulfed the campus all semester. Over fifty SLU students (our largest IV event ever on campus) sat down together from a variety of backgrounds, both ethnic and religious. We began the night with small group discussions about our own experiences of race as taught by our families growing up and how these experiences have framed our perspectives and choices on campus. My table of 6 was made up of two Black students, two Latina students, one White student and myself. Though we were originally unsure of how forthcoming students would be in these discussions, I found this time to be incredibly life-giving and helpful. As a white male, it's been an incredible learning experience for me to realize that I don't have a universal perspective on the world - that there are fears and questions and hurts that go deeper and come from places that I simply cannot understand. I am learning to listen closer and ask better questions. Around the room, I could hear these sorts of healing, eye-opening conversations happening all around me. These conversations were truly a gift from God.

From there, we transitioned into Elizabeth's talk. It was fascinating to watch students from different backgrounds responding to the presentation as she called out the fears of both majority and minority cultures in approaching a conversation on race. In the middle of the talk, she allowed students to post their own contributions to racial injustice and brokenness on campus on a large poster along the wall. I want to share a few excerpts from students who attended in response to the question "How do you contribute to racism on campus?":

• "I decide that other minorities don't understand because they get treated a little better."
• "I find it REALLY HARD to let go of the racism I've been taught. I want to with all my heart."
• "I am afraid to tell my parents that their views on race DON'T SHOW LOVE."
• "I'm scared to initiate conversations with people who look different from me."
• "I refuse to talk in class because I don't want to be seen or known as the STUPID BLACK GIRL."

You can see that there was a powerful mix of emotions in the air as Elizabeth continued her talk. She led us through the story of the Good Samaritan and showed us that Jesus has a different definition than we do about what it means to truly "love our neighbor." She challenged us to acknowledge the sin of racism in our hearts and follow Jesus in his ministry of reconciliation. We ended the evening by giving students the chance to respond with feedback and take a next step in the conversation Sixteen students decided that they wanted to further explore their own ethnic identities and contribution to multi-ethnic community. Eleven students indicated that they wanted to explore Jesus and his solutions to brokenness further. In their written feedback, here were some thoughts from students on the event overall:

• "Wonderful! Excellent speaker who really made me think deeply about my decisions and actions on campus."
• "It really opened my eyes to the sinfulness of racism."
• "A great start to a big solution."
• "This was well-needed for this campus."

As we begin following up with these students and figuring out how to continue this conversation next semester, we're excited to see the doors that Jesus is opening on campus for partnership with ethnic-specific student organizations and future conversations about the healing power of the Gospel to bring true racial reconciliation. This conversation has been very new and unsettling for me at times, but after a semester of following Jesus into this dangerous territory, I can tell you for certain that there is something good here. He is doing something new and powerful on this campus and he has called us to follow him into it. Please keep praying for us as we seek to do just that.

March Proxe Stations: A Recap

As I sit looking out on downtown Marion, IL on this warm and breezy Good Friday, I feel like I am pausing to catch my breath halfway through a distance run. This weekend comes as a gift after the crazy, risky schedule of March and leading up to the inevitable whirlwind of an April laden with campus events, investigative Bible studies, traveling, visioning for next year, and prayerfully ending this one well. A weekend to pause and reflect, not only on the year that has been and the month to come, but on the reason why we continue to labor in Hope and Anticipation, is a tiny reminder of the Gift that stood before the executioners he came to save so long ago.

Upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his stripes we are healed.

Isaiah 53:5

As promised, I wanted to give you an update as to how last week's Proxe Stations went on campus. Overall, I would tell you that we were extremely satisfied with the week. We were given a prominent and public space on campus even during a campus-wide, event-heavy social justice emphasis week. A few administrators and faculty members went through the station with words of encouragement and gratitude that we were engaging the campus in this fashion. Several young leaders in InterVarsity received significant experience in sharing their faith, many for the first time. My staff partner and I walked away with an invaluable deepening of our understanding of students on campus - from their unflinching hope in education and awareness to fix the world to their difficulty in naming their own personal contributions to injustice. Our chapter was united and emboldened by the opportunity and many of them are hopeful that we will do another similar station next semester. For those of you who like numbers (as I do), here's a breakdown:

• 16 - the number of SLU IV students who gained significant experience sharing their faith (around 70% of the chapter)
  
• 163 - the number of students who went through the Proxe Station in 4 days (15 total hours)
• 67 - the number of students who indicated that they would like to further investigate Jesus with folks from InterVarsity
• $716 - the amount of money raised at our adjacent table which sold jewelry handmade by former sex slaves in Nepal, all of which will go into their hands to provide a dignified income for themselves and their familes (check out the incredible Christian Foundation for Education for more details)

I want to end this update by thanking you so much for your prayers, encouraging e-mails and text messages, and other support that you poured out on us last week. My staff partner and I were pretty drained by Wednesday morning and I have to believe that it was your prayers that carried us through Friday. I am beginning to understand more and more why Jesus prayed that we would be one, even as he and the Father are one. I can't imagine doing this without you. In the spirit of our unity, the healing work that God is doing on campus at SLU, and especially in light of this holy weekend, I leave you with a passage from John Stott's Basic Christianity that I have been meditating on today. Peace to you dear friend.

Paul described his work as a "ministry of reconciliation" and his gospel as a "message of reconciliation." He also made it quite clear where this reconciliation comes from. God is its author, he says, and Christ is the one through whom he brings it about. "All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ." Again, "God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ." Everything that was achieved through the death of Jesus on the cross had its origin in the mind and heart of the eternal God. No explanation of Christ's death or humanity's salvation that downplays this fact does justice to the teaching of the Bible. "God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life." Again, "God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether thingss on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross."
But what does this "reconciliation" mean? The answer is that it indicates either an action by which two parties in conflict are brought together or the state in which their oneness is enjoyed and expressed...Sin caused a separation between us and God; the cross, the crucifixion of Christ, has brought us back together. Sin made us enemies; the cross brought peace. Sin created a gulf between us and God; the cross has bridged it. Sin broke the relationship; the cross has restored it.