To: The United Church of Canada
3250 Bloor Street West, Suite 300
Toronto, ON M8X 2Y4
Regarding Truth and Reconciliation
Let me start with a quote from Rebecca Solnit:
from http://lithub.com/rebecca-solnit-the-loneliness-of-donald-trump/
Equality keeps us honest. Our peers tell us who we are and how we are doing, providing that service in personal life that a free press does in a functioning society. Inequality creates liars and delusion. The powerless need to dissemble—that’s how slaves, servants, and women got the reputation of being liars—and the powerful grow stupid on the lies they require from their subordinates and on the lack of need to know about others who are nobody, who don’t count, who’ve been silenced or trained to please. This is why I always pair privilege with obliviousness; obliviousness is privilege’s form of deprivation. When you don’t hear others, you don’t imagine them, they become unreal, and you are left in the wasteland of a world with only yourself in it, and that surely makes you starving, though you know not for what, if you have ceased to imagine others exist in any true deep way that matters. This is about a need for which we hardly have language or at least not a familiar conversation.
I spend half the year in small town Ontario. This particular village has a church on every corner, but the United Church holds sway here. White folk also hold sway and are what is visible on every street, in every shop and place of business. We are painted with the kind of obliviousness that white privilege affords. The truth is that if you scratch the surface you can easily find attitudes and discourse that I would label redneck and at times racist would be the more accurate descriptor. And yes this from “church” people. First Nations, people of colour are not seen or acknowledged in this community.
There are a handful of people from the surrounding area that are involved in any kind of action toward Truth and Reconciliation. It is the one ray of light but it is not in any way a beam or a beacon of hope.
Canadians need more leadership than our elected officials can offer. The ministers of the United Church are in a unique position to bring people into a conversation. To me this is what living a good, a moral and compassionate life is all about. Education and awareness is critical. Yes – I am calling on you to make this a priority.
What kinds of conversations are you having within the United Church at a grass roots level? What actions are you taking to support each small town Ontario church and others like it across Canada to have difficult conversations?
The fact that good people are silent and not taking a stand or making their voices heard in protest makes me want to howl in frustration. We cannot afford another 150 years of banking that white privilege will protect us from the pain of others and the inequities that they bear every day. Every pulpit needs to participate in helping to remove the kind of blinders that keep us oblivious.
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