'Jesus sent [the Twelve] out with the following instructions: “Go nowhere among the Gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. As you go, proclaim the good news, ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near.’ Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons. You received without payment; give without payment."'
--Matthew 10: 5-8
One of my spiritual heroes is Will Campbell. He was a Baptist preacher, but he never had a congregation. He was a white man who was heavily involved in the Civil Rights Movement; in fact, he was the only white person present when Dr. King founded the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1957. He wasn’t the kind of person who was front and center for photo ops, but he was always there at protests for integration in Arkansas or at sit ins in Mississippi, always just showing up and working behind the scenes. In the summer of 1964 Will heard black activist Stokely Carmichael, founder of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee speak. Stokely told the white folks in the crowd that, while their efforts at sit-ins and marches were appreciated, what they really needed to do to affect change was to refocus their efforts on educating their fellow white people, the very folks in positions of power and influence. Will took that literally and started having conversations with members of the Ku Klux Klan, figuring, as he said, that they needed to hear the message of freedom and equality, maybe more than anyone else. Will died in in 2013, but he wrote extensively on his days as, what he called a bootleg preacher, so I encourage you to check out his books—Soul Among Lions, Brother to a Dragonfly, and Forty Acres and a Goat, to name a few.
Will Campbell, bootleg preacher.
The Gospel reading this week makes me think of Will Campbell. After he calls the 12 apostles—and let’s remember that an apostle is someone who is sent out, which is different from a disciple, which is someone who follows—Jesus gives the 12 some specific instructions, the first of which is this: “Go nowhere among the Gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”
Their mission is to be sent out among their own people, to the folks just like them, and to preach this message of Jesus, a message of radical hospitality, of salvation for everyone, and of the truth that God had made all things, and all people, clean. The ones that need to hear it most are the very people who, at that time, were denying it. The towns where these folks are most prominent are the ones to whom Jesus sends the 12 on their mission.
What Jesus is doing here in this initial sending forth of the apostles gets echoed in the words from Stokely Carmichael that Will Campbell heard, which led him to do the work he did among the Klan. Stokely was doing for Will what Jesus was doing for the 12 apostles, sending them to their own people; those are the very ones who need the message the most because those are the people who have created and maintained the social systems and structures that have denied the inherent goodness and basic human dignity of other groups of people, based on their racial, social, or religious standing.
The hardliners in Jesus’ day—the Saducees and some of the Pharisees and scribes—were determined to keep their laws in place, thinking that the laws were fair. Well, they were…for them. But what about the Gentiles? What about women and foreigners? What about the folks on the outside, the folks whose lives didn’t appear to matter much to those in the positions of privilege and power? Jesus’ message offered good news for those kinds of folks, but the ones who really needed to hear that message were the hardliners, the ones who could actually stop the cycle of oppression because they were the ones holding on to those oppressive systems.
This is why Will Campbell worked among the Klan. They were the hardliners—the folks who were determined to keep legal segregation now, tomorrow, and forever. Will never stopped being a part of the sit-ins and marches with his black brothers and sisters, but he also understood that as a white person, he needed to be in relationship with other white people who could affect change on a systemic level, and he needed to call the oppression out and get white folks like him to understand the role they had played.
He also understood that it wasn’t just the Klan that was the problem; in fact, he knew that the Klan was a by-product, a symptom of a much larger system of oppression, and he was very often critical of institutions that supported and benefited from such a system. He was known to say the following at more than one university at which he was invited to speak:
Ouch! Those are harsh words to hear, but it doesn't make them untrue. Few of us may know active Klan members, but we all are caught up in structures and institutions for which we are fiercely loyal, and which often uphold and maintain systems of oppression. Until we can accept that, and until those of us in the positions of power and privilege, those who can affect the necessary change, accept that and are willing to do something to break the cycle of oppression, we cannot know real freedom and equality.
The past three weeks have, I believe, been among the most important in our country in the last 50 years. The death of George Floyd has galvanized us to address the systemic oppression that is very real in this country, leading a great many of us, including folks in our own church, to ask: what can—or should—we do? Some of us have protested. Some have shared insightful articles on social media. Some have had watch parties and conversations around the documentary 13th and films like Just Mercy.
The Netflix documentary 13th is currently free on YouTube.
One example that I would like to lift up to you today is our sister Angie Kratzer, a teacher and member of Good Shepherd. Angie has given me permission to share with you some of the work she has done through her Facebook page, and she invites any and all of you to go to her page or send her a message and be a part of the conversations that she has been having. These conversations take the form of simply telling our stories—for Angie that story includes being the white mother of a black child. So far her conversations topics have included: White Privilege, the Confederate Flag, Black Lives Matter, microaggression, and terms like bigotry and institutional racism. These are not easy topics to discuss, that’s for sure, but Angie is wading into those difficult waters, and she is doing so primarily by asking her black friends to speak to their experience and for her white friends to simply listening. In doing so she is educating her white friends by lifting up the witness of her friends of color. All of this is done in safe and open conversations. This is what the work looks like, and I’m quite proud of our sister for showing it to us, and I commend her Facebook page to you.
Where is Jesus sending us? If we are serious about doing the work of dismantling unjust and oppressive systems, and if we’re determined to preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ that proclaims the dignity of every human being, then those of us who are part of the majority population must go to the people like us, for it is up to those in the majority to change if those in the minority are to truly be treated with equality. It was true in Jesus’ time, and in Will Campbell’s time, and in our time.
This is how we address systems of oppression and how we affect change. If those of us in the majority can recognize the role folks like us have played—whether directly or indirectly—in the systemic oppression of others, and if we can understand the ways we have benefited from those systems, and if we are willing to change, then this world can truly be transformed into something that more closely resembles the kingdom of God. Dr. King said the arc of the universe bends towards justice, but as, Richard Rohr reminded us in one of his daily meditations last week, it depends on our participation.
I wonder what are the ways that you can affect that change. Who are the folks that need to hear from you? What are the kinds of conversations that you can start with people? One of the ways our church is looking to do that is to encourage everyone to watch Just Mercy and then join us for a Zoom conversation about the film at a date and time that we will announce in the coming days; Just Mercy, by the way is free to rent during the month of June on Amazon Prime. Perhaps you could start up a Zoom book club. Read White Fragility, The New Jim Crow, or America’s Original Sin, all of which speak to this important moment in our lives.
The film Just Mercy is free to rent on YouTube and Amazon Prime this month.
Jesus sent the apostles out to be laborers in a harvest that was plentiful. Now is the harvest time, and the Church—the people, remember, not the building—the Church are the laborers. So ask yourself today: what can I, what can we, do? What conversations can we start? Who are the people, like us, that most need to hear this message from Jesus, a message that offers good news to those who are oppressed and calls for repentance on the part of those who have played a role in that oppression? I encourage you to share those thoughts in the comments on this blog, or on your own page—as Angie has done—or even send your thoughts to me, and let’s have a conversation and work on something together. Now is the time, my friends. Where is Jesus sending us?
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