living in coronavirusworld 78: Lynching as virus

6/8

Morningside Park bulletin board

Spend most of the day trying to deal with the Presbyterian Church.  Every two years it has a General Asssmbly made up of equal numbers of clergy and lay representatives, or teaching and ruling elders in Presbyspeak. The GA deals with ecclesiastical  issues, but more seeks to exegete the time we are living in for both the broader church and the general public. There is a long tradition of Presbyterian engagement with social issues as part of the church’s reformed theological perspective self understanding of being commissioned by God to act in stewardship of God’s creation. John Calvin, for example, believed that serving as a civic magistrate was God’s highest calling.  This years’s Assembly was to have been in Baltimore, Maryland, a city much maligned by our current President. 

The onset of the Coronavirus led the church ultimately to shift the church from a week long event in Baltimore to a three day event on ZOOM. (The convention center that was to have housed GA has been turned into an emergency field hospital) However, the Committee on General Assembly, responsible for GAs, decided  that the business needs to be restricted to institutional maintenance only. NO social action. No commissioner resolutions or new business, preventing commissioners from affecting the agenda. My Presbyterian Health Education and Welfare Association believes that this is  a crucial moment in US history, perhaps definitive for years to come for country and church. To us it seems  a dereliction of our commission and violation of our historic identity not to speak. And we have been seeking to find the way to do that. 

A beautiful day for a walk.

Morningside Park pond

Tonight’s Bible Study is the Mathew passage form Trinity Sunday. Which means we’re talking about the Holy Trinity. But also the Great Commission (Matthew 28:20):9 Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost:

20 Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. Amen.1

Which Leila refers  to as the last command…

Russ sees the writer of Matthew trying to present Jesus as the new Moses, who led people to a new reality. And Jesus, too , seeking to create a  whole new way of life. With the outward sign of Baptism as introduced by John the Baptist. Russ sees Jesus as a disciple of John, which seems apparent. i also see John’s Baptism as a propaganda of the deed, an act proclaiming its own meaning. In the use, for John (or Matthew) the traditional institution had become so compromised and corrupted as to require its follwoers to go through a conversion ritual again to begot renewal. Baptism, a for of the Mikva, cleansing bath. 

Marsha sees that commission where things went wrong. She sees and responds to the imperial colossal history pf Christianity with its forced conversions, lacruz y la espada (cross and sword) and Doctrine of Discovery. Both perspectives are of course correct. As Wes Howard Brook pointed out in Come Out My People, the Bible has a constant tension between the religion of covenant and creation and the religion of empire. Christianity has both. 

I share the different aspects of relationships with God….awe and wonder, service and human solidarity and the power of the Holy Spirit.  Jesus’s statement in verse 18 about being ..given dominion links directly back to the prophetic words of Daniel 7: 13-14 and the Son of Man idea. ….a new kind of kingdom, not based on power an control but “…as a human one…” based the best of human community. Long before communism, Christianity had an ideology based on a positive humanist view. 

As we talk about the Spirit, Leila talks about the necessity of breath.  The horror of George Floyd having his breath taking away. And as she says, the centrality of breath issues  with covid19, that’s how we die. This clearly connecting the two critical issues defining our present moment.

I’m very happy that West Park will be returning to worship next Sunday after a very long time. 

I make sure to conquer my fear and return to the Songwriter’s Exchange tonight. At first it feels good just to be back. And I’m feeling relaxed.  But as I hear my colleagues, the anxiety comes back. Most of the songs are responding to the moment. One is George Floyd looking down form above, “Not a good day for me” riffing on Trump’s unbelievable announcement that the job report was “…a great day for George…” These singer-songwriters are good. I envy the discipline, the commitment to craft. I’m almost afraid to share.But I do my remake of “hard rain”…

and I'll call out the man who says law and order over all

and all who stand with him in the congress hall 

and l'll sing for the ones who take a brave knee 

while congress is silent while black bodies bleed

and I'll give it to you straight before it's too late

it will take a strong love to turn back this hate

and it's a hard

it's a hard

it's a hard

it's a hard

it's a....I can't breathe....

hard rain's a gonna fall 

The best criticism starts with the thought that all folk music is derivative, takes from an existing source. And I should write my own song based on this, maybe with a ‘…hard rain..” reference at the end. And we talk about how several  songs came from the perspective, even voice of the back victims and that we cannot do that anymore unless invited to. As allies, we can not presume.    

Did the city do the first step reopen today? Did 250000 go back to work? 

My housemate returns home . Reports a solid lie of police I riot gear between Adam Clayton Powell and MalcolmX Boulevards on 116.

Living in coronavirus world 76: Trinity Sunday

6/7

Home communion

Sunday morning.  Get my Sunday Times. Make my coffee. Time for worship with the good people of Beverley again. Today is Trinity  Sunday. Here's what I had to say:

It’s been another week.  Protests every day. My boys have been out almost every night in Brooklyn Twice  this weeks marches came right by my building. I've been to a candlelight vigil where the names of all who have died since Trayvon Martin were read. The city “Link” kiosks continue to scroll the names against simple black backgrounds. I was at a commemorate of Brionna Taylor’s birthday at an event organized by young black women focusing on the very special struggles of their lives.  At our music events there are always songs that relate to what’s going on. And yes, we were here 7 years ago, but what’s different now? Some of you may be old enough to remember the Vietnam War and a photo of a young girl who had been hit by napalm. Somehow that photo struck people in a very deep way and attitudes about the war took a serious change.  Likewise, the video of George Floyd’s death, the nonchalant attitude of the officer's keeping his knee on George for almost 9 minutes has struck almost every person with a conscience. The reaction this time is deeper and wider than ever before. That is the context  in which we gather to hear God’s word and to share in the breaking of bread this morning. 

I wish that I could sit down with each of you and ask, so how’s it going? How have you been feeling? What thoughts have you had? It is a bit interesting. I do so many things on ZOOM.  Everyone in boxes like Hollywood Squares. It’s a way to connect, but kind of tiring.  Last week as I started to preach for you over the phone, I could see myself in the Beverley Church pulpit, I could look out and see you all there in your  usual places. And when we shared communion, I could see everyone as we passed the plate. So here we are together this morning. 

This is a unique Sunday in the Christian year. This Sunday, as opposed to most of our special Sundays that feature an event in Jesus’ life or the apostles, like Ascension, or Pentecost, thisSunday we deal with a theological concept, the Holy Trinity. And believe me, that’ still tough one. Our Jewish neighbors can’t understand how we can be monotheists, believers in one GOD, when it looks like we have three.  I remember that chart form when I was a kid with the ‘ises” and ‘Is nots.” So what do we understand?

* God is in three persons, though all are the same God.

All of us are multiple persons at the same time. I can be a son, a husband and a father all at the same time. Each of these is distinct, and yet I am the same. 

* Each defines a different function, or role, of God.

The father is the creator, the source, the essence of being

* The son is the divine as found in one particular human being, as the divine is  always present in humanity.

The source of grace. And the TRUTH. To be plain, in Jesus is seen xx every essence of TRUTH.

* The Holy Spirit is the flowing force that sustains. 

The power that first breathed life into the world breath thorough us, Sustains us. (That’s in part why those words “ I can’t breathe” are so disturbing.)

Our Gospel lesson gives us our ultimate marching orders….make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you….This means when we invite someone to take on the Christian life, we are inviting them to be in relationship with all three expressions of God. And we need to understand what he practical implications  of each person are. Just for an example:

* Father ….awe, wonder….let me also say that we try to be more inclusive in language, however the word “parent” has no emotional resonance. The word “father’ is used for  intimacy. What other word could we use? 

* Son..”obeying all that I have command you…” living in service to others…

* Holy Spirit…..take a deep breath,…what sustains us

Note two other things in this passage…first even after everything,,  resurrection, appearing out of nowhere, etc…still, some doubted…as they will…as we will..it keeps us honest, strengthens us, deepens our faith.  And finally, the ultimate promise…. lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. Amen….that’s worth repeating every day…

Finally, as far as what we do in the days, look at Paul’s benediction…O, brothers and sisters, farewell.  Put things in order,

That’s a tall order…both our nation and our church, not to mention our own lives

 listen to my appeal, agree with one another,

Another tough one….can we figure out what we do agree on? Maybe we start  by listening…making sure we hear one another..

 live in peace; 

Yes Lord, let it be

and the God of love and peace will be with you. 12Greet one another with a holy kiss.

Tough with social distancing, sacred distancing,…virtual hugs, kisses

 All the saints greet you.

The days ahead are difficult….but this s a very real chance  to make a real difference with a real change…

13The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.

Amen

Later, our family gathers for its weekly international gathering. Germany is all but  reopened. Which at some level, doesn’t seem to make a whole  lot of sense. The data is pretty clear that young children just don’t seem to get hit by Covid. On the other hand, there is data that 9% of school age children have bene victims of domestic violence during the lockdown, (And 31/2 % of women have been raped.) The children are  clearly  safer in school than locked in at home. Children in the poorer neighborhoods are getting no food,  no exercise an dare getting left behind. Which is New York City as well.  And you are 19 times more likely to get coronavirus inside than out. 

The heavier converstion though has to do with the global protests over black lives matter. Our son repots that while the German marches may be seen as solidarity marches, in cities like London and Paris black immigrants with colonial imperial histories see their own lives reflected in the struggles of African Americans. It  is their own just treatment they are protesting for. Germany did simply not have the same degree or breadth of empire as the British and French.

Of course the real struggle becomes what do we each do as individuals and with each other to take our own part in the dismantling of white privilege. And how will we respond when it actually begins to hurt. 

A walk to visit a friend at Jackie Robinson Park. Figure out where we are in the whole social distancing dance is not clear. And fear it may take months. A long slow walk home. Street birthday parties, picnics and folks just talk like a normal spring day.

Harlem Tavern

A margarita at Bean & Barley as I talk to my mom. A woman sees my Grateful distancing stay at home tour 2020 t-shirt.

she liked my spirit

I like your spirit, she says, I need more of that in my life. 

Th woman who always asks for my son with warm memories of him playing with the kids in the fire hydrant and summer water balloons. I notice for the first the she works at Montefiore Hospital.

Back home, I ask Eddie to tell the story again. And he does. They set his cousin on fire. And threw him in a house with 14 people in it. He remembers the store that charged “colored” 4 times the prices whites paid. The little girl who looked at him and said, “Look mommie, a gigger.” The people who tried to leave to go to New York and disappeared. Going for a walk into the woods and finding bodies hanging. He takes a drag on his cigarette,  Yes, that’s the way it was…

Tonight is the last night of curfew. 

Living in coronavirusworld 75: One step

6/13

Window at Paint and Pour

I haven’t  done a road  race for many years. I only began walking again regularly in March. But I got an invite for “Run Across America,” a “virtual” 5k to benefit “Feeding America.” It says you can “run, walk or roll,”  So I will walk, And the distance from my pace in Harlem to Pier 1, near where I’ll be meeting my family,  is exactly 3.1 miles…5K.   As I take off, I notice hills in a way I haven’t before. Feel the shortness of breath and think about the years. As I think of the challenge of 3.1 miles, I remember how in my running days, that was my short run.  And as I hit the Hudson River trail, I remember years of runs down this path. I remember that I actually ran 10 marathons in my days. And like at the beginning, it’s step by  step. I haven’t been down along the river in years.  So I walk through years of Little League baseball games and soccer games and nights at the Boat Basin when you could hang out there with a cold drink and watch the sun set over the bobbing of masts on the Hudson. There’s only one or two big ships parked in the River waiting to head south to the harbor and then out to sea. 

The path is filled with runners and bikers, families. About 50/50 on masks and social distancing. People laying out for tans. Picnicikng. The Boat Basin seems about half full, maybe only permanent boats, no in and out weekend traffic in this pandemic. The Pier 1 Cafe is filled with people getting a drink or snack.  Wear a mask. Stay 6 feet apart…the line snakes. Our family is meeting further south, I pass the ruin of the 69th street transfer bridge, one used to transfer railway cars to floats across the river to Weehawken, New Jersey.   Their birthdays were missed. We are here to celebrate  their mom’s.

the Transfer Bridge ruins

Finally I find my family on a blanket in the shade. It is the first time I have seen my boys in three months.

The Boat Basin

Both boys, 27 and 30, have been going to the demonstrations in Brooklyn. The younger one every night. Most of our conversation is taken up with the current uprising. Questions. How do we talk to black colleagues? What do we say? How do we ask how they are doing/feeling without sounding condescending or not sensitive? What do you do when your work administration has been strangely silent, even when significant employees are African -American?  Or when you feel they have been tone deaf or insensitive? I talk about the necessity of making complaints objectively, not assuming motive or intention. But describing the personal effect of actions and non-actions. And the golden rule of no response until  the listener has repeated back what they’ve heard and you agree that they heard the message. 

It gets deeper when we try to figure out what we are supposed to do. Yes…it’s good that we show up. Be present. Put our bodies between black protestors and police. But there’s an inherent understanding that this goes beyond cultural sensitivity training.  This is beyond removing the proverbial “bad apples.” There is the beginning of understanding that  on a broad scale something systemic is terribly wrong. That the police are playing a role of domination and control in a system that is inherently exploitative and has been since the beginning. That endemic to the system is a structure of white privilege and domination and that issues related to the police can only be addressed in relation to that system of privilege and domination. Current discussions about community based police and citizen review and even defunding the police in order to fund restorative social programs are only the first  steps.  That ultimately what is required is the dismantling, the deconstruction of the architecture of oppression. The active deconstruction of white privilege. That is a tall order.

And it is an order that requires white people taking responsibility and accountability. And doing the work of figuring out what we are supposed to do. We are going to have to have uncomfortable conversations with people we love. One wonders how to invite family members into that conversation. He has already talked with former fraternity  brothers about their experiences during their college years, things  they were not  even aware of. But what of  family? Cousins? Aunts and uncles? His mom is aware of commitments and serious investments some have made over the years, often quietly. We can’t always assume what others may feel, think or do. And there is absolutely no room for  condescension. Or the sense that any one of us is further along.

We talk about what it was in our family experience that enabled our boys to have the perspectives they do. They both remember how the “Peace Olympics” at their old Jewish lefty summer camp, including living in cabins named for Goodman, Schwerner and Cheney and the Robeson cultural hall or the Clemente sports center, the research they did on their teams’s issue, all come  back to mind in the midst of demonstrations.  Teach your children well. It makes a difference.

A little rain starts to fall.  We stand under the highway until  the sun comes out again.  My road back, my 5K today began with one step. That’s where we are. One step. Time to take it. 

Living in coronavirusworld 74: when will you say my name

6/5

Remembering Breonna Taylor

One of the actions today was a birthday commemoration for 26 year old Breonna Taylor of Louisville, Kentucky who died as a result of Kentucky’s  controversial “no-knock” warrant law..Police entered her home with no warning.

On the  way to 125th street, I notice one of the city’s ubiquitous   information kiosk stands.  Since Black Out Tuesday, these screens continue to show the names of those killed by police. Silent, graphic, 24 hours a day the names keep scrolling through. I find something very moving  by this, like a piece of contemporary street installation art.  

Her day

The action takes place at the Adam Clayton Powell, Jr State Office Building. The ceremony takes place on the statue of former Harlem congressman Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. which is engraved with a record of  his legislative achievements. Another side carries this quote: Press forward at all times, climbing forward toward that higher ground of the harmonious society that shapes the laws of man to the laws of God."

Adm Clayton Powell, Jr. quote

Adam Clayton Powell, Jr

A crowd of several hundred has gathered. In the shadows of the office building two squads of police  stand  by, looking bored. Across 125th street,  police in riot gear stand at the ready.

memorial

But the event itself is the model of quiet and solemn. It seems to  have  been planned and mostly  executed by young black women who want to have the particularities of that experience, those  who want   to have their stories, heard. The leader cedars the plaza to make it holy.

holy ground

These words from her opening spoken word performance stayed with me :  “When we say their names, I wonder when you all will be saying mine…’ That’s what our neighbors live with…knowing that every day their very lives could be snatched away from  them. 

Say their names

                                                                                                                                                                                  

Along the periphery are volunteers with masks, sanitizers, wipes, snacks, water…and a numbers to call if arrested.

Walking along 125th,

good time for yuor merchandose

I am shocked to see all the boarded up buildings in preparation for expected vandalism and looting. Most covered with graffitti.  (It never comes.).

On the boards

bImmediately in my head I go back to being in Santiago Chile last October. That felt a bit more pervasive and there was central gathering locale.  I wonder how along these portrait can last. But the boarded up buildings and shop windows take me back.      

                                         a memorial                                               

****

If the NFL was serious in its apology to the players for not hearing them in their peaceful protest, if i.   was  serious it would have mentioned Colin Kaepernick by name and called him to come home at last.  Otherwise it’s  just an empty posture. 

****

Trying to get home, I run into barricades set up by the NYPD.  They've created a two block perimeter around the precinct house in every direction. I've got to walk a total of 4 avenues and 2 blocks to get back to my path. When I ask the officer guarding the perimeter why? he says, We can't be having people coming and throwing molotov cocktails at us..."

Guarding the precinct from us

****

Our open mic again is a comfort,  place to gather and share music. And conversation, Tonight I welcome everyone to another concert in the :Grateful Distancing Stay at Home Tour 2020.

welcome ot the tour

****

My Yemeni friends at the corner closes the store at 8 to avoid harrasment by the police over curfew breaking. This has created created problems.  Only two nights left .

****

My neighbors are talking outside. Eddie, part of the post world War II Southern migration to Harlem,  recalls growing up in North Carolina being forced to ride in the back of the  bus.  And recalls  14 cousins perished in a house, burned to death in a fire.. fire set by the Ku Klux Klan. 

Living in coronavirusworld 73: ...It's a hard rain....

6/4

Marching in memory

“Black lives matter, peace-ful protest.”  For the second time the week, I hear the sounds of chanting and march coming by my house. So I go out to see a steady stream of people. This march is more solemn than usual, it’s leading to a gathering in solidarity with George Floyd’s memorial service. Many people are dressed up in suits, their Sunday best.

marching

At the end of the day, I will learn that my housemate and his girl friend were in the march. A phalanx of police cars followed the march.

The police followed

Today the Center Board faces yet a new and unanticipated  challenge. Originally the Program Committee was simply (simply?). dealing with the impact of the coronavirus and response on our program.  Many productions had been shut down midstream, Many contracts left unfulfilled. With it being impossible to even know when reopening might take place, taking care of clients was next to impossible. At one point it seemed that August might be possible, and we had been playing around with idea of a Phoenix festival, as in rising from the ashes of the pandemic to renewed life.  But that possibility is long gone. And that question now has had to become a secondary concern. Our city is under curfew.  Daily protests  with raised fists and voices, scattered violence mark the days. The question becomes, how does an arts organization responsibly respond to the events around it?  This is especially important for an organization that had its birth from a vision to create a center for transformation of the individual and society. We talk about performances. But there are many logistical issues to be dealt with. The idea of conversations begins to emerge, Ted says we are doing this in what is essentially a white neighborhood. And I say, yes, except fr the reamaining public  housing projects that are for the most part ignored. And Ted says and perhaps part of the goal is to find a way to create a dialogue.   As always, that conversation seeking the intersection of beauty and justice, ethics and esthetics,. This current uprising is pushing the Center back to its roots. 

Comes time for my “show” with all the anxiety that accompanies a show in a club or other venue. I want to do it right. My friends Esther and Steve, from the very first edition of my band, have joined me.

Our show....

In addition to our live performances, we also include a video of Esther’s performance in church last Sunday with a song from the Wailin Jennies, Glory Bound. My friend Steve will sing a new song Resistance is holy, based on one of our conversations. What he has done with one phrase is amazing.  Only six people join us  in the ZOOM room, but I am amazed as a crowd builds up on our Facebook live stream.  Friends and colleagues check in from all over, the state of Washington, Atlantic City, Indiana, Illinois, El Paso and Juarez…before we’re done, 269 views,  my largest audience ever. I realize that as a tech naif, I’ve managed to produce a ZOOM show, stream it live on Facebook and even import a video. That feels pretty good. 

All my songs tonight relate to one or the other of the crises. When I first began singing and writing again, I stayed away from social political themes. But the 2016 Republican Convention changed all that. I believed that if I was going to perform, I had to make social witness part of that performance. At the first open mic I played at after the convention, at Maggie Reilly’s, I brought out an angry “Hard rain’s a gonna fall” and host Katelyn said “Good call.”  Since then I’ve written songs, joined the People’s Music Network, played rallies and marches, a full set of “topicals;” at the Peoples’Voice Cafe and at a 100th anniversary of the Russian Revolution event. I’ve sung in Chile during the uprising and at the US-Mexico border wall.  Tonight I’ve added new verses to “We don’t roll that way.” I want to be done with that sing, but the President keeps adding new verses.  I had also set ‘Hard rain…” aside for awhile. But my anger this week brings it back. 

New verses for “We don’t roll that way”

This coronavirus has got us all stuck inside

You can run, you can run, you can run but you cannot hide. 

Come outside everybody and play I heard you say

All I can say is….well until there’s more testing, tracking more reward on antibodies…

We don’t roll that way.

Common governors, do what you want, it’s all okay

Everyone for themselves, that’s the American way

I take no responsibility, I heard you say

All I can say is we don't roll that way.

We    don’t     roll    that way

It’s not the country I believed in, not the way I was raised.

I feel like it’s late and getting darker every day. 

AllI can say is, 

We don’t roll that way.

Rubber bullets, stun grenades and tear gas clear a path to the church

Where you stand with a  Bible and pretend you know what it’s  worth. 

If you don’t back down, I’m sending the army I heard you say

All I can say is, we don’t roll that way

We don’t….

And at the end of Hard rain I add (forgive me,Bob..)

And I’ll call out the am who says he’ll build a Great Wall

And all who stand with him in the Congress Hall

And I’ll sing for the new who take a brave knee

While congress is  silent and black bodies bleed

And I’ll give t to you satrught beef it’s too late

It’ll take strong love to conquer this hate

And it’s a hard…it’s a hard rain….I can’t breathe….a gonna fall….

Concert here:

https://www.facebook.com/robert.l.brashear/videos/10158143012863361/