Because A Black Boy Calls Me "Mama"

Since the death of Trayvon Martin in 2012, I have written blog post after blog post about race only to delete each one out of fear of the opinions of the people I interact with daily and weekly. I've felt the swell of "something" continue to grow inside of me. I can continue to be quiet and seek to live simply and quietly, but I am the mother of a black boy and that puts me in the middle of the racial divide in this country. I am not black so I do not have firsthand knowledge or understanding of what it means to be black in this country. I only have history lessons, books, friends, and the experiences of black people to enlighten me and help me on my journey of understanding. I've spent the last few years reading what I can, listening, thinking, praying, attending conferences on racial reconciliation and I have arrived at a few thoughts. Know that the lens through which I view the world is a Biblical lens. My worldview is determined by God's Word. I won't elaborate on all the thoughts I've had or the conclusions I've drawn in this blog post, but I do hope to begin dialogue. I do hope that people will become interested and begin to ask questions, begin to seek to understand, too.

1. White Privilege Is Real And Every White Person Has It. In my experience this is one of the more difficult things for white people to admit, accept, acknowledge. I never grew up with the idea that I had privilege over anyone. I was the first person in my family to graduate from a four year college. But I equated privilege with money, material things, and prestige. I had none of that.
As I began to seek to understand the racial divide in this country, I began to understand that the fact that I'm white has afforded me privilege in this country. I have never been profiled or considered a thief or thug, or targeted in anyway by law enforcement or other authorities. College was available to me, even though no one in my family had gone before me. I have traversed an easier road in life just because my skin is white. The authorities have always been on my side and I've never had to fear unjust treatment by them.
Admitting white privilege is not an admission of guilt in the sense that it's my fault Alton Sterling is dead or that I have even personally oppressed black people. It's an admission that I have walked an easier road, though not without its own bumps, than my black brothers and sisters. I have never faced discrimination for the color of my skin. For my gender, yes, for my skin color, no.
Further, my black son will most likely not experience the degree of discrimination or profiling that other black boys will because my son is being raised by white people and somehow that makes him "different." I'm not exaggerating or being dramatic in this. There are people who have commented to me that he's being raised "white". In a sense, he is because he does get to benefit from the white privilege that my husband and I have. This makes me incredibly sad for the mamas and daddies whose sons do not get this. It breaks my heart that my whiteness somehow gives my black son a leg up over his counterparts and thus further proves the existence of white privilege. It should not be so.

2. We Can't Use The Gospel As Our Excuse To Do Nothing. I've often heard from my friends who are willing to acknowledge the race problem in America that the gospel is the fix for it. I wholeheartedly agree that the Gospel is the answer to everything, but often these people use "the gospel is the answer" as an excuse to just do nothing. Saying this about race and the issue of continued segregation, especially in our Christian churches, is like saying the gospel is the answer to the number of unreached people groups in the world, yet never going to those countries to share the gospel with them. Or saying the gospel is the answer to poverty in America, yet we never give to others in need, or saying the gospel is the answer to the orphan problem in the world, yet we never open our pocketbooks or our homes to the orphan. We just stay home in our comfortable lives all the while talking about how the gospel is the answer, but really living out the gospel and changing the way we live and think is how the gospel is the answer.
In order for the gospel to truly be the answer to our race issues in America, we, and by we, I mean white Christians, must extend our arms to our black brothers and sisters and say we want to understand, we are listening, we want to join the fight, we want to help. In order for our churches to look more like the Kingdom of God, we have to set aside our traditions, our cultural preferences, our worship styles, our service styles and embrace each other. Personally, I believe white believers should take the initiative in this, but that's an entirely different blog post.

3. Humans Are Not On A Sliding Value Scale. I can mourn the loss of someone even if that someone was involved in criminal activity when it happened. If my sons drive their car too fast and die, am I not allowed to mourn because they got what they deserved? Absolutely not! Black people are upset! I'm upset! They have a right to be upset. They have a right to demand change. Deciding that the death of someone does not merit mourning because you think that person was doing something they shouldn't have been is like saying we are on a sliding scale of value. If we're doing right things, we are valuable. If we're doing bad things, we are not valuable. First, this is not how God operates. His love is unconditional. He proved it was when He sent His Son to die for our sins while we were STILL sinners. We were doing bad things, had wicked hearts, and He said, "You Are Valuable!"

There are questions that need to be asked and answered. There are deeper issues that need to be addressed and it's time to address them. We can no longer be satisfied with soft answers that ask nothing of us. We must stand firm and strong and demand that our fellow image-bearers, our black brothers and sisters be afforded the same privilege that we receive. We must decry any form of bigotry and mistreatment towards them and call it what it is---sin! We must seek to broaden our friend groups and remove ourselves from our white bubbles.
I have a black boy who calls me "mama" and I don't want to tell him that people will treat him differently than his white brother. I don't want to teach him to keep his hands out of his pockets and to never wear his hood on his head in public. I don't want to! But I have to because if I don't, he would not know that there is danger ahead.