Non In Honere Odio: A Lament for American Democracy

Portland, Oregon from Washington Park.

It was a beautiful Sunday, with sunshine breaking a midday shower, as sprinkles of rain fell among the brilliant bursts of red, yellow, and pink in the Rose Garden at Washington Park. The green space, thick with groves of tall Douglas Firs, armored with bark hardy against whatever ecological changes shaped this landscape before this city grew up around it, was no doubt named for this nation's first President. He was a man who owned a stately plantation, fought the majority of his military career in the Royal Army of King George II and III, and owned many slaves before writing their freedom into his will. A politician second and a duty-bound soldier first, his actions shaped the course of this land, even though we stood on the other side of the continent from the battlefields of the American Revolution. In fact, the city of Portland, as the largest urbanization of the state of Oregon, is quite close to the end of the exploratory path traced by Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, two landed men of infuence from President Thomas Jefferson's circles. The territories opened up by their exploration had incredible consequences on the expansion of the American nation from a Confederation of colonies to a formidable nation-state surging on a tide of religious zeal and military strength. Though not every soldier was equally cognizant of his yoking to such a force, the character of this expansion became obvious to anyone on the other side of Destiny's manifest: America was an Empire.

It is true that this Empire emerged from the colonial (mis)management of European powers. The Spanish, French, Dutch, and Anglo-Brittanic Imperial forces all preceded the particular conquests of America. Some of them dealt with ambivalence towards the Indigenous peoples (Spain and France, owing to the work of the Catholic missionaries accompanying the conquistadors and explorers), or outright brutality (Britain and the Netherlands). Staring out over the beautiful city of Portland, surrounded by green mountains and the mild mediterranean climate of the Oregon interior, it is no wonder that the British settlers wanted to stake a particular claim to this space. No matter the hundreds of thousands of Native peoples that called this place home, many of whom understand the universe and cosmos in the explicit context of the local topography. In fact, the entire legal system of land titles in this nascent nation regarded these Natives as little more than "occupiers," with no right to ownership. It's fine; they won't mind: don't Indians have no concept of land ownership anyway?

The particular history of Oregon continued to darken beyond the horizons of Manifest Destiny and the ethnic cleansing that followed Lewis and Clark. White settlers in the Oregon Territory from the east forbade slavery within the jurisdiction in 1844, but also forbade freed black people from being in the region, under the penalty of torture. The constitution of the new State of Oregon in 1857 incorporated a clause of exclusion for all black citizens, slave or free, and disgustingly, the ban on blacks remained in effect until 1916, coupled with a mandatory tax for all ethnic minorities. The culture of Portland remains idolized by young millennials as a Mecca of liberal progression, diversity of thought, and individual expression. Its ubiquity as the face of young adult "hipsterdom" is obvious to the point of parody. Do I have a problem with the fact that I only see white faces as I walk down the street, perhaps apart from the few obvious tourists from California like me? I should not blame a place to be anything more than it is. For Portland in particular, and Oregon in general to show me the face of the legacy of institutional racism in this country is perhaps more straightforward than in my own hometown.

But the day that I walked with my partner through the quiet groves of Douglas Fir, Western Hemlock, and Redcedar, the racialized realities of this nation exploded in a way that continues to tear into my consciousness. Across the country in Albemarle County, centered on the modest and historic college town of Charlottesville, Virginia, the face of abject racism reared its face with violent force. By day's end, thousands clashed as white supremacists marched through the grounds of Thomas Jefferson's University campus, bearing torches and shouting in chilling unison "You will not replace us! Jews will not replace us!" Beyond them and filling the alleyways were armor-clad militia coming to support the hatred: riot shields, gas masks, and assault rifles in tow. The normally (quietly) progressive town of Charlottesville had become stained with the blood of three Americans: two police officers killed in a helicopter crash, and one counterprotestor, killed when a white supremacist Neo-Nazi drove a car through a crowd.

We mourn the dead. Their deaths continue to add in the senseless tally of losses to racial hatred in this country. The pain was real for me, though centered in this incident's geography: I remember many times journeying to the grounds of UVA, hosted by my loving (and very white) Virginian family from rural Albemarle County. Their home was just a few miles out of town amidst the rolling hills and wood copses.The context of my upbringing was again driven into sharp relief as I remember my own education as a child in the shadow of the Confederacy, driving to church past the literal shrines of dead Rebel generals.

As a child I cried aloud with others as a bystander to war reenactments meant to bring dignity to a defeated cause. I traveled to sites like Jamestown (and its replication of a Powhatan Native American village) without questioning where the great civilization of indigenous peoples had gone. I could have continued to hide behind the abstractions of history, a particular trade, or the merit of trivial knowledge.

Instead, I found Jesus.

Yes, my evangelical upbringing engendered my journey to one of personalized faith valuing the authority of Scripture and an individual ownership of my relationship with God. But as the years progressed and my faith evolved beyond the strict confines of conservative religion, I was forced to address the growing disconformity between the demands of this Jesus, his treatment of women, outcasts, and "sinners," and the spiritualized allegiance of the American church and its national government. America is proud of its legacy of religious freedom, its separation of church and state, and this history has allowed an unprecedented flourishing of myriad varieties of Christianity within its borders. But new arrivals from beyond them put stress upon the privileged varieties of Protestantism, while simultaneously giving older settlers reason to resent and scapegoat these immigrants. As I write this, my own community soaks in anxiety over the President's impending repeal of President Obama's Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), and the implications of such an action on millions whose lives have been legitimized, even slightly, in the eyes of their nation. Such young people, arriving with their parents years before they formed their own concepts of nationality, race, or even ethnic identity, now question if the state will have a legal imperative to knock down their doors and tear them from their homes into an alien context. How the vast majority of white evangelicals, who emerged after the last election as the most important single political group in this nation, could monolithically support such actions seems to be an utter betrayal of the principles of Christian discipleship, to human decency, and to the basic understandings of what it means to follow Jesus.

To be an ally of Jesus is dangerous, and in my estimation is now essentially illegal. For supporting my neighbors, immigrants, refugees, and sexual minorities, I am an enemy of the state. Does this mean that I will suffer the same consequences as they do? Of course not. I do not presume to understand the horror of such an impending threat as the repeal of DACA. But I am proud to oppose this regime with absolute resolve, because I do not kneel to this nation's false gods and pay homage to its altars.

Of course I will continue to pay taxes, to respect the temporal authority of law enforcement and the military. Jesus was quick to disrupt his critics in their accusations, but he also reminded us who indeed belong to the Father and Creator of all. Our currency may show the embossed images of rulers and statesmen; mixes of good and bad in them all just like me. But every child of Lincoln and Jefferson, Roosevelt and Kennedy bears no more dignity than the PTSD-wracked children from Syria waiting in airport halls, or the fieldworkers who leave early to work in the sweltering heat of this Central Valley every day of the week. Tomorrow is a day set aside for rest from Labor, honoring the work of unions and worker organizations for their contributions to what we understand as our American economic system. It is thus a celebration of what, in essence "makes America great." Because we have denied these rights to the undocumented, to refugees, and others, we understand implicitly that the quality of "democracy" in this country is intimately linked with our economy, with what makes each of us awaken each day, with what structures the very social fabric of our lives. Do I pretend that my life is not a part of such a system, with this simple analysis? Of course not. Thus I depend on the infinite grace of God who knows full well the entire story of whichever worker in a developing nation that sewed my clothes together. But I cannot pretend that our values are not suspect unless we name and defend our own convictions accurately as people who claim to follow the crucified enemy of the Roman state. We must remember that every Empire operated with almost godlike arrogance to claim that "progress" and "perfection" were found within the societal and economic systems that it creates. Even the "pagan" Assyrian, Babylonian, and Persian cultures made indelible contributions to our biblical narrative through their interaction with the exiled Jewish community. The Israelites had the prophets to correct the collusion with power that abrogated their first allegiance: a covenant commitment to creating a better society than those outside of that covenant. This meant keeping the Sabbath and saying the prayers, yes, but it meant the equitable distribution of property, the dignified treatment of foreigners, and utter care for the poor and marginalized. Jesus stepped into a religious landscape rent with dissent. The Pharisees and Sadducees both fancied that they, and not the other, would rise on the Last Day at Mount Zion. They both leveled their criticism at this bastard from Galilee, with his funny accent and questionable bloodline, to preserve their ideology.

Jesus did not respond to them directly, but instead showed us, through responses, teachings, and parables, how this New Thing works. I am fascinated by what the New Testament writers do not tell us, namely, how that first gathering of disciples, including within their ranks a religious extremist and a tax collector on the Imperial payroll, did not devolve into bloodshed. Somehow they emerged to start the most influential movement in history. Unfortunately their descendants did not practice this same example of radical inclusion, where transformation is born in the crucible of authentic relationships. What could it look like if we chose to do so in our cities, churches, and neighborhoods?

My own heart is healing from years of racial trauma in contexts sick with white supremacy. I could not carry on in that process without the incredible grace of trusted friends who could not be more different than me. A few of my closest friends have burned out of church and suffer psychological illnesses, disillusionment, and even the rejection of their very families. Still, an important distinction marks them for me: they are white men. These are white men whom I would have regarded as spoiled with privilege, and yet they bear wounds strikingly similar to those scars in my own heart. They will never understand what it is like to inhabit this skin, where one day I feel proud to claim my heritage as a Latino and Native American man, and the next I recoil in shame because my fair skin and overall appearance do not grant me trust among other partners who are people of color. But they are my brothers, and I would give my life for them. We show them that we can be different than the rest of the tribes that fight like wolves for meat at the table of this nation. We are Republicans, Democrats, Green Party, and undocumented. We are white, black, red, yellow, and brown. We are straight and gay and question our gender. We are depressed, anxious, and angry. We are full of hope. We are hopeless and fall into despair. We work for this radical community beyond all of us. We believe. We lost faith years ago. We strive to see the emergent Kingdom of God.

This is not a lament for the future of American Democracy. This is a eulogy for the reality of its death. With every hour that passes in this nation's leadership the tide turns from a generalized nostalgic nationalism to full blown totalitarian oppression. In every death, there is cause to mourn. There are many, many dead to remember. Yet even as the disgruntled African lawyer Tertullian said, the blood of these witnesses is the seed of the church. Can a renewal of genuine Christian discipleship emerge from the ashes of this America? Can we cry out with the songs of liberation that marked people from Moses' time to Gandhi's to Martin Luther King, Jr.'s? This song burns in my lungs, and my singing is mingled with sobs that erupt with every new act of terror that arises from within this nation. Glory is emergent...creation groans...the skies and oceans quake. We can finally take heart in the brilliant light of the Savior: our redemption is at hand.

Or so I hope.