An Anti-Racist 7 Last Words

Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. Luke 23:34

A Reflection by Rev. Emily Joye

In all of the Gospels is Christ ever more Christlike than this moment? Okay, maybe when He gets checked by the Syrophoenician womxn and actually gets it. Maybe. Point being: this moment is up there in “Moments Exhibited by Jesus of Nazareth Where You Can’t Deny He’s God.” Missing from earlier manuscripts, either Jesus said it and oral culture preserved it long enough to include it, or the theme of pardonable ignorance became so central to early Christian communities, that they slipped it in. The commentaries call this theme “pardonable ignorance.” As in: forgive those who oppress you because they don’t know any better. You’ve heard it over and over right? He/she/they don’t know any better! Oh come on; it’s just ignorance. Either way, this trend of forgiveness has a strong hold in our tradition; and if I do say so, it has a strong hold in the wider culture too. As a person who does anti-racism work for a living I cannot tell you how often ignorance is excused by those colluding with white supremacy. It’s enraging and exhausting. We could say the same thing about transphobia, xenophobia, and countless other isms/phobias. Seems like we are quicker to forgive ignorance in this society than hold ignorance to the fire. I’m not here for that. And I don’t think that’s what Jesus is praying here. Years ago I had a therapy session where I was working through a relationship with a family member. That family member had been abusive to me in several ways. I kept teeter-tottering between the appropriate rage I felt in response to my pain and the need to release the rage which kept me locked up. My therapist--a young white womxn, and non-theistic Jew--asked me about forgiveness and I remember rolling my eyes. But then she asked me what I actually believed about oppressive people. We went back and forth about that for a while, and then she said something about how by committing abuse/oppression he was sacrificing his own humanity, that he was harming himself, and didn’t know it. That I could get behind. When I think about those who were putting Jesus on the cross, and those who put Trayvon Martin and Sandra Bland and Matthew Shepherd and so many other victims of senseless violence on the cross, I can’t help but see those perpetrators in that light: as people sacrificing their own humanity. It’s one thing to kill the body; we know what comes on the third day. it’s another to kill your own soul. 

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Today you will be with me in paradise. Luke 23:43

A Reflection by Rev. Dominique Atchison

How can this moment speak to those seeking to be productive anti-racist allies? In order to answer this question, we must look at this text a little differently than we usually do. We must look at it through a more radical, anti-racist lens. Jesus’ innocent suffering body now represents the injustice and brutality waged against innocent black and brown bodies. There are two people on either side who may not be implicated in the his suffering in the moment but they are in need of redemption. They are in need of a pathway to that redemption. They see Jesus as that pathway. Both of them had the same goal and need but different approaches. The first one arrogantly barked at Jesus in a way that not only showed is lack of belief and acknowledgement of Jesus and his suffering but also showed his sense of entitlement. The second rebukes the first and acknowledges the injustice of the moment. Additionally, the second one acknowledges who Jesus was without mocking or questioning if Jesus truly was who he said he was. And baring all of that in mind, asks Jesus for help to find his own redemption. The behavior and belief of the second criminal leads Jesus to these words, “today you will be with me in paradise.” For white people living in the legacy of privilege, you may be searching for a pathway to relinquish that privilege. Joining a movement, expressing your rage, doing the active work of anti-racism, is important to the process. What this text shows us is the way we approach the work is as essential to the process as getting the work done. We can approach with arrogance, entitlement and lingering disbelief that the suffering before us is real. Or we can approach with humility, an acknowledgement of the injustice of it all and with a willingness to believe the stories and experiences of those who have suffered are real and true.Only one of those choices leads to true redemption. 

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Behold your son: behold your mother. John 19:27

A Reflection by Dr. Gabrie'l Atchison

The story of Mary at the foot of the cross reminds me of a lesser well-known story of a mother in the Bible who keeps a vigil over the body of her son. In 2 Samuel, Rizpah (whose name means ‘a hot stone’) was a concubine of Saul. Her two sons were murdered along with five sons of another woman through the orders of David, and their bodies were left impaled on a hilltop. Rizpah spread a sackcloth on a rock and stayed up night and day to watch over the bodies of all seven sons. “She did not allow the birds of heaven to touch them during the
day or the wild animals during the night.” (2 Samuel 21:10) After a time, David was moved by Rizpah’s actions and gave her sons and the others a proper burial.  Many theologians like Karen Baker-Fletcher and James Cone have likened the crucifixion to the lynching of black
bodies. The ‘strange fruit’ of the lynch mob was always a public event, but now cell phone witnesses and police cam videos allow us to witness contemporary lynching. In 1955, Mamie Till was a mother who decided to have an open casket funeral for her son Emmett Till, so the
world could see the brutality inflicted on her son. Like Rizpah, her act was a vigil keeping the broken body in the forefront until justice could be served. I began this season of Lent thinking about Erica Garner who literally sacrificed her life in her twenties trying to get
justice for her father, Eric Garner; and I end the season of Lent wondering about the pain of Sequita Thompson, grandmother of Stephon Clark, who now has to walk the same path. Jesus tells his mother, “behold your son” as she prepares to watch him die a painful death.
Then he tells his disciple, “behold your mother”, and the disciple prepares to take Mary in, and take care of her. I believe, Jesus’s statement challenges us to ‘take in’ all the mothers, grandmothers and daughters who have to witness their loved ones die at the hands of the
police – by continuing to bear witness to their grief and by standing with them in their struggle for justice.

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My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Matthew 27:46

A Reflection by Rev. Dominique Atchison

Lament is a tradition that has been lost in modern day Christianity. We tend to want to understand our faith as something that we can plug into so that we no longer have to feel the difficulty of the world. Yet there is nothing like Good Friday to remind us that the feel-good-only interpretation of our faith is not exactly accurate. There is honestly a lot of difficulty that comes with journeying with Jesus. Jesus himself was not exempt from painful experiences that called for lament. In this moment Jesus  is quoting the Psalms, which is a book filled with both powerful faith and powerful lament. Apparently, our faith does not see these things as religious contradictions. I wonder what it would look like for those of us who engage in racial justice work to embrace the Psalms as our biblical book of choice. What would it look like if we could both be faithful to the cause of speaking truth to power and disrupting systems off oppression while also taking moments to simply go to God with our laments: My God, my God why have you forsaken me. My God My God why have you allowed such injustice to thrive in the world? My God My God will it ever get better? My God my God will your people learn how to live in equity? I think our movements might be healthier if we re-embrace the lament tradition. We may find our movements will thrive if we begin to find safe spaces where we can be free of the expectation of constant strength. The movement may become healthier if we can learn how to simply name our feelings and emote. Additionally, the practice of lament releases us from having to be fixers. It gives the problem and the power to fix it back to God. It stops us from feeling solely  responsible for fixing the world. It lifts the world off our our shoulders and gives it back to God. e

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I am thirsty. John 19:28

A Reflection by Rev. Emily Joye
Could you ask for assistance from the people who were about to kill you? It’s hard to project what any of us would do while incarcerated and tortured, on the verge of our last breath. But this particular moment in scripture always astounds me. It says in the text that Jesus asked for something to drink in order to fulfill the scripture. Exegets will point you to Psalm 69 in order to understand that foreshadowing and fulfillment. But for me, the textual history is less important than the theological manifestation happening in this scene. This text is the fulfillment of the incarnation; it is the ultimate assurance that, yes, Jesus was human, from start to finish. To thirst and to thirst enough in bondage that one has to ask one’s oppressors for mercy--what might Jesus’ have come to know in those last minutes about the frailty of flesh? It causes me to tremble.  

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It is finished. John 19:30

A Reflection by Dr. Gabrie'l Atchison
In John 19:30, Jesus exclaims, “it is finished” and then he bows his head and dies. However, the promise and beauty of Easter means that Jesus’s death is followed by a resurrection and an ascension marking the victory of life over death. This leads me to believe that what is
finished is not Jesus’s life or his impact but rather what Jesus came to accomplish. Jesus’s birth was met with so much anticipation and so much trepidation on the part of those in power, because he was the fulfillment of the prophecy.  Jesus spoke in parables, because he knew that most people couldn’t understand the importance of what his presence really meant. Jesus says, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.” (Mark 1:14-16) In the story of the alabaster jar, the people around
Jesus become angry when a woman uses her expensive oil to anoint Jesus. He explains that the woman is the only one in the room who truly understands how important his presence really is. He says, “The poor will always be with you, but you will not always have me.”
(Matthew 26:11) Jesus did what he came to do. His ordeal on the cross and walking in the world with human limitations had indeed come to an end. Additionally, the broken body of Christ symbolizes the end of the separation between humankind and God and the end of a need for us to separate ourselves. As we pray for God to give us our daily bread and as we take Communion, we are celebrating a sense of wholeness. The broken Christ body becomes unbroken through repairing the breach, healing and helping others find paths to healing. Jesus tells Simon Peter “If you love me … feed my sheep” and “ … follow me”. (John 21:
15-19) The feeding of the sheep involves spiritual fulfillment as well as making sure everyone has their basic needs met. Social justice is the method which allows us to ‘break every yoke’ of those who are oppressed. When Jesus proclaims, “it is finished”, I believe it means
that the time of separation is finished. The more we can recognize that Jesus was the fulfillment of God’s promises and that the time of the Kingdom is “at hand”, the more we can set about the work of bringing everyone back into the fold.

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Father, into Your hands I commend my Spirit. Luke 23:46

A Reflection by Rev. Dominique Atchison 

When we think about ancestors, we often thinking about people who are long gone. As an African American, I think of my African ancestors who lived on the continent before the slave trade. I think about enslaved ancestors. I even think about my grandparents and great grandparents. I think about people who were born before I was born. But it occurred to me that in black and brown communities we have a set of ancestors who were born after I was born. We have a group of young ancestors who died way before it was their time to die: Sandra Bland born in 1987. Rekia Boyd born 1989. Erica Garner born 1990. Trayvon Martin born in 1995. Michael Brown born in 1996. Stephon Clark born in 1996. Tamir Rice born in 2002. Aiyana Jones born 2002. We have a set of young ancestors who are crying out for justice and longing for rest for their spirit. And there are so many of us who are working toward justice. But as we do that, we pray that their souls find rest: Into you hands oh God I commend the spirits of those who have lost their lives to racialized violence. May they find rest in Your hands. 

Amen.