Disciple: St. Philip's Is Talking About Racism
By Summerlee Walter
“St. Philip’s is talking about racism.” So proclaims the large banner displayed on the front lawn of the church since September 16, 2015.
Inside the building, a passionate group of parishioners has been engaged in intentional conversations and discernment surrounding how their parish can address racism head on. Their efforts are a response to the racial tensions that have become a focal point of national dialogue in the wake of events in Ferguson, Baltimore and Cleveland.
While the sign hanging from the church is new, the Rev. Jonah Kendall, rector of St. Philip’s, views it as a logical next step in the church’s long history as a leading progressive voice in downtown Durham.
“St. Philip’s didn’t just come upon this; it’s part of the church’s identity and mission,” Kendall explains.
CHOOSING TO STAY
Located in the eastern part of downtown Durham, St. Philip’s was there to witness the area’s downward spiral into economic depression during the 1960s. A debate ensued among parishioners as to whether the congregation should stay in the area or relocate. They decided to stay, taking on their challenging location as a central part of the church’s ministry. At the time, this engagement led to the creation of a soup kitchen that would eventually grow into Urban Ministries of Durham, still located next to the church.
The church’s engagement with social issues continued into the 80s and 90s when St. Philip’s became involved with the burgeoning population of Liberian and Sierra Leonean refugees. Their presence at St. Philip’s marked the start of the real racial and cultural diversity at St. Philip’s. The presence of refugees in the congregation attracted more diversity as it became the norm.
“There’s a deep-seated history of trying to respond to the needs of the parish’s surrounding area,” Kendall says. “There’s a culture of inclusivity and support and a sense of community.”
According to Kendall, then Bishop Michael Curry’s call to go to Galilee came together with the church’s ongoing intentional effort to be a Beloved Community and yielded the results St. Philip’s sees today.
ENGAGING IN DIFFICULT CONVERSATIONS
After Ferguson, people at St. Philip’s wanted to talk about race and racism in society. Two or three parishioners who wanted to think about racism started having conversations with Kendall about how to engage the congregation in such a ministry. Soon larger groups began to coalesce around the goals of engaging institutional racism as a societal sin and supporting members who were dealing with how to be a person of color in Durham. The group of 12 - a biblical number, senior warden Sue Guptill notes - was composed of people who had in some way been involved with anti-racism activities or had expressed significant interest.
Early on the group recognized the importance of intentionally building trust among its members. To that end, they invited the Rev. Ollie Rencher, rector at St. Peter’s, Charlotte, to lead a retreat in March 2015. The group members began to build a common vocabulary and feel more comfortable talking about race.
“There’s a difference between personal prejudice - which we all honestly have to grapple with - and being a beneficiary of white privilege whether we choose to be or not,” Guptill explains. “There are a lot of examples of how white people might be benefitting from white privilege without even knowing it.... It’s not that I chose to discriminate against a person, but that’s how the system sometimes works.
“You might not know it, but once you know it you can’t unknow it. And once you know it and do nothing about it, you are guilty of a sin of omission.”
THE NON-PLAN PLAN
The group’s early work led to the creation of the Racial Justice and Reconciliation Ministry, a body tasked with regularly putting the issues of race and racism before the congregation. So far, the congregation has participated in book studies (Michelle Alexander’s The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness), invited speakers (Cornell professor Dr. Ed Baptist, Jr., who grew up in St. Philip’s), held forums, took a trip to the plantation at Stagville State Historic Site and engaged in lots of conversations.
“Some people have asked, ‘When are we going to do something?’ but the reality is we are doing something through the dialogue across racial lines,” Kendall explains.
Current and future initiatives at St. Philip’s include a Lenten program talking about sin that uses racism as a tangible expression of sin and an intergenerational event at Pentecost exploring how racial reconciliation relates to that holy day.
“It was an important decision that we drifted into that we wouldn’t lay out a plan for the next several years,” Guptill says. “We’ve let the Holy Spirit lead us and been blind to those movements until they happened.”
While the congregation has engaged deeply with the difficult work of racial reconciliation, the clergy, vestry and committee members have also worked hard to engage people’s anxieties surrounding the anti-racism work St. Philip’s has undertaken. The banner itself took nine months to move from idea to reality. Some parishioners were concerned hanging the banner could invite retaliation from somewhere in the Durham community. Others, while supportive of anti-racism work, thought the banner seemed like the church was bragging. Another said, “Before we put a banner up, we better be sure it’s true.” As a result, the Racial Justice and Reconciliation Ministry spent several months thinking carefully about exactly what message they were trying to convey.
“We made sure to communicate to the congregation everything we were doing ahead of when we planned to do it,” Kendall explains. “We were careful and deliberate.”
“People are in different places and have experienced different things, so not every parish can start in the same place, but every parish can start somewhere,” Guptill says. “You don’t have to dive into the flames, but you can get closer and closer to the heat.”
LEARN MORE
The 200th Annual Convention passed Resolution 200.3 asking each congregation to undertake at least one initiative aimed at addressing systemic racial inequity and injustice every year.
The diocesan Committee on Racial Justice and Reconciliation has compiled an extensive list of resources for individuals and congregations interested in engaging race and racism. The committee has also scheduled “Seeing the Face of God In Each Other” anti-racism seminars for the spring.
Resources, and information about the seminar are available here.
Summerlee Walter is the communications coordinator for the Diocese of North Carolina.
Tags: North Carolina Disciple
