A letter to my sisters: 

My very first airplane flight was when I was a small child. I was the flower girl in my aunt and uncles wedding, but we lived on opposite sides of the country. So my family packed up a little bag of entertainment for me to survive our plane ride. All I remember about that flight is playing with paper dolls. Do you all remember them? The bodies were essentially cardboard cutouts. The clothes covered the front of the body by folding the small tabs around the edges. For much of the flight my paper dolls tried on various dresses, shorts, hats, even sunglasses. I could dress her in casual clothes or I could make her truly fancy. Moment by moment, I was deciding who she was and I was engrossed in my own imagination. 

When I first started working towards racial justice and reconciliation, I had a really bad habit of making myself into a paper doll. For years I would walk into a white space let the room dictate whether I should be casual or fancy, easy going or passionate, outspoken or quiet. I allowed people to tell me who I am, but more devastating, I let them tell me who I am not. 

Not multifaceted. 

Not a leader. 

Not playful. 

Not present. 

Not effective. 

Not needed. 

In my desire to be a change agent, I lost myself. The weight of the paper dresses and hats and sunglasses became too much. They became too much when I realized that I am nobody's blank slate. I am fully human and fully alive. I am not perfect. I am not finished growing. But my body does not exist for the whims of others. 

Ever since the Charleston Massacre, I have been trying to figure out what to say to my sisters. Is there anything left to say? We watched Dajerria's body suffer the trauma of unregulated power. We pushed back against Dolezal's stories while so many people denied, minimized or erased our own complicated narratives of life in a black female body. We mourned 6 women shot to death in their church by a white male claiming to be concerned about white women being raped. And this was just the month of June. 

Most days we must wake up and reject the simple, ill-fitting, paper-thin narratives of who we are and who we should be. We live in a world where we must convince others that our stories matter, that our bodies are traumatized, that our voices are needed, that we are brilliant 

vulnerable

goofy 

gifted 

spiritual 

inquisitive 

curious 

real. 

We are real. We are real people with hopes and dreams. There are places we want to visit. There are people we want to meet. There are many different ways we wish to leave out mark on the world. We are unique. Contrary to popular belief we each carry our own personality, our own way of engaging culture, our own histories, our own styles, our own interests. We are not impervious to those around us. We feel pain, many of us deeply. We know disappointment. We are intimately familiar with anger and numbness and passion and joy. We are messy. I breathe our culture in, and out again into the world transformed.  

You, my sister, are no one's paper doll. 

Your body is worthy of care. Your body is worthy of care.  Your body is worthy of care. Your feelings are valid, your worth immeasurable, your legacy is still being written. 

I know this cruel and dangerous world would have you believe differently. It would have you believe that you are wrong. Not that what you think is wrong, or what you believe is wrong, but that you are wrong: your body, language, culture, knowing. We, together, must reject this message. Your body is strong but worthy of gentleness. Your language is beautiful and complete, your culture is vibrant and rooted, your knowing is deep and vast. 

I know these words do not save you from pain, but I hope they help you through it. I know these words dont take away the fear, but I hope they inspire courage to keep being yourself. I know these words dont fix it, but I hope they offer just a glimpse of healing. I know these words aren't wide enough to cover all the places where it hurts, but I hope your wounds are safe here. 

I hope your wounds are safe here. 

-Austin 

On Saturday morning we were schedule to have our third chat on Radical Reconciliation. But I have to be honest. I am not in a place to talk about reconciliation in any authentic way. The unfolding, unending nightmare of racial injustice and hatred is quite frankly overwhelming in this moment. 

But rather than cancel altogether, our friend, Kelley, had a great idea. Lets instead come together to lament. You can use prayers or poetry, Scripture or your own words. Just use #WeLament at the end of each post so we can all see the posts. Feel free to post all weekend long. 

This is, of course, only practice for what I hope we will all being doing in our community spaces. This is not a substitute for the power of lamentation in real life, but I hope it helps to practice in this space. 

We will figure out how and when to return to our book chat, but for now, we lament. 

I need to open by asking for grace for the words I am typing now. I need grace because I am not super human or super woman. On Wednesday night I was laying in bed, finally getting over a cold. I was about to turn on the Golden Girls as I fell asleep when I decided to check my phone one more time. When I opened it, I saw immediately Chris Hayes describe a shooting in a black church in 140 characters. I have been through a range of emotions since that moment- grief, rage, frustration, numbness. I have wept and pounded on tables. Much of my emotional journey is all over twitter where I generally don’t hold back my humanity. I say all this to drive home the point that I am human, with deep feelings and emotions over what has transpired. I do not feel “strong”. I don’t feel “passionate”. I feel grossly, overwhelmingly human. But I don’t know what else to do besides write. I hope that my words will be helpful to someone, but please know, they just might be more for me to make sense of the world, than to change it.

I’ll start with a confession. Last night when I went to bed, I just knew by the time I woke up we would know who the shooter was and that he would be apprehended. I couldn’t believe it when I discovered the shooter was still at large. However, within just a few minutes new reports started pouring in that the suspected shooter had been captured. As various officials were interviewed there was a resounding theme. “Safety has been restored.”

“Our community can now come together.”

“Now the healing process can begin.”

“The threat is now over.”

Though I understand what these officials meant. I want to say that safety has not been restored. I am glad the suspect is in custody. I really am. I am glad for the country, but I am mostly glad for the community of Charleston and anyone that was afraid their home, church, community center or neighborhood might be another target. But my gratefulness does not extend far enough to create any sense of safety. For the next few weeks, maybe even months, black churchgoers will not feel safe because we know the threat is not over.

There have been far too many mass shootings in America. I still remember watching columbine and Virginia Tech unfold on the news screen. More recently I remember crying over Sandyhook, shock over the movie theater shooting, fear that my own mentor could have been a victim of the shooting at Seattle Pacific University. Those were frightening, awful, gut wrenching moments in their own right. They and many more ripped our hearts out, created trauma for so many families. But this is different.

Though the weapon is the same, gun violence, this is different because the driving force was white supremacy, this act the epitome of racism, the goal to kill black people. The level of terror that black people feel in America at this moment cannot be underestimated. Because when the driving force of such a massacre is the very thing imbedded in the roots of America, thriving on the branches of generation after generation, sitting in the pews unchallenged every Sunday morning in white churches- there is no reason why black Americans should feel safe.

The sin of white supremacy is thriving in this country because white Christians refuse to name it and uproot it, refuse to confess it and dismantle it, refuse to acknowledge it and repent of it, refuse to say the words

“Its in my family”

“Its in my church”

“Its in my soul.”

Every time I write about race, someone white says “just know it isn’t all of us,” believing this will bring me comfort. It is offered as balm, but fails miserably. I would much rather people say, “I see this sin in my own heart, my own life, my own church and I am working to uproot it. I don’t want to be this way, and I will do the work to submit this ugliness before Christ.” That’s what I want to hear. Creating distance from it doesn’t serve me, doesn’t bring me comfort. Because it is in all of us. White supremacy has infected all of us who know America. If I have to deal with the white supremacist notions within myself, than I don’t want to hear about how “its not all of us”. It is. It is all of us who must learn to love blackness as an equal and authentic image of God. 

Some of us are doing that work. Naming that work. Wrestling through that work.

And others are content to let it grow. And I need you to know those are the only two choices. There is no such thing as neutrality. You are either nurturing love or hate. There is no middle ground, no third way, no alternative.

There is this pervasive belief that Christians can simply choose to be tolerant, or polite, or even kind. There is this sense that as long as certain lines aren’t crossed, that you’re okay. As long as you don’t tell the racist joke, as long as you had a really good reason for moving into an all white community, as long as you never say nigger, as long as you do charity work, as long as you go on the mission trip, as long as you never do anything mean- then you’re alright. Not so.

Jesus has two commandments. “...You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your mind and with all your soul. This is the first and greatest commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” (Matt 22:37-39). The second is like it. So loving your neighbor as yourself is like loving God with all your heart and all your mind and all our soul. Love. 1 John 4:20 says this, “If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.” Cannot.

I need you to know that these two verses fly in the face of the sin if white supremacy and racism. To not uproot white supremacy from the mind, heart and soul is to miss the mark on loving your neighbor as yourself and is hatred toward God. I repeat. The sin of racism is hatred toward God. Racism is hatred toward and denial of blackness as an equal and authentic image of God. Now you can let that live if you want to. You can try to wrap it up so tight that it never leaks out. You can try to bury it so far deep that no one ever knows. You can try to avoid contact so that you never say anything stupid. You can try to cover it up so that no one ever calls you out. You can try to fix on MLK day but let it linger every other day. You can talk about it once a year from the pulpit. You can remain silent and never speak of it at all. Those are all options. But it allows hate to live.

Those verses do not say:

Just tolerate one another.

Just be nice to each other.

Just don’t say anything stupid.

Just go volunteer.

Just take the mission trip.

Just don’t be rude.

Just give them some money.

Just build a center.

Just attend a multicultural church.

Just make sure you have one black friend,

Black family member

Black child

God demands love. Love toward God. Love toward humanity.

This love is a decision, and too many Christians have made their choice by simply refusing to acknowledge the power, the depths, the reality of white supremacy in America.

This shooter took white supremacy to its only logical conclusion- death. Now you might never shoot anyone, or plant bombs, or brutalize anyone. That’s entirely possible, but is that really your threshold, your standard for determining the health of your heart, mind and soul? My life might depend on whether or not you, your family, your church are willing to uproot racism and nurture love or instead continue to let the same evil that compelled this shooter to pull the trigger, to live on in your soul.

I hope you will choose love today and tomorrow and for the rest of your life.

I wrote on twitter that every church in America should be talking about this shooting on Sunday. But you know what? My real fear isn’t that churches will ignore the shooting. My fear is that churches will underestimate it. I fear that it will alter one Sunday’s plans and nothing else. I fear that the words will be reduced to one lone shooter, to one silent moment, to one prayer. I fear that it will change nothing about every Sunday thereafter, that it will inspire nothing of lasting significance, that no one will make a declaration to kick racism out of the pews. My real fear is that this moment will slip by just as so many others have, that white churches will refuse to see their own reflection. Or that they will and simply turn away.

That is the fear of black Americans because white supremacy is deadly. And people who look like me are its victims.

And despite this reality. We are still here. We still speak truth to power. We will mourn and cry and lament and wail. But we also fight. We resist. We refuse to be erased. My words here will be joined with hundreds maybe thousands of other black writers who will declare that we wont lay down, we wont hide, we wont go away quietly. You haven’t heard the last from us. We fight on. 

* this is unedited. and honestly i dont plan to edit it anytime soon. I'll do my best as i notice typos. I hope none are so egregious as to miss my meaning. If you want to tweet and know there is a mistake, feel free to fix it. Its all so raw right now. I need to take my time before re-feeling all these words. thanks to readers who have stuck with me through all of my demanding posts. welcome to new readers. get comfortable because demanding is my new norm.*

She sits down in the hard chair using a cushion to soften the feeling. She knows she is in for a long wait. Her hair is washed and ready to go. Netflix is on and she has already decided what she will watch as the woman above her uses a rat tail comb to part and section her thick hair. Her hair is soft and its slight red hue can be seen under the direct light. As the braids start to form, she gets used to the click, click, click of nails taking up the same space to twist the three strands together. After the first movie has gone off, she needs a break to stand, to stretch, to unfold. She turns her neck back and forth as she reaches up to touch what has been done. Progress. She smiles to herself, enjoying the length of the braids. She knows there is still a long way to go, as she returns to the chair. Another movie. And then another. At this point the excitement is completely gone. All there is the sheer will for a finished product, and sleepiness. So much sleepiness. There are more breaks for both. More stretching and laughing. More yawns and shared looks of determination. And then she hears the words, "Last one." Suddenly she is wide awake. Click, click, click... silence. She has done it. With a head full of braids she hugs the soft body of the woman who dedicated her time and energy to this project. She slips her the cash she deserves and runs off for advil and a scarf. She is still in for a long night as she attempts to sleep through the pain, but she is satisfied. The braids mean freedom. The freedom of time because she will no longer have to do her hair in the morning unless she feels like it. The freedom to swim without worry about what her hair is doing or how it looks as she bobs in and out of the water. The freedom to enjoy her summer, to get up and go. 

She never expected. 

She never expected to have a violent encounter with an officer as she grabbed her towel and shimmied into her bathing suit. She flipped her braids around, enjoying them more now that the pain has disappeared. 

She never expected that she and her crew would walk barefoot in the street, wrapped in towels to get away from the startling discord of the party atmosphere and the racially charged words hanging in the air. 

She never expected that the officer would grab her arm. Her feet no longer stable, she is completely confused. Her reaction is to fight. The only time she has ever been treated like this was that one fight with that one girl years ago over some silly stuff. Her body is yanked again. She is trying to talk, to yell, to demand her mothers presence. She can hear her friends calling out to her, she hears in their horrified voices the confirmation that this isn't right. Her body continues to fight as he pulls her braids, yanking her tender scalp. Her body falls. She kicks her legs still trying to regain some measure of dignity. She feels the officer press one knee and then two onto her small frame. She cant breathe. The weight of him and all his gear is too much. She wants her mother. She wants her mother. She cries out, unwilling to let this treatment go unnoticed. She will be heard. 

Her long brown legs. Her braids covering her face. Her cries for her momma. That is what I saw when I watched that video. I saw myself. I saw every black girl I know, but I also saw myself. 

For a moment. For a moment I didnt care about the officers barrel roll or all the white people standing around watching this horrific behavior. For a moment I did not see the houses or the cars or the other teenagers helpless but defiant. For a moment all I saw, all I felt was her. I felt her shock and humiliation. I felt her fear and terror. I felt her outrage. Her sobs exploded through my own body.  

This is what its like to be a black girl in America. 

We look into the faces of the women who love and care for us. We see one another. We share in meaningful moments. We trade secrets. We know things. We know things about hair and patience and waiting. We know about love and laughter and dancing and joy. We know things about beauty and we create it together. And we know that beauty can be shattered. We know about ugliness. We know too well about dehumanization and violence. We know about the power of our voices. We wish we didnt. But knowing our power is a necessary survival mechanism. We know about being suddenly and violently unwelcome. We know about fear and defiance. We know about being publicly stripped of our dignity while others stroll casually by. We know about the walls violence erects so that none can save. We know about people with a repressed conscience, ruled by racism, unable to see us as we are. 

There are already many things you should go read about McKinney. You should read about the history of segregated pools. You should read about housing discrimination and restrictive covenants. You should read about the history of black women in this country. And after you have read all the things, you should take a look at your own life, your own decisions. Who are you trying to keep out of your restricted neighborhood? Your private community pool? How often do you call the police instead of parents over the inconvenience of a teenage party? Who do you assume is or isnt in your neighborhood? Were you hopeful for white neighbors? Do you even see anyone else? When this happens in your neighborhood, will you just watch? Will you use your body to protect children or to ignore them, or to hurt them? Yes, you must learn and reflect and decide how you will be different. 

But for a moment. Before this becomes about you and your actions and your reactions and your thoughts and your assessment and your judgements, i need you to know two things. 

1. I need you to know that she is fully human. I need you to know that she is a full person who exists outside this one moment and also felt every yank, tug, pull, press of what you watch. I need you to know that this is not "just another" anything. This is a moment in this girls life forever. She slept in her bed this weekend, and ate breakfast prepared by her momma, and received phone calls from her girlfriends, and is right now trying to make sense of how her body, mind, emotions and spirit will carry on in the world. She is human. 

2. I need you to know that whatever feelings I had as I watched this unfold, whatever pain I felt, whatever reaction I had, God had tenfold. God felt every yank and pull. God felt every shooting pain and press of the body. God felt her sobs. For God knows the violence of this world, is intimately aware of state-sanctioned brutality. God needs not imagine. God knows. God knows this little girl's pain, a pain she didnt choose and should not have endured. 

Now usually, I would let you post what you want (within reason) in the comments. But you should know that anything that justifies the treatment of this child will be deleted without response. I am not entertaining debates on this one. You will respect the body of this little girl or you will have to go converse elsewhere with someone else. I cant protect her safety in real life, but I will protect it here.