By Ajung Sojwal

I would like to think of myself as a reasonable, well-informed person who cannot and will not deny the evils of systemic racism. I also thought that the “Church” would never willfully perpetuate the evils of systemic racism; until a few years ago, when I found myself dumbfounded by the open declaration of a deeply racist belief from a high-ranking member of the clergy. At a meeting with the clergy person who had the authority and power to recruit and reject priests seeking a call, I was told of a black clergy colleague, “I don’t trust her, she is very dark.”

It’s a conversation that I hope never to forget. I hang on to it as a reminder of how individuals within the system who willfully deny the dignity and humanity of another person allow for systemic racism to take root. It’s a conversation which I hope will continue to remind me of the need to be vigilant of my own propensity to deny someone else’s dignity and humanity because of racist ideas I inadvertently have picked up and maybe even believe.

It was at the onset of the Black Lives Matter protests this past summer that I confronted my own prejudice in denying the significance of a particular expression of spirituality that appeared to me far too focused on a life beyond another shore. I had to be situated in a pre-dominantly Black church to understand the critical importance of the theological vision of a home on another shore.

The frustration, anger and woundedness expressed in the conversations I had with black mothers from my congregation as they spoke to me about the need to protect their sons, grandsons and nephews from the moment they are able to walk was an indictment against my stunted theological imagination. My long-held suspicions of the depth of a spirituality that refuses to loosen its grip on the vision of a sweet chariot to swing low suddenly became incarnate as I listened to the black mother whose son was shot to death 33 years ago and her pain became palpable through the phone. I realized then, of course, that my spirituality cannot find a home in this world as long as I am forced to justify my very existence on this earth.

It is in the reality of many being denied their very humanity that I must learn to live into my belief that God incarnate amongst us is not just a one-time event. It is God’s relentless validation of the vision where a person’s trustworthiness can never be measured by the shade of her skin color. It is God’s validation of the restless yearning for a true home of millions who are denied their humanity and their lives cut short — because of their skin color, their gender, their race, even the zip code they live in.

This I see now, that the spirituality rooted in a life on the other shore is about transforming the searing pain of being denied the dignity of human beings created in the image of God; it is true lamentations before a God who has become much too mortal.

Ajung Sojwal is Rector of St. George’s Episcopal Church in Hempstead, NY.