Stay in your lane
Last night I was sitting in mass minding my own business (my personal favorite phrase) when our pastor announced that there would be an informational meeting about critical race theory this week. It wasn’t going to be a debate, but Catholics should go because they need to be “informed” if they have school age children.
Of course, he couldn’t help get in the dig that the school attached to the church was never going to teach critical race theory, but the public schools can obviously do what they want. Obviously, I’m not optimistic about the level of information that is going to be offered at this meeting.
I’ve written about matters of faith here before and even though this involves the church this isn’t really about that. The church has stances on discrimination and racism and for the most part they are on point. However, those stances come from a purely faith perspective and that is an area where one either believes or doesn’t believe.
Far be it from me to dispute learned theologians and Biblical scholars on the fine points of faith. They have far more training than I do. All I have is my near perfect score in my Bible course in college and a few decades of private study that goes along with my time as a catechist. That can’t compare to nearly a decade of intense study and then a lifetime of working within the faith.
However, the church has long inserted themselves into opinions on science as it combines with faith. While they clearly understand the faith implications of any number of issues, they clearly are not up to date on the science. They have done this with stem cell research as well as other things that pertain to health and science. Critical race theory is an academic theory that is not being taught in public high schools or junior highs. There is certainly no reason why it would be taught in elementary schools.
So, what the church is likely to present has little to do with critical race theory. They are likely to present a perversion because that is what has been bandied about elsewhere on Fox News and other conservative outlets. A narrow and focused concept has been somehow bastardized into a catch all debate about whether we should tell our kids that they are racists.
Obviously, the approach varies depending on how nuanced the presenter is. The most common sophisticated approach is to point out that racism and discrimination used to exist (it’s impossible to deny Jim Crow) but that it no longer exists because we are better now. So, there is no need to burden our children with the sins of our parents. After all, it might make them feel bad.
Where CRT comes into play is that many of these discriminatory practices were codified into law. These laws have long-lasting effects even if the intention wasn’t there. We can erase those laws. We can change those laws. We can speak out against those laws, but those laws have a lasting effect. Those effects can last generations.
We have somehow taken these simple truths and somehow perverted it into an overly simplistic “white man evil” message. That is the conception that has somehow been attached to CRT. It’s purely an academic theory that was perhaps only somewhat related to other social commentary. Something primarily taught in undergraduate programs and law school programs has suddenly become the bogeyman that the church now appears it needs to address for some reason.
We have the usual caveats about keeping politics out of religion and religion out of politics but this is somehow worse than that. This involves taking something we don’t understand, hastily throwing something together, and then rendering an opinion that has the weight of the church behind it. I’m not attending this informational meeting. I already know what’s coming and I need to keep my blood pressure down.
IHmm? You’re not going to the meeting. ‘m going to take a wild shot in the dark here and guess what your response {non-repsonse?) to this will be. Rather than meet with your church’s board to discuss this and, after the inevitable support for the priest’s position, inform them that you will find a church more in keeping with the values of the New Testament, you will quietly (because that’s your way) lead by example towards a path of tolerance and enlightenment. Or in a more realistic phrasing, continue to enable The Church in its efforts to take us back to the Dark Ages when kings bowed before the Pope. Too bad Hell is an imaginary concept because you would surely be joining Andrew Sullivan and Ross Douthat in a very special inner circle.
1The Catholic Church is the world’s best-funded international pedophile organization.
It has no moral authority to speak on anything. Nor do its legions of supporters.
2Not to make too too fine of a point of it but this is another demonstration of how religion screws up virtually everything it touches.
Instead of facing reality, a core fact being that we are all human and fallible, and figuring out the ups and downs of how things shake out here on the ground we get distracted worrying about what an all-powerful supernatural being might think. And worse still, there is going to be someone who will be an asshole about it and claim to be speaking for God. At which time all reason goes out the window.
3What Wally says.
4And Nick, I hope you’ll question whether your only way to keep your blood pressure down is by avoiding face-to-face conflict. That seems like the definition of white privilege. Do you think that people of color have that luxury?
Far be it from me to point out the irony in statement number one, but taken at face value I’ll just point out that in order to be a positive example in life, I need to avoid more situations that will make me angry. There’s certainly a lot of courage in fighting a tyrannical majority, but there’s also the inevitable angst that leads to be less than a loving example. I choose to exert influence in other ways.
5Grey’s Anatomy made an excellent point with this (black people do not have different metabolisms or bodies than white folks). If only the church watched TV!!
6@Wally #1
7Don’t think Catholic churches have boards. They have bishops. It is not a democratic organization. They don’t care if you leave
Mr. Carraway @4, how do you then reconcile pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s public position regarding his gov’t and the churches that acquiesced to that gov’t knowing this would very likely lead to his death? He had a chance to escape but passed on it to be with his flock.
8To put it simply, he is a better man than me. I’ve never claimed to be good or heroic. I certainly try to be good but fall short like I’m sure most of us would readily admit. Part of being as good as I can be is recognizing the importance of self care. If I am to be at my best I need to manage my frustration. That’s me. It could be an example of white privilege and I accept that. It’s the way I’m wired and I’m sure a part of my failing
9Let me be more clear, Mr. Carraway. I am not attacking or trying to denigrate you. My point applies to me as well as all others. I do not know for sure how I would react if I were in Bonhoeffer’s position. I like to think I’d act heroically. I won’t know until I’m in that situation.
10But I am more sure of your type of situation since I am estranged with most of my family and some former friends over politics which also involves religion indivisibly. I speak up under certain circumstances against the extreme thirst for power, avarice, narcissism, racism, sheer self-willed ignorance/stupidity et al.
So, in principle, what’s new under the sun regarding mankind other than different clothing?
Jesus told the story of the Good Samaritan. The Samaritans were looked down on by pious Jews, yet those same Jews didn’t help the injured man, but the Samaritan did. There’s a reason those parables are still relevant today.
11That’s a lot of words to take to the confessional, when lacking the strength of one’s convictions might summarize the problem.
12It seems to me the push back against teaching about racism is about white people hoping if they don’t allow any discussion about the bad stuff they did, everybody will forget about it. And that, it appears, includes the pastor of your congregation. I left the denomination in which I was born and raised in good part because I found it to be atrociously exclusionary and narrow-thinking. I understand how hard it is to leave a denomination, but I think I’d be shopping for another congregation and pastor. I cannot explain the tolerance of the church leadership towards those who abuse children. That would have been the deal-breaker for me.
13I’m staying in my lane so I won’t try to comment on organized religion per se since I fled that 5 decades ago (for good reason that has been reinforced more and more over the years).
14I would expect the meeting you’ll miss to be more like a political rally which I think many churches have become. I don’t blame you for not attending the meeting and I suggest, as others have, you flee and find a less political place to practice your faith and one that sticks more to your values. Oops, did I get out of my lane too much?
Obviously, a few things have come up over the course of the conversation that weren’t a direct part of my initial commentary. First of all, I can’t offer a comeback that would be satisfactory on the abuse scandals within the church. I just can’t. Analogies generally don’t do anything like that justice, but I liken it to a relationship with someone in your life that is emotionally or physically abusive. Some people get out and some people don’t. It’s difficult for me to judge others that are in that situation since I am not in it myself. It’s easy to say just get out and that might make sense rationally, but these things are rarely ever rational.
My church has opined on politics before (individual parish and not the global church) and it was on the issue of immigration and refugees. They came out strongly in favor of protection for the refugees and legal protections for immigrants. So, I am hopeful that some within the church are of sound mind on the issue of racism generally and CRT specifically.
If I were to go it would likely be as a representative of public education so as to report what is actually happening in public schools. I’m still more upset that the church is doing period even if it were from a positive perspective. The level of “information” on this issue is suspect at best, so the negative connotation would almost certainly carry the day.
The question Wally brings up in his initial response is cruel but fair. It’s the same one we might ask any conservative that continues to vote conservative. How can you maintain membership in that club under such conditions? Again, cruel but fair. However, such a question without the benefit of a response lingers like a fart in the elevator. My answer might not be a good answer, but it is an answer. The tenets of the church in grand total come closest to my values overall. I certainly don’t agree with all of them. However, I choose to participate and even volunteer because I would rather participate in shaping young minds than give that over to someone else that doesn’t share my values. Again, these answers might not be satisfactory, but they are my answers.
I appreciate everyone’s honesty even if it stings every now and then. I think everyone comes from a good place.
15Grandma Ada has it covered!
16Nick:
I regret to inform you that your toxic frustration is being caused by massive internal conflict about the doctrine of original sin.
You’re really a humanist who is ready to leave religion.
You’re obviously a nice guy who has absorbed some conflicting cultural values. I think you need to extend the abstention from the training session to include the whole intellectual cancer that’s causing you so much pain:
http://www.recoveringfromreligion.org (secular therapists!)
17Biden should really appoint Mikey Weinstein to head the office of religious liaison. He has been championing separation of church and state ever since he got harassed at the Air Force Academy for being Jewish.
18I left essentially this comment hours ago, but apparently it was squashed, so I’ll try again.
Nick’s choice to avoid confrontation to keep his blood pressure down is the very essence of white privilege. People of color don’t have that option, and they pay the price with their health and sometimes their lives.
19Nick Carraway,
20You’re heart’s generally in the right place. However, you spend a great deal of time here telling us why you tolerate this and that, how you are seeking to establish a rapport with those that you disagree with, why you are avoiding conflict, etc., etc. You’re working incredibly hard to try to find the benefit Hof the doubt for things you know are flat out wrong. Last I checked, Catholicism wasn’t offering an a la carte menu
Nick, you’re clearly stuck between the proverbial rock and a hard place, and I know how hard that can be. You are part of a body that, on the 1 hand, seems to [mostly] try to do what you consider right, and on the other hand, does some stuff that angers you. And you’re trying to decide whether to try to help however you can to make things better by sticking it out.
Let’s face it: nothing in life is perfect. Leaving your church likely would put you farther away from a place where you can be helpful; staying means you have to put up with some bad actors. But we all run into that kind of stuff all around us.
I admire your courage in telling us about your struggle. Not much in life is black and white, as your situation illustrates. Hang in there.
21Again, I’d like to thank everyone for their kindness and tough love. I’ll give everything some careful thought.
22Nick, I have the highest respect for your writings and your decisions. Most of us don’t open up like you do. You’ll do the right thing for yourself and your family I’m sure. Your heart is in the right place.
23You know what they’re going to do, won’t do anything to stop them and keep going to that church? Okay, dude.
24Nick, good on you for being interested enough to describe the situation and write a bit about your take on it.
As someone who actually had to read and talk about Critical Theory during my graduate school days, I understand the genealogy of ideas that moved from disillusionment with Marxism, to Critical Theory, to Critical Legal Theory (or Critical Legal Study), to Critical Race/Queer/Feminist/etc. Theory. After an escape from academia, I didn’t expect to think about it again. Apart from the occasional reference to some of the ideas during some academic debate rounds and a brief reacquaintance via the writing of some more successful professors that emerged from my program, I never did.
So, I’ve been astonished to read about this flare-up of controversy about “Critical Race Theory.” And the widely varying understandings of what is being talked about.
Knowing just a bit about theology and Christian preaching, I wonder what would happen in the discussion if CRT was equated with Original Sin. Both concepts presume a powerful force, one able to persist despite efforts to alter law and policy (CRT) or adopt holiness through corporate and personal rituals.
25Saying this here is fine. But saying it at the “informational meeting” might be better. Among other things, silence from one side encourages the other to think that nobody disagrees with them.
26Whether a speaker gets angry isn’t the point. Whether they reflect actual reality is the point. And if one doesn’t speak up against irrational delusion now, how can one possibly reign it in later?
There are many in the Church hierarchy that want the organization to be a political action committee for the republican party. Think of Cardinal Dolan chumming around with his good “friend” Donald Trump.
Currently, the Bishops are working on a proposal to deny communion to Biden. Of course, the Vatican has told them to “stand down” but they have no respect for Pope Francis who they despise for his liberal views. Check out EWTN that masquerades as religious programing but is actually FOX NEWS for Catholics.
27The church has long been a patron of science, currently including the advanced technology telescope in AZ, part of the Vatican Observatory. Unfortunately the complementarity of faith and reason hasn’t filtered down to many Catholic parishes (some university-based parishes are an exception).
28Captain Dan sats that the TRumpster aka Donald Trump the EX and most illegimate of all presidents should be tried and executed for Treason, Sedition, and other high crimes!
29The former USAF Captain also allows typos into his tirades.
30YELLOWSTONE @ 27 …
the proposal to develop an advisory to bishops to bar politicians (including Biden) from taking communion was quashed. To begin, the Delaware and DC bishops said they would not follow such a statement from the Conference of Bishops. Then, there were a number of others eligible to attend and vote at the Conference who chimed in and advised against it, and said they would show up to vote against it. And then, there apparently was some sort of communication from Rome — never explicitly linked to the Pope, but the geography was well-known — pointing out it would not be a winning move.
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