Two friends came over this weekend, and we had a blast. They left yesterday morning between 2:00 and 2:30 AM, which means I have three precious days to catch up on blogging before starting my job at the Macaroni Grill (trendy, Italian, casual dining concept). ...but there's too much to say. I guess I'll write down a question I'm thinking about today and write more later.
Prelude to the question: So I just returned from a bargain grocery adventure in East Ridge, TN -- one I didn't plan on having. It was nice, despite the spontaneity, and it filled my finely-tuned senses with lots of delightful Tennessee texture (ruty cars, fake tans on white people, loud kids with accents, Asian food markets, used car lots, obesity, crumbling asphalt, smiles). It seemed odd to me to think of some polished, pro-Covenant admissions people hanging out in this context. And it seemed an equally odd juxtaposition to place the characters I rubbed elbows with this afternoon in the rarified atmosphere of higher education and cultural engagement up on campus. But I spend time in both, a regular Renaissance man, I guess.
I've been wearing a lot of hats the last few days: looking dressy for job interviews, looking inconspicuous for cleaning with BEST, and looking shabby and comfortable for shopping at the East Ridge Save-A-Lot store. Each "look" went with a particular set of people who all live in my city. I was wondering about those people - how life feels and looks and tastes, etc to those who have lived here forever.
And I asked myself: What would it look like to intentionally refuse to elect just one particular environment or slice of Chattanooga community? In other words, what would happen if some group of folks decided to have significant relationships and transact significant business in ways that transgressed the economic, educational, racial, geographical and ecclesiastical lines that criss-cross Chattanooga?
Posted by nickles at September 1, 2004 03:12 PMA nice thought, perhaps. Call me a pessimist if you want, but I'm convinced that people just aren't interested in that kind of diversity. In fact, as much as it's preached at us non-stop, I have yet to meet pretty much anyone who's actually a fan of diversity when it comes right down to it. We humans like being around people who are like us. We like to play tourist, to see how the other half lives from time to time, but we'd much rather keep our business to ourselves, thanks very much.
I live in Harlem now. Starting just a few blocks south of me, and extending north and east for several miles is a largely low-income minority community, mostly black but switching to Hispanic towards the East River. Just three blocks west, across the park and up the hill, is Columbia University and the north end of the Upper West Side, which extends dozens of blocks south. Do people up there come down here? Only on the bus and only on their way home to Long Island or points upstate. Do people down here go up there? Not unless they're students like me who couldn't get into university housing and can't afford $1500/month in rent. Frankly, I'd much rather be up there; this part of town is pretty sketchy, and I'm more than a little uncomfortable walking around after dark.
People like insular communities. People like being isolated. People like divisions that help them define who they are by defining who they aren't. People don't want to be different, and don't really have much incentive to try. You can try and refuse to "elect just one particular environment," but I'm not sure you can actually do it. You can't be at home everywhere, or at least most people can't, because even if you're comfortable, everyone can tell you're just a tourist; you can go "home" any time you want.
Posted by: ryan at September 3, 2004 09:21 AMRyan, you're being pragmatic.
Which is always good for people like me.
You're right when you say that PEOPLE like being isolated. They thrive on what you call divisions "that help them define who they are by defining who they aren't." It takes too much work to abide with diversity: it is often awkward, it means being seen as abnormal. It isn't really worth much discussion, the way things are now.
But I am considering working for the international church in an area where immigration and laws of refuge have brought cultures into severe juxtaposition -- a lot like your neighborhood sounds. And I will have to work very hard. It is very likely that my efforts will meet with programmatic failure as well as personal failure. I need community, too, and it will most likely be difficult to come by!
So what shall I do? I find more and more that this is the only option for me if I will be obedient to the Lord. In times of stress, I find myself seeking out those passages where the same Lord talks about Jesus being our peace, the wall-breaker who defies all man-made exclusive definitions. Of course, our God is an exclusive God, but only in terms of divine election. Any excluding we men engage in will always be a dark, vain things -- pragmatic, perhaps, but ultimately worthy of breaking, should they become idolatrous centers of our affections.
I also find myself longing to learn, realizing how much I do not know about God. When things become difficult overseas, I shall look upon every difficult thing as another step in learning about our cross-cultural God. Seeing him through the lens of a Turkish immigrant or a Moroccan teenager will bring me closer and paint the picture in ym mind mroe fully than I might have painted it on my own.
In the end, I suppose I find myself responding to pragmatic concerns by pulling out the Holy Spirit card. I've gotta be careful with this, because of stewardship issues and the need to plan wisely, deliberately, etceteras. But all the same, it boils down to a recognition that the tasks of making my home somewhere else and living cross-culturally by intention are both impossible yet perhaps do-able under the Spirit's power.
You see why these idealistic principles have to be near to my heart. Every time I think about what lies ahead, I feel my pulse racing just a bit: what am I doing? Still, you were right to say a word about the pragmatics (something I often ignore). You are living them! Your words therefore penetrated as truth and have actually formed some of what I was thinking in today's post -- the ideal "someplace other" is somewhat of a lie. Thanks for shedding some light on the matter!
Posted by: bob at September 4, 2004 07:30 PMI'll get into the fray, though it's quite a few months late.
Ryan, you are right when you say we like insular communities. But really, what has that got to do with reality? Reality is not how you and I see it, but with how God defines it in his word. He tells us to love one another, to include the disenfranchised, to care for the poor and the widow and the fatherless, to follow his example and reach out. So we do, and while we do it, we find that the whole thing was the right choice after all.
I told my kids the other day, while they were complaining about attending the spelling bee, that they could exercise their obedience/faith/works muscle by enduring a bit of boredom out of love for their fellow students. I challenged them with these truth statements:
If we are Christ's disciples
If we obey his command to love one another
If we define love biblically (specifically that love bears all things, hopes all things, endures all things)
Then we can say "I love my classmates enough to bear a little boredom and show them -- even if they don't notice -- that I want to obey Jesus by loving them more than I love my preferences."
Ryan, you are right. We like to be insular. So what? I love my students more than myself, so I will bear a headache and loneliness and bodily tiredness to get their papers graded and their lessons planned. I'd rather be hanging out with my boyfriend (he's so great!!), or watching Survivor and CSI (I'm writing this on a Thursday) after a great taco meal with my parents, or napping, or curling up with a book while the rain taps on my window here in Harrisburg, or any number of things. But I'll bear discomfort to obey my Jesus.
I'm glad you live in Harlem. That's God's will for you right now! It's his best for you. How can you serve him where he's set you? You're a grad student...perhaps you could pray in faith for your neighbors when they scare you or annoy you instead of fearing or complaining about them. Perhaps you could buy extra bread next time you go to the store and give half the loaf to a neighborhood kid and go feed birds together...somewhere...there's got to be birds+water somewhere in New York.
Enough. I've got to grade papers now. And plan lessons.
Posted by: Krista at November 4, 2004 05:23 PM