I wrote this for medium.com back in June, but I wanted to share it here as well. Communicating with honesty and transparency are active ways to love others and grow as believers, and this purpose is at the heart of lavitavera.

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There are a lot of things I should have said before June 1. I should have said that black lives matter long before it was trendy, when I knew they did. When I taught lives that were brown and black and mattered to me. When I knew the right response to others saying “all lives matter.” 

My experience in close relationships has often been that, when I sin against or wrong someone, the best way to heal and repair the relationship is to lay it all out before the other person. This will not be another white page filled with manipulative intentions, pointing fingers, justifications, or other examples of white noise. To my white friends and family: I hope my words and confessions prompt you to look inside, cause you to think back, push you to confess, and repent. 

When I was in middle school, on a trip with a friend, I bought something I had wanted for weeks. It was a t-shirt with an American flag and confederate flag on it that said, “It’s a Southern thing, y’all just wouldn’t understand.” My family was not supportive, so I had to do it when I was away. If you would have asked me then if I was racist, I would have said, “Of course not! I like black people. Yeah, I have a few black friends.” As a matter of fact, that year I worked on my research project about the KKK sitting right next to my black friend. Confederate flag shirts and other paraphernalia were popular at my middle school in SC. (But racism doesn’t still exist?) No one made me wear that shirt. I did it, because I wanted to be cool. That flag didn’t mean anything to me but acceptance. It didn’t mean hate or fear or loss or anything. But, a symbol of hate in so many eyes was acceptance to me. This season has come back to my thoughts often over the past few years. 

Flash forward to college. My middle school years were awhile gone and that symbol wasn’t acceptable to me anymore. I had become a Christian. And while I would like to say that this new identity sucked all the stereotypes and prejudices out of my head and heart, it did not. I wasn’t automatically more enlightened about hate or racism. And I still did not have many friends that looked any different from me. It was during this time that I started watching Madea movies. My friends and I laughed through each movie, often repeating her words and jokes in everyday conversations. I also had a few black YouTube comedian favorites. One was a black woman comedian who sang a song while she drove in a car. We watched it over and over. One evening I thought it would be funny to draw on lips with red lipstick and sing it to my friends, imitating the woman in the video. It has taken me years to come to the understanding (and I still haven’t “arrived”) that watching shows that perpetuate stereotypes about black people and people of color when you yourself aren’t around a lot of people that look different than you is a slippery slope and it’s unhelpful. Years later, when probably quoting a Madea movie in the classroom, one of my students told me he didn’t like watching those movies. When I asked him why, he said it made black people look stupid. And there it was. Maybe, watching Madea wasn’t building up. In fact, maybe it was strengthening the divide. (Some, Many, Most) white people think that because you watch black comedians, listen to black artists, or pull for black athletes, you have some connection with black culture or the black community. That it makes you more “woke.” I’m realizing this is dangerous and wrong. 

Flash forward to early professional years. I was a Special Education teacher at a school with mostly black students and teachers. It was my second year teaching, and I showed a movie. I figured some of the students had seen it, but I personally didn’t find it appropriate for myself. I shielded my eyes during a scene or two. I asked myself: would I have shown this in a school of mostly white students who had white parents that would have contacted me? I could not say yes. I realized in that moment that, in my heart, I believed that I needed to shelter white kids but not black kids. That the respect from white parents was more motivating than my student’s parents. Were they not worth protecting? Was their innocence not as important or valuable? Apparently not. Interesting how, as I got older, my racism got more hidden, a little sneakier, but still very present. I hesitate writing these next sentences but, here you go—I “loved” these kids. I spent evenings with them, bought them birthday presents, and prayed for them. But those things did not make me innocent of racism. They still did not root out prejudices. These roots go deep…like a weed allowed to grow and fertilized for years. 

I wish I could say that after Ferguson everything changed. That year was the moment that I really started to realize that racism was alive and well and that my whole American experience was so different than that of my fellow teachers. My black teachers, my friends, were rocked. I taught beside them as they grieved and with heavy hearts taught students that looked like them with a whole system working against them. They weren’t just grieving for Michael Brown. They were grieving for their loved ones, our students, Trayvon Martin, Eric Garner, and countless others. Their actions, honest stories, and wise words caused me to pause and think. But because of my privilege, that’s all I had to do. Or, that’s all I did. I could read books (important) and listen to my wise coworkers (essential), but I didn’t have to speak out. I didn’t have to challenge my friends or family. The lack of justice planted a seed. It began to challenge my lens through which I had seen America and my place in society for 26 years. But I still wouldn’t call that the turning point. 

This week has drawn a line for me. I can keep my challenges and convictions to myself. Using them to only instruct my children or my like-minded friends. OR, I can confess and share them with my friends and family. I can call, email, and tweet at leaders and plead for specific actions. I can give of my resources to organizations. I can pray each time I hear a police siren—that justice and respect for life would replace hate and carelessness. I can challenge my heart and confess, and repent when I find myself anxiously wondering why a black man is walking up to my front door. I can continue to plead for Jesus to renew my mind in all areas. 

We have all been racist. We have been manipulative, tolerant of hate, and have lived under the notion that silence is acceptable and beneficial. Now isn’t the time to turn a blind eye. You can’t move forward from something without acknowledging where you have been. It would be awesome to say that, after the protests, after the posting of little black boxes, after our confessions, it will be easy to love and accept. It will be easy to call the senator and demand justice. It will be easy to give to organizations supporting injustice. It will be easy to fight for injustice without putting it on Instagram or Facebook. It will be easy to stop justifying how we treat other humans based on the way the same race or different races treat each other as our moral compass. But it isn’t easy. It is a fight in our hearts as much as outside our hearts. Ashley and I hope that over the next few months this space will be used for good. That these pages will be used to promote honesty, truth, and accountability while also promoting the wise black voices we have been privileged to work, mother, worship beside, and learn from.

This is not the time to wallow in shame. For my fellow brothers and sisters in Christ, the guilt and shame are gone. Shame will bring you inward and only keep you focused on yourself. We must move past ourselves. We must stop trying to prove our innocence or cover up our prejudices. Black lives matter. Black minds, black bodies, black souls. And not as diversity trophies or as part of the strategy—sports teams, congregations, advertisements, or professional groups. But because black lives are human lives, and they are beautiful, valuable, and essential.

We must confess, hold each other accountable, listen, and act—not as savior, we already have Him—but as a helper, having our brothers’ and sisters’ backs. Calling out others. Calling out ourselves.

Hoping this helps you on your journey this side of the line.