Agora
THE LIBERAL ARTS AT LUTHER COLLEGE
SPRING 2021
LUTHER COLLEGE, DECORAH, IOWA
THE LIBERAL ARTS AT LUTHER COLLEGE
Martin Klammer, editor
SPRING 2021 VOLUME 33 NUMBER 2
Bonnie Tunnicliff Johnson, production editor
Agora, an interdisciplinary journal grounded in the humanities, is a project of the Luther College Paideia Program. The Luther College Paideia Program encompasses many activities and resources for students, faculty members, and the broader community. It includes an annual lecture series, library acquisitions, student writing services, a faculty development program that includes sabbatical grants and summer workshops, and Agora: The Liberal Arts at Luther College. All these activities receive financial support from the Paideia Endowment, originally established through National Endowment for the Humanities grants matched by friends of Luther College. The Paideia owl logo was designed by John Whelan.
The primary Agora contributors are Luther College faculty; writing is also solicited from other college community members and, occasionally, from outside writers. Agora was established in 1988 LUTHER COLLEGE by Paideia Director Wilfred F. Bunge, Professor of Religion and Classics, who edited the journal from 1988-1998. Other editors include: Mark Z. Muggli, Professor of English, 1998-2004; Peter Seeking Wisdom in Community A. Scholl, Professor of English, 2004-2014; and Martin Klammer, Professor of English, editor since 2014. Agora is distributed to on-campus faculty and administrators as well as to off-campus friends of the college. Anyone wishing to be included on the print copy list or donate to Agora should contact us at (563) 387-1153 or e-mail agora@luther.edu.
PAIDEIA
To see the current issue and archival issues online, go to www.luther.edu/paideia/agora.
Contents Essays and Occasions How Did We Get Here? Reflections on the Capitol Insurrection Todd Green, Susan Schmidt, and Orçun Selçuk......................................................... 3 The Love and Rage of James Baldwin, The Unwavering Witness Novian Whitsitt...................................................................................................... 9 Reflections on a Professional Life Nancy Jones........................................................................................................... 14
2020-2021 Paideia Texts and Issues Lecture Series: Building Community in a Changing Society Amish Genetic Health Needs and an Innovative Community Response Angela Kueny, Philip Iversen, and Lee Zook .......................................................... 20
Sabbaticals Julian of Norwich and “The Showing of Love” Brooke Joyce........................................................................................................... 25
Chapel Talks The Black Church and Beloved Community (February 24, 2021) Guy Nave.............................................................................................................. 28 Shifting Our Thinking on Islamophobia (March 3, 2021) Todd Green............................................................................................................ 30 The Wisdom of the Fool (March 10, 2021) Gereon Kopf........................................................................................................... 32 The Common Good of Our Global Community (April 21, 2021) Siletselwe Dlamini '22........................................................................................... 35 Hope: My Reflections on Climate Justice Week (April 23, 2021) Salomé Valdivieso Santillán '23.............................................................................. 37 Can't Help Falling in Love (April 28, 2021) Nancy K. Barry..................................................................................................... 39
Cover: Oneota, a woodcut by Orville Running, for the Fund for Luther. Courtesy of Luther College Fine Arts Collection 2010.07.01.
Introduction by MARTIN KLAMMER, Professor of English, Editor of Agora
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Shortly after publication we received an interesting note from John Christianson, professor emeritus in history. John wrote that in 1921 Tess Arneson married Bryn “B. J.” Hovde, a Luther graduate who taught history at Luther and the University of Pittsburgh, served for many years as administrator of public housing in Pittsburgh, and was president of the New School for Social Research in New York City from 1945 to 1950. Their son, Carl F. Hovde, John wrote, was an English professor who as dean at Columbia University helped resolve the anti-war protests there in 1968. I found this all quite fascinating, particularly Carl F. Hovde’s role at Columbia, so I looked into this a little more, finding his obituary in the September 10, 2009 New York Times. Born in 1926, Carl F. Hovde was one of three children of B.J. and Theresse Hovde. After graduating from high school in Pittsburgh in 1944 he enlisted in the Army and saw action in France and Germany. He graduated with a degree in philosophy from Columbia College in 1950 and a doctorate in American literature from Princeton in 1955. He taught at Ohio State University before joining the English department at Columbia in 1960. It was as a dean of Columbia University that Carl F. Hovde came to prominence, 2
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COURTESY OF LUTHER COLLEGE ARCHIVES
n the Spring 2020 Agora we featured on the cover a photo of Luther College nurse Theresse “Tess” Arneson with two of her patients during the 1918 influenza pandemic. In my introduction I wrote that Tess Arneson was remembered in the college yearbook as an “enthusiastic, good-natured, and sympathetic girl, willing to help us in our difficulties and to give us encouragement.”
Theresse Arneson with two of her patients during the 1918 influenza pandemic. playing a key role in restoring calm to the campus after six weeks of student protests against the Vietnam War in 1968. Protestors occupied five buildings on campus, smashed windows, and burned administrative records. Police in riot gear were called in by the university president, and 700 students were arrested, mostly on charges of criminal trespassing. The protests continued and the campus life was on hold for five more weeks. As dean of Columbia College, the undergraduate school of the university, Carl F. Hovde sought to strike a balance between the student protestors and the university administration. He called for the university to drop criminal trespassing charges against students. According to the Times, Hovde said that the protesters “were not acting without cause, but they were acting with insufficient cause.” When he returned to teaching in 1972, an editorial in The Columbia Daily Spectator said he had “sought to quietly guide the college, not to rule it; to use the force of persuasion and reason, not the blunt power of authority.”
Carl F. Hovde died at his home in New Canaan, Connecticut, age 82. The Times described him as “a lanky, boyish-looking professor of comparative English literature” who brought “a soft-spoken equanimity” to his post as dean—maybe not so different from his mother Tess Arneson, the “good-natured, and sympathetic” Luther College nurse during the 1918 pandemic. This Hovde family, by the way, is not related to long time Luther College librarian Oivind Hovde (1911-1986), as far as we know. B.J. Hovde died of a heart attack in New York City in 1954, age 57. Theresse Hovde died November 24, 1979 in Chicago, age 86. She was born in Decorah and, John Christianson wrote, she “always kept up on events at Luther.” 333 Earlier this year we sent out postcards thanking folks for being readers of Agora and asking if they would like to continue receiving the print version. We were happy to hear back from a number of you, and happier still to learn how much you enjoy Agora. One reader wrote that “the content of the magazine is so informative and so often thoughtprovoking, it is a joy.” Another reader said that Agora is “really an impressive journal” which “reflects well on the high degree of academic excellence of the Luther College faculty. Another reader simply wrote: “FUN READ!” Thanks to all of you for your encouragement, and thanks, too, to those of you who made financial contributions. We will continue to work hard to convey in Agora what one reader called the “interdisciplinary spirit” of the liberal arts at Luther College.
How Did We Get Here? Reflections on the Capitol Insurrection
by TODD GREEN, Associate Professor of Religion; SUSAN SCHMIDT, Assistant Professor of Social Work; ORÇUN SELÇUK, Visiting Professor of Political Science
Introduction
O
n January 6, 2021, an angry and aggressive mob descended on the US Capitol, spurred on by what media outlets increasingly have labeled “The Big Lie,” or the belief that the presidential election was rigged and ultimately stolen from Donald Trump. Protestors breached Capitol security, violently assaulted Capitol police officers, and penetrated the innermost chambers of the Capitol. Their ostensible purpose was to halt the verification of the electoral college count and to prevent the ratification of Joe Biden’s electoral victory. While the Capitol was eventually cleared of rioters, and while the counting of electoral votes resumed that evening, the end result was not just damage to government property but the loss of life. Five people died in the riots, one a Capitol police officer. Five days after the insurrection, three Luther faculty members—Todd Green (Religion), Susan Schmidt (Social Work), and Orçun Selçuk (Political Science)—participated in a panel discussion hosted by the Center for Ethics and Public Engagement. They addressed a question that permeated media and political discourse in the days following the attacks: How did we as a nation get to this point? What follows are reflections from all three faculty members based on the formal remarks they made on the January 11 panel. The Violent Attack on the US Capitol was Not an Aberration Todd Green It is important to recognize that what was on display at the US Capitol on January 6 was not an anomaly or an aberration. Many journalists and politicians have expressed shock and dismay at what happened. A common thread is that this was out of character for the
United States. This was not who we are. I have lost count of the number of instances in which media commentators have pointed out that this was something that we would normally see in some other part of the world, such as the Middle East or Latin America. Trump’s authoritarianism, violent mobs, efforts to overturn legitimate elections—these are things we are accustomed to seeing those uncivilized people “over there” doing. But not here. Not in America. Or at least that was the prevailing assumption in public discourse in the days following the insurrection. As Representative Alan Lowenthal (D-California) stated: “It felt like a coup in a third-world country” (Ruhl, 2021). Such commentary is possible only because of a collective failure in this nation to come to terms with the fact that violence and opposition to democracy are also part of who we have been and who we still are as a nation. Far from being out of character, the violent mob at the Capitol was the actualization of beliefs and attitudes that have existed for quite some time in this nation. That applies not just to the past four years but stretches back to before the nation’s founding. We would do well to remember several things as we process and contextualize what happened on January 6. First, we would do well to remember that White Americans’ opposition to full democratic participation and inclusion has existed since the very beginning of this nation’s history. Women, slaves, indigenous peoples, non-propertied men—none of these groups were allowed to hold public office in the earliest chapters of this history. While these groups were eventually enfranchised in the course of history, it wasn’t without opposition – at times, fierce opposition. Even with enfranchisement, efforts to
Todd Green, Susan Schmidt, and Orçun Selçuk discuss the January 6 insurrection at the US Capitol during a virtual campus gathering on January 13, 2021 limit or undermine full civic and political participation of all Americans have proliferated. Gerrymandering and voter suppression are just two of many tactics in modern American history employed to exclude groups, particularly communities of color, from having their voices fully heard in the democratic process. We would also do well to remember that violence and hostility from White and White Christian Americans toward racial and religious minorities were integral parts in the formation of this nation. Native American genocide was perpetrated largely by White and White Christian Americans, often in the name of Christianity. Closer to our own time, White Christians have defended segregation and Jim Crow. More recently, from exit polling from 2016 and 2020, we know that more than any other faith Spring 2021 Agora
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US Capitol, January 6, 2021 community, White Christians are the most likely to support President Trump, despite and at times because of his targeting of racial and religious minorities in his rhetoric and policies (Chew, 2020). That support has persisted even as hate crimes targeting Jews, Muslims, and people of color have risen significantly. On January 6, we saw some White Americans appropriating symbols of Christianity and White supremacy as they attacked the Capitol. Signs reading “Jesus Saves” and “God, Guns, and Guts Made America” were on full display. Other rioters yelled: “Shout if you love Jesus!” Alongside of these shouts and signs were Confederate flags. My point is not that the Christians in the mob were representative of the attitudes of all American Christians. My 4
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point is that the symbolism and the intertwining of Christian and White supremacist attitudes and rhetoric in the insurrection has a long history in the United States. This didn’t simply materialize in the last four years. It has been part of the effort to build and solidify a White Christian America for centuries. There is a religious context to the insurrection as well as a racial one. We ignore this context and this history at our peril.
Finally, we would do well to remember that labeling the Capitol insurrection as a form of “domestic terrorism” itself points to the utter hypocrisy involved in exceptionalizing this violence instead of recognizing that violence by White Americans targeting either the government or other civilians has been commonplace for many years. It’s simply that the word “terrorism” has not been applied in any meaningful way to White American violence. I believe the word “terrorism” has become so racialized, so tied to Muslims, that it has lost any power to describe what extremist White Americans have done or will do in the future. According to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, right-wing and White supremacist violence accounts for the majority of all terrorist incidents in the United States since 1994. In 2019 alone, right-wing and White supremacist individuals or groups perpetrated two-thirds of terrorist attacks or plots in the United States. ( Jones, Doxsee & Harrington, 2020).
Yet journalists and politicians have often been reluctant to use the “t” word to describe White violence. The word only seems “natural” when applied to Muslims (Green, 2017). I don’t think the Capitol insurrection will easily reverse or erase any of this. Journalists and politicians should stop patting themselves on the back for calling the insurrection an act of terrorism as if this reflects how enlightened we have become as a nation to the fact that White people can be terrorists too. What’s more, the use of the word “terrorists” to describe the rioters who stormed the Capitol will never lead to racial and religious profiling of White and White Christian Americans, not in the way that the use of this word has led to racial and religious profiling of Muslim Americans. Our nation suffers from historical amnesia in terms of the role that violence and anti-democratic movements have played in our past and in our present. As we ask the question—“How did we get here?”—perhaps we should formulate our answers to this question much more carefully, with much more humility, than has been the case in our public discourse. The Capitol insurrection does not represent some alternate reality or alternate universe. The insurrection is a mirror into the soul of this nation, and we would do well to remember that. Our House Susan Schmidt How did we get here? By “here” I refer to the storming of the US Capitol by a mob loyal to former President Donald Trump, resulting in the deaths of four rioters, a Capitol police officer, two subsequent suicides by police officers who had been at the scene, and the suicide of a rioter after being charged in connection with the siege (McEvoy, 2021). There are many dynamics that contributed to this toxic stew that culminated in a violent mob breaching, damaging, and defacing “the people’s house,” sending Vice President Pence, his family, and Congressional lawmakers into hiding, interrupting the certification of Joseph Biden’s election, and resulting in death. The official “Congressional Record” is spare in its documentation of the events of January 6, 2021: apart from law-
Faculty from each of the disciplines at Luther College could contribute a different perspective on how we as a nation got here. As a social worker, here is a non-exhaustive list of significant dynamics that I identify: • Hubris • Inequality • Racism • Social media I’ll say a few words about each of these. Americans often view our government through a lens of “American exceptionalism.” Indeed, in the comments made by our Congressional lawmakers on January 6 before and after the Capitol siege, at least seven representatives and senators, both Republicans and Democrats, referred to the United States as “the greatest democracy this world has ever known” (Congressional Record, 2021, H83, H90), “the greatest democracy human kind has ever known” (H87), “the greatest power on earth” (H86), “the greatest nation in the history of the world” (H108), “the greatest country on Earth” (S21), and “the most exceptional nation in the history of the world” with the US Constitution as the “greatest political document that has ever been written” (S22). We are socialized to believe that the US is different from other countries, that it is the best version of democracy, and that the US therefore has a responsibility to share our version of democracy with the world. In some sectors, this set of beliefs is mixed with the religious view that the US has been chosen by God (Rodgers, 2018) and by extension for some a belief that Donald Trump was chosen by God (Pew Research Center, 2020). Yet this hubris may prevent us from facing and addressing our flaws, while also spurring some of our brethren to elevate nation above all else. One of those flaws we avoid addressing is growing inequality. US inequality is
higher than in most other developed nations due to wage stagnation, lowering taxes on the rich, and reduced prospects for people without college degrees combined with the rising cost of college, among other things (Siripurapu, 2020; Institute for Policy Studies, n.d.). Inequality has traditionally been higher in rural areas, but it has been increasing in urban areas over the last decade (Thiede, Brown, Butler & Jensen, 2020). Inequality can contribute to a sense of alienation from societal systems, which may make a candidate like Donald Trump seem like a savior. The economists Anne Case and Angus Deaton have written about the rise in “Deaths of Despair” as the life expectancy of White Americans between 45 and 54 has declined due to suicide, opioid overdoses, and alcoholrelated deaths (Zarroli, 2020).
and should therefore control society— evident in visible symbols (e.g. the Confederate flag, a noose, anti-Semitic slogans), behavior towards African American law enforcement officers at the scene (Bowden, 2021), and views espoused by groups identified in the crowd (Farivar, 2021). As the US becomes more multiracial, some White individuals and groups find this threatening and seek ways to hold onto power and societal dominance. Political science researcher Larry Bartels explains the “antidemocratic sentiments,” identified in January 2020 interviews with Republicans and right-leaning Independents, as: …not primarily products of social isolation or insufficient education or political interest. Rather,
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makers’ own words, the official record merely notes that the Senate recessed from 2:30 p.m. and reassembled at 8:06 p.m., (Senate, 2021) and that the House stood in recess from 2:29 PM until called to order by the Speaker at 9:02 p.m. (House of Representatives, 2021).
Insurrectionists outside the US Capitol, January 6, 2021 Inequality in the United States builds on a foundational history of slavery and systemic racism that has been persistent in our policies and practices (Carten, 2016), including in ways illuminated by the pandemic (USA Today, 2020; Scott, Johnson & Ibemere, 2020). The storming of the US Capitol on January 6 was not carried out by those most directly affected by systemic racism (though there are convincing arguments that systemic racism makes us all losers; (McGhee, 2021). Instead, the largely White crowd on January 6 included groups who espouse explicitly or implicitly an ideology of White supremacy—a belief that White people are superior
[these views] are grounded in real political values—specifically, and overwhelmingly, in Republicans’ ethnocentric concerns about the political and social role of immigrants, African-Americans, and Latinos in a context of significant demographic and cultural change (Bartels, 2020). The organizational vehicle for these events was social media, which facilitated the online connections, propagated the spread of toxic ideas, and cultivated misinformation into identity groups and communities of grievance. These platforms, run by largely unregulated Spring 2021 Agora
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the rise of populism and nativism around the world. From a comparative perspective, it is not surprising that the Capitol attack was directly tied to then President Donald J. Trump, a right-wing populist who claims to represent the real American people against the corrupt Washington elite. In the 2016 presidential elections, Trump not only positioned himself against Hillary Clinton but also establishment figures within the Republican Party such as Jeb Bush, whom he called “Crooked Hillary” and “Low Energy Jeb” respectively. When Trump announced his candidacy in 2015, his style of politics was considered marginal, fringe, and unpresidential (Ostiguy and Roberts, 2016).
Insurrectionists and tear gas outside the US Capitol on January 6, 2021 technology behemoths, have managed to simultaneously expand communities of identity while also contracting access to contradictory information systems, creating polarized echo chambers that feed and cater to our latent beliefs (Seneca, 2020). The documentary “The Social Dilemma” (Orlowski, 2020) raises disturbing questions about the algorithms controlling our media feeds, the personal data being harvested from our online activities, the financial interests guiding ethical technology decisions, and the larger societal impact of the sector on which much of our lives depend. How do we rein it in, for both individual and collective good? As we get farther from the unsettling yet crystallizing melee of January 6, 2021, I wonder what lasting impact it will have on our democracy. Will we recognize it as a cautionary tale and seek ways to build bridges and rein in sources of misinformation? Will we downplay its significance and seek to move past it, rather than examining its causes? Will we ignore the evident risks and continue as if nothing unusual happened? Initially, I thought this event might present opportunities for collective examination, but lately I am wondering if we as a nation have the willingness to face the uncomfortable dynamics within our shared democracy. In her article applying the concept of caste to the racial hierarchies of the United States, Isabel Wilkerson uses the metaphor of a house to help readers grasp our shared responsibilities: 6
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We in this country are like homeowners who inherited a house on a piece of land that is beautiful on the outside but whose soil is unstable loam and rock, heaving and contracting over generations, cracks patched but the deeper ruptures waved away for decades, centuries even…We are the heirs to whatever is right or wrong with it. We did not erect the uneven pillars or joists, but they are ours to deal with now (Wilkerson, 2020). By the time you read this article, what will you see as the lessons from January 6, 2021, and more importantly, what are you willing to invest in repairing this civic house that we share? Challenges to American Democracy Orçun Selçuk Building on the reflections of Professors Todd Green and Susan Schmidt, I would like to offer three comparative themes to understand the current state of American democracy, which are directly linked to the events of January 6, 2021. As a political scientist whose work is at the intersection of populism, polarization, and democratization, my goal is to situate the United States within a global context. Rather than analyzing the US as an exceptional or unique country, I would like to illustrate some patterns that can help us make sense of the last five years and beyond. The first theme that would answer the question “How did we get here?” is
As he started to win key primary races and became the Republican nominee, this perception within the GOP quickly changed. After his surprise victory against Clinton in 2016, Trump soon consolidated his grip over the Republican Party and gradually turned it into a far-right movement that revolved around fiscal conservatism, cultural nativism, and personalism. During his four-year presidency, Trump delivered to establishment Republicans like Mitch McConnell and Lindsey Graham judicial appointments and tax cuts. At the same time, he mainly appealed to his core constituency, who were predominantly White, non-college educated, and lived in rural areas. As a populist leader, Trump opened up the political space to “angry patriots” who saw themselves as the owners of the country and the president as their savior. Under Trumpism, far-right ideas like building a wall on the Mexican border and conspiracy theories like QAnon have found themselves a place in the mainstream (Mudde, 2017). From a comparative perspective, Trump’s brand of right-wing populism is similar to other populist leaders like Marine Le Pen in France, Geert Wilders in the Netherlands, Viktor Orban in Hungary, Jair Bolsonoro in Brazil, Alberto Fujimori in Peru, Narendra Modi in India, Rodrigo Duterte in the Philippines, and Recep
Tayyip Erdoğan in Turkey (Norris and Inglehart, 2016). All of these populist leaders have positioned themselves against the establishment in their own countries and claimed to represent the authentic people, who felt marginalized, victimized, and silenced. Populist figures like Le Pen and Wilders have not won a national election yet, but they have pushed centrist political actors to consider their xenophobic and Islamophobic agenda. More successful populist leaders like Fujimori and Erdoğan have used authoritarian tactics to undermine civil liberties and weaken checks and balances in their country (Selçuk and Arrarás, 2017). Thus, for observers who look beyond the borders of the United States, Trump’s brand of populism is far from novel. Trumpism is a successful application of an already existing right-wing populist playbook from Europe, Latin America, and Asia into the American context. Like Trump, the above-mentioned populist leaders subscribe to democracy as long as they are on the winning side. The moment they lose an election or a referendum, the most common explanation is to call it fraudulent or a heinous conspiracy against the will of the people. Another variable that explains the crisis of American democracy is the multiple types of polarization that undermine the political center and reward extremist behavior. The first type of polarization that erodes democracy in the United States is partisan polarization between Democrats and Republicans. The growing divide between the two parties has ideological and affective origins. From a comparative point of view, both political parties in the United States subscribe to free-market capitalism and do not offer any structural alternatives to neoliberal globalization. Regardless, in the last decade, the Democratic Party has shifted to the left and the Republican Party has moved to the right, which reduces the likelihood of bipartisan legislation and incentivizes gridlock. At the citizen level, Democrats and Republicans increasingly dislike and distrust one another. They tend to live in echo chambers that reinforce their existing beliefs and attitudes, thus minimizing their social interactions with the members of the out-group (Iyengar et al., 2019).
Populist leaders like Donald Trump not only benefit from these polarizations but deliberately deepen them to consolidate their base and capitalize on pre-existing fears. In the age of negative partisanship (Abramowitz and Webster, 2016), for millions of Democratic voters the 2020 presidential election was less about voting for Joe Biden but more about voting against Trump and Republicans. The possibility of the other party winning elections is a feeling that dominates American politics. In polarized countries like the United States, Venezuela, Brazil, and Turkey, every election is seen as “the most important election of our lifetimes.” One of the main challenges of President Joe Biden is to keep the diverse anti-Trump coalition (from Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on the left to the Lincoln Project on the right) together while trying to govern with a slim majority in the Senate, which makes Biden’s progressive agenda depend on centrist senators like Joe Manchin. Lastly, I would like to reflect on the contemporary challenges to American democracy with a focus on its outdated institutions that need urgent reform. Unlike the mainstream media outlets like CNN and politicians on the both sides of the aisle who believe in American exceptionalism or leadership of the free world, according to well-known measures of democracy, the United States is far from being the best democracy in the world. According to Freedom House, a global watchdog of democracy in the world, the United States has a score of 83 out 100, which classifies the country “free” but ranks way behind Norway (100), Canada (98), Uruguay (98), Japan (96), and Germany (94). Other countries that also have a score of 83 include South Korea, Romania, and Panama, which all share a legacy of authoritarianism during the Cold War period (Freedom House, 2021). As a scholar of comparative democratization, I cannot think of another country where the winner of the popular vote (i.e., Al Gore in 2000 and Hillary Clinton in 2016) would lose the presidential elections. The United States is the only country that I know that lacks a na-
tional electoral body and uses an archaic institution called the Electoral College to pick its powerful head of state. The current winner-take-all system not only favors smaller, Whiter, and rural states at the expense of highly diverse population centers but also disenfranchises millions of Republicans living in California and millions of Democrats living in Texas. Given Trump’s rural appeal, it is not a coincidence that he questioned the integrity of the vote in urban areas like Detroit, Philadelphia, and Atlanta with significant Black populations instead of the Whiter parts of Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Georgia. If the United States is serious about fixing its democracy, it should start with abolishing the Electoral College and restoring the integrity of elections in all fifty states and territories, which would force the Republican Party to appeal to a larger segment of voters who are racially and geographically more diverse than the current narrow base. According to the Bright Line Watch initiative, besides abolishing the Electoral College and instituting a national popular vote, political scientists also support campaign finance transparency, flexibility on when and how to vote, redistricting commissions, same-day voter registration, suffrage for ex-felons, public funding of campaigns, ranked-choice voting, eighteen-year Supreme Court terms, eliminating the filibuster, multi-member districts, and enlarging the House of Representatives (Bright Line Watch, 2021). A comprehensive reform package is the only way to revitalize democracy in the US and minimize the risk of violent events like the one on January 6.
References Abramowitz, A. I., & Webster, S. (2016). The rise of negative partisanship and the nationalization of US elections in the 21st century. Electoral Studies, 41, 12-22. Bartels, L. (2020, September 15). Ethnic antagonism erodes Republicans’ commitment to democracy. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 117(37). https://www.pnas.org/content/ pnas/117/37/22752.full.pdf Spring 2021 Agora
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Bowden, J. (2021, February 25). Capitol Hill officer details racist abuse during mob attack. The Hill. https://thehill. com/homenews/news/540576-capitolhill-officer-details-racist-abuse-duringmob-attack
Bright Line Watch. (2021). American democracy at the start of the Biden presidency. Bright Line Watch January-February 2021 surveys. http://brightlinewatch.org/americandemocracy-at-the-start-of-the-bidenpresidency/
Carten, A. (2016, August 21). How racism has shaped welfare policy in America since 1935. The Conversation. https:// theconversation.com/how-racism-hasshaped-welfare-policy-in-americasince-1935-63574
Chew, Cassie M. (2020, November 5). Have White Christians Changed Since 2016? Not Much, Early Data Says. Sojourners. https://sojo.net/articles/have-Whitechristians-changed-2016-not-muchearly-data-says
Congressional Record—House of Representatives. (2021, January 6). “Recess,” p. H85, Vol. 167, No. 4. https://www.congress.gov/117/ crec/2021/01/06/CREC-2021-01-06. pdf Congressional Record—Senate. (2021, January 6). “Recess subject to the call of the chair,” p. S18, Vol. 167, No. 4. https://www.congress.gov/117/ crec/2021/01/06/CREC-2021-01-06. pdf
Farivar, M. (2021, January 16). Researchers: More than a dozen extremist groups took part in Capitol riots. VOA News. https://www.voanews.com/2020usa-votes/researchers-more-dozenextremist-groups-took-part-capitolriots
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Institute for Policy Studies. (n.d.) Income inequality in the United States. https:// inequality.org/facts/income-inequality/
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Iyengar, S., Lelkes, Y., Levendusky, M., Malhotra, N., & Westwood, S. J. (2019). The origins and consequences of affective polarization in the United States. Annual Review of Political Science, 22, 129-146.
Jones, S. G., Doxsee, C. & Harrington, N. (2020, June 17). The Escalating Terrorism Problem in the United States. Center for Strategic & International Studies. https://www.csis.org/analysis/ escalating-terrorism-problem-unitedstates McEvoy, J. (2021, January 27). Another officer who responded to Capitol attack dead by suicide. Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/ jemimamcevoy/2021/01/27/ another-officer-who-respondedto-capitol-attack-dead-bysuicide/?sh=7f5dd0e21782
McGhee, H. C. (2021, February 13). The way out of America’s zero-sum thinking on race and wealth. The New York Times. https://www. nytimes.com/2021/02/13/opinion/ race-economy-inequality-civil-rights. html?smid=url-share
Mudde, C. (2017). The far right in America. Routledge. Norris, P., & Inglehart, R. (2019). Cultural backlash: Trump, Brexit, and authoritarian populism. Cambridge University Press. Orlowski, J. (2020). The social dilemma [documentary]. Netflix. https://www. netflix.com/ Ostiguy, P., & Roberts, K. M. (2016). Putting Trump in comparative perspective: Populism and the politicization of the sociocultural law. Brown J. World Aff., 23, 25.
Rodgers, D. T. (2018). As a city on a hill: The story of America’s most famous lay sermon. Princeton University Press. Ruhl, Ashleigh. (2021, January 6). Rep. Lowenthal on U.S. Capitol riot: ‘felt like a coup in a third-world country. Daily News. https://www.dailynews. com/2021/01/06/rep-lowenthal-onu-s-capitol-riot-felt-like-a-coup-in-athird-world-country/ Scott, J., Johnson, R. & Ibemere, S. (2020, September 21). Addressing health inequities re-illuminated by the COVID-19 pandemic: How can nursing respond? Nursing Forum, 56(1). https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/ doi/10.1111/nuf.12509
Selçuk, O. & Arrarás, A. 2017. Here’s what Peru can teach Turkey about presidential power grabs. Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/ news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/05/02/ heres-what-peru-can-teach-turkeyabout-presidential-power-grabs/ Seneca, C. (2020, September 17). How to break out of your social media echo chamber. Wired. https://www.wired. com/story/facebook-twitter-echochamber-confirmation-bias/
Siripurapu, A. (2020, July 15). Backgrounder: The U.S. inequality debate. Council on Foreign Relations. https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/usinequality-debate Smith, G. A. (2020, March 12). About a third in U.S. see God’s hand in presidential elections, but fewer say God picks winners based on policies. FactTank, Pew Research Center. https://www.pewresearch.org/facttank/2020/03/12/about-a-third-inu-s-see-gods-hand-in-presidentialelections-but-fewer-say-god-pickswinners-based-on-policies/
Thiede, B., Brown, D. L., Butler, J., & Jensen, L. (2020, April 14). Income inequality is getting worse in US urban areas. The Conversation. https://theconversation. com/income-inequality-is-gettingworse-in-us-urban-areas-132417 USA Today. (2020, October 12). Deadly discrimination: ‘An unbelievable chain of oppression’: America’s history of racism was a preexisting condition for COVID-19 (6-part series). https:// www.usatoday.com/in-depth/news/ nation/2020/10/12/coronavirusdeaths-reveal-systemic-racism-unitedstates/5770952002/ Wilkerson, I. (2020, July 1). America’s enduring caste system. New York Times Magazine. https://www.nytimes. com/2020/07/01/magazine/isabelwilkerson-caste.html
Zarroli, J. (2020, March 18). ‘Deaths Of Despair’ Examines The Steady Erosion Of U.S. Working-Class Life. NPR News. https://www. npr.org/2020/03/18/817687042/ deaths-of-despair-examines-thesteady-erosion-of-u-s-working-classlife#:~:text=Much%20of%20the%20 decline%20stems,or%20shooting%20 or%20hanging%20themselves.%22
The Love and Rage of James Baldwin, The Unwavering Witness Editor’s note: This lecture was part of “Luther College Commemorates Black History Month,” a series of live, virtual presentations offered in February to illuminate current events with historical perspectives. Following the lecture, Professor Amy Weldon joined Professor Whitsitt in a discussion of James Baldwin’s short story, “Sonny’s Blues,” on February 15, 2021.
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n May 24, 1963, Robert Kennedy, the U.S. attorney general in the John F. Kennedy administration, called for a meeting with James Baldwin and a number of Black leaders, and the meeting took place at Kennedy’s apartment in New York. In addition to Baldwin, there was Kenneth Clarke, the noted research psychologist and educator whose work buttressed the case of Brown vs. the Board of Education in 1954, Lorraine Hansberry, playwright of A Raisin in the Sun, actors Harry Belafonte and Lena Horne, Clarence Jones, one of King’s attorneys, and Jerome Smith, a young Black activist of CORE (Congress of Racial Equality), who had been badly beaten multiple times protesting in the South. The leaders were there with the expressed intention of prodding the Kennedy administration to take a more public stance of support for the civil rights campaign in the South. At the time, protests to desegregate Birmingham were in full swing, and the American public was watching Bull Connor, the Commissioner of Public Safety, give police the authority to use fire hoses and dogs on Black protestors of all ages. By all accounts, the meeting did not go well. Young Jerome Smith quickly grew impatient with Kennedy’s perceived insensitivity and uttered that his being there to ask for rights that he should already possess made him feel like vomiting. He went on to say that if he was ever called to fight in defense of America, he would never do it, to which
Kennedy accused him of lacking patriotism. That was the tipping point. All of the Black leaders sided with Smith as Kennedy grew increasingly defensive and promptly left when Hansberry got up and walked out of the apartment. Originally, it had been Baldwin’s connection to the attorney general that had led to the meeting, and its failure upset him. Shortly after the meeting, in an interview with Kenneth Clarke, Clarke asked Baldwin what he genuinely felt about the future of America and Black Americans. It took Baldwin a second to gather his thoughts, and he began by stating, “I can’t be a pessimist because I am alive. To be a pessimist means that you have agreed to believe that life is an academic matter. So I am forced to be an optimist. I am forced to believe that we can survive. Whatever, we must survive” (Baldwin, “Conversation” Youtube). The rest of the decade would be a cavalcade of dizzying events and results. The March on Washington would happen in another couple of months, and significant federal legislation would be passed with the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and the Fair Housing Act of 1968. However, that legislative progress came at a cost that left many Black leaders and citizens despondent about the movement. The likes of Medgar Evers, Malcolm X, and Martin Luther King Jr. would be murdered, and a new wave of more militant Black leadership would characterize the older guard and its tactics as out of touch with the mindset of the Black masses. The traditional mainstream narrative of James Baldwin’s life following the death of King is that he felt profoundly disappointed by the movement’s failings, had succumbed to pessimism, gave up on his belief in a beloved interracial community, and actually became almost politically and artistically irrelevant. However, I want to argue that that reading of
PHOTO COURTESY OF THE AUTHOR
by NOVIAN WHITSITT, Professor of English and Identity Studies
Novian Whitsitt Baldwin is flawed. Again, mainstream critics characterize his body of work in the 1960s as moving from an emphasis on the power of love serving as a tonic for White supremacy to a rageful acceptance of White hostility to social justice and his subsequent embrace of a more militant rhetoric and dismissal of crossracial cooperative possibilities. This position, however, fails to duly note the high level of rage that always existed in Baldwin’s work, particularly in his nonfiction political essays, and his remaining optimism about possible change in his post 1960s ideas. Finally, I’d like to consider how Baldwin’s contributions can serve as a lens for our current political and social moment. Can his perspectives help us make sense of the volatile climate and provide some guidance on how to deal with our disappointment and anger as we attempt to move forward? By looking particularly at two of his non-fictional writings, The Fire Next Time (1963) and No Name in the Street (1972), we’ll see what we can find. I wish I had time to provide a robust biography right now, but I don’t. Suffice it to say that his childhood and adolescence growing up in Harlem, his life as a teenage preacher, his decision to leave Spring 2021 Agora
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America for France in 1948 at the age of 24, and his European experiences over the next nine years all represent lives in their own right. By the time he writes The Fire Next Time in 1963, he has already established himself as a gifted writer of novels, plays, essays, and one of the most respected intellectuals talking about race. The Fire Next Time offers a call for the salvation of America through love, which hopefully would affect White America’s honest admission of social injustice and commitment to change. It consists of two essays: “My Dungeon Shook: Letter to My Nephew on the One Hundredth Anniversary of the Emancipation” and “Down at the Cross: Letter from a Region of My Mind.” The first is a short letter essay, written to his young nephew coming of age, at a time when the youth’s rageful behavior incubated in his urban misery has alarmed the family. The second piece is an extended essay, which allows Baldwin to explore many of his previously expressed ideas all in one place. It addresses America’s racial strife through his blending of autobiographical components with his portrait of the Nation of Islam and its widening appeal to the Black masses. He juxtaposes the reasons behind the Harlem storefront churches’ appeal to him and those prompting thousands to join the new movement lead by Elijah Muhammad and Malcolm X. For our purposes, I’d like to move back and forth between the two essays and shape his analysis. What’s unequivocal in Fire is his assertion that America’s pretense to innocence constitutes America’s greatest crime. Speaking candidly to his nephew, he describes how the design of the inner city has sought to destroy the likes of their family. I know what the world has done to my brother and how narrowly he has survived it. And I know, which is much worse, and this is the crime of which I accuse my country and my countrymen, and for which neither I nor time nor history will ever forgive them, that they have destroyed and are destroying hundreds of thousands of lives and do not know it 10
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and do not want to know it. One can be, indeed one must strive to become, tough and philosophical concerning destruction and death, for this is what most of mankind has been best at since we have heard of man. But it is not permissible that the authors of devastation should also be innocent. It is the innocence which constitutes the crime. (Baldwin, The Fire Next Time 5-6) If all of Baldwin’s ideas had to be reduced to a single critique of America, it would be its refusal to look honestly at the state of America and acknowledge the social forces that have created it. It is the lie about American history and the material and psychic devastation of people of color, at home and abroad. It is the lie that America has been and continues to be wholesome and good, and dark moments can be dismissed as we’ve always striven to live up to the creed that “all men are created equal.” It is the lie that allows us to distort current events and reframe them to support our innocence. What’s at stake for White America is the maintenance of its identity. Baldwin states: Try to imagine how you would feel if you woke up one morning to find the sun shining and all the stars aflame. You would be frightened because it is out of the order of nature. Any upheaval in the universe is terrifying because it so profoundly attacks one’s sense of one’s own reality. Well, the black man has functioned in the white man’s world as a fixed star, as an immovable pillar: and as he moves out of his place, heaven and earth are shaken to their foundations. (Baldwin, The Fire Next Time 9) So this recalcitrance to change identity is two-fold: it’s first rooted in the belief of America’s goodness, and second in its desire to maintain socio-economic status. What’s key here for Baldwin is that the process of creating oneself requires that one pays dues. When one has the terms by which one has invented oneself collide with the real circumstances of life,
one must make a choice: one can hold on to the old definition of oneself, or one can choose life and begin the work of creating oneself through genuine effort. Real freedom depends upon truth about life’s realities, and he notes, “I have met only a very few people—and most of these were not Americans— who had any real desire to be free. Freedom is hard to bear” (Baldwin, The Fire Next Time 88). The Fire Next Time rests upon his abiding faith in the power of love in changing America’s future. He says, “Love takes off the masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within. I use the word ‘love’ here not merely in the personal sense but as a state of being, or a state of grace—not in the infantile American sense of being made happy but in the tough and universal sense of quest and daring and growth” (95). So his message to his embittered nephew is not that White society must learn to accept him, but he must learn to accept Whites, for those folks who believe in their innocence have no other hope. And just as he rejects what he describes as the Nation of Islam’s dream of Black vengeance, he countenances his nephew to leave it behind as well. He concludes, “It is so simple a fact and one that is so hard, apparently, to grasp: Whoever debases others is debasing himself. That is not a mystical statement but a most realistic one, which is proved by the eyes of any Alabama sheriff—and I would not like to see Negroes ever arrive at so wretched a condition” (83). These words of love and social salvation had such a rhetorical power that they captured the essence of Baldwin’s perspective in the eyes of the general public. However, what the public too often missed was his anger, his outrage that accompanied the message of hopeful brotherhood. While he could offer sermonically inspiring visions of the future, he was equally committed to being a witness to the moral morass of America, his potential of offending the people who believed themselves to be White be damned. Discussing the Nation of Islam’s elaborate mythology regarding the birth of the demonic White race, Baldwin states:
the obvious material and psychic boon of being at the top of a social hierarchy. There is something much more insidious at work, and America must deal with why it’s afraid of experiencing real, meaningful life. America, to Baldwin, has scapegoated Black America for its own sins; however, he notes scapegoating never saves the sinner. The scapegoat may actually find freedom, if not even through death and the release it provides, but the sinner won’t be changed through this ritual. Ultimately, Baldwin asserts people pay for what they do, for what they’ve allowed themselves to become, and pay for it simply by the lives that they lead. Making his point, he recounts a late evening meeting with Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth, a key leader in the Birmingham protests, when he made a comment about the danger awaiting the reverend during his journey home in the Alabama night. He notes: Only, when I made my halting observation concerning his safety, a shade of sorrow crossed his face, deep, impatient, dark; then it was gone. It was the most impersonal anguish I had ever seen on a man’s face. It was as though he were wrestling with the mighty fact that the danger in which he stood was nothing compared to the spiritual horror which drove those who were trying to destroy him. They endangered him, but they doomed themselves. (Baldwin, No Name in the Street 67) WIKIMEDIA COMMONS IMAGE BY ALLAN WARREN
There is nothing new in this merfor its continued pushing of the lie of ciless formulation except the exWhite innocence, perhaps with even plicitness of its symbols and the greater emphasis. It’s a review of the candor of its hatred. Its emotionCivil Rights Movement, offering poial tone is as familiar to me as my gnant portraits of Medgar Evers, X, and own skin; it is but another way King and his friendships with them, a of saying that sinners shall be telling full of wistfulness. For Baldwin, bound in Hell a thousand years. America’s pretended humanism rests That sinners have always, for upon its inability to reconcile its public American Negroes, been white life with the private. is a truth we needn’t labor….Most Negroes cannot risk assuming that the humanity of white people is more real to them than their color….The brutality with which Negroes are treated in this country simply cannot be overstated, however unwilling white men may be to hear it…a Negro cannot believe that white people are treating him as they do; he does not know what he has done to merit it. And when he realizes that the treatment accorded him has nothing to do with anything he has done, James Baldwin, 1969 that the attempt of white people to destroy him—for that is what it is—is I have always been struck, utterly gratuitous, it is not hard in America, by an emotional for him to think of white people poverty so bottomless, and a as devils. (Baldwin, The Fire Next terror of human life, of human Time 68-69) touch, so deep, that virtually no American appears able to achieve And so as he recounts a friendly any viable, organic connection conversation with Elijah Muhammad between his public stance and and company at Muhammad’s Chicago his private life….The failure of home, he confesses that he had no the private life has always had rebuttal to Elijah’s authority and the the most devastating effect on reality of their lives and experiences in American public conduct, and on the street. He had nothing to counter black-white relations. If Ameritheir condemnation of Whites. For cans were not so terrified of their Baldwin, anyone who failed to underprivate selves, they would never stand the immense attraction of the have needed to invent and could Nation simply had no sense of Blacks never have become so dependent as human beings, but only as symbols of on what they still call ‘the Negro suffering. And these were his thoughts problem.’ (Baldwin, No Name in in 1963. Indeed, American liberal critics the Street 54) had undervalued his outrage. Here, he continues to push White In his 1972 memoir, No Name in the America to grapple with its need to Street, he returns to excoriating America invent Blackness as peril; it goes beyond
So yes, Baldwin in No Name in the Street in 1972 is beside himself with outrage here: about White America’s persistence in the lie of its innocence; about the devaluing of Black life; about police brutality and the penal justice system; about White America’s refusal to believe that Black America’s grievances were Spring 2021 Agora
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real. His anger and frustration pervade the work, more than it did in The Fire Next Time. However, it’s impossible to conclude that in the message he has resigned himself to a hopelessness for change. He wants to emphasize the idea that as the acts of inhumanity pile upon each other, inevitably there is a selfdefeating nature to those who rule by force: force does not convince the victim of the strength of the adversary, but rather it spawns patience in the victim. He prophesies: It is ultimately fatal to create too many victims. The victor can do nothing with these victims, for they do not belong to him, but—to the victims. They belong to the people he is fighting. The people know this, and as inexorably as the roll call—the honor roll—of victims expands, so does their will become inexorable: they resolve that these dead, their brethren, shall not have died in vain. (Baldwin, No Name in the Street 89) And thus, the continued struggle was unswerving for Baldwin. He was the consummate witness; that’s what he had always been, and a witness seeks to instill accountability in us. At the end of the work, Baldwin makes what sounds like a plea for our shared humanity. Characterizing American streets as a wretched orphanage, he says: It has been vivid to me for many years that what we call a race problem here is not a race problem at all: to keep calling it that is a way of avoiding the problem. The problem is rooted in the question of how one treats one’s flesh and blood, especially one’s children. The blacks are the despised and slaughtered children of the great Western house—nameless and unnamable bastards. This is a fact so obvious, so speedily verifiable, that it would seem pure insanity to deny it, and yet the life of the entire country is predicated on this denial, this monstrous and pathetic lie. (Baldwin, No Name in the Street 186)
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The passage here explicates the meaning of the book’s title, No Name in the Street, and embodies Baldwin’s capacity to hold grief, rage, and remnants of hope for our shared humanity. To be outraged is to be invested in the struggle; it is the antithesis of being resigned. In no way had he taken his pulpit and removed himself from the fray. If anything, the disappointments of the 1960s had strengthened his commitment to speaking the unbearable. For the next fifteen remaining years of his life, he would continue to witness to the country’s refusal to change, with every last breath in his body, making no room for bitterness in his mind. So now, it seems like it would be marvelous if the ideas and commitment of this man might shed some light on the chaos of our times. We are all grappling with what feels insoluble, a country passionately divided over what it should look like, what it should represent. It feels like Baldwin would have something to say about it all. Let me just say, before I offer a few ideas here, my real hope is that some of the things I’ve shared already will prompt your own analysis and application to our present moment. In the introduction to a recently published work, Begin Again: James Baldwin’s America and Its Urgent Lessons for Our Own, the scholar Eddie Glaude elegantly sets up a frame for us to embrace Baldwin’s relevance. For Glaude, there have been two significant moments of racial betrayal in America, the first being the era following the Civil War during the Reconstruction, and the second being the times following the modern Civil Rights Movement. In both of these fateful moments, which offered authentic prospects for social growth and change, there would be a retrenchment of the status quo, a doubling down on preserving what Glaude refers to as the “value gap” between Blacks and Whites. Baldwin writes in the “after times” of the second moment of racial betrayal, wrestling with the darkness created by the undoing of the movement. Glaude asserts we currently find ourselves in the next significant historical moment of disappointment, the next “after times” if you will. Trump’s presidency was the response to the
political and social possibilities of the Obama era and the demands of the rising Black Lives Matter movement. Forty per cent of the country loved what they saw in Trump—specifically, his celebrated policies and targeted rhetoric that affirmed Black/brown people were responsible for undermining their happiness and success in the country. With this setup in mind, let us think briefly about Baldwin’s wisdom. What speaks to me immediately is Baldwin’s emphasis on the crime of White innocence. Many want to maintain America’s basic goodness, wholesomeness, exceptional commitment to fairness, so much so that one claiming systemic racism exists can be quickly dismissed as someone painting America as being evil to the core, irredeemable, incapable of change. A position of innocence warrants that America’s greatness deserves a patriotic veneer in all academic curriculum. The 1776 Commission, established by Trump, returned its findings on January 18, Martin Luther King Jr. Day of all days. It began as a response to Black Lives Matter rallies and some of the alleged violence that they prompted, and it was based on the assertion that school curriculums had indoctrinated students with a radical left-wing version of American enslavement. It meant to offer up a counter to the New York Times 1619 Project, which Trump called “toxic propaganda.” A White House statement described the report as, “a dispositive rebuttal of reckless ‘re-education’ attempts that seek to reframe American history around the idea that the United States is not an exceptional country but an evil one” (Vazquez). The report espoused the belief that history and historiography should be charged with communicating a set of cherished, timeless values such as liberty, justice, and equality. While celebrating such values certainly has a place, it’s not in the work of American historians trying to make sense of how this country evolved. Not a single member of the 1776 Commission was a professional historian, which concluded that the true meaning of history must be dedicated to a “patriotic education.” In other words, let’s not wake those who are safely asleep in their dream of
innocence. In thinking about his own relationship to history, Baldwin says: I am speaking as an historical creation which has had bitterly to contest its history, to wrestle with it, and finally accept it in order to bring myself out of it. My point of view certainly is formed by my history, and it is probable that only a creature despised by history finds history a questionable matter. On the other hand, people who imagine that history flatters them (as it does, indeed, since they wrote it) are impaled on their history like a butterfly on a pin and become incapable of seeing or changing themselves, or the world. (Baldwin, The Price of the Ticket 410) That fear of changing can be seen in Trump’s executive order last September to prohibit any discussion in the federal workforce of systemic racism, White privilege, or unconscious bias. Diversity and inclusion training continue to be characterized as anti-American, divisive, and racist against Whites and sexist against men. In truth, the Lie of Innocence can be applied to so much. The push for an aggressive U.S.-Mexican border patrol accepts that immigrants are a threat to our national security, and serves to feed our racist discourse about the dangers of brown people. It then becomes acceptable to separate family members, keep them in depraved caged conditions for months, and feel good about our inhumanity. It allows us to delegitimize the Black Lives Matter movement, characterize it as a terrorist organization, and quickly dispense of the painful truth of police brutality of Blacks that has a history dating back to antebellum years. The focus on the brutalizing of Black bodies quickly moves to a focus on the destruction of property, and the conclusion that All Lives Matter, even though all lives are not dying at the hands of the State at equal rates. We can point to impoverished Black urban areas experiencing horrific violence and determine that the Black Lives Matter movement can’t be serious about its claims of police brutality given homicide rates in cities like Chicago, all while exonerat-
ing ourselves of any accountability by erasing the people who engineered such cities through racial covenants and redlining. At this very moment, we can try to pass state legislation to limit medical professionals providing care to young trans and non-binary people, particularly when the prospects for queer rights are improving at the federal level, and then say that we do so in the name of religious freedom and family values. As Biden passed an executive order extending nondiscrimination protections for the LGBTQ community and lifted the ban on trans troops, #BidenErasesWomen began trending on Twitter. For Baldwin, closely linked to the lie of innocence is White America’s desire to hold on to its identity, its Whiteness, and he referred to this phenomenon as “the white problem.” This mindset currently exists as we see the ways people continue to invest in their Whiteness. As we undergo seismic shifts in our demographic makeup, cultural anxiety is palpable. The prospects of Whites losing majority status is unnerving, causing racial anxiety and change in political attitudes. The appeal of Trump and “Make America Great Again” speaks to our fear of growing diversity and inclusion, and nostalgically takes us back to simpler times when hetero-White patriarchy exerted greater authority. So it’s no stretch to say that Baldwin would profess that White folks have work to do. He says, “The truth, forever, for everybody, is that one is a stranger to oneself, and that one must deal with this stranger day in and day out—that one, in fact, is forced to create, as distinct from invent, oneself. Life demands of everyone a certain kind of humility, the humility to be able to make the descent….” (Baldwin, The Cross of the Redemption 89). This passage speaks to the work that we all must do as we say “yes” to life.
equal humanity. And if our witnessing taps into our anger and rage, that’s okay; it’s acceptable and justified. Baldwin, however, was always able to distinguish between bitterness and rage. So witness, and testify until you yourself can no long bear it. And when you finally hit that point, then start all over again.
Works Cited Baldwin, James. No Name in the Street. New York, Vintage Books, 2007.
---. The Cross of the Redemption: Uncollected Writings. Ed. Randal Kenan. New York, Vintage Books, 2010. ---. The Fire Next Time. New York, Vintage Books, 1991.
---. The Price of the Ticket: Collected Nonfiction 1948-1985. New York, St. Martin’s, 1985. “A Conversation With James Baldwin/ Dr. Kenneth Clark/May 24, 1963.” Youtube, https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=zhop-eFB0sI.
Vazquez, Maegan. “Trump Administration Issues Racist School Curriculum Report on MLK Day.” CNN Politics. www. cnn.com/2021/01/18/politics/1776commission-report-donald-trump/ index.html?cid=external-feeds_ iluminar_newsbreak. Monday, January 18, 2021.
Finally, what Baldwin showed us as he faced the disillusionment of his own historical moment is the necessity to witness. He was tenacious in calling America to task on all of its shortcomings, and he models moral commitment. The words on the country’s lips are unity and healing, but these cannot occur without truthful acknowledgement about current forms of contempt for Spring 2021 Agora
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Reflections on a Professional Life by NANCY JONES '69
Editor’s note: The following talk was given by Nancy Jones ('69), Phi Beta Kappa alumna inductee, to Luther College students initiated into Phi Beta Kappa on April 25, 2021.
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I graduated from the college in 1969, 52 years ago this spring. Much has changed in the world since then, of course. Back in the late ’60s, there were no personal computers or cell phones or internet or Google translate or text messages, much less abbreviations like LOL, TLDR or IMHO. Items in grocery stores did not include bar codes to be scanned, microwave ovens would not become mainstream for another five years, and the Sony Walkman was still a decade away. The world would not experience the first ground-breaking Star Wars movie for another eight years, nor begin playing Pacman and Tetris until the 1980s, with Pokeman and Super Smash Brothers not arriving on the scene until the late 1990s, and Call of Duty somewhat later still. (My sons, Sven and Bjorn, would be so proud of their mother for even knowing the names of any video games.) Here on campus, back in 1969, firstyear students—at that time referred to as freshmen—wore beanies for the first weeks of their fall semester, to distinguish them from everyone else (as if their looks of occasional bewilderment didn’t already give that away). Young women had “hours,” the times you were required to be back in the dorm on given nights—10:00 p.m. week nights, 11:00 on weekends—but young 14
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PHOTO COURTESY OF MARTIN KLAMMER
t’s a pleasure to be with you young people today, and other members of the broader Luther community, on the occasion of our induction into Luther’s chapter of Phi Beta Kappa. I am quite honored to be joining you as we become members of this illustrious honor society, however many years separate us as Luther students.
Nancy Jones at the Phi Beta Kappa reception with professors emeriti Will Bunge and Harland Nelson. men did not. As one of my professors explained this discrepancy, “If the women are back in their dorms, there’s no reason for the men not to be back in theirs.” We women also had “lights out,” 30 minutes after we were to be in our rooms. Many of us used up lots of flashlight batteries that year, studying late under the covers so none of the RAs could detect any light coming through the space at the bottom of the door. If you needed to call home, you could wait your turn at the one phone for outgoing calls near the front desk in whatever dorm you lived, and that’s the phone your parents and friends called when they wanted to reach you as well. When you went to the library, you did not go to the spacious Preus Library, which opened the fall after I graduated, but you went to cozy Koren where I spent many an evening in the stacks. The CFL didn’t exist back then, so we had chapel and church services and Messiah rehearsals and performances, and other musical events, in the Field House, as I recall.
So, a lot has changed here since I graduated, lo, these many years ago. But some things have not. The Oneota Valley seen from the Union is as glorious as ever. Faculty members continue to produce exciting research, as the pages of Agora regularly attest; students—at least prepandemic and surely in months ahead— are challenged to branch out through international programs in countries around the world. And the commitment to living responsible lives seems deeply rooted, whether in the face of climate change or in reaction to racial injustices. So, too, is the commitment of faculty and staff to the lives of individual students, their desire to provide them with an education for life and to model the truth that the life of the mind and the life of faith can work hand in hand. I could give you many examples of such commitment to me on the part of Luther faculty and staff members, but I’ll mention only one this afternoon. When I was a senior, I found myself walking one afternoon in front of Main—where the English Department was housed
and many of my classes were held—not much has changed there! Professor Mary Lou Mohr, dear Mary Lou, who would be instrumental in the founding of Luther’s Phi Beta Kappa chapter in 1983, was also walking nearby and made a point of coming over to me. By then she had heard that I had been accepted into the M.A.T. program at Brown University, where I’d get a degree that would qualify me to teach junior high or high school English in the public schools. She jumped right to her point. “Nancy, I think you should consider working towards a Ph.D., so you could teach at the college level.” While it’s not at all unusual today for young women to hold such goals, it wasn’t all that common among my circle of friends at Luther in 1969. I remember feeling honored that Mary Lou felt I was capable of aiming that high, though it would be a number of years before I took her up on the implied challenge, and longer yet before I ended up at the front of college and professional school classrooms. After getting my degree at Brown, I did what countless other young people were doing in those days. I headed off to see the world, or at least Western Europe. I bought a backpack to carry everything I’d need for three months, purchased travelers checks to cash along the way (If you want to know what those were, most anyone over 50 or 60 could explain them to you), told my family and friends which American Express offices I’d be visiting over the coming months where I’d be able to pick up any mail they sent me (remember, there were no smart phones for keeping in touch), bought a Eurail Pass that would allow me to board virtually any train at a moment’s notice once I got to Europe, and bought a round-trip ticket to Amsterdam on Iceland Air, following in the footsteps of thousands of other college-aged students and recent graduates with Frommer’s Europe on $5 a Day in hand. What I also carried with me was the energy and sense of adventure and fascination with the world that my liberal arts education gave me in spades. I wanted to see the art museums that my freshman course in art from Professor Orville Running had whetted my appetite for—the Louvre, the Prado, the
Rijksmuseum, for example, along with a foray to Florence and its Uffizi Gallery, the Galleria dell Academia (with Michelangelo’s David), and the Museum of the History of Science, not to mention Frogner Park in Oslo; I wanted to visit the countries that had produced Homer, Goethe, and Shakespeare, authors whose works I had read in Core, the predecessor to Paideia. I wanted to go to La Scala in Milan, the Teatro Real in Madrid, and the Royal Albert Hall in London, all places that figured in the music appreciation course I took from Professor Bart Butler at Luther. Not to mention London’s West End, for the theater that was central to many of my English courses at Luther. I realized soon enough that three months wasn’t going to give me nearly enough time to fit all of this in, so foot loose and fancy free, I decided to forgo my return flight and stay in Europe longer—four years, to be exact. In those years I taught English in Madrid to businessmen and to young women hoping to be hired by Iberia Airlines; taught English to Arab students in Dijon, France while studying French; and taught junior high and high school students at a U.S. Air Force base near Zweibrucken, West Germany (the fall of the Berlin Wall and the reunification of Germany was still almost 20 years away). This base near Zweibrucken was a NATO base that had been rented out to the Canadians before the U.S. Air Force, and there were beautiful maple trees everywhere. Also a base commander who didn’t understand young people. He wanted all the students, K-12, to walk on the sidewalks between scattered school buildings, rather than on the grass or in the streets. Good luck with that, as they say. This was also where I learned that the ways of the military can be inscrutable. One day the high school band director came into my classroom in great excitement, saying he’d received word that a large shipment had arrived with “Band” written on the outside of multiple large boxes. He was hoping this included the music and music stands he’d been waiting for for months. But, no. The military had shipped him 12 bass drums, which he’d never asked for, instead. Go figure.
I also worked for a couple of years as a high school guidance counselor at Lakenheath, England, a U.S. military base north of Newmarket, a small town considered to be the birthplace of thoroughbred horse racing. (I had to carefully time my commute from my Newmarket apartment to the base to make sure I left before all traffic was stopped, sometimes for as much as 20 minutes, so that the thoroughbred horses could cross the road—the main thoroughfare from London to the north of Suffolk—from their stables on the east to the heath where they were exercised and ran on the west.) The military base was where I met one of the few falconers on the military payroll, an officer who released falcons before the enormous transport planes took off from or landed at Mildenhall Air Base, to frighten away other birds and prevent them from being sucked into the engines and causing planes to crash. (Not an impossibility, as we learned many years later when Captain Chesley Sullenberger landed US Airways Flight 1549 on the Hudson River in New York City after both engines of the plane were struck by a flock of Canada geese.) My life in those years, peripatetic as it was, was varied and very satisfying. I’m grateful to have had those experiences and I’ve returned to those memories often in the years since. But life moves along, and I returned to the States, spent a year teaching part-time at Luther, and then headed off to the University of Iowa to get my Ph.D. in English, just as Mary Lou Mohr had urged me to do seven years earlier. My life in Iowa City, much more stationary than my life in Europe, also held its own series of adventures, and I’ll focus on one of those in just a few minutes. Much of my attention in my degree program was the teaching of writing, and I had the opportunity to work with a range of populations in my early years at the university: undergraduate and graduate students; directors of freshman English programs from across the country who came to the university as part of the Institute on Writing (a joint program of the University and the National Endowment for the Humanities—I was a member of its staff ); and Spring 2021 Agora
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K-12 teachers and administrators across the state whom I taught in summer writing workshops in the State of Iowa Writing Project over the course of 12 years. Through all these experiences, and through ever so many conversations over time with members of the general public, I have come to see that the surest way to elicit silence is to tell someone that you teach writing. At best, you may get a nervous laugh in response, or a confession about writing being something that the person you’re talking with has tried to avoid. I imagine it’s something like the reaction dentists gets when announcing what they do. Many people—too many people— have had poor experiences with writing, going back perhaps to red-inked notes on papers from teachers in the schools—bleeding across the pages, as it were—that it takes a certain amount of fortitude to overcome.
I have come to see that the surest way to elicit silence is to tell someone that you teach writing. So what happens when you suddenly find yourself working with students whose academic program features writing at the center of so much of what they do? That’s the world I found myself in beginning in 1990 when the dean of the College of Law asked if I’d like to begin shaping a Writing Center there. It was a wonderful opportunity, to direct the first law-school-based writing center in the country. And that’s the work I continued to do for 30 years, until I retired last year, in the early months of the pandemic, just before all instruction at the university went remote. (As a result, I never became proficient at Zoom teaching, by the way, so I’m mighty glad to have expert IT set-up and back-up here today.) While the examples that follow are law-school and lawyer-specific, what I have to say about writing is relevant to 16
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virtually any field you might choose to enter, to virtually every profession and career. The importance of writing never goes away. In the time we have left here, just consider me your Sherpa as I guide you through some reminders, strategies and recommendations for the writing tasks you will face. When I accepted the law dean’s invitation 31 years ago now, I didn’t know what I was getting in for. There were no writing centers that I knew of in any professional schools at the time, so there were no parallel models for me to work from. While I did have a doctorate, I didn’t have a law degree, and the faculty, getting used to this new position in their midst themselves, made it quite clear that I was not to address the accuracy of students’ writing when I worked with them—something they needn’t have worried about, as I wouldn’t have known promissory estoppel or the rule of perpetuities or quantum meruit if they were to hit me over the head. The first months were something of a blur, but I was quite fortunate to have the help of Cameron Stracher, my associate director, a lawyer and graduate of the Writer’s Workshop. When I asked Cameron early on to look at a few paragraphs from a student’s memo, I said to him, “Do I not understand this because I don’t understand the law or because it’s just poorly written?” And I remember the great relief I felt when he said, “Oh. This is terribly written. I think I understand the law and can’t make heads nor tales of the prose.” It didn’t take me long to realize that, while I didn’t know what I was getting into when I took the position at the law school, the majority of law students didn’t know what they were getting into when going to law school either. Many were first-generation students without lawyers in their extended family, while others had absorbed the popular view of lawyers from novels by John Grisham or Scott Turow or TV shows such as Law & Order and Boston Legal. To be immersed in these elements of popular culture would convince a person that lawyers can out-talk anyone in the room, argue with energy and drama wherever they happen to be, and have very complex personal lives.
What such fictionalized accounts and televised trials fail to convey is that lawyers write, and they usually write a lot. As Jay Topkis, a lawyer in residence at the law school and a top-flight NYC litigator, said to my staff one fall, “I realize every day I practice law that I must write—and that I must care agonizingly about every word I put on the page.” So began my years helping law students care about every word they put on the page. I realized early on that first-year law students are at a great disadvantage when it comes to writing. For one thing, they are entering a world with a vocabulary they know little about. They’re excited, and alert, but they make mistakes they would never make under normal circumstances. It’s something like travelling in a new country where you don’t really know the language. The up-side is that it can be exhilarating, with your senses particularly alive. The down-side is that it can be frustrating, even if sometimes amusing to others. Early on during my time in Spain, for example, I was in a group of international and Spanish students at a college in Madrid, all of us talking about the places we called home. Now, in Spanish the words “winter” and “hell” are identical except for one phoneme. I remember the laughter that ensued when I inadvertently said that Hell in Iowa is much worse than Hell in Madrid. The other writing problem for first-year students is that they’re asked to write about subjects they don’t know much about, and in some cases don’t care much about either. Don’t get me wrong. They care about doing well in their classes, and they want to learn, but if you’re not particularly keen on contracts or civil procedure or property, let’s say, and don’t really understand the subject matter all that well, but have to write about it anyway, you’ve got two strikes against yourself right off the bat. In such circumstances, members of my staff and I would help writers clarify their thinking by asking questions, getting a writer to explain the logic in moving from one paragraph to another (if we couldn’t otherwise discern it), having them rephrase sentences that
didn’t make sense to us, having them tell us how they would explain a particular section to a family member or friend back home, rather than to the all-knowing professor. (To take away the fear of the audience often produces amazing and clarifying results.) We never addressed accuracy, as I mentioned before, but dealt with everything else, such that I often said that our aim for students as they left the Writing Center was that their writing be perfectly clear. It might be completely wrong, but it would be clearly wrong—making it much easier for their professors, incidentally, to know where the thinking problems happened to be.
According to Aristotle, there are three elements of any act of discourse: a subject, an audience, and a speaker (or writer). And corresponding to each of these elements is an artistic form of persuasion or proof. With the subject there is the persuasion inherent in logic (logos); with the audience the persuasive power of emotion (pathos); with the speaker/writer the persuasive power of one’s character (ethos). Thus, according to this model, you can prove your point, persuade your audience, through logic, through emotional appeals, and through the quality of your character. Note that Aristotle refers to these as artistic forms of persuasion, those supplied by the speaker’s or writer’s creation. Beyond these artistic forms are the non-artistic ones, such as threats and torture (which of course could persuade someone to do what you’d like them to do, but aren’t at all “artistic”).
school as he tried to figure out what to do with his life. He was a little slow in signing up, and by the time he tried to get into a general education literature class, the classes at times convenient for him had closed. So he went to the office of one of the instructors and said he’d like to take her class. “Why should I let you in?” he reported that she asked him. “This class is already full.” And, apparently without missing a beat, Sven replied, “Well, I had to grow up without cable, so I read a lot.” She must have found the argument compelling because she let him in. (He may also have been appealing to her emotions, trying to elicit sympathy for his life of deprivation.)
Just as writing is central to so much of what lawyers, and law students, do, so Of course, logic isn’t the only way that too is persuasion central to so much of we persuade one another. One powerful what lawyers and law students write. additional means is through appealing An office memo will aim to persuade to your audience’s emotions. Thus in a lawyers in the firm that your memo aclegal brief, you try to favorably prediscurately conveys a reasonable assessment pose your readers towards your client, of a client’s situation, and has painting the client in a symextracted from case law the pathetic light, diminishing the pertinent parallel cases that power of unflattering informawill guide the court’s decision tion by “hiding” it in the middle if the case goes to trial. A leof paragraphs rather than in gal brief will aim to persuade positions that garner more ata court that your client is in tention, such as the beginning the right before the law, worand end of paragraphs. In the thy of prevailing in the case at Writing Center we worked with hand. And then there are all students to tell the story of their the letters and motions that client, using narrative to highget sent and filed, to move a light qualities that would make case along and, wherever posthe client a sympathetic characsible, place your client in an ter, appealing to the audience. Nancy Jones presenting via Zoom for the 2021 Phi Beta Kappa advantageous position. Induction Ceremony So, for example, imagine that To understand the scope you represent a mother who of such persuasion, and the fears for her child’s safety, scope of work I undertook in the law Within the context of law school, doesn’t trust the child’s father, from school’s writing center, I’d like to shift the power of logical reasoning holds whom she is divorced, and, in light of gears and turn very briefly to Aristotle’s considerable sway, the power, that is, this distrust, has hidden the child from Rhetoric and his theory of persuasion. of proving a truth, real or apparent, by him. The father sues the mother for inargument. Class after class calls students terfering with his custodial rights. To set Aristotle wrote The Rhetoric during the to defend a position, find the logical the stage and give your audience reason fourth century B.C.E. while living in arguments on which the position is to be sympathetic to the mother, you Athens. Because Athenian democracy based, and through always rigorous and might phrase the question presented— called every free male into politics, every sometimes excruciating public examinathe very first part of the legal brief that Athenian man had to be ready to stand tion, hone one’s arguments. your readers would see—accordingly: in the Assembly and speak to persuade his countrymen to vote for or against a We all have examples from our own Was the trial court correct in particular piece of legislation. It was in lives of someone trying to persuade refusing to recognize a claim for the context of speaking effectively, perby logic. One of our favorite family custodial interference against a suasively, that The Rhetoric had its focus, stories involves our older son, Sven, who child’s mother, and refusing to though the principles apply to writing decided to take a few classes at Kirkaward damages to the other jointly effectively or persuasively as well. wood Community College after high custodial parent? Spring 2021 Agora
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Notice that the writer accords the mother that term, along with the link to her child (“the child’s mother”), whereas the father is referred to as the “other jointly custodial parent.” The former tugs at the heartstrings. The latter, wooden and cold, certainly does not. So right off the bat, we are drawn to the mother, precisely what her attorney would want. Or take another pair of examples from a case in the late ’60s, Miller v. Amusement Enterprises, Inc. At issue is whether the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Title II, prohibits racial discrimination in amusement parks. The trial court said no; the appellate court two years later said yes. Using facts strategically, persuasively, to help justify or set the tone for their differing decision, the two courts present the plaintiffs in quite different lights. (Incidentally, court opinions often lift language verbatim from the briefs submitted by attorneys for one or both parties, and such borrowing is not considered plagiarism. In fact, attorneys are pleased to have the court use their language, without attribution. It’s often a mark of pride.) First, from the opinion by the trial court in 1966 (and another aside: some of the language back in the ’60s was different from the language we’d use today): On March 1, 1965, plaintiff, Mrs. Patricia B. Miller, took her two children to Fun Fair Park [in Baton Rouge, LA], intending to use the ice-skating facilities which were then in operation. Upon their arrival at Fun Fair Park, the attendant, believing that one of the children who requested a pair of skates was a white child, handed her a pair of skates. Thereafter, upon learning that both of the children were Negroes, the attendant retrieved the skates and informed the plaintiffs that the facilities of Fun Fair Park were privately owned and were open for use by white people only. I’d say that’s a rather dispassionate rendering of a situation that would seem foreign to us in 2021, but that the trial court apparently found unremarkable back in 1966. But look at how 18
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the appellate court told the story in its 1968 opinion, by including and framing additional information from the record, in support of its decision that the Civil Rights Act did indeed prohibit such racial discrimination: Mrs. Miller, in response to Fun Fair’s advertisement that “Everybody come,” took her two children, Daniel age 12 and Denise age 9, to the park to ice skate. At the skate rental counter she asked for skates for Denise, who has a fair or light complexion, and the attendant thinking the little girl was white, promptly handed Mrs. Miller a pair of skates. Daniel, darkcomplexioned, who had been sent back to the Miller car for heavy socks, then joined his mother and sister. The rented skates were soon discovered to be too small and Mrs. Miller returned to the rental stand and placed the skates on the counter. In the meantime the attendant had discovered that the child was Negro and he had left the skate room to inform the manager of the situation. As the manager approached the counter, Mrs. Miller stated to him that the skates did not fit. The manager snatched the skates off the counter and announced to Mrs. Miller that Fun Fair did not ‘serve colored.’ The people standing in line waiting to rent skates began to giggle, and Denise, frightened and disappointed at not being allowed to skate, started crying. As Denise stood there crying, others in line appeared to be amused. Mrs. Miller and her children quickly left the park. What we have here is a very different story, of course, in which we are invited to feel sympathy for little Denise, frightened and disappointed, and none whatsoever for the representative of the amusement park who “snatched the skates off the counter” and announced that Fun Fair “did not ‘serve colored.’” What the trial and appellate courts have done is prepare us for their differing decisions by eliciting different emotional responses from us in the way they present the facts of the case—in
the first instance by not finding any legal problem with the behavior of Fun Fair, in the second instance finding that the establishment had engaged in racial discrimination, action the court held was prohibited by the Civil Rights Act of 1964. (Again, these versions are probably identical to what lawyers for each side had used in their briefs, in the first case hoping to convince the court to absolve Fun Fair of any responsibility, in the second case trying to elicit sympathy from the court about the plight of this Black family just trying to have a good time.) So, much of my work in the Center was teaching about these appeals to emotion, and helping writers negotiate this persuasive strategy (while not becoming hyperbolic nor calling into question their own integrity). And that brings us to the third means of persuasion that Aristotle talked about, along with appeals to logic and to emotion: ethos, or the character of the speaker/writer himself or herself. The way you present yourself in writing or speaking has persuasive power of its own. You aim for qualities that engender trust and inspire confidence, such that your audience will be inclined to listen carefully, even agree with, even act on what you have to say. Sometimes your reputation and credentials precede you, and can help your persuasiveness. When the Iowa State Supreme Court holds hearings and cases at the law school, which they do once every year, the audience is alert and highly respectful, knowing the power of the justices’ positions and the authority they carry by virtue of who they are.
Why “take actions” when you can simply “act”? Not many of us are or will be justices, of course, but we all have ways of inspiring confidence in those who hear or read what we have to say. Inspiring such confidence, establishing your credibility, means knowing the rules of the road, as it were, how
citations are presented, what kind of support you need for arguments, how you effectively conduct research in your field. It also means being attentive to the needs of your audience, doing what you can not to bore them, nor exhaust them, nor make them wish they were listening to or reading something else. It was within this context that I taught students strategies for making their sentences energetic, thereby more engaging—generally using the more forceful verb-based rather than noun-based constructions (that we call nominalizations), for example. Why “take actions” when you can simply “act”? There’s no reason to “make assumptions” instead of “assume.” Why “have a collision” instead of “collide”? No reason to “commit a violation” rather than “violate.” And why “interpose an objection” instead of “object”? It is also within this context that I taught students to avoid “throat-clearing,” that is, long windups, extraneous words, and unnecessarily repetitive language. So, instead of writing “The second defendant is plainly and unequivocally innocent,” go with the shorter and more direct “The second defendant is innocent.” Similarly, instead of writing “There are several facts that must be confirmed by that witness,” try the more active and concise version: “That witness must confirm several facts.” Even if brevity is not as highly valued in your field as it is in law, concise constructions are generally easier for readers to process, making their reading less of a struggle, something for which readers will thank you. Readers will also thank you if you avoid annoying errors such as confusing its and it’s, mistaking effect with an “e” with affect with an “a”; writing alot as one word rather than two (we never write alittle as one word nor should we with a lot). Similarly, it’s best to be alert for mixed and misplaced modifiers which, while humorous, are distracting. Consider the following that crossed my desk at one time or another: Though only 18, the judge found the young defendant guilty on all charges. [Who was 18?]
Exhausted, the boat was too difficult for Ellen to manage. [How do you know a boat is exhausted?] Sometimes you just have to sit in the other guy’s shoes. [Try to picture that.] In trying to reach an agreement, the employee felt he was beating his head against a dead horse. [Again, try to picture that.] You can never anticipate everything for which readers will thank you but, if you always have your readers in mind, these strategies provide a good start. Finally, it’s within this context of establishing credibility and being attentive to your audience that I gave presentations and worked with students on “Plain English,” the movement to make legal writing more intelligible and accessible to the greatest number of intended readers. Traditional legal writing, or “legalese,” as it is known, has been described by David Mellinkoff in The Language of the Law as “wordy, unclear, pompous, and dull.” And, quite fittingly, law books have been described as “the largest body of poorly written literature ever created by the human race.” (That’s John Lindsey in The Legal Writing Malady: Causes and Cures.) So, more felicitous alternatives are greatly to be desired. Consider this wordy, cumbersome, legalese-laced sentence of 58 words. Now, bear with me. It is hereby covenanted and agreed that any claims, disputes, or controversies arising subsequent to the signing of this Agreement and which arise out of or concern for the aforestated terms, provisions, or conditions of this Agreement shall be subject to all applicable laws prevailing in the State of Michigan as applied by a court of competent jurisdiction.
off-putting and dense to those about to read what you have to write. If you can find “plain English” alternatives, more accessible to your audience, they will be grateful and, I do believe, more inclined to think well of you. (And which of us doesn’t want that?) And that, in turn, increases your credibility and persuasiveness.
I hope that you will be able to say that you gratefully—and gracefully—carried with you throughout your lives the gifts that Luther has given you. After 30 years at the law school, there is much more I could say, but time is short and I’m aware that my audience is ready for this to move along. I hope that in years hence, when you look back on your lives after Luther, you will be able to say that you seized opportunities that presented themselves to you, that you made a difference in a small corner of the world, and that you gratefully—and gracefully—carried with you throughout your lives the gifts that Luther has given you: curiosity about the world; a fascination with the life of the mind; respect for the energizing power of the liberal arts across the natural sciences, the social sciences, the humanities and the arts; and the faith that Luther’s faculty and staff have placed in you, including the affirmation that your fine work at Luther has entitled you to become a member of Phi Beta Kappa. All of these gifts from Luther are bequests that will fortify you along the road ahead, circuitous, rocky, or unpredictable as it might be. I wish you well, each of you, with the adventures that await.
And in contradistinction, its five-word Plain English translation: Michigan law governs this contract. I would urge you to become in the habit of recognizing the jargon in your own fields, perhaps not as dramatic as legalese happens to be, but perhaps still as Spring 2021 Agora
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Amish Genetic Health Needs and an Innovative Community Response
by ANGELA KUENY, Associate Professor of Nursing; PHILIP IVERSEN, Associate Professor of Mathematics; and LEE ZOOK, Associate Professor Emeritus of Social Work
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his year’s Paideia Text & Issues Series, entitled Building Community in a Changing Society, inspired us to submit a presentation and article summarizing our work with Amish and Mennonite (jointly referred to as the “Plain Population”) communities across Minnesota and Iowa. This series asks, “What can we learn from the past and the present about different ways that communities survive, adapt, and flourish in periods of drastic change?” Given the very high risk for serious and sometimes lethal genetic conditions, Amish and Mennonite families innovatively collaborated with health care providers to provide community-based treatments that allow them to survive and flourish. We have much to learn from this work. This presentation and article follow Angela Kueny’s sabbatical project described in a previous Agora article, “A Different View of Health Advocacy in Amish Country” (Kueny, 2020). The purpose of this article is to describe our work in assessing the genetic health needs of Amish families in Iowa, and situate these findings within a national clinic initiative to address genetic needs in Amish populations. Background: Amish Genetic Conditions Dr. Holmes Morton writes in his essay “Through My Window” from the Clinic for Special Children in Strasburg, Pennsylvania: I have also watched the sun rise over the field in all seasons after long worried nights at work because of a sick child. I especially like to watch Jake Stoltzfoos or his son-in-law work in the field with a team of mules. Jake and Sam plow, plant, and harvest with four small red mules. You may think, such a contrast, the work of a doctor, 20
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Angela Kueny, Philip Iversen, and Lee Zook
analytical chemistry, biochemistry, efforts to understand how an inherited disorder injures the brain of an infant, all within 100 feet of an Amishman’s fieldwork with mules. Such contrast, you say. Yes, I say, but these people and their way of life have much to teach us. (Morton, 2012) Only through understanding Amish social and historical underpinnings does it become more clear how complex the health care concerns, networks, and decisions for children with genetic illnesses are. The Amish religious community has roots in the Anabaptist tradition that continues to grow in population size across 31 of the United States and four Canadian provinces (Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies, 2020). Amish families typically reside in rural settlements, geographically and culturally separate from the dominant culture. The core tenets of the Amish religion limit the use of technology, automobiles, public telephones, or indoor plumbing in order to maintain self-reliance and prevent dependency on public utilities (Kraybill et al., 2013). A particular concern in the Plain communities are genetic conditions that necessitate family outreach to biomedi-
cal health services. Plain populations experience a heightened risk for genetic illnesses because of historical practices of marrying within their tight-knit religious groups, large family sizes, and founder genetic illnesses within members. Genetic illnesses are widely varied and extensive from settlement to settlement, many of which are life limiting without early intervention (Payne et al., 2006). The result of these genetic conditions for years was the loss of too many children. In a community that does not ascribe to public or private health insurance and lives remotely to any genetic specialist (Kraybill et al., 2013), a significant challenge is to make the connection between these families and life-saving health care. Amish Clinic Model and the Ethics of Care Dr. Holmes Morton, the physician who founded the Clinic for Special Children in 1989 and now the Central Pennsylvania Clinic in 2015, inspired a network of clinics to address the health care needs of Plain families with genetic illnesses. It is timely to highlight the significance of his work as he was recently the recipient of the 2020 Pennsylvania Pediatrician of the Year award (PCAAP, 2021). The Plain Population clinic model is described in more length in Kueny (2020). In this article we will
Dr. Morton’s ethical stance is clear, and is written clearly in one of his early reflections, “Death and Life” (Morton, 2012, p. 11):
from the families in his practice.
IMAGE COURTESY OF SARAH MCRAE MORTON
draw upon Dr. Morton’s inspiring work to situate our work in assessing the needs of the local Iowa and Minnesota Plain communities toward establishing a possible local clinic to serve the needs of families who have children with genetic illnesses.
To set the stage, the extended family is gathered in the bedroom where the young boy died, and Morton is there in the bedroom with them. The adults are sitting shoulder to shoulder on chairs around the bed and the young boy’s siblings are at the foot of the bed where the deceased is lying. Morton reflects:
I talked about how Special children hope difficult it is to care for to suffer less and children who have illlead fulfilled lives nesses that are not unthrough the help of derstood and cannot others. Within their yet be treated. I said families and comthat as a doctor and munities they are not scientist when each merely the object of new therapy fails I compassion and love must somehow renew but often are the very my efforts to learn source. Such children more. Then the boy’s shape the Amish and Of Kings and Fishers by Dr. Morton’s daughter Sarah McRae Morton grandfather spoke. As Mennonite cultures he spoke he smiled and and inspire work such as that looked first at me then the chilclinics it seemed that both are informed at the Clinic in important and dren on the bed. He said, “We will by the ethics of care (EoC). EoC is an forceful ways. We should not be glad if you can learn to help ethical framework formulated by Carol underestimate the value of their these children but such children Gilligan (1982), who contends that lives, however brief or however will always be with us. They are empathy and compassion, which are difficult. We should not assume God’s gifts. They are important to not addressed in many ethical theories, that the Plain cultures, or our all of us. Special children teach a are essential aspects of moral decision own cultures, would be better family to love. They teach a family making, and that reasoning without without them. how to help others and how to these characteristics comes up short. accept the help of others.” (The While Gilligan emphasized that women These special children are not Death of Enos Fisher, Morton, portray these characteristics more than just interesting medical problems, 2012, p. 10, 11). men, subsequent authors seemed to find subjects of grants and research. her work important regardless of gender Nor should they be called burElsewhere in his writings Morton (Tronto, 1987). dens to their families and comrefers various times to William Carlos munities. They are children who Williams, a physician and writer who The ethics of care seem to be part and need our help and, if we allow lived in the early part of the twentieth parcel of Morton’s work and writings. In them to, they will teach us comcentury. Williams also seemed to have a the first essay in Roads Taken, Morton passion. They are children who keen understanding of the culture where describes his visit to an Amish houseneed our help, if we allow them his patients lived. Williams (1967) hold where the extended family had to, they will teach us to love. If wrote, “We catch a glimpse of somegathered to grieve the loss of the young we come to know these children, thing, from time to time, which shows boy Morton had been treating. In that as we should, they will make us us that a presence has just brushed past essay Morton shows his understanding better scientists, better physicians, us, some rare thing ... For a moment we of the culture as well as his empathy and and thoughtful people. are dazzled.” compassion for the families and individuals who are his patients. He refers to As we learned more of Morton’s work Additionally, the clinics that have come children with genetic illnesses as “special and writing and the work of the genetic about because of Morton’s work operate children,” a term apparently borrowed Spring 2021 Agora
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In summary, it appears that empathy and compassion inform Morton’s work and the work of the clinics. Further, Morton (2012) says that special children have been his most important teachers and that, “The secret of caring for the patient is in caring for the patient. Caring is the important work of a Doctor” (p. 93). Method of Gathering Data To assess the genetic health needs of Amish families, data gathering was accom- Ruthie’s Prayer by Sarah McRae Morton plished by adapting a survey Iowa Amish population. The number used by the WeCare Clinic, a recently of surveys returned in Minnesota is established genetic clinic in Kentucky much smaller and not included in this serving Amish and Mennonite families report. We extrapolated the number with genetic disorders (Hunt et al., of individuals from household data 2018). The survey asked families to list in consultation with Professor Joseph members with diagnosed and undiagDonnermeyer, an expert in Amish nosed genetic disorders, undiagnosed Population studies at The Ohio State medical disorders, and deaths in the University (Personal communication, household. Our survey was intended to January 25, 2021). reach as many of the Amish and Plain Mennonites in Iowa and Minnesota as The first several contacts with settlepossible. As of June 2020, the estimated ments were made through personal population of Amish in Iowa was 9,780, acquaintances with Amish elders, or in Minnesota 4,740 (Young Center, bishops, in several of the larger settle2020). The population of Plain Menments. Additionally, those first contacts nonites is unknown, though we know provided names of specific bishops in there are fewer than 1,000 Old Order other settlements they suggested should Mennonites in Iowa (Young Center, be contacted. In this manner trust was 2020). established as the process unfolded. It At this point we have surveyed 554 households which represent an estimated 3,324 individuals. Of those households, 436 households, representing an estimated 2733 individuals, are Amish living in Iowa, about 28% of the 22
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was thought that involving the bishops in the early discussion of completing the survey was important as they are the “chief authority” of the church district (Hostetler, 1993). Furthermore, they gave valuable feedback about how to proceed in a variety of instances.
IMAGE COURTESY OF SARAH MCRAE MORTON
on a different basis than typical medical clinics. They are non-profit entities and their boards of directors have at least 50% of their members from Plain populations that they serve. The Plain populations they serve are important in the initiation and ongoing operation of the clinics and in formulating policy about how they operate.
Other contacts were made with Amish bishops using Raber’s Almanac which is found in many Amish homes (Raber, 2020). Typical of information found in almanacs, this almanac lists all the Amish bishops, ministers, and deacons in the Old Order Amish settlements across the United States and Canada by state, county, and church district. In addition to the names of individuals, their birthdates and the dates of ordination are listed. Thus we were able to identify the eldest of the elders in a given settlement; usually this is the individual who convenes the group of bishops in a settlement.
Typically, when first contacting a bishop in a given settlement and after explaining our intentions to do a health needs assessment focused on genetic issues to see if a clinic might be established, the response of the bishop was that he would take the matter up with his fellow bishops in that particular settlement and they would together decide whether to assist in the endeavor. In 10 of 15 settlements where we contacted bishops face to face the answer came back in the affirmative; five settlements declined. It should also be noted that surveys were distributed to several conservative Mennonite churches in Iowa; these were either Old Order Mennonites or Holdeman Mennonites. How the surveys would be distributed to the households was left up to the bishops; most were distributed after Sunday services, returned to a central location, and then mailed to the research team. In Iowa, an overall return rate of those surveyed where face to face contacts were established was 54%. Surveys were completed by an individual for each household; all surveys were voluntary. Human Subjects Review Board approval from Luther College was obtained for each settlement where we had face-to-face contacts.
Table 1. Iowa Amish settlements surveyed with genetic disease prevalence
By March of 2020 the COVID-19 pandemic was a concern. Therefore, we stopped face to face contacts and sent each bishop who had not been a part of a previously contacted settlement a letter explaining our project. Several bishops responded to these letters and surveys were sent to them for distribution. As of this writing few of those have been returned and none are included in the data discussed below. Findings These findings are presented with a few disclaimers. First, the surveys were sent to all households in the participating settlements, but those returned represent a self-selected sample. Therefore, we cannot do any formal statistical inference to generalize these results to these settlement populations or beyond. Our hope is to share these initial results with the settlements and work toward a more complete census in Iowa and Minnesota. Table 1 outlines the Iowa Amish settlements surveyed with genetic disease prevalence. Based on our sample across six settlements, an average of 3.4% of people surveyed were diagnosed with a
Table 2. Miscarriages
genetic disease. Although it is tempting to compare this to a national average of individuals living with genetic conditions across the United States, this comparison has little value because of the different genetic conditions within each population sub-set. Figures 1 and 2 outline the most prevalent genetic conditions across settlements. Within the survey, families identified diagnosed genetic conditions and undiagnosed genetic conditions. Outlining the undiagnosed genetic conditions is helpful to understand some of the symptoms that may be underlying genetic conditions which could be diagnosed and treated in the future. It is important to note that “other” categories in the diagnosed and undiagnosed categories represent 17 and 18 different conditions, respectively, signaling the diverse genetic conditions across the settlements. We also explored the rate of miscarriages reported on the form, as that can be representative of complications due to genetic conditions (Table 2). Overall, across the settlements, approximately 43.8% of households reported at least one miscarriage. The miscarriage rate of
Figure 1
Figure 2
13.5% of all pregnancies (ranging from 2.0-20.3%) is reflective of the national miscarriage rate of 10-15% (March of Dimes, 2021). Conclusion Working with Amish community leaders, we distributed genetic health needs surveys to Amish settlements across Iowa and Minnesota. The surveys highlight genetic trends within and across settlements, allowing us to discern Amish health needs that will inform the development of an innovative community-based clinic. Dr. Morton’s essays bring to practical life the call for compassion and empathy found in Carol Gilligan’s ethics of care (EoC). These Amish clinics for families with genetic conditions are a community based and collaborative response to increasing medical costs and complexity in the mainstream health care system. It is the hope of this presentation to inspire the audience to consider collaborative community efforts in other underserved communities in response to an everadvancing health care delivery system. Spring 2021 Agora
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References Clinic for Special Children (2021). Retrieved from, https:// clinicforspecialchildren.org/
Cooksey, E. & Donnermeyer, J. (2013) A Peculiar People Revisited: Demographic Foundations of the Iowa Amish in the 21st Century. Journal of Amish and Plain Anabaptist Studies, 1, 110-126. Gilligan, C. (1982) In a different voice. Harvard University Press.
Hostetler (1993) Amish society. The Johns Hopkins University Press.
Hunt, M., Jones, S., Main, M.E., Carter, D., Cary, K, & Hall, M. (2018). Genetic medical clinic in Kentucky: A needs assessment of Anabaptist households. Journal of Amish and Plain Anabaptist Studies, 6(2), 159-173. Kraybill, D. B., Johnson-Weiner, K., & Nolt, S. M. (2013). The Amish. Johns Hopkins University Press.
Kueny, A. (2020) A different view of health advocacy in Amish Country. Agora, 32(2), 20-25.
March of Dimes (2021). Miscarriage. Retrieved from, https:// www.marchofdimes.org/ complications/miscarriage. aspx#:~:text=Miscarriage%20(also%20 called%20early%20pregnancy,15%20 percent)%20end%20in%20miscarriage. Morton, D.H. (2012) Roads Taken: Recollections, words, and images from meaningful work.
Retrieved from, https://www.etown.edu/ centers/young-center/files/hmortonreferences/Roads%20Taken.pdf
Morton, D. H., Morton, C. S., Strauss, K. A., Robinson, D. L., Puffenberger, E.G., Hendrickson, C. & Kelley, R. I. (2003). Pediatric medicine and the genetic disorders of the Amish and Mennonite people of Pennsylvania. American Journal of Medical Genetics Part C: Seminars in Medical Genetics, 121C(1), 5-17. Payne, M., Rupar, C. A., Siu, G. M., & Siu, V. M. (2011). Amish, Mennonite, and Hutterite Genetic Disorder Database. Paediatrics & Child Health, 16(3), e23–e24. https://doi.org/10.1093/ pch/16.3.e23
Pennsylvania Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics (PCAAP) (2020). Pediatrician of the Year Award. Retrieved from: https://www.paaap.org/ recognition.html Raber, A. & Raber, M. (2020). The new American almanac. Ben J. Raber, Ohio. 24
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Strauss, K. A., Puffenberger, E. G., & Morton, D. H. (2012). One community’s effort to control genetic disease. American Journal of Public Health, 102(7), 1300–1306. https://doi. org/10.2105/AJPH.2011.300569 Tronto, J.C. (1987) Beyond gender difference to a theory of care. Signs, 12(4), 644–663.
Williams, W.C. (1967) The autobiography of Williams Carlos Williams. New Directions Publishing Company.
Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies (2020). Amish population, 2020. Retrieved from, https://groups. etown.edu/amishstudies/statistics/ population-2019/.
The paintings in this article are courtesy of Dr. Holmes Morton’s daughter, Sarah McRae Morton: https://mcraemorton.com/home. html.
Julian of Norwich and “The Showing of Love” by BROOKE JOYCE, Professor of Music
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Julian was a fourteenth century theologian and the first woman to write a book in the English language. As an anchoress, she lived most of her life in a kind of self-imposed solitary confinement, as she was literally walled into the corner of her parish church in England, with one window providing her a view of the outside world and another window that allowed her to see into the church’s sanctuary and participate in worship services. During her life, several waves of the bubonic plague ravaged England, one of which may have been responsible for an illness that almost cost Julian her life when she was in her 20s. A pandemic, self-isolation, income inequality, social upheaval—these were
PHOTOS COURTESY OF THE AUTHOR
s I write this essay in late winter, 2021, it’s been one year since the onset of the coronavirus pandemic. Although I couldn’t have known it at the time of my sabbatical in fall 2019, my research and the creative work based on the life and work of Julian of Norwich—“The Showing of Love,” a dance-opera for solo voice, electronics, and dancers—became even more meaningful as the year of the pandemic progressed.
St. Julian’s Church in Norwich important facets of Julian’s life and times, not so different from our own. Shortly after the concert performance of “The Showing of Love” at Good Shepherd Church here in Decorah on March 1, 2020, most of the world went into a lockdown, and it seemed as though Julian was speaking to us across time and space.
A bowl of hazelnuts inside Julian’s cell in Norwich, England, with her text “Revelations of Divine Love,” which Brooke Joyce used in his composition of two choral works
But even before I settled on creating a large-scale theater work, Julian’s writings, theology, and legacy had been important touchstones for me for many years. One of the first pieces I composed after arriving at Luther in 2005 was a choral setting of one of her most famous writings, “Revelations of Divine Love,” where God reveals the vastness of creation in the form of a hazelnut.
In the fall of 2019, I returned to Julian’s writings and created a theater piece for solo voice, dancers, and electronics based on her work. In preparation for this project, I reread Julian’s “Revelations of Divine Love” and traveled to Julian’s church in Norwich. As I told a number of people I met during my visit, I wasn’t quite sure why I traveled to Norwich, or what I hoped to learn. I suppose I simply had a desire to see the place where she lived, and that, perhaps, some idea, image, or sound would come my way and aid in my creative process. Mostly, what I learned is that Julian’s church is quite small, very plain, and these days surrounded by homes and businesses. In some ways, it feels like a typical “neighborhood” church—it blends in with its surroundings and doesn’t really call attention to itself. It reminded me, in fact, of Good Shepherd in Decorah! And yet, Julian’s church is a place of pilgrimage, attracting hundreds of visitors every year. Spring 2021 Agora
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relatively free of strife, and they haven’t felt close to the point of being overcome. For others, tragedy or hardship may be ever present, and for them, they may feel constantly overcome, that perhaps they are barely hanging on, that God doesn’t seem to intervene when most needed. I Mother Julian’s cell, recreated inside her church pay particular attention to the word Mostly, what I learned in Norwich is “diseased”—we are living in a time that Julian’s writings have engendered when invisible diseases run rampant in a devoted following, and that many the world, both in the physical realm, people, from both Christian and nonsuch as COVID, and in the societal, Christian backgrounds, find wisdom such as racial injustice. We are diseased, and guidance in her words. For me, I am and those diseases cause all manner of drawn, in particular, to this passage: tempest and travail. And these words, Thou shalt not be And yet, Julian offers comfort, and a overcome, was said full sharply, and challenge. Earlier in her book, she defull mightily, for secureness and scribes a “great deed” that God will do. comfort against all tribulations She doesn’t describe or define it, because that may come. God said not, thou she doesn’t know what it is. None of shalt not be tempested; God said us do. Her faith in God is not, thou shalt not be travailed; such that she knows the God said not, thou shalt not be love of God, and the power diseased; but God said, thou shalt of God’s love to heal, or, as not be overcome. God wills that we she says, “all shall be well, take heed at these words, and that all shall be well, and all we be ever mighty in secure trust manner of thing shall be in well and woe, for God loveth us, well.” We can be comforted and so wills that we love God, and in the knowledge of God’s mightily trust in God, and all shall love, but that knowledge be well, and all shall be well, And all can only come through manner of thing shall be well. The faith and trust. That’s the love wherein God made us was in challenge. God from without beginning, in which love we have our beginning. I also asked the students, And all this shall be seen in God “Do you think that Julian’s without end. vision of a world in which I recently shared these words with a group of students at a virtual Sunday evening worship service on campus. We had an opportunity to spend a few minutes in small group discussion, and I asked the students, “What has God done to let you know that you will not be overcome?”
This is a difficult question for many to answer—for some, their lives have been 26
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‘all shall be well’ is possible? In our deeply polarized world, what would that look like?” This is another difficult question to answer. My version of wellness may be very different from yours. I may pursue my goal of wellness in ways that feel threatening to you.
How can we find common ground, and pursue a kind of wellness that benefits all of creation? I think Julian gives us a tiny clue. When she says “all manner of thing shall be well,” I think she is pointing beyond the world of things, that is, the world we can see and understand, to the world beyond our understanding, “all manner of thing.” There is a world beyond, a world of love and beauty, that we can’t even imagine. That’s the world that only God can create. Theological and philosophical conversations can be wonderful and engaging… but can they also be theatrical? After all, part of what drew me to Julian was the idea of folding her words and ideas into a musical work that might be performed in a theater, worship space, or some other venue that worked both as a performance as well as meditative space. I decided to start by imagining the sounds that Julian might have heard from her cell. Having little to look at beyond her windows, I imagined that sound played an important part in her life, giving meaning and context to her limited experience of the world around her. I imagined she heard voices, bells, birds, water, air, fire, and the sounds of the earth. These sounds, both real and
A memorial to Mother Julian inside her recreated cell
by a corps of student dancers. The audience saw a physical manifestation of Julian in the form of a solo dancer and heard the vocal music as recorded by my collaborator, mezzo-soprano Lisa Neher, who is based in Portland, Oregon. It was a performance scenario we wouldn’t have imagined prior to the pandemic, and yet, it allowed us to bring this work into its next stage of development without having all members of the creative team present in one location. We hope that when it is safe to sing and dance for an audience, we’ll be able to share this work as a live dance-opera.
Brooke Joyce imaginary, found their way into my composition, and form the primary structural elements that demarcate each section of the piece.
My thanks to Luther College for supporting my creative work, both through the gift of sabbatical as well as the Paideia Endowment grant that aided my research.
One other important structural element I incorporated was both a theatrical as well as practical one: in order to sustain a one-hour long work for solo voice, sung episodes alternate with dance interludes. Dramatically, this allows for Julian’s words to be heard in a musical setting as delivered by the singer, and then for dancers to offer a visual reflection of those words through movement. Practically, it allows the singer time to rest and hydrate. Other than the singer, all other musical and sonic elements are present as prerecorded sounds that are heard through loudspeakers in the performance space; no additional musicians are necessary for performance. This decision was made both for creative purposes (essentially forcing me to create a dynamic soundscape that could be sustained for an hour without the benefits of collaborative performers) as well as practical ones (without the need for piano or additional musicians, the piece can be performed with just a singer, a dancer, and a technician). As we continue to live through the pandemic, the small-scale production requirements allowed the piece to take on a new form. This spring, “The Showing of Love” became a filmed dance piece, directed by Jane Hawley and performed Spring 2021 Agora
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The Black Church and Beloved Community FEBRUARY 24, 2021
by GUY NAVE, Professor of Religion
Jesus left that place and went away to the district of Tyre and Sidon. Just then a Canaanite woman from that region came out and started shouting, “Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David; my daughter is tormented by a demon.” But Jesus did not answer her at all. And his disciples came and urged him, saying, “Send her away, for she keeps shouting after us.” Jesus responded to the woman, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” But the woman came and knelt before him, saying, “Lord, help me.” Jesus answered, “It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” The woman replied, “ Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.” Then Jesus answered her, “Woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish.” And her daughter was healed instantly. Matthew 15:21-28
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t’s my pleasure to join you today and to briefly talk about the role and history of the Black Church in America. PBS recently premiered a four-hour, two-part series entitled The Black Church: This Is Our Story, This Is Our Song. The series traces the history of the Black Church in America. It reveals how Black people have worshipped and, through their spiritual journeys, improvised ways to bring their faith traditions from Africa to America, while translating those traditions into a form of Christianity that was not only truly their own but also a redemptive force for a nation whose original sin included the enslavement of Black people. I strongly encourage everyone to view this powerful series. Pastor Mike Foss recently interviewed me for a blog post that was published on the Luther College Ideas and Creations blog page. I also encourage everyone to read his blog post. As part of that interview, Pastor Mike asked me a series of questions, one of which was, “What are the two or three most significant influences from the Black Church to American culture as a whole?” Part of my response included the ways in which the Black Church has provided (and continues to provide) America with an example of how faith can be used to confront and challenge social injustice and to work for the creation of beloved community. The term “beloved community” was first coined in the early 20th century 28
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by the philosophertheologian Josiah Royce. In 1913, Royce wrote, “My life means nothing, either theoretically or practically, unless I am a member of a community.” The word “community” literally means “common unity.” Royce observed that besides the actual communities we experience on a daily basis, there is also an Guy Nave ideal “beloved community” comprised of people who are committed to the wellbeing of all humanity. While Royce is believed to have coined the term, “beloved community,” it was Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. who popularized the term. For King, the “common unity” of beloved community is our shared humanity. King asserted that members of the beloved community are united by their recognition of and commitment to their shared humanity, and this commitment is demonstrated through justice. For King, beloved community requires the presence of justice for all people. King often said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” While it is often presented as some otherworldly utopian ideal, beloved community is sought for in this world, not some heavenly afterlife. This idea of securing beloved community in this
world is emphasized in what is commonly referred to as the Lord’s Prayer. According to Christian tradition, when Jesus’ followers asked him to teach them how to pray, Jesus instructed them to pray in this way, “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” The prayer is about establishing the “Kingdom of God”—the reign of God’s justice—here on earth. The Black Church in America has consistently understood the “Kingdom of God” as being reflected in the beloved community. While there is often debate about what constitutes “justice,” I believe justice requires recognition, acknowledgement, and honoring of the equal humanity we all share. The sort of racialized police violence the world witnessed last summer with the brutal and calloused murder of George Floyd is one of the many bla-
tant examples of a “systemic” disregard of the humanity of Black people. The Black Church was established as a direct response to the denial of the humanity of Black people, exhibited not only by America as a nation but also by the White church in America. Unfortunately, many White Christians supported chattel slavery and other forms of racialized terror and oppression that denied the humanity of Black people. In the passage of scripture read for today, we find the author telling a story of the humanity of a Canaanite woman being denied. After Jesus initially “ignores” the woman and the disciples urge him to “send her away” (even though she is a resident of the region and they are the ones who are visiting), Jesus tells the woman, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” He informs her that he was not sent to help her, her daughter, or her people. After Jesus denies her request, the author depicts this Canaanite woman doing the unimaginable: she gets down on her knees in front of this Jewish man and begs for his help. In response to this act of vulnerability, Jesus replies with a statement denying her humanity. Jesus tells the woman, “It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” For me, Jesus’ racist comparison of this woman, her daughter, and their people to dogs is extremely disturbing. It doesn’t fit my image of Jesus. The author of the Gospel of Matthew, however, doesn’t seem bothered by presenting a disturbing image of Jesus. I believe the author wants this story to be disturbing, because the message is found in the midst of the disturbance.
dogs, this Canaanite woman responded by saying, “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.” For the record, I don’t read this statement by the Canaanite woman as evidence of self-hatred or an acceptance of Jesus’ designation of her and her people as dogs. Instead, I read it as this Canaanite woman meeting Jesus where he is and then challenging him by showing him that he fails to exhibit the type of compassion that would be exhibited even toward dogs.
saying it. Jesus celebrates her faith—a faith that empowered her to confront and challenge not only him but also hundreds of years of prejudice and oppression. Confrontational faith has been and continues to be the faith of the Black Church, and it is this faith that the Black Church shares with the world because it is this faith that leads to the creation of beloved community.
This Canaanite woman demonstrates what I call confrontational faith—a faith so strong she dared to challenge a man many called “the son of God.” For this Canaanite woman, Jesus’ response was not consistent with what she considered to be the love of God. If Jesus truly was the son of God, he needed to demonstrate the love of God. This Canaanite woman had an image of God as compassionate and merciful, and Jesus’ response was not consistent with that image. She believed so strongly in whom she understood God to be that she was willing to challenge Jesus. The challenge made by Black Lives Matter activists against American society is a similar challenge. BLM activists—like the Black Church and a long line of other Black activists— are challenging America to live up to its espoused founding principle that “all people are created equal” and “are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.” If it is true that “all lives matter,” then America needs to demonstrate it by showing that “Black lives matter.”
Matthew’s story reveals an attitude of ethnic (and possibly even patriarchal) superiority that the author challenges. The story reveals how easily people can be influenced by the prevailing sexist, racist, and ethnocentric views of their time and culture. Even Jesus is influenced by such views.
Significant societal change has often been the result of confrontational faith—faith so committed to notions of equity, justice, and compassion that it is willing to confront and challenge injustice even when that injustice is demonstrated by those in positions of great power—whether it be the president of the United States, or, as in Matthew’s story, Jesus.
This marginalized Canaanite woman, however, confronted and challenged such views. After Jesus’ comment about not giving the children’s food to the
In Matthew’s story, Jesus is transformed by the faith of the Canaanite women. Jesus marvels not only at what the woman says but also at her courage for Spring 2021 Agora
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Shifting Our Thinking on Islamophobia MARCH 3, 2021
by TODD GREEN, Associate Professor of Religion
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ood morning. It’s my pleasure to be the first chapel speaker in the series called Interfaith Cooperation and Civil Rights. Let me offer my gratitude first to Dr. Edward Curtis who kicked off this theme for us last Wednesday evening with a talk focused on the challenges he has faced in the interfaith movement with engaging on questions of Palestinian liberation and civil rights. My own brief remarks this morning will focus on an area that intersects both with my research and my public engagement. My focus will be on the need for Christians to rethink their approaches to and understandings of Islamophobia in an age in which civil liberties for Muslims have been under constant assault and in which Muslim lives and livelihoods have been jeopardized. In my experience, Christian allies who have genuine interests in combating Islamophobia struggle to understand what it is they are actually trying to combat when it comes to anti-Muslim prejudice. The result is either misplaced energy or resources, or simply inaction. While there are many misunderstandings of Islamophobia that abound, the one I want to focus on this morning is the widespread belief that Islamophobia is driven by an ignorance of Islam. The idea here is that if more people knew more things, or had more accurate information, about Islam, there would be less prejudice. In other words, if more non-Muslim Americans knew the five pillars of Islam, or studied the Qur’an, or recognized the significance of fasting during Ramadan, then they would be less Islamophobic. The end result has been countless “Islam 101” talks and presentations around the country for the past twenty years. The idea behind these campaigns to educate 30
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the public on Islam is the assumption that ignorance is the main driver of Islamophobia, and knowledge of Islam is the solution. While it is true that ignorance abounds among Christians and many others in America when it comes to Islam, ignorance is not so much the cause of Islamophobia as it is the byproduct of it. Racism, not ignorance, is the main driver. It’s racism that animates Islamophobia. It’s racism that gives Islamophobia its legs and its life. Islamophobia as racism makes it difficult for increasing numbers of Christians to “download” correct information about Islam so that suspicions toward Muslims are alleviated. Islamophobia as racism distorts and damages the cognitive frameworks of majority populations, including Christians, so that it becomes epistemologically and theologically challenging to learn about Islam in a healthy and constructive manner. A common retort I hear whenever I make this point is: “But Islam is not a race. Muslims are not a race.” It’s true. Islam is not a race, nor are Muslims. But Muslims are racialized. Muslims are treated as a race, as a monolithic entity collectively presumed guilty of harboring terrorist impulses. They are viewed and dealt with as a suspect population, deserving of contempt and alienation. Their religion is framed as a monolithic belief system inherently oppressive and violent and therefore as a threat to presumably peaceful Christians or a presumably peaceful America. It’s a form of racism scholars refer to as cultural racism, or racism that involves hostility toward a group of people based on real or perceived religious beliefs, cultural traditions, and ethnicity. All of this opens the door for governmentbased surveillance, racial profiling,
Todd Green immigration bans, and other forms of systemic discrimination against anyone connected to Islam. It’s also a racism that at times relies on traditional racialization categories that many of us are more familiar with, such as skin color. That’s why it’s not only Muslims but those who are “read” or perceived as Muslims that are targeted with racist rhetoric and violence. The first post-9/11 retaliatory murder, for example, claimed as its victim Balbir Singh Sodhi. The killer was a man named Frank Roque. Roque saw Sodhi outside Sodhi’s gas station in Arizona and thought Sodhi was a Muslim. So he killed him as payback for 9/11. Sodhi, however, was not a Muslim. He was a Sikh, part of an entirely different religion. But Sodhi had brown skin, wore a turban, and had a long dark beard. To Roque, Sodhi “looked” Muslim. Individuals with a South Asian or Middle Eastern background, irrespective of their actual religion, are often subject to discrimination and violence based on their perceived religious identity, a perception driven by assumptions based on skin color and/or cultural and religious difference. We’ve witnessed other notable instances of this kind of
racism leading to violence against nonMuslims, including the 2012 massacre at a Sikh gurdwara outside of Milwaukee that almost certainly involved the perpetrator, Wade Michael Page, mistaking Sikhs for Muslim. The need for Christians to shift their thinking from Islamophobia as driven by ignorance to Islamophobia as driven by racism matters in how we understand and counteract this form of bigotry. If we view Islamophobia primarily as ignorance, our energy will continue to be disproportionately given to teaching the public about Islam, in the hopes that if enough individuals acquire basic information about Islam, Islamophobia will fade away. But if we view Islamophobia primarily as racism, then our gaze will widen to the systemic and violent aspects of Islamophobia, and our energy will be redirected to incorporating strategies modeled on other successful anti-racism movements in modern American history. These strategies include nonviolent protests, economic boycotts, and other forms of high-impact grassroots activism. Christians can and should play a central role in this anti-racism work. And Christians can and should see this anti-racism work in response to Islamophobia not as an extracurricular activity, not as something they get around to doing once they have done the “real” work of ministry, but rather as essential to their Christian identity and witness.
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The Wisdom of the Fool by GEREON KOPF, Professor of Religion
G
ood morning, I would like to thank the college ministries team for inviting me to share some reflections on interfaith cooperation and civil rights. Reading from Ecclesiastes 1:12, 16-18: I, the Teacher, was king over Israel in Jerusalem. I applied my mind to study and to explore by wisdom all that is done under the heavens.… I said to myself, “Look, I have increased in wisdom more than anyone who has ruled over Jerusalem before me; I have experienced much of wisdom and knowledge.” Then I applied myself to the understanding of wisdom, and also of madness and folly, but I learned that this, too, is a chasing after the wind. For with much wisdom comes much sorrow; the more knowledge, the more grief. Having grown up in a German Catholic home, I have always had a fondness for the Book of Ecclesiastes because of its air of existentialism and its vicinity to the general feeling of the transience. The lines from chapter 1 that I have read today also have an appeal for us at Luther College or any other academic institution, especially us professors. The first-person voice of this passage speaks as someone who has “experienced much wisdom and knowledge.” As members of an institution in higher education I assume, nay I hope, that all of us can relate to this sentiment. The speaker, however, immediately puts a damper on our enthusiasm and suggests that both wisdom and madness are “chasing after the wind.” This is of course depressing for people like us college teachers who have dedicated our whole lives to education and the pursuit of knowledge. But not to worry: the author does not 32
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discourage knowledge per se. In chapter 9, right after making some rather problematic political claims (at least from our perspective today) which deserve reflection in their own right, he clearly values wisdom over folly. In addition, verse 18—“For with much wisdom comes much sorrow; the more knowledge, the more grief ”—seems to be descriptive rather than normative, suggesting something along the line of “ignorance is bliss” and knowledge implies responGereon Kopf sibility. If I know about injustice, it is harder for me to ignore it. I need to do something about it. In Buddhism, wisdom/prajñā and compassion/karuna are inseparable. But there is another take on this disclaimer to wisdom. If you read the whole book of Ecclesiastes you will see that, to the author, wisdom—just like pleasure, wealth, and all the things we value—is meaningless. Everything is transient, nothing last forever, nothing can be owned. Therefore, chapter 7 suggests, “The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning, but the heart of fools is in the house of pleasure.” A wise person is aware that, to cite George Harrison, “all things must pass,” while the fool is deluded and distracted by pleasure. Most of all, transience seems to be a major theme in Ecclesiastes as well as the question of how the awareness of it shapes our outlook on wisdom and life in general. So, what I want to talk about today is the epistemological fool—the fool who is not certain of the possibility and infallibility of knowledge. This terminology is inspired by a rather provocative book of a friend of mine, Hans-Georg
MARCH 10, 2021
Moeller. In this book, Moeller introduces what he calls the “moral fool.” The moral fool is not someone who is immoral but someone who is not attached to moral beliefs, someone who is not attached to morality to the degree of falling into moralism. Similarly, the fool I am talking about is not a person who devalues knowledge or wisdom but who is not obsessed with people’s IQ, with knowing everything, with always being right. The epistemological fool is a person who is not attached to being right and therefore not obsessed with proving other people wrong. I am talking about persons cognizant of their own fallibility, of their own limitations, who have the ability to forgive others who are as imperfect as we are ourselves. I was asked to talk about civil rights and interfaith cooperation. Thus, I would like to explore how epistemological fools who, while learned are neither convinced about not obsessed with their own infallibility, enact social justice and interfaith collaboration. Isn’t it ironic that a Roman Catholic is talking to a mostly Protestant audience about the impossibility of infallibility? But that’s
a different story. To talk about our topic, I would like to introduce another such fool, Vimalakīrti. Vimalakīrti is introduced to us by the Vimalakīrti Sūtra, a Mahāyāna Buddhist text that inverts a couple of social norms and hierarchies of the early Buddhist communities. Among others, it breaks the gender norms and the institutional hierarchies of its time. Its protagonist is Vimalakīrti, a layperson who is spiritually more advanced than even the disciples of Buddha themselves. He, not unlike the author of Ecclesiastes, was wise yet appeared foolish. The author of Ecclesiastes seems to reject knowledge and a lot of socially accepted values and wisdom. Vimalakīrti similarly remained silent when asked about his knowledge and led a life that was scandalous for either a layperson or a monastic. Chapter 2 of the Vimalakīrti Sūtra reads: He wore the white clothes of the layman yet lived impeccably like a religious devotee. He lived at home, but remained aloof from the realm of desire, the realm of pure matter, and the immaterial realm. He had a son, a wife, and female attendants, yet always maintained continence. He appeared to be surrounded by servants yet lived in solitude. He appeared to be adorned with ornaments, yet always was endowed with the auspicious signs and marks. He seemed to eat and drink, yet always took nourishment from the taste of meditation. He made his appearance at the fields of sports and in the casinos, but his aim was always to mature those people who were attached to games and gambling. He visited the fashionable heterodox teachers, yet always kept unswerving loyalty to the Buddha. He understood the mundane and transcendental sciences and esoteric practices, yet always took pleasure in the delights of the Dharma. He mixed in all crowds yet was respected as foremost of all. In order to be in harmony with people, he associated with elders, with those of middle age, and
with the young, yet always spoke in harmony with the Dharma. He engaged in all sorts of businesses yet had no interest in profit or possessions. To train living beings, he would appear at crossroads and on street corners, and to protect them he participated in government. To turn people away from the Hinayana and to engage them in the Mahayana, he appeared among listeners and teachers of the Dharma. To develop children, he visited all the schools. To demonstrate the evils of desire, he even entered the brothels. To establish drunkards in correct mindfulness, he entered all the cabarets. I keep telling myself the last sentence whenever I go to Pulpit Rock or other bars, “It is okay, I am just doing the work of the Buddha.” Be that as it may, in the text, the life of Vimalakīrti is neither that of layperson nor of a monastic. He does layperson things, having a family, engaging in business, going to bars and brothels, yet he possesses the attitude of a monastic: he is detached, he does not get involved. Vimalakīrti accepts his body, his profession, his social role, his identity, but he is not attached to anything. Detachment provides us with liberation from ourselves; compassion, however, requires a bit more. Chapter 8 suggests that some “become food and drink to alleviate hunger and thirst,” “become courtesans to convert those stricken by desire,” and “remain impartial in military conflict.” This is a radical message. Those are tough passages for good Christians as well as for good Buddhists. Many serious Mahāyāna Buddhists I know would feel uneasy hearing words like these. But this is what the epistemological fool, i.e., the person who understands the transience and the emptiness of everything, does out of compassion for those who suffer. The goal is not to be wise, not to be moral, not to be best, but to give oneself for others in need. This sentiment should sound familiar to both Buddhist and Christians. This kind of behavior may not imply civil rights but it lifts up the downtrodden. It is not easy but this is
radical compassion. And now, it might become clear why I called such a person a fool. In the last part of my reflections, I would like to explore how the epistemological fool would approach interfaith collaboration. We could start with the above-cited line, “He visited the fashionable heterodox teachers, yet always kept unswerving loyalty to the Buddha.” If one replaces “Buddha” with whatever religious authority one chooses, we encounter a frequent attitude towards interfaith work. Even for many Buddhists there is an assumption that one’s orthodoxy or orthopraxy is “ortho,” i.e., “correct.” I have to admit that I feel uneasy with such an approach. And I say this as a person who has organized two interfaith forums at Luther in the past five years. First, “hetero” means “different” not “false.” We construct our identity vis-à-vis others. Both our identities and that of others are constructed. Identity constructions like these are explored in our new program in Identity Studies. Second, when we use terms such as “Christianity,” “Buddhism,” or “Islam” we talk about traditions. Religious truth claims can be analyzed, religious institutions have clear membership criteria, but traditions are fluid, diverse, and ever-changing amalgams. They are not monolithic. Our texts would say those terms are “meaningless” or “empty.” I would say that when we use them as identity markers we endow them with specific meaning that may or may not be shared by others. Interreligious dialogue is not a dialogue between traditions such as Christianity and Buddhism, but between individuals who identify as “Christian” and “Buddhist.” This is a big difference. What a representative of one identity claim says might ring true for the representative of another, but not for a representative of one’s own imagined community. How can anyone represent a “tradition”? Participants in these dialogues represent their own beliefs, their own identify and perhaps their institution. Finally, I would argue, a lot of what we do is syncretic: Christian Yoga? We may call it “praise moves” but it is inspired by Hindu Yoga. Buddhist ghost weddings? They are Buddhist Spring 2021 Agora
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rituals, based on Shinto beliefs to fulfil a Confucian need. Third, and this returns us to Ecclesiastes or the Vimalakīrti Sūtra, if wisdom is meaningless and all truths are empty, why am I so convinced that my beliefs are true? The older I get the less I understand the obsession with proving other beliefs to be false, besides the ego boost such an exercise might give us. Do we really feel comfortable claiming that we know it all? In addition, dogmatism seems to be harmful more often than not. To illustrate this sentiment, I turn to a Buddhist thinker who “remained impartial in conflict” to use the words of the Vimalakīrti Sūtra: Thich Nhat Hanh – who was banned by both Vietnams in 1966, because he was neutral and refused to take sides in their conflict. He went to France and founded the Order of Interbeing in the Plum Village. This order has 14 precepts. The first four commit the members of the order to “openness,” “non-attachment to views,” “freedom of thought,” and “awareness of suffering.” In the interest of time, I will limit myself to the second precept here. It reads: Aware of the suffering created by attachment to views and wrong perceptions, we are determined to avoid being narrow-minded and bound to present views. We are committed to learning and practicing non-attachment to views and being open to others’ experiences and insights in order to benefit from the collective wisdom. We are aware that the knowledge we presently possess is not changeless, absolute truth. Insight is revealed through the practice of compassionate listening, deep looking, and letting go of notions rather than through the accumulation of intellectual knowledge. Truth is found in life, and we will observe life within and around us in every moment, ready to learn throughout our lives. This is the wisdom of the epistemological fool. This is the way to understanding across traditions and to compassion for all living being. Amen. 34
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The Common Good of Our Global Community APRIL 21, 2021
by SILETSELWE DLAMINI ‘22
G
ood morning everyone. I want to thank you all in advance for lending me your ear for the next couple minutes and for the invitation to speak here today. Given that it is Climate Justice Week and as I am nearing the completion of my Environmental Studies undergrad, I wanted to share a little reflection on my own journey and my interests and motivations for learning and doing sustainability and environmental justice work. But before I begin, I feel that it is necessary to acknowledge the news that we all learned yesterday. I saw the verdict as I was going about my day in the afternoon and like many of you, my first reaction was joy and relief. Joy because Derek Chauvin was convicted for his actions, a first step to accountability, and relief because even though we all saw what happened with our own eyes on video, even though many of us didn’t need a trial to convince us this was a ruthless taking of life, we’ve also seen this very same justice system fail Black people before, and there was no guarantee it wasn’t going to happen another time. However, later on in the evening, as I sat in my apartment I was overcome by a wave of sadness and anger. This was because at that moment, I realized a couple of things; 1) This wasn’t going to bring George Floyd back: his life was taken from him and he is gone forever, and 2) The very same system that enabled his cruel and unjust execution (!) … still exists today. Just last week it took Daunte Wright and yesterday, 16-yearold Ma’Khia Bryant. It just keeps taking! How many times are we going to have to march, to shout, to ask for the police to be held accountable? So yes I am still angry because it shouldn’t come to this, we shouldn’t
have to ask for justice and accountability again and again. We need to do Black and people of color justice, by keeping the air in their lungs … by letting them live … by dismantling the systems of oppression, because as long as we have to live with the reality and constant fear that something like this might happen to any of us, then justice is not yet served. Today I want to highlight just a small section of Luther College’s mission statement about “challenging one another to learn in community, to discern our callings, and to serve with distinction for the common good.” Specifically, I’d like us to think about the words “community and common good.” I’ll come back to this in a bit. In my reflection about my journey, I came to the realization that the person that I am today, enthusiastic about environmental health and social equity, is a result of a confluence of experiences and inspirations that I’ve had since my early childhood. See, I grew up in the small southern African country of Eswatini—aka Swaziland—in a low to middle income family. What I didn’t realize until later was that being from a low to middle income family meant my family and most of our community were living sustainably before I even learned what sustainability was. Principles of sustainability such as conscious consumption, material reuse, and growing your own food have been a part of my life since before I learned of climate change and global warming. Back then, this was just how life was. You were taught to save resources because we did not know when a shortage would occur. It made sense to grow our food so we would spend less on grocery shopping, and it also made sense to respect the environment so that it is
Siletselwe Dlamini able to provide for you tomorrow. These things JUST MADE SENSE. And so even though I grew up pretty much living in a sustainable manner, it wasn’t until high school that I decided I wanted to dedicate my life to contributing to a more sustainable and socially just future. At that point I started to really understand the negative impacts of our civilization on the environment. Most importantly, this was the time when I learned about the disproportionate impact of climate change and environmental degradation. Not only is our way of doing things detrimental to this planet, but the people who are bearing the brunt of these impacts are the most vulnerable people in our societies, the ones contributing the least to the problem. These are people like my family, like most families around the world who rely on subsistence farming for their food, like most low-income people of color who live in disproportionate proximity to sources of pollution because of social injustices, like small islanders who face the threat of rising sea levels. I’m talking about marginalized, underrepresented, overexploited Spring 2021 Agora
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people that are feeling the burn of environmental issues. Now that DOES NOT MAKE SENSE! Why are the people who contribute the least, why are the people who are most vulnerable the ones who suffer the most?
Climate change does not recognize boundaries, it does not care which country emitted the most greenhouse gases. And so in recognition of the boundaryless nature of this global problem, I want to invite you all who are here today, and Luther College at large, to apply this same thinking as we think about community and the common good. May we expand our definition of community. In all that we do, may we think about community beyond the boundaries of this campus, or this city, or this country. As we make commitments to sustainability, may we think of them as not only for our little community but for the common good of the global community--for the people who have contributed the least to the problem and yet are experiencing the harshest impacts of it. May we teach others to do the same. As an educational institution we need to make sure that every person that walks this campus is aware of the environmental and climate injustices that occur around the world even though they may be hidden from us, and what their contributions are to what is one of the biggest challenges of our time. I am asking that we go beyond our Luther sustainability commitments and do everything in our power to cultivate change everywhere. I am asking that we do all of this now before it is too late, for the common good of our global community. Thank you!
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PHOTO COURTESY OF MARTIN KLAMMER
To cut the long story short, it is these experiences that have fueled my distaste for an environmentally and socially unjust world, and motivated me to want to be a part of a solution that will create a thriving, just, and conscious society.
Siletselwe Dlamini speaks at chapel on April 21, 2021.
Hope: My Reflections on Climate Justice Week APRIL 23, 2021
by SALOMÉ VALDIVIESO SANTILLÁN ’23
W
e have a belief in Inca Andean cosmology that the earth is our mother, named the Pachamama. The Pachamama is believed to be the source of all our living creatures, life, and the souls that inhabit this planet. We humans are the daughters and sons of the Pacha. We owe her our life. As our mother, she vows to protect us and we vow to protect her. However, there’s just so much the Pacha can do if we don’t protect each other in our community. It is believed that if humans don’t show gratitude after every harvest season, the Pacha gets upset, and she will respond with suffering, scares, and illness. Every year gratitude to the Pacha is a collective effort to show her that we are grateful for the life she provides. The Inti Raymi festival and the Pawkar Raymi celebrations are spaces in which the community reflects on the value of life and the importance of taking care of one another as a symbol of respect to our mother, the Pachamama. Many times, I have wondered if the Luther community resembles the sentiments I have found at home in Ecuador. I have experienced environmental injustice in flesh and blood, and as a person of color from a Third World country, I sadly know that I will keep experiencing it in the future, and my daughters and sons will do as well if I, and we, don’t do anything about it. Sometimes I feel very hopeless. I feel hopeless when I see the values of capitalism and consumerism overshadow our humanity. I feel hopeless when I see that environmental disasters don’t hold us all accountable because people across the ocean have money to cover their crimes. I feel hopeless when I see how Black, Brown, and Indigenous bodies and
communities are disproportionately affected by the climate crisis. I feel hopeless when the Ecuadorian government and American oil companies are not held accountable for the destruction of the Amazon rainforest in the name of the oil we all consume every day. I feel hopeless when I see the arbitrary murder of Black and Brown bodies, like Salomé Valdivieso Santillán the murder of Ma’Khia Bryant, a 16-year-old On Wednesday morning, when I heard girl who called the police for help but my peer Sletsy talk about the resiliency only found death in the response, and and resistance of his community back the murder of Adam Toledo, a Latino home in Eswatini, I recover my hope. boy of 13 years old in Chicago shot by On Wednesday evening, when I was a policeman after he raised his hands to part of the vigil organized by BSU and show he didn’t have a gun. campus ministries, at the moment when I feel hopeless when I don’t see myself all of us for a second held our lights up represented in a class, or when some of high to illuminate the dark spaces in my peers’ faces seem numb to the pain between the feelings of pain and relief, I of others in our community. recover my hope. I feel hopeless when again and again I On the same Wednesday evening, when see how we humans hurt each other and anthropologist Susan Crate mentioned hurt our Pachamama by extension. I feel how humans are causing the environhopeless in the lack of empathy, solidarmental crisis but how also we, the youth, ity, and action. I feel hopeless and I feel have the power to shift it, I recover my tired of feeling hopeless. hope. But there are also spaces of recovery and On Thursday, when for a moment I just healing. There are spaces of hope. And saw people grabbing lunch outside and if I could summarize what this Climate sitting in the grass enjoying the sun, and Justice Week has given me this year, it when today I see all of us united in this is hope. chapel talk to simply hear me, an Ecuadorian young woman who only hopes On Tuesday, for example, when I heard that her future gets better, I recover my the verdict declaring Derek Chauvin hope. guilty of the murder of George Floyd, I recover my hope. Spring 2021 Agora
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All these moments make me forget for a second what kind of society we live in. But we cannot be oblivious to the oppression and suffering from people in our community, in this country, in our world. Every action counts. And I have hope that every little thing we do here today in this campus has a bigger impact. Like the butterfly effect, today my hope is that in one way or another we are contributing to building a better future for people all across the globe. Healing for our earth, healing for us humans, especially healing those of us in vulnerable communities is needed. And we all have the power to create spaces of healing, empowerment, and action. I believe that the power of a united community can change everything. I believe in the power and potential of this, the Luther community. It’s my hope today that we keep building this community towards a more fair, just, and sustainable future. Students, staff, faculty and administration, all of us should and NEED to be together if we want real change. I have hope that our leaders won’t disappoint us while we keep them accountable. I HAVE HOPE IN THE POWER OF OUR COMMUNITY. Thank you.
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Can't Help Falling in Love APRIL 28, 2021
by NANCY K. BARRY, Professor of English
I
n my thirty-something years at Luther College, I have spoken in chapel almost as many times, but none of those sermons have inspired so much befuddlement, so much anxiety as this one, my last.
so many deep articulations of faith and soul. The practice has been life-giving to me, and in the spirit of telling one more story, I want to reflect with you today on an event that showed me another example of witness at Luther College.
Well, maybe my first one did, thirty years ago. It was in January of 1991, and I was giving a sermon during the week of Epiphany. I spent two days writing and working through my thoughts about gift-giving, only to be seized suddenly the night before by a deep fear that what I had to say had absolutely no theological basis and even less moral direction. It was as if all the ghosts from previous years of faith at Luther College—when the service was required for all students and the only people who spoke in chapel were campus pastors and members of the Religion and Philosophy departments—were somehow floating through the air and landing at my doorstep, pressuring me to measure my own delicate journey toward the web of my soul against some giant, monolithic, centuries-old doctrine of Lutheranism. What, I wondered, could I possibly say that would make sense?
You might say it was for me the most important chapel service I ever attended, but it wasn’t a chapel at all—it was a service project gathering, in 2015, during an off-campus January term course in South Africa. But it was a moment in which I felt so uplifted by the grace of Luther students, I have never forgotten it. I was teaching the course with my colleague Martin Klammer, and for one evening in Johannesburg we had organized a dinner and gathering for a special group of children who were housed at an orphanage known as “Children of Fire.” As their name suggests, they were all survivors of terrible fires, and their bodies bore the impact of those burns in dramatic, quite visible ways. Because so many homes in South Africa don’t have safe vehicles for heating or cooking, people use kerosine lamps and oil-burning heaters, and the resulting fires can often be disastrous, especially for small children.
My uneasiness with my first sermon was based in part on my ambivalence toward the whole enterprise of chapel. When I came to Luther thirty years ago, I was more curious than anything else about the structure, this dedicated time three days a week to gather together and suspend ordinary labor. So I decided I would “give it a try” as a new community member. I thought I would go a couple days each week, to see what it was about. Within months, I was hooked, on the gentle warp and weft of stories, testimonials, scripture reflections—the presence of so many voices within our community telling the softly-woven or the hard-fought faith stories of their lives. It has been a privilege for me all these years to witness
I was worried about how it would go that night, because Martin, who had worked with the children during his previous year on sabbatical in South Africa, had alerted all of us that several of the children were severely disfigured by their burns. I myself have a deep, primal fear of fire within me, and I wondered how I would feel upon seeing such vulnerable children—their arms and legs misshapen; their faces disfigured; their hands or feet rounded into stumps. I wondered, in all honesty, if I had the stomach for it. Like all those in need of grace, I was worried about me, myself, and I—a safe white woman’s fear that it was all going to be unsettling or uncomfortable.
Nancy K. Barry But then, I was rescued by Luther students, who embraced the children, and spent the long evening playing games with them, singing songs, letting one another into the not-so-fearful places of the heart. It was as if we were a microcosm of the world on that small backyard patio: the young, the old; the black, the white; South Africa and North America; the lucky and the unlucky; some with their scars so visible they could make you wince; some with their scars so hidden no one in the world would know the silent, secret pain carried inside. Throughout the evening, I was called to reach outside of myself, to join the students in simply accepting these children and letting ourselves connect. It felt like a moment of grace, a deep intermingling of life both tragic and healing, a long-forgotten understanding of what it means to be human. The best sermon a person could write or hear. Late into nightfall, we ended with a spontaneous outpouring of songs, from the children and the Luther students. And rather than any hymn that we might have sung, the first tune that was shared that night won my heart and made me feel closer to Luther students Spring 2021 Agora
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than I ever had before. I shall always remember how a soprano named Genevieve (from Nordic Choir no less) began to sing that old Elvis Presley song: “Wise men say, only fools rush in. But I can’t help falling in love with you.” That has become my refrain, for that night, and for all the mornings I’ve spent in chapel, throughout these thirty years. For every sermon, every prayer, every anthem sung, that is what it has meant: a process of falling in love, of opening up my heart, of saying grace, of saying yes, of saying thank you. They may have been burned in South Africa; they have been choked to death in Minneapolis; they have been shot to death in Louisville, but they are—all of them-our children, our family. That is why I have come to chapel all these years—to hear the word made real to us, to hear the deeply woven threads that bind us to other people, to feel for just an instant, the presence of divinity nudging our souls toward something bigger, something that will burn into our souls and connect us to other human beings. Last night, as I was preparing this, I thought, just like a good Lutheran, But what about scripture? Where is your SCRIPTURE?! Surely, Nancy there are some inklings from God to show the link between you and the ancient word. But all I could remember was the Gospel of John, when Jesus tells his disciples: “I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you. A little while longer and the world will see Me no more, but you will see Me. Because I live, you will live also. At that day you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you.” Those words, then as now, are hardly magic, but they still inspire us to believe there is life beyond life, with the presence of a God who offers that to us, provided our faith is willing to admit it. “I am in my Father. And you in me. . . and I in you.” That is the lesson that chapel services have extended to me all these years, particularly on days when it felt like a lot of trouble to walk over to the CFL, or when my mind was distracted by small fears and lesser calamities. But then I would get there, 40
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show up, and all I had to do was pay attention. Show up. Pay attention. Listen to the word of God somehow become the word of life. I can’t help falling in love with you. I’m sure you are all assuming that this group of select sopranos and altos from Nordic Choir are going to sing exactly that, but I’ve asked them to do another song I’ve always wanted to hear in chapel. It’s called “I Have a Million Nightingales” and many times before I’ve spoken in chapel, I’ve sung it to myself, so I thought it was only fair to let you hear it after all these years. It is a canon round, and its words are simple: “I have a million nightingales on the branches of my heart.” What they are calling for is not so much love, but love’s older sister, Freedom—that far-flung bird that knows no boundaries of time or place, that wants to love whoever is near or far, whoever is most in need, or most afraid. That is what we are singing for, within the chapel and beyond its walls. Freedom: from ourselves; from the terrible, tragic weight of a world on fire; freedom toward whatever and whoever we are falling in love with, especially when we cannot help it.
Find the current issue and back issues of Agora online
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ou can read the current issue of Agora online, and you can also find and search all back issues by going to our webpage: www. luther.edu/paideia/agora.
Changing your address? Want to stop receiving Agora? If you do, please email or write us. Contact Agora at agora@luther. edu, or write Agora, Main 126, Luther College, 700 College Dr., Decorah, IA 52101. The image at left illustrated early issues of Agora. The journal was established by the Paideia Program, and paideia translates as education. The image shows a teacher with his tablet on his lap and stylus in his hand.
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