Bruce Reyes-Chow

The “Marginalization” of the Christian Right

This week I received a funding solicitation email from a conservative Christian organization with the following justification for their plea for support:

. . . the church is being marginalized by a culture that is increasingly accepting homosexuality and same-sex marriage . . .

While I don’t want to deny that groups such as this are feeling marginalized, I argue that what is being experienced is not marginalization, but the repercussions of new reality of their influence and dominance on larger cultural conversations and direction setting. Society is no longer willing to sit idly by and allow the conservative Christian view to be the unquestioned social moral compass and other people of faith are no longer willing to abdicate the Christian voice to this particular narrative.

This is not marginalization, it’s called accountability.

Change is hard for anyone, so in some ways I do feel for folks who are experiencing change that feels so much out of their control. That said, it is one thing to have compassion and understanding for a person as they feel the decline in their sphere of influence and hold on power, but is quite another thing to respond to that feeling in a way that validates the realities of the power and influence that still remains. After all, as you can see from the map, more and more states are bannin same-sex marriage, so to cry marginalization rings a bit hollow.

Sociologists and pundits could argue the meaning of marginalization, but when I think about marginalized people, I think of those who are kept in a cycle of poverty because of predatory financial practices, those who have poor educational opportunities because of the state of public education, anyone for whom their civil rights are determined by a majority vote and so on and so on.When I think of marginalization, I do not think of religious communities who are simply having their religious views challenged, are no longer able to dictate moral social norms and are just plain loosing influence.

Now if, as a country, we vote to pass a Constitutional Amendment banning preachers like Pastoral Charles Worley, it might feel great, but this would be one step towards marginalizing conservative Christians. Thankfully, we live in a country where people can speak their mind, no matter how distasteful and dangerous I may find it. They must deal with the consequences of their words, but they can still say them. Ban the ability for a preacher to speak his/her your mind in a house of worship that and then maybe, just maybe,the marginalization banner can be raised.

Call it “losing influence,” call it a “soul-losing moral defeat,” but don’t call it “marginalization.”

The Importance of Making Memories With Our Children

One of the reasons that I am so committed to community: church, family, school, etc. is because I don’t believe we can move forward in healthy ways unless we understand our past. No, this is not a new concept, but it seems that many conversations about innovation, creativity and growth are void of and understanding of and grappling with our shared past. In our instant-gratification, speed-obsessed and conflict-avoiding culture we too easily skip over important parts of building and being community and fail to build foundations that will sustain us into the future. Still, as frustrating and difficult that it often is to build these stories in church, family, school, etc. it’s really the only way that we can all grow.

I have found this need to remember the stories nowhere more important than in the raising and parenting of our children. Next year we will have one daughter in all three levels of our public school system: elementary, middle school and high school so are dealing with multiple stages of life and development. While our conversations about high school and college play a role in building expectations for their growth and help develop some life-disciplines, we don’t do this at the expense of creating space for and acknowledging the glue that holds together all of life’s grand aspirations, thrilling successes and disheartening failures, the ”Do you remember when . . .” moment/s.

I was reminded of this again this week as my youngest and I had a couple of those, “Do you remember when . . .” moments. The first was at a baseball game that she and I went to. In full Oakland A’s regalia we walked through the importance of a pitch count, worked on the nuances of boo’ing and ate cotton candy without having to share. In itself, there was nothing all that mind-blowing about the evening, but as the third of three daughters, she so rarely gets Dad-only time that this will def be one of our “Do you remember when . . .” moments.

And then again, after getting tangled up with a park jungle gym during while on a school field trip, her chin was left a little worse for the wear. We had ALMOST made it an entire school-year without having to take a child to the Emergency Room . . . almost. She ended up not requiring anything more that rest and a pain reliever, but the novelty of laying in a hospital bed, getting a personalized bracelet and grossing people out with her black and blue chin filled her with joy. I can hear it now, in ten years, “Dad, do you remember that time when we had to go to the emergency room because my chin was black and blue?”

As I look back on my own childhood, those “Do you remember when . . . ” moments free me to think about my own upbringing and how I may make good choices in shaping the personhood of my own children.

Do you remember when we used to catch crawdads in the creek?
Do you remember that time you busted me for lying about where I was?
Do you remember when you would scream your heads off at my little league games?
Do you remember that night when you taught me the correct way to pack a car trunk?
Do you remember your reaction when I told you I was getting married?

Obviously, not every “Do you remember when . . .” moment was joyful or planned. Some memories were easy to spot in the distance and others just happened to us, but they are all part of what has shaped and formed my being. Being able to look back on those times, hold them for what they were and allow them to shape my future is a gift that I cherish and a gift that am committed to give to my children so they too can build a future that best reflects and honors the strengths of their past.

So what are your “Do you remember when . . .” moments?