From Flower Mound Marcus to Lewisville High

“The world will not be destroyed by those who do evil but by those who watch them without doing anything.” –Albert Einstein This morning, Dale Hanson rung my bell and reminded me of the best days of my life when I transferred from Flower Mound Marcus High School to our cross-town rival Lewisville High School.  Watch his commentary here on the kids from Flower Mound High School who held up racist signs at their game against Plano: http://bit.ly/1B94Ajc.

Having already lived in a small town outside of Jackson, Mississippi, I would not have qualified Marcus or my friends, teachers and community parents there as racist. They were kind people. We loved each other.

But when I transferred to Lewisville, there was backlash from “friends” and their parents who could not understand my decision to go from a basically all-white school to one of significant racial and socio-economic diversity. They didn’t say those words of course. We didn’t have those words.

Over the next two years, entrenched in the lives of my peers, basketball teammates and coaches - black, white, Hispanic, gay, straight, Christian, non-Christian, determined, confused, poor, middle-class, alcoholic and abusive parents, and also dedicated parents, absent parents, loving parents, committed parents, honest, authentic, got-nothing-to-lose families – my life was forever changed for the better.

I’ve tried to write this story so many times and I’m yet to do justice to the life transformation I experienced at LHS. But I fell in love with life in a new way. The beauty in diversity, the authenticity of those who had never been told to hide the family dirt, the joy of victory when you are the underdog, the girls who lived with us in different seasons of home-life challenges, the eye-opening reality of how over-resourced I was in every way brought a new level of appreciation, the gratitude that grew for my parents who opened their homes and their hearts to every person I brought through the door. Just when I would think my heart could not hold more love, God would make room for another person, another story, another delightful creation of His to come into my life.

Now that I’m an adult, I have heard the parents who say they don’t want their (white) kids to go to school with “those” kids. They avoid diverse neighborhoods. If you asked them if they were racist, they would say no. They might even have an African American “friend” or coworker they “really like” or tell you how they just love their gay hair stylist; he’s just so fun. (wink) We see it in Plano as families contest legislation to keep businesses from discriminating against the LGBT community. These biases are pervasive.

So the question is will we stand by and watch? Will we silently turn the other way when we recognize racism, bigotry, or even just subtle implicit bias in ourselves and our children and our loved ones? Or will we do the hard work of valuing each person as a child of God? Will we have the hard conversations with our children about why we celebrate Martin Luther King or what happened in Ferguson? Will we invite our gay and lesbian friends into our homes and receive the benefit of their love for ourselves and our children.

Or will we remain in our homogenous neighborhoods, go to our homogenous churches, “protect” our kids from real-life challenges, and perpetuate the biases, which while they may not feel like our destroying our lives, are most certainly destroying the lives of others.

God has given me the great joy and also ache of working for non-profits who are doing the hard work of bringing light to the issues of racial and gender equity, implicit bias, they systemic nature of poverty and homelessness and prostitution and the great chasm that separate those with much from those with nothing. The research we do tells the truth. It’s a long and sordid history of oppression and segregation and protecting the way things are.

Here is what I know: I will not solve any of these problems. But I will recognize that I am either contributing to the problem or the solution. There is no middle ground. You are either adding to the idea that each life is of value, brought to life by a Creator whose love is for you and for them, and that your gifts, your life has a purpose beyond fulfilling your own desire and those of people just like you. Or you are not – whether it be with your silence OR with your aggression.

This is for my LHS family – thank you for loving me, accepting the strange, little, rich white bird that flew into your nest and showing me how to walk honestly and authentically before God and man. I am forever changed by your love. You are my people. Where you go, I go.