I have been meditating on a disturbing juxtaposition of
images that is meant to be provocative. I do not mean to equate these images in
every respect. They do not represent exactly
the same thing. What they do suggest is
a certain historical continuity in our social structures and the way in which
they shape our perception of who is, and is not, human.
The first image is a photograph of overcrowded prison
conditions in California.
The second image is a recreation of the way in which
slaves were stored aboard ship as cargo for the middle passage from Africa to
North America.
While the mass incarceration of men of color in historically
unprecedented numbers is not the same thing as chattel slavery, it is another
moment in the evolution of racist social structures that seek to keep black and
brown people locked in an inferior racialized under-caste. What
story do these images capture? How does
mainstream culture tell that story? How
do people of color tell their own story?
As people of faith, we understand the importance of images
and narratives. Whoever controls the narrative, controls our interpretation of
reality and determines what we are allowed to see. In one sense, Jesus’ whole ministry was spent
trying to open people’s eyes and ears.
“Jesus said, ‘I came into this world for judgment so that those who do
not see may see, and those who do see may become blind’” (John 9:39). Jesus is changing the narrative, empowering
those considered “blind” to trust their perception of reality, while
challenging those who control the interpretation of reality to recognize just
how blind they are to the truth. Jesus
knows what every community organizer knows:
if we are not telling our own story, somebody else will tell it for us
in ways that serve their self-interest rather than the truth.
Conversely, it is important for us to listen to people tell
their own stories, rather than hearing about them from someone else. I’ve come to believe very deeply that to
understand these images, I’ve got to listen very carefully to people of color
as they tell me their stories. And so I
was in East Oakland this week at the Elijah Muhammad Cultural Center listening
to black colleagues talk about their experience of the War on Drugs (which, in
truth, has been a war on poor communities of color) and gun violence and mass
incarceration and police brutality in their communities.
There, I heard Dr. Alvin Bernstine, pastor of Bethlehem
Missionary Baptist Church, open up the "Good Shepherd" passage from John’s Gospel in a new
way. He broke it down real simple. If Jesus came so that we may have life, and
have it more abundantly, then we have to value life. We have to value the lives of black men and
boys enough to question why it is that they are being warehoused in prisons
like livestock - like sheep, if you will.
Looking at these images of people treated like livestock
challenges me to reconsider Jesus’ figure of speech about the shepherd and the
sheep. The first thing to note is that
Jesus is employing a metaphor. He is neither
talking about fuzzy pets or animal husbandry, nor is he deploying this metaphor
in the ways we might assume as 21st Century people. We think of sheep as dumb animals who do what
they are told. It is insulting to be
referred to as sheep.
For 1st Century people, sheep were the animal of
choice for ritual sacrifice. Sheep were victims sacrificed as scapegoats in
lieu of human beings, both as sin offerings and thanksgiving offerings to
God. They are made to suffer for the
benefit of others. Remember that Jesus
here is addressing the religious leaders in the Temple, where such sacrifices
were offered on a daily basis. The
connection is clear.
Jesus is also drawing on prophetic traditions in which God
is seen as a good shepherd of the people who brings justice, unlike corrupt
human leaders; a shepherd who feeds the flock rather than simply fattening them
it for slaughter. God desires that we
care for one another, rather than exploit each other. Another stream of prophetic thought imagines
the Messiah, God’s anointed leader, as one who identifies with the suffering of
God’s people, and even chooses to endure suffering for their sake. God desires mercy, rather than sacrifice.
In his peculiar use of the shepherd image, Jesus brings both
of these streams together. For Jesus,
the sheep are human victims of injustice, exploited by the very leaders who are
supposed to guide and protect them.
Jesus speaks of himself as both the “shepherd” who goes before them and
the “gate” through which the sheep pass.
What does he mean?
As shepherd, Jesus knows the victims of injustice intimately
– by name – and they recognize his voice.
He is one of them. In fact, he tells us later that he will even
give his life for them. Unlike the
thieves and bandits who kill victims for unjust gain, and the cowardly hired
hands who run away at the first threat of violence, Jesus willingly becomes a
victim so that others may live.
In Jerusalem, there was an actual Sheep Gate through which
the herds were brought to holding pens to be ritually slaughtered. That Gate led in only one direction – toward
death. In claiming the gate image for
himself, Jesus emphasizes the reverse:
through him, victims are led out into freedom and new life. When we walk through the Jesus Gate, we enter
into a spacious and generous reality in which forgiveness replaces retribution,
justice restores relationships, and the abundance of God’s love brings life out
of death.
In walking through the Jesus Gate, we begin to be
transformed into a people who identify with victims and act in solidarity with
them. Compassion moves us even to take
some risks on their behalf, but always in such away as to avoid the making of
new victims. Jesus makes clear that he
is not like the bandits – the revolutionaries of his day who simply kept the
cycle of violence churning, replace one unjust regime with another. Jesus sacrifices his life in protest against
the making of victims, completely trusting in the ever-renewing, creative power
of God to renew life.
Which brings me back to the images of black men warehoused
like sheep awaiting slaughter. They are
among the victims with whom Jesus so compassionately and forcefully identifies
himself. They are being exploited by a system of social
control reinforcing white privilege; criminalized to politically and
economically disenfranchise them in some ways even more subtle and devious than
slavery or Jim Crow.
Since 1982, the War on Drugs has provided a veneer of
legitimacy to an unprecedented assault on communities of color that has swelled
the prison population in the U.S. from some 300,000 to more than 2 million
inmates in just thirty years (larger even than the prison populations of Russia
or China). The increase is due
overwhelmingly to new harsh sentencing for nonviolent, drug-related felonies,
massively disproportionately targeting communities of color and especially men
of color.
Today there are more African-Americans under correctional
control (including prison, parole, and probation) than were enslaved in
1850. As of 2011, because of laws
prohibiting convicted felons from voting, more black men are disenfranchised
than in 1870, the year the 15th Amendment was passed to protect
their right to vote. In major urban
areas, more than 50% of African-American men have felony, again mainly drug,
convictions. If you add the men who are
in prison currently (who, by the way, are not included in calculations of
poverty or unemployment), that number shoots up to 80% in some states. This has led to massive social dislocation
and economic inequity.
Jesus knows these victims intimately. He knows there names and they know his
voice. Do we know their names? Do they recognize our voices? Who will lead them out through the Jesus Gate
if the Church has not entered the gate in solidarity with them?
A faith-based movement called the Lifelines to Healing Campaign has begun to do so. The
Campaign is committed to ending the public health crisis of gun violence in
communities of color AND the mass incarceration of men of color feeding the
distress and hopelessness that fuels the violence. Here in California, the Campaign is working
concretely to lead victims through the Jesus Gate by passing the Safe Neighborhood and Schools Act of 2014, a voter initiative that will be on the
ballot in November.
This law includes four components that will help reverse the
school to prison pipeline:
1. Reducing nonviolent
drug possession and petty theft crimes from felonies to misdemeanors, and
authorizes resentencing for anyone incarcerated for these offenses who poses no
threat to public safety – both juveniles and adults. The vast majority of those eligible are men
of color.
2. Redirects hundreds
of millions of dollars from prisons to education and drug treatment
programs. Since 1981, the percentage of
California’s general fund going to prisons has increased at a rate 22x that of
K-12 eduation spending. We spend more
than $60K per year on each inmate, and less than $8.5K on each student. That has to change.
3. Protects public
safety by limiting prison release to nonviolent offenders, and focusing law
enforcement resources on violent and serious crimes and programs that can stop
the cycle of crime.
4. Eliminates the
collateral consequences of nonviolent felony convictions by reducing prior
convictions to misdemeanors, eliminating barriers to employment, professional
trades, housing options, and public assistance programs faced by convicted
felons.
Jesus came so that victims may have life and have it
abundantly. Let us share that abundant
life, beginning today with a commitment to value the lives of black men and
boys victimized by mass incarceration. Let
us hear their stories, and let them hear our voices calling for justice.
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