Charlottesville

This is a rough draft:

We have had a great demonstration of what happens when we (white people, mostly) don't keep the commandments. There was a neoNazi march through the University of VA on Friday night (8/11) ahead of a "Unite the Right" rally on Saturday in Charlottesville. White men marched through campus with Tiki torches shouting slogans such as "White Lives Matter" "You will not replace us" and "Jews will not replace us." Clearly their deep story is hurting them as well. It's causing them to feel threatened and ignored rather that being catered to. Being one voice among many scares them - they're so used to being the only voice that mattered.

It worsened the next day when the KKK, neoNazi groups and white supremacy groups came to the rally armed; with shields and racist flags. Police were slow to do anything when violence broke out. The governor finally declared a state of emergency and the police began dispersing people. I don't know who started the violence - it doesn't matter because the rally goers came prepared for it and the protestors did not. After most of the rallygoers dispersed, a Dodge challenger drove into a crowd of protesters, killing one person and injuring 19 others. Terrorism.

David Duke, a former kKK grand knight, called for Trump to recognize the white supremacists gave him the wh. There were so many people who could have stopped this and chose not to. So much blood on our hands for allowing this kind of hate to gain such power.

I'm sad. I'm writing this out in lieu of going to church because I have no current church home in which to lament this tragedy. This tragedy is due to a deep story that says white people are better, superior to black people, that America is a "European" country, and that America is a Christian country. None of that is true. There is no love in these ideas and thus no keeping of the commandments. It's an ideology of death. They have (consciously or otherwise) chosen death over life.

I'm so grateful that there were counterprotesters willing to challenge these bigots face-to-face. Certainly Trump didn't challenge them on Saturday claiming violence on many sides. Monday he condemned them and then last night defended them. Our own president is one of them. It was obvious but so many people said, "give him a chance." Well that's what primaries are for - to see what they're like. I think people really don't want to believe, even now, that we have a Nazi problem in the US. We white-wash our history so we don't understand how horrible slavery was. We white-wash racism so we don't have to look at its effects. We really don't like to question the stories we were given even when they no longer match what we see.

My heart is sad and yet maybe, maybe some good might come - people's eyes might be opened, conversations might be possible. I must have hope. Hope in the God whose with us in this mess - even if it doesn't feel like it - encouraging us to do better, feeling hurt and sad along with us, loving those who are being wounded and killed. The saddest thing is that this is just another day in black America. Nothing new. We have not dealt with our history of slavery, Jim Crow, KKK and general racism and this is the end result - a divided nation. The longer we put those conversations off, the more people will be hurt and killed and the chances of having the conversation becomes dimmer.
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