My friend, Kristin, and I went down to the South Side yesterday to visit St. Thomas Episcopal Church, a Black parish in Bronzeville. Bronzeville is a historic African-American neighborhood that is now moving from economic hardship to gentrification, and major real estate development. The church burned down in the seventies and they rebuilt using modern architecture (that's not it in the photo up there - I had my camera, but just forgot to do anything with it). The church sort of resembles a bunker, which might have been what felt necessary to stay in the Bronzeville of the late seventies, I don't know. But it's still beautiful: abstract and image-based stained glass windows - using thick chunks of bright colored glass, a huge empty cross, and the smell of incense lingering in the air. They call themselves "the Mother Church of African-American Episcopalians in the Diocese of Chicago."They mix traditional Episcopal hymns and traditional American spirituals, piano and organ (their organist is a white guy), high church stuff - like bells, incense, cope and biretta on the priest, lots of bowing and kneeling - AND traditional African-American preaching and the parish responding with (if subtle) "Amens." and "Mmmhmms." They had an almost entirely male altar party, unfortunately, except for two little girls who were torchbearers... and one very spunky one kept scrunching down while she was supposed to be kneeling, looking very bored. I think she was the priest's daughter, actually. :) They turn off all the lights during the Lord's Prayer and their dismissal anthem... pretty cool and very contemplative. Tons of people came over to welcome us during the peace and after worship. Kristin and I loved it. It felt liturgically alive, rooted in tradition, and interconnected as a community. We were fed smoked sausage links, gratin potatoes, biscuits, and fruit salad, engaged in conversation, and told "Come back!" Even the teenagers ate and stuck around, talking at their own table. It's sad, but few Episcopal churches are that friendly to newcomers.
I asked one woman about the gentrification in the neighborhood (FYI: these are middle to upper-class Black people, for the most part). She said that the parish is working to prepare itself for major outreach, but first they want to work on their internal community, "so we know what we're inviting people into." They just hired a new rector a couple years ago, so they're going through a transition.
I'm so fascinated by race, especially by the African-American experience. I've soaked it up over the years: growing up in Hyde Park, going to an almost entirely Black Catholic elementary school, learning from my mom, who eats up every book she finds on the Civil War and the Civil Rights movement (especially the Taylor Branch books on King, they're EXCELLENT), having a close friend, Kirstin, at U of C, who is Black and tells me about her experiences, doing anti-racism training with my diocese. It all just fascinates me, both because racism has been so destructive, and because the African American experience has shaped the United States profoundly and deeply, in ways I think most of us don't recognize. Black culture is a both an amazing and painful gift to all the people of our country. There's so much I don't know, but I like to keep learning.
Dwight Hopkins was here at Seabury a couple weeks ago to celebrate the retirement of Newland Smith, our librarian, who's been here 40 years. Newland, who is white, has done a lot of anti-racism work, among other amazing things, and Prof. Hopkins, in his talk, admired him as a "race traitor," among the likes of John Brown, and some other white folks who I didn't recognize, which is too bad. It's interesting, because wikipedia identifies "race traitor" as a derogatory term, but for Prof. Hopkins, it was the highest compliment. I don't know if I'm capable of being one myself, but it's something to aspire to, and probably something that costs.
