Karen Kistler

karen.kistler@salisburypost.com

 

SALISBURY — Pausing to Heal, an interactive, conversational event, celebrating the National Day of Racial Healing was held Feb. 3 in the Stanback Room of the Rowan Public Library’s main branch with 20-plus in attendance.

Founder and President Michelle Strong and her husband Frank Strong facilitated the event, which had to be postponed from its previously scheduled dates due to weather and a scheduling conflict.

Rev. Olen Bruner, former pastor of Trinity Presbyterian Church, welcomed everyone to the Pausing to Heal program, which was offered by the EYES Journey (Embracing Your Elephant Scripturally).

He shared that the “EYES Journey brings together the faith community to address racism, the elephant in the room. The EYES Journey approach to conversation is dialogue, not debate so that we can address the heart and gain understanding of one another.” 

As the event began, Michelle began first with the statement that “we know how racism came into our country” followed by a question for the group to consider and share thoughts. She asked them “where are we, as Christians, missing the mark addressing racism” and why can’t we talk about this issue.

Several responded, saying first that efforts are being made, but that many are afraid to do so and many don’t believe there’s a problem and others don’t think racism exists.

Another, a minister in the group, said he had seen racism in both the south and the north and responded that the church isn’t dealing with this issue because, he said, “the church at this point is really not sure what the truth is. Slavery was justified to the church through the Bible and yet we are still here today.”

Frank Strong continued by telling the group that there would be lots of time to talk and said “we are not here to debate, we are not here to challenge each other’s viewpoints.”

Michelle said the group was there to have dialogue and “build understanding and make a difference, bringing us closer to unity” and growing closer to God.

We aren’t here to perceive sound, Frank said, to which Michelle continued, but the group is there to listen and truly hear what is being said, thereby bringing unity.

“I want to hear and I want to honor you by hearing what you have to say,” she said.

Being faith-based, Michelle said they are “trying to embrace that topic of racism through the lens of God” with the intent of reminding Christians that Christ has shown what unity looks like and it’s up to each to yield to what the Father says to do and that God’s children are supposed to look like their Father by loving “Him with all our heart, soul and mind.”

They then shared multiple scripture verses showing what that looks like from Psalm 139 which speaks on God searching our hearts and from John 13 about the soul and Romans 12 dealing with transforming our minds.

After each verse was read, Michelle said they call this Pausing to Heal and had everyone pause and gave them time to consider what the verse said and how it speaks to them. They were then invited to share their thoughts.

One person pointed out that we might think we are good and right, but only God can show us certain things about ourselves because “He knows me better than I know myself. It takes Him because He’s the one who made me. He knows all about me and those intricate parts that I don’t even know myself.”

Michelle pointed out that the Bible says we are to love with all three, the heart, the soul and the mind, telling that people can see the outside of us the shiny stuff and how we help others, but they can’t see the inside, our hearts and what we are thinking.

This led to an ice breaker activity where those at each table were asked to guess what they thought their neighbor as a child wanted to be when they grew up.

It was later discussed that this was hard because there was no conversation allowed, no chance to talk, no opportunity to learn backgrounds.

During the evening the group also watched a video of Dr. Gail Christopher who was sharing a TED talk to a group in Charlottesville, Va. 

She told the crowd that “we have to uproot racism and that we have to learn how to relate to one another as equal human beings.” 

The way to change people, she said, is to share meaningful narratives and listen and connect and when this happens, “divisiveness will begin to fall away. We call these racial healing circles, and they help us recognize we have so much more in common.” 

A second activity that got the group involved was a question on what has shaped their life decisions and following discussion at their tables, some of the responses included life experiences, family background, culture, faith and church.

Sharing how they learned to handle or avoid conflict, Michelle and Frank provided life experiences. Michelle said it was through absorbing what she saw in the household and listening to parents.

“When things happened, that’s what I did. They never told me that, but I did absorb it in my household,” she said.

Frank said his parents told him noting that his dad, who had seen a man hung, dealt with trust issues, while his mom told him “you find out for yourself, baby.” 

He shared that it wasn’t until he entered the workforce that he was introduced to a mixed culture, but then faced culture shock when he entered the Air Force as he said the biggest shock was colorism. He explained to those who might be unfamiliar with that term is “my Black people have this issue with light skin and dark skin,” which resulted in being treated differently.

Michelle said that is a global thing.

She posed the question if her white brothers and sisters knew this took place and how they learned it.

The conversation turned to making assumptions about others, which led to several sharing personal stories about this topic and how God spoke to them about how they handled the situation.

Michelle related these conversations to why “this is a pause. God wants to shape our hearts,” she said, adding that it’s a personal response.

“Before we make an assumption,” Frank said, “you have to MTO,” and Michelle explained that MTO stood for More Than One conversation, telling us we need to not dismiss people but are told to love them.

As the evening drew to a close, Michelle said that when things happen, others reaching out and expressing care and concern means a lot. She related this to the scripture of when one part of the body hurts, it affects the whole body and therefore, it’s important to show that care.

Before Frank concluded the evening with prayer, Michelle closed the event the same as it began by asking those who have now been through the EYES Journey, “how will you handle the conversation (on racism) differently? Will you be afraid to have that conversation?”