(prepared for University of Maryland forum, 4/4/12)

It is hard for me to separate my personal, emotional reaction to Trayvon Martin’s killing from my intellectual, academic reaction, so at least at first, I’m not going to try.

I am the mother who has waited up for her children, alone with my own vivid imagination. Sybrina Fulton’s reality is my worst nightmare.

I have experienced the murder of a friend, by someone who was found competent to stand trial.

I am a Unitarian Universalist, which means, among other things, I don’t believe in hell. I believe in salvation for all. I imagine Hitler being dragged kicking and screaming into heaven, and Trayvon Martin and George Zimmerman embracing like brothers the next time they meet.

When I am faced with a moral or ethical challenge, I try to be guided by two principles.

First, to stand on the side of love. That comes easy when it comes to expressing support for Trayvon’s family and friends, and the family and friends of Shaima Alawadi, the Iraqi immigrant beaten to death by an assailant who left a note calling her a terrorist. It is easy to stand on the side of 23-year-old Deoni Jones, a transgender woman stabbed to death at a DC bus stop. I grieve for her and her family, like the others, victims of hate and ignorance and fear.

But it is harder to stand on the side of love for their killers, for George Zimmerman, to wish if not damnation — that’s off the table — at least revenge, punishment. But I must instead pray for his safety so that he can be brought to justice, and eventually to redemption.

Justice. That is my other guiding principle. Justice demands that George Zimmerman be arrested, that the killers of Shaima Alawadi and Deoni Jones be identified and arrested. Even if, like the killer of my friend, they turn out to be unfit to stand trial. Even if the sentence doesn’t satisfy my emotionally calibrated need for revenge. Even if he is found not guilty because the Stand Your Ground Law protects him.

Sadly, Trayvon will not be the last victim. There will be others. But let us do what we can to prevent what we can, in the name of love and justice. Speak out, vote, help others vote, vote for legislators who will repeal the existing “stand your ground” laws, vote for legislators who stand on the side of justice. Consider a career in politics or public service and work for justice. Because it will come, if we as individuals continue to press forward.

togetherforjacksoncountykids:

“It’s Okay to be Neither,” By Melissa Bollow Tempel

Alie arrived at our 1st-grade classroom wearing a sweatshirt with a hood. I asked her to take off her hood, and she refused. I thought she was just being difficult and ignored it. After breakfast we got in line for art, and I noticed that she still had not removed her hood. When we arrived at the art room, I said: “Allie, I’m not playing. It’s time for art. The rule is no hoods or hats in school.”

She looked up with tears in her eyes and I realized there was something wrong. Her classmates went into the art room and we moved to the art storage area so her classmates wouldn’t hear our conversation. I softened my tone and asked her if she’d like to tell me what was wrong.

“My ponytail,” she cried.

“Can I see?” I asked.

She nodded and pulled down her hood. Allie’s braids had come undone overnight and there hadn’t been time to redo them in the morning, so they had to be put back in a ponytail. It was high up on the back of her head like those of many girls in our class, but I could see that to Allie it just felt wrong. With Allie’s permission, I took the elastic out and re-braided her hair so it could hang down.

“How’s that?” I asked.

She smiled. “Good,” she said and skipped off to join her friends in art.

‘Why Do You Look Like a Boy?’

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Those Lexus ads are so romantic and heart-warming: pretty people expressing their love with a surprise gift of a brand new car with a big red bow on top. In previous years, I found them slightly irritating. This year, given the pain in world, they strike me as unfeeling and insensitive. Here’s my solution, inspired by yesterday’s sermon by our minister, Liz Lerner-Maclay. She is working for peace this holiday season by contributing half a camel through Heifer International. I just bought a share in a camel and hope that others in my congestion will also contribute to make Rev. Liz’s camel “whole”. Imagine a big red bow on that!

If you can afford a Lexus, but you really don’t need a new car, give a Gift of Transformation from Heifer International. For $25,000, you can give

“Herds of heifers, llama and goats,
Flocks of both sheep and chickens,
A pen of pigs,
A school of fish,
And, of course, a gaggle of geese!”

Your gift also provides the training the recipients need to make sure your gift is productive and fruitful. Give it to your loved ones with your wish for a peaceful world.

That’s the question Rev. Liz Lerner Maclay is asking this morning in her sermon. She means it as a real question, one for which she does not yet have an answer. She points out teachings from variety of spiritual traditions that provide complicated answers. Yes and no. Emphatically yes and also equally emphatically no.

For me, my fleeting experiences of peace are what drive me to seek peace for those who are denied it.

I am doing a bit of church history in advance of the Rev. Mark Morrison-Reed’s visit next month. We were most definitely a civil rights congregation; our minister, Fred Cappucino, and one of our members marched in Selma. We hosted some of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party delegation who came to DC in January, 1965, to protest the seating of several congressmen from Mississipi. We worked hard for fair housing in Montgomery Country, Maryland and in neighboring Prince George’s County — one of our members went to jail for participating in a protest at a Leavitt development there. We hosted controversial speakers: Stokely Carmichael in his early Black Power days, and Frank Kameny, the founder of the Mattachine Society. But we also passed up a chance to call an African American minister — still working on the exact date, but either late 60s or early 70s — because of fears that the neighborhood wasn’t ready yet.

It’s a mixed blessing, history.