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Keren Threlfall

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Decrying the Racism Within

December 15, 2017

It’s easy to decry the racism that marches in on a city, unmasked and carrying torches. It’s much harder to identify the subtle, masked racism that dwells within my own heart, a racism I could otherwise be blind to. One rarely admits to being racist. Even the KKK has a code of conduct that sounds noble at first glance, interlaced with Scripture. It takes effort and intention to detach politics from your religion and examine what has become unrecognizably entangled. It takes vulnerability to admit that the problem isn’t “this is not who we are as a country,” but that we’ve whitewashed and retold those parts of our history to maintain a romanticized national narrative. It takes silence…to hear the voices of those who have been silenced for centuries, and to know that in the recording history, it is most often the people in power who get to tell the story; but that history is never only the voice of the dominant. It takes courage to realize that we naturally try to drift towards people who are most like us, but that there is a line that is easily crossed when we begin to believe that “different” means inferiority or reason to be feared as a threat. (In Christianity, we sometimes like to blame “conviction,” “a sensitive conscience,” or the Holy Spirit for what is in actuality, feeling uncomfortable with something that is unlike us. In both the secular and sacred worlds, it’s easy to become fearful of what we do not know, and to let that fear turn into something else.) As a wise man once said, “The enemy is fear. We think it is hate; but, it is fear.” And as another wise man — a survivor of the consummation of fear and hate, the Holocaust — also told us, “The opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference.” I posted this on my personal Facebook all the way back in August, in the fallout of Charlottesville. But I felt it warranted being posted here, too. Photo: Unsplash

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Grace When a Mama Drives Her Van into the Sea

March 6, 2014

Yesterday a tragedy occurred. A pregnant mother drove her minivan, filled with her 3-year-old, 9-year-old, and 10-year-old, into the ocean, in what appeared to be an attempt to end life for them all. But another tragedy took place as soon as this news went viral. We shook our heads, declared the woman a monster, and made self-righteous remarks about the amount of evil that must reside in this women to do such a thing. This, too, is a tragedy, and I think we’d all be wise to reconsider our hasty judgment:

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Reading 2013: Twelve Years a Slave

September 25, 2013

Twelve Years a Slave is the autobiography of Solomon Northup, a free-born African American husband and father who was kidnapped, drugged and beaten, and sold into slavery in Louisiana. There, he bore the hardships of slavery for twelve years before he was able to be freed. I am thankful for the recent interest in this book (not to mention, it’s about to be released as  a major motion picture). Because we are still historically close to the era of slavery and segregation (which extended far beyond official Emancipation), Americans often react defensively upon hearing indictments on our cruel history. And yet, it is our history, and this is not merely a random anomaly that occurred within an otherwise “good system.” (As Douglas Blackmon wrote in Slavery by Another Name, “When white Americans frankly peel back the layers of our commingled pasts, we are all marked by it. Whether a company or an individual, we are marred either by our connections to the specific crimes and injuries of our fathers and their fathers. Or we are tainted by the failures of our fathers to fulfill our national credos when their courage was most needed. We are formed in molds twisted by the gifts we received at the expense of others. It is not our “fault.” But it is undeniably our inheritance.”) Gradually, as we distance ourselves from history, it does become easier to accept the past and even strive to make amends. Thanks to the life-long work of Dr. Sue Eakin, we now have this once bestselling, subsequently overlooked book available. In recounting her own discovery of the book, I found Dr. Eakin’s story rather telling: “I searched for years for a copy of the old book for my own, but one was nowhere to be found. Then, when I entered Louisiana State University in 1936, I searched at Otto Claitor’s Bookstore, with its storehouse of old books spilling out of his gallery. Suddenly I spied Twelve Years a Slave and asked the price with trepidation. “What do you want that for?” asked Mr. Claitor, known as an authority on rare old books. “There ain’t nothing to that old book. Pure fiction. You can have it for 25 cents.” And that began my life with Solomon Northup.” At times, this book was a very difficult read. Over the past three years, I have read a good number of books on slavery and the horrible treatment…

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Links to Think: 04.16.12

April 16, 2012

Rethinking Tattling – A thoughtful article on working to communicate with our children when they “tattle,” rather than simply viewing their attempts to communicate as an annoyance. “Few other things irritate adults as quickly at a tattle-tale. The kneejerk response is often “Stop tattling” or “Handle it yourself’ or even to punish the little tattler. But what is being communicated? What is a child actually trying to say when they tattle, and what is a child actually hearing by our response? Tattling is, in effect, a child seeking wise counsel for a situation they don’t know how to handle. When faced with a conflict that just weeks or months earlier would have resulted in tears or snatching or hitting or some combination of all three, a child who has matured and begun to develop some self-control is learning to stop and think instead of just react. But what do they do if no solution presents itself? What if they’ve tried to reason or negotiate with the object of their conflict and been unable to come to a resolution?” “When a child approaches a trusted adult with a problem, the child is saying, “This is important. Hear me. Help me.” This is a wonderful opportunity to guide the child through the process of conflict resolution. So often we relegate life skills such as conflict resolution to textbooks and worksheets, if we address them at all. But learning is far more powerful and effective if it is tied to real-life, real-time issues that are important to us, that impact our lives, that matter.” Afghanistan sees rise in ‘dancing boys’ exploitation – Readers of The Kite Runner will be somewhat familiar with this aspect of Afghan culture (as portrayed through Hassan’s orphaned and abused son, Sohrab). This is a sad plight for a growing number of boys in Afghanistan that will hopefully gain greater exposure and push for an end to this practice. ““You cannot take wives everywhere with you,” he said, referring to the gender segregation in social settings that is traditional in Afghanistan. “You cannot take a wife with you to a party, but a boy you can take anywhere.”” “Although the practice is thought to be more widespread in conservative rural areas, it has become common in Kabul. Mohammed Fahim, a videographer who films the lavish weddings in the capital, estimated that one in every five weddings he attends in Kabul features dancing…

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Reading 2012: In the Garden of Beasts

March 13, 2012

Erik Larson gives readers a front row seat to the unfolding of Hitler’s rise of terror in his book In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler’s Berlin.

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