People Get Ready

 

Change Is Coming

“Men do change, and the change comes like a little wind that ruffles the curtain at dawn, and it comes like the stealthy perfume of wildflowers hidden in the grass.”

John Steinbeck

          On an individual level, change is difficult for most of us—especially if we are comfortable where we are. Systemic change is even harder. We got ourselves into the situation we are in—with our systems supporting inequality—by passing laws that disenfranchised some of us and enabled some of us to prosper. Slowly, over time, those laws and practices became normalized, and we settled into them like a favorite pair of shoes. At least, those of us who benefitted from them did. For the rest of the population, they caused oppression, poverty, and lack of opportunity.

          Change has come, but ever so slowly. We reached a symbolic pinnacle of that change when a black man was elected President, but that caused a backlash of major proportions in the segment of the population who had become comfortable with the world as it was. We can expect this tug of war to continue until enough of us support the changes to our systems. What is required most of all is empathy—as Jesus instructed us, walk a mile in someone else’s shoes—on second thought, walk two. (Matt. 5:41)

          Systemic change, as Martin Luther King suggested, leans toward equality and justice. But it is not a pendulum swing. It is more like a snail crawling along a garden path. It is slow and cumbersome and sometimes, it gets diverted. We can speed it up (and I think we are doing this now) by becoming aware of how the system has worked against some of us, and what changes would lead us toward righting the balance of power. No one person is in control of this, but all of us together can bring it about, if we choose.

          To be sure, it is not comfortable to walk a mile in the shoes of a homeless person, or an impoverished woman with children to feed, or an out of work coal miner, or a midlevel manager who cannot find a job, or even a small business owner who can’t afford to keep paying his/her employees. It is the heavy load mentioned in Matt. 5. We won’t have to go that whole mile, let alone two, to understand how hard it is to put one foot in front of the other. Change happens when we understand someone else’s plight. And to do that, we must choose to understand.

          Like the ruffle of the curtains at dawn, like the sweet perfume of wildflowers carried on a breeze, change is coming to America, and to the world. We can welcome it, or we can fight it. Truth is, though, it’s impossible to fight a breeze.

                                                  In the Spirit,

                                                  Jane