Love Knows No Borders
This is a sermon I wrote and then delivered to the Castle Rock UU Community on January 16, 2022. It is, among other things, about White Savior Complex and how it can creep into our work for justice.
I write for the ear to hear, not the eye to read! So pardon spacing and short sentences. Also, citations are not formal, but included.
Unitarian Universalists are into justice, aren’t they? Aren’t we? If you go to the UUA website right now, the home page features articles about: threats to democracy, reproductive justice, democracy can’t wait, defunding fear.
Dig a little deeper, and you’ll see that we are committed to: LGBTQ and gender justice, climate justice, racial justice, immigration justice, voter engagement.
At first blush, you might think our whole faith tradition is about politics. The President of the UUA, Susan Frederick-Gray, addresses this in a recent article in UU world Magazine. She says:
“There are those who mistakenly believe that justice is the heart of our faith as Unitarian Universalists. However, a theology of interdependence is the true heart of our faith, and our work for justice is our faithful response.”
A theology of interdependence.
She quotes The Rev. Dr. Mark Morrison-Reed who says: “The central task of the religious community is to unveil the bonds that bind each to all. There is a connectedness, a relationship discovered amid the particulars of our own lives and the lives of others. Once felt, it inspires us to act for justice.”
Connectedness comes first. Our work for justice is a response to that. That’s the thesis of this sermon. If you walk away and wonder what I said, it’s that.
Our faith is based in interconnection. That comes first. Our work for justice is a spiritual practice that helps us live our faith.
I invite you to pause for a minute. Notice what’s happening for you as I share about the UUA, our theology, this thesis.
What emotions are you experiencing — relief, resistance, anger, fear, pain, joy, shame, contentment, guilt, confusion, etc. If you can, notice how your body is responding to this message so far. You can jot a few notes if you’d like. Or just notice.
We’re going to do this several times throughout our time together, and I’ll explain more about the thinking behind it in a minute.
In that same article, Susan Frederick-Gray goes back into history and shows, in a succinct way, that our theology of interconnection comes mostly from our Universalist ancestors. Their focus was on relationships — with each other and God. The belief in universal salvation meant that no one was ever cast outside of God’s love. The goal wasn’t perfectionism of the individual, but rather to unveil the grace and mutuality already present.
Then she does some truth telling about Unitarianism. Shaped by the Enlightenment, Unitarians emphasized the inherent goodness, virtue, and value of the individual. William Ellery Channing wrote about perfectibility — that people could become like God, and that society could become perfect, too. Salvation was attainable, but virtue and character were the pathway.
Of course, we know that perfectionism can get pretty rough. It leaves little room for struggle, failure, the reality of how we hurt each other, and legacies of harm. It also fosters a culture of paternalism where we think we can fix everything and treat others as if they need a parent. Susan warns us against this in general, and especially in our work for justice. And boy do I need the reminder.
There is a thing called white savior complex. It’s a specific form of paternalism, and I was raised with it. It’s so deep in my bones that I’m constantly catching myself in it. You don’t have to be white to have the complex, but it’s most prevalent in white folks like me. It is when people with privilege are rewarded by “saving” those less fortunate. It’s when people with privilege focus on all the good works we’re doing. All the ways we’re virtuous and of good character.
I first learned how to do this when my family adopted a Laotian family after the Vietnam and Laos Civil Wars. We were so proud of how we helped them, clothed them, fed them. Took them to the dentist, taught them to drive, got them drivers licenses. There was a lot of talking about it with friends, I remember. I was about 10, and I remember playing with the eldest daughter, Lee. I’m more than certain that the parents, Lo Fung and Cher Lo, appreciated all that my parents did. But looking back I wonder why our family got involved and how it actually went down.
Here are three things about white savior complex I want to emphasize today. First, it’s usually driven by guilt. We take action out of guilt, instead of taking action because those being oppressed have asked us to. In other words, it’s driven by our own need to be more perfect and create a perfect society instead of from a connection with those impacted.
Secondly, white people often assume that those being oppressed don’t have agency and can’t speak or act for themselves. That means white folks often erase the voices and agency of people who are being oppressed at that moment. And our voices erase the long history of oppressed communities who have been resisting the treatment they have been experiencing for centuries. The term “we give voice to the voiceless” is a classic phrase that I’ve learned to stop using. No one is voiceless.
Third, white savior complex usually neglects the policies that created the problem in the first place. Here’s a great analogy that struck me when I heard it. There is a lake fed by a river. Dead fish keep appearing in the lake. Well-meaning people keep pulling the dead fish out of the lake. These good people can devote time and efforts for the rest of their days pulling dead fish out of the lake. However, unless they travel to the top of the river to learn about what is poisoning the water, their efforts can be more or less futile.
One way white savior complex shows up is in how we tell the stories about our justice work.
We can either use deficit framing or asset framing to tell a story. Trabian Shorters teaches us about the difference:
Ok. Let’s pause.
What emotions are you experiencing in response to this message about white savior complex, perfectionism, paternalism, individualism, and deficit framing? If you can, notice how your body is responding. This act of pausing and reflecting is a spiritual practice that is critical in working for justice.
When you paused, you may have thought, “Well wait a minute. Someone has to do those good acts. If we just give up doing virtuous things, the world will be a lot worse off.” You’re right. I’m not suggesting we stop doing good things, rather, I’m suggesting we consider why and how we work for justice.
A quote that rocked my world when I first got involved in immigration justice work was this: “If you have come here to help me, you are wasting our time. But if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together.” -Lilla Watson, visual artist, activist, and academic (written in collaboration with Aboriginal activists in Queensland in the 1970s)
That is interconnection. My liberation is bound up with everyone and everything.
So here are a few suggestions about how to do justice as a spiritual practice of connectedness.
The title of the sermon was specific to immigration, so I’ll use immigration examples, but all of this can be applied to any of the justice work you do.
First, connect to your own story. What is happening in your own life, the life of your congregation or the community? In UU Church of Boulder, there were two members who had “children-in-laws” who were undocumented. So there it was — people directly impacted by immigration policy right in our midst. That led us to realize that many immigrants worked in the Boulder area and were facing all kinds of housing issues.
Rather than thinking we could solve the problems as a sole church, we connected to organizations already doing immigration justice work in the area. The one we chose to work with most closely was the American Friends Service Committee. And they were immigrant-led.
Today, I’m working with Casa de Paz, a Denver-based organization that welcomes people when they are released from detention and helps reunite them with their families. It is led by and staffed by immigrants. And it’s a great place to take a first step in immigration work. We’ll talk more about them later since they are the offering recipients today.
If you wanted to work on prison reform, you would connect with a prison-rights group that is led by current or former prisoners. If you want to address houselessness, you would want to connect with an organization led by those who experience houselessness. You get it.
Once you’re in a partnership, connect to your humility. Become completely humble. Stop talking and start listening. Forget that you know anything or have the best answers. Become accountable to the people impacted by the systemic oppression that’s alive.
The American Friends Service Committee connected us to a family in Boulder. The mother was an amazing and courageous person. She had three young girls, and her husband had been deported. They were living in public housing, but the mom needed a way to make a living. Let’s call her Maria.
We got to really test our humility and temptation to be white saviors, let me tell you. It was so obvious to us what should be done; what needed to be done. But we had to learn to ask these questions:
-Have I been asked for help, or am I jumping in to solve someone’s problem?
-Do I know this person’s wishes, and are my actions and goals in line with them? If I don’t know for sure, how can I find out?
-Am I taking on something that this person could do for themselves? Am I going to tell them something they would most certainly already know?
-Am I trying to fix something that can’t be fixed? If so, is there a way to just be present with someone through the loss/pain/grief?
Over time, and Maria is still in relationship with the Boulder church, we learned to follow her lead. She made decisions about her girls and their schooling. She made decisions about how to earn money and where to live. She made decisions about getting passports and driver’s licenses and more. And she became a prominent leader in the Colorado immigration rights movement. Then we got to follow her to the top of the river to look at the causes of the problems for immigrants in Colorado. We protested and attended court hearings and really worked to change systems. But none of it was our leadership that made the difference. We learned to follow.
Pause. One last time today, pause. How do you feel? This is my last little tidbit for today: The pausing. The reflecting. The connecting to yourself over and over again to see how you are being transformed. Unless we track our own emotions, thoughts, memories, behaviors and bodies, we will bring more dominance, white savior complex into the movement for justice. And the pausing helps us remember that our faith is based in interconnection. That comes first. Our work for justice is a spiritual practice that helps us live our faith.
May it be so.
