Four Biographical Stories and Racism
USMC Bootcamp
In my youth, prior to advocating non-violence, I had joined the USMC. Forty-Six years later I still remember boot camp with clarity and laugh at most the stories from the fourteen-week experience. This story is about my gradual education on racism in America.
There were rows of concrete wash racks near the barracks. In the center of each long narrow trough there were garden faucets to turn on and scrub your white boxers and t-shirts. We also brushed our teeth there for twenty minutes (Marines need white teeth).
I quickly learned that if you wanted to keep the drill instructors from getting in your face and screaming at you, you had to outrun everyone and be first at everything. So, when they ordered us to get outside with our toothbrush, toothpaste, soap, and white-colored laundry, I ran and was at the wash trough with the fastest recruits.
I was scrubbing away on my laundry and the drill instructors were all at the far end yelling at the slowpokes. A tall recruit on the other side of the wash rack spoke to me and said, "Hey boy what ya doing here?" I thought, that's a stupid question, and looked at him with a 'whats wrong with you' face. He responded, "Don't you notice anything about where you are, look around." It was then I realized I was with the 'blacks' and I smiled real big and kept washing my laundry!
I grew up in a small town comprised of 'white' people, Mexicans, and a mixed Filipino family. I had never been around black people and didn't know the rules. Apparently, in our group of 70 (only 38 of us graduated), everyone else knew the rules.
My 'black' friends realized that I didn't care about those rules. I violated those rules often and sat with the 'black' guys in the chow hall and kept the lines we often found ourselves in integrated with the 'white' guy LOL.
Racism in my Church Tradition
It was 1980, I was 24 years old and at the Southern California District Council of the Assemblies of God to interview for a ministerial license. I had been raised in an AG church in Fillmore Ca. The pastor of my youth (Jimmy Guinn) left an enduring impact on my pursuit of Christ.
I entered the room well prepared. I had taken their courses and had been reading from my (at the time) small collection of research resources and theology books. During the interview, I used some theological words like 'ecclesiology' and they all laughed. They explained they were not accustomed to applicants using theological terms. As the interview proceeded I felt accepted and it was apparent they liked me.
Then, they asked me to bring in my wife. She entered the room wearing a dress with heels and a million-dollar smile. I looked at the men in the room, the distinguished leaders of the district, to see their eyes drop to the floor as disappointment replaced their enthusiasm.
I had married my wife in the Philippines while in the USMC, she was a Filipina (she passed away a few years ago). I was now disappointed in all of them, all proud white men.
I studied the origins of the Assemblies of God and learned of their racist beginnings and failure to work with the 'black' community that first provided for them their ministerial licenses so that they could function as ministers. Bishop Mason of the COGIC (a 'black' denomination) helped the first white Pentecostals but they did not want to work with a 'black' denomination and sought to begin their own movement for white people.
I also learned that in California there was a law on the books until 1965 that did not allow 'white' people to marry Filipino people. I was married in 1976. Racism permeates every aspect of American life and history - it must end.
#3 A Road Trip to Church
I was with four Americans of African Heritage. We were all wearing suits and on our way from Oxnard to the West Angeles Church of God in Christ. One of the men was Pastor David Moore the other men were leaders in the church.
We were in a family van and stopped at a burger joint on the Pacific Coast Highway. When we exited the van, I heard one young man in a group of surfers say, "We ought to just punch those n****s."
I was shocked and ready to do my best to defend my friends. We all kept moving towards the entrance of the burger joint, entered, and sat down. David said to me, "Mike, are you okay?" I was red-faced and shaking. I asked David, "Didn't you hear those guys?" David smiled at me and said, "Yes". My friends all directed the conversation to our expectations for the convocation we were on our way to attending at West Angeles COGIC.
At that moment I was touched deeply by the integrity and power of my friends. I realized how I would never know the depth of racism that they experience. My respect for their strength to refrain from escalating ignorance and hatred skyrocketed. Their spiritual and emotional intelligence surpassed anything I had ever experienced at that point in
my life.
#4 A brief story on Racism in my Hometown
In the late nineties, I was working my plumbing business, attending seminary, and pastoring a church in Santa Paula. I was on a plumbing call, working for one of Bardsdale's orange ranchers. The orange grove ranches of Bardsdale were on the other side of the Santa Clara River from our little town of Fillmore.
The ranch owner and I were chatting while I was working. He had spoken in a derogatory manner about the Mexicans buying the ranches in Bardsdale. So, I shared with him how at 13 years old I had begun working each summer picking oranges with Mexicans who lived at the labor camp on the other side of the railroad tracks from the packing houses.
He said, "What were you a white kid doing picking oranges with Mexicans?" I wanted to be clever and attempt to realign his thoughts while challenging his obvious racism. So, I said, "I wanted to make some money, learn Spanish, and eat those tacos that the Mexican laborers wrap in foil and warm them up by laying them on hot coals at lunchtime."
His response was laughter, so I shared with him how I had met Cesar Chavez during a labor strike. I continued to express my respect for Cesar Chavez and his work. The rancher went back in his house, he wasn't interested in my views on the history and race relations of our little town.
Growing up in California it was evident that white people were originally immigrants moving into a land that to this day is marked with historic missions that served the Mexican inhabitants.
In Fillmore, when I was growing up most of the Mexican peoples lived in Mexican areas. There were two movie theatres, one for Whites and one for Mexicans where Spanish speaking movies were shown. There were Mexican grocery stores and as a little kid, I thought Cinco De Mayo was an American Holiday!
In my fifties, I taught liberation theology classes. I taught courses on African American Liberation Theology and the LIberation Theology that blossomed across the nations of South and Central America. I taught the Liberation Theology that had been developed by Catholic leaders in the Philippines.
Contrary to the attempt to silence liberation theology, an attempt that associated violence, and Che Guevara with the movement, liberation theology is a nonviolent theology. I was attending a large church in the Southern U.S. and the Pastor, unknowingly had accepted the propagandist claims that liberation theology originated with Che Guevara. I quickly explained to him that ninety-nine percent of all liberation theologians teach and live nonviolence. I offered a list of names until he patted me on the shoulder smiled and said, "Okay, Mike" LOL.
Theology in U.S. seminaries is dominated by 'white theology'. I have learned more spiritual, more practical theology from a Danish philosopher, from Americans of African Heritage, from Spanish speaking liberation theologians and Asian theologians than anything Karl Barth ever offered. If we are to end racism, we will need to align our theology with believers outside whiteness.
