Derek Chauvin was just found guilty on all counts for George Floyd’s murder. I can remember a time, not long enough ago, when I would’ve interpreted this as a miscarriage of justice. Now I see it as anything but.
I am not who I used to be, though I will always be me. Does this make sense? Somehow, yes: we can travel the world and arrive where we started, which is to say, home, even if home is in a different place. We can be changed by the journey while still being who we were. I like to think of it (and complain to The Husband about it) as what happens to women who become mothers: we change physically, mentally, chemically, neurologically, hormonally, emotionally, though there are things about us (often reflected back by our children, and our marriages) that never do a full 180. Or anywhere close to a 180.
I started in Alabama. I’m now in Australia. I was single; I am no longer. I was childless and now am not. I was on one side of the political spectrum and now I’ve migrated positions. There are causes that I care about now that were once never on my radar; differences I didn’t knew existed that I now hope to champion. So much has changed.
The other day, a friend asked how my faith was going. It irritated me; then again, I’m easily irritated. But after I gave it some thought, I understood why I was irritated: because what ultimately matters is not how my faith is going (it’s forever intact yet all over the place on any given day, thanks), but the state of the One in whom my faith rests. And that One never changes.
Bear with me as I mention a niche but growing category called Exvangelicals, who have left the faith of their youth (American Evangelicalism/fundamentalism) in favour of no faith at all, or a very different one. I’d consider myself in the latter camp, as over the years I’ve come to see what I was taught as little more than Self-Improvement and Behaviour-Management dressed in church clothes, and I need so much more than what I can buy from Amazon’s “inspirational” section to cure what ails me. These people discuss “deconstructing” their faith, and I am here for it. Mainly because I’m no longer afraid of deconstruction, of closer examination, of confrontation and tension.
It’s why I teach ethics at the boys’ school now, whereas they were enrolled in Scripture: I like the curriculum of critical thinking ethics provides, and I know they’ll hear plenty about Jesus from me. It’s why we can accept a church here (and skip some weeks) even though I long for the more grace-driven preaching back in Atlanta and New York; grace will always find us. It’s why I can face the racism I used to practice; I know that there is such a thing as redemption and healing, though it often lies on the other side of hard realities.
This is what freedom often looks like: a process of deconstruction, which is really just a part of reconstruction, or even resurrection. The same, but so different. The way to becoming the truest versions of ourselves: who we were made to be.