“If you could pick one leverage point in systemic racism to make a difference. . .”

Rev. Pat Jackson, Interwoven Congregations Quarterly (ICQ): Thank you Bernard Carpenter and Marty Swaim for joining us for this conversation about "Congregations Doing Racial Justice" and the partnership between Calloway UMC and Rock Spring UCC in Arlington, Virginia. As part of that partnership, you co-lead the "Racial Equity Action Group" focusing on education. How did you get connected to these congregations and this special initiative?

Bernard Carpenter: I was raised in Halls Hill, a segregated community in Arlington County. In 1965 my mom had to go into Washington D.C. to have me even though we lived a block away from Arlington Hospital. Calloway UMC was the church my family went to up at the top of the hill.

Marty Swaim: I moved here in 1978 and taught in Arlington public schools for 20 years. After I retired, I got involved in conversations on race at Rock Spring where I found a welcoming community and people who didn't think I was crazy.

ICQ: Bernard, how did you get involved in the antiracism efforts at Calloway and the education Racial Equity Action Group?

Bernard: When I heard about the Courageous Conversation with Rock Spring and Calloway, I thought that was amazing because we have to have a conversation. You can't walk around thinking everything is fine and it's not. I joined the education group because I just retired and I'm getting ready to be a math teacher in the public-school system.

Marty: This idea about public schools that it's really difficult to overcome achievement or opportunity gaps between African American kids and other kids of color and white kids drives me crazy. From my perspective as a teacher, that's nonsense.

ICQ: Why do you say that?

Marty: Because it's not rocket science to teach kids to read. It's a skill and I respect the teachers who do a good job of it. But we have a school system in which maybe 45% of the kids of color on sixth and seventh grade tests are way below grade level and it's just irresponsible. The reason is because they're not reading on grade level at grade three and then by the seventh and eighth grade kids start talking about dropping out. I feel that if you could pick one leverage point in systemic racism that would make a huge difference, it would be education. If you can persuade members of the school board to invest in the areas of pre-K and three-year old education, you have a possibility of really changing the community. Of course you're talking money, but this is a rich community.

ICQ: What does the education Racial Equity Action Group do? What are its goals?

Bernard: We started meeting right after the 6 month Courageous Conversation series to decide what our goals and mission were going to be. Goal #1 is to ensure that students are at reading level by grade three. Goal #2 is ensuring that children hear or experience all of history. Children deserve to understand what this country actually was developed on.

Marty: We wrote a letter to the school board with our mission statement and arguments for what they should pay attention to in their budget. We started talking to people in the school system and the lady who runs the early childhood department said, “Don't focus on four-year olds. We have resources for four year olds, but we have almost nothing for three-year olds. So focus on that.” So we put together an analysis and testimony about things in the budget that would improve early childhood services through grade three. We met with two schoolboard members this past year and other school system people.

ICQ: Do you think you’ve been able to impact things, or are you still finding your legs?

Marty: We work with 5 or 6 people on our REAG and we're finding our legs. I do feel that cultivating relationships with school board members has the potential to be very productive, even though we lost the chairman of the school board with whom we talked last year when he didn't run again. I feel like one of the biggest productive investments of time is talking to people in the school system at the middle management level, like the early childhood person.

Bernard: We're still learning where to prioritize our time and effort. I agree with Marty, we can go to the school board and advocate for what is needed in the middle management areas. We met with the director of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion for Arlington Schools, Dr. Ottley, but he has left. There's going to be transition in people, but the office staff knows us and what we're doing and how to reach out and advocate for us and ask us to advocate for them.

Marty: That's true. When Dr. Ottley set up a new diversity, equity and inclusion advisory group group, we were the beginning people in the group. Some of the members of the criminal justice Racial Equity Action Group have gotten involved too.

ICQ: Was that DEI advisory group something that Dr. Ottley had in the works, or did your outreach play a role in its creation?

Bernard: I think it was a brainchild of a meeting we had at Calloway with Dr. Ottley where we discussed the possibility of a community advisory group. Based on that conversation, Dr. Ottley birthed the group.

ICQ: So you engage the school district at multiple levels. Do you use other strategies to advance your goals?

Marty: We’ll talk to the NAACP about their goals and see if we can support them. They have a tutoring program that some of us have supported financially.

Bernard: We are still young as a group, we’re passionate, and we're still learning to prioritize and to find opportunities to advocate.

ICQ: So this takes time. I think it’s helpful for other congregations to hear that.

Bernard: Don’t give up!

Marty: Yes!

ICQ: What are your challenges and encouraging signs in your work to impact systemic racism in education?

Marty: I think our practice of sharing our goals with school board members laid a good foundation so that those in the system understand that we represent people very committed to educating everybody by third grade. You just have to take the long view. You have to get your oar in the budget cycle one year and keep going back and back and back. And if you're lucky, you get two or three people on the school board who can really push it along. I think our biggest challenge is our lack of time.

Bernard: I see the challenge as keeping the ball rolling. The good things that I've seen are the relationships that we've built with the people in early childhood education and the DEI office -- relationships not just with one person but with a staff. Those relationships are just going to grow.

ICQ: Can you speak about the significance of your own relationship between the two of you?

Bernard: I think that's huge. Marty and I just clicked.

Marty: And vice versa! I mean from the first time we met over lunch, we've had a good time.

Bernard: (laughter)

Marty: I think that's a really important part of organizing. If you're going to be in this for 5-10 years, you've got to have a good time along the way.

ICQ: How do you keep the whole Racial Equity Action Group together for the long haul?

Bernard: Respect and let everybody's voice be heard. Understand that Rome wasn't built in a day; systemic racism wasn't created in a day. So it’s not going to take just a day to break it apart.

Marty: You don't need a lot of people. We would be glad to have another six people, but dance with the people who come. I do think the experience of doing the testimony and writing letters was very affirming and empowering. “Yeah, we can do this.”

ICQ: What advice would you have for congregations who want to take a swing at systemic racism but just aren’t sure how to go about it?

Bernard: First thing, if you see an opportunity to participate -- participate. Don't be afraid, jump into it. You're not going to find out if you don't try.

Marty: I feel like one of the most important things if you're interested in education is to not be intimidated. The skills involved in running a really good school system exist and there are people doing a really good job of this. So if your school district isn’t, hold them accountable. Just show up and talk about it -- because the kids who aren't succeeding in third grade in reading are not different from the other kids who are succeeding. I'm sorry, they aren’t. So don't be intimidated by the bureaucracy or by people who say how complex education is. I would recommend that anybody who is thinking about working on education in public schools reads “Whatever it Takes.” It’s about the Harlem children's zone and the young man who takes the children from birth when their parents are raising them through third grade and gets them all passing the New York state regents tests. The book demonstrates what's possible.

ICQ: Final question. To what degree does your own faith and participation in your congregation sustain your personal commitment to anti-racism?

Bernard: As a black man growing up in a segregated Arlington County, I had nothing but faith to hold onto. This is not a society that was going to help me. My faith is what brought me through all of what I've gone through in my life, and so I stand here today, giving honor to God and my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. If it wasn't for them, I'd be dead and gone somewhere.

Marty: I don't talk about faith in the same way that Bernard does, but I do feel very strongly that the underlying assumption of the Christian faith is that all things work together for good. That gives me support.

[This interview was a part of the October 2023 Interwoven Congregations Quarterly on "Congregations Doing Racial Justice." Catch the full issue here.]

The Pastors -- Doing Racial Justice

Rev. Kathy Dwyer of Rock Spring United Church of Christ (left) and Rev. Dr. DeLishia Davis of Calloway United Methodist Church (right)

Rev. Pat Jackson, Interwoven Congregations Quarterly (ICQ): Rev. DeLishia Davis and Rev. Kathy Dwyer, thank you, and all your congregational members and community partners in Arlingon, VA, for sharing in these conversations about the racial justice partnership between your congregations. How did you personally come to this work of antiracism? And how did you find each other?

Rev. Dr. DeLishia Davis: I think Kathy and I were destined to meet each other and for our congregations to be joined together at this time. Long before we arrived at our congregations, there is history of our congregations meeting together 60 years ago, 42 years ago, and about 11 years ago for racial justice and reconciliation. Kathy and I did not set out to look each other up; there were people in our congregations working behind the scenes who brought this to us.

Rev. Kathy Dwyer: I went back and checked Rock Spring's history book which talks about 1963, the march on Washington and the movement for desegregation. That year our two congregations worked together to hold an integrated vacation bible school that attracted 150 kids. I think that memory inspired our congregations to come back together, because members of both of our congregations were seeking to do more than educate about racism, but come together for some kind of action. DeLishia is right -- we had people from both congregations setting up this partnership, telling DeLishia “You need to call Kathy” and “Kathy, call DeLishia. We want you to meet so we can take a next step.”

ICQ: That speaks to the power of champions in a congregation!

Kathy: Yes! But you asked about how we personally came to the work. I grew up in a home that talked about the importance of civil rights, equity and inclusion and people of privilege using their voice to help lift other voices and make changes. So it's always been in me. But in 2014, with the murder of Michael Brown, I remember standing in my kitchen just weeping, and that really activated in me a desire to do something. And so in 2014 our congregation began an intensive learning process to understand history that wasn't taught in schools and our own white privilege and biases. We kept going deeper, culminating in a course I led with Professor Beverley Mitchell from Wesley Seminary called Challenging White Supremacy. But there was a burning desire to move beyond education to some kind of action, and Calloway was a natural partner.

DeLishia: I'm part of a clergy family so I grew up thinking that speaking about injustice was the norm. In 1991 in Baltimore County, a young man, Roy Mason, was driving his parents’ car and was stopped by the police. He was reaching into the glove compartment to take out the paperwork, and he was shot. That event put a righteous determination within me to speak out, to unite and educate people and stand together. So if you see an African-American male pulled over by the police, stop your car and just be a presence there. If I see that happening, no matter what's going on, if I'm late to church, I will stop and wait because it's a way of showing people that they're not by themselves. I have a tremendous respect for the police department, but we can all fall into stereotypes and make assumptions. Today I look at my responsibility as pastor as being not simply for members of Calloway Church, but for the entire community. So when social injustice happens, regardless of where, I feel called to speak up about it.

The Zoom interview.

ICQ: What would you say is the significance of a black congregation and a white congregation coming together in partnership for racial justice?

DeLishia: I think we have a bond in understanding that we are all created equal. Also, I think it was important from the African-American community side to see that there are other cultures that are willing to sit down to learn, to embrace, and to grow together, because all of us have cultural biases.

Kathy: I serve a congregation that loves to learn and for me there is a big difference between learning from reading and learning from experience. We can read about implicit bias and stereotypes. But I think bringing difference around a table together is one of the basic keys that will bring healing to community – being in conversation not just for one night but again and again and then elevating that learning model to an action model.

DeLishia: I think one of the key parts of what we did during the initial Courageous Conversations was to create a safe space where people could say “I've experienced racism,” or “I have implicit bias or white privilege and I didn't realize it.” We were able to share openly, without judgment, and be heard.

ICQ: If the Courageous Conversations education program was the first step in your renewed partnership, then a second step was forming these “Racial Equity Action Groups” to get at systemic racism. How did you get from Courageous Conversations to the Action Groups?

DeLishia: During our Courageous Conversations we lifted up particular topics – education, housing, etc. Towards the end of that, there were signups for people who wanted to continue the conversation. Those groups decided the direction they're going in. They brought in guest speakers to talk to them about current affairs in Arlington and they made decisions about where they're going to take action.

Kathy: The initial conversations with our steering committee for the Courageous Conversations emphasized that we don't want this just to be “What is racism, what is white privilege, what’s the history?” We wanted to focus on issues that we can understand and have an impact on. So there was some brainstorming and four action groups emerged on criminal justice, housing, education and environmental justice.

ICQ: What do you see as the specific role for you as pastors in this partnership?

Kathy: The gift of a faith community is that we get to practice -- we get to practice agape love and forgiveness. So I think part of our job is to provide ongoing vision and encouragement for practicing love boldly, practicing using our voice to speak truth to power. The more we practice, the more powerful and effective we’ll be.

DeLishia: I think the involvement of our members allows us to shift to providing spiritual support, undergirding the work that's being done. That includes preaching, teaching, bible studies, the Pastor's Word in our newsletter which all revolve around us being courageous and working for social justice. We have people who asked us “What does this anti-racism have to do with the Bible, with who we are as believers?” It's a special time when a congregation actually wants to grow more in a particular area, and it pushes you as a pastoral leader to study more, to know more, to encourage more. We have to be very careful that we are hearing from God, so that we are able to share and direct people in the path God wants us to be on.

ICQ: What do you think is the significance of your personal relationship, DeLishia and Kathy, for the broader partnership?

DeLishia: I think the bond and friendship that Kathy and I have is essential because it has helped us to be able to work together. And our team was able to move forward because they knew we were going to be in agreement, that there was unity.

Kathy: When you're doing work that takes people out of their comfort zone, I don't think it will go forward without that relationship of pastors and the support of pastors. I strongly feel that learning, change and growth happens through relationship. Then there is how this goes beyond our congregations. When either of us are engaged in the community, we can text one another, find different resources, and come together with one voice. I think that's added richness and breadth, and made us stronger because we have one another.

Celebrating worship together in September 2023.

ICQ: Lest our readers think you're in racial justice Nirvana, can you speak about the challenges that you have encountered as you’ve sought to take action against systemic racism with your congregations?

Kathy: This has gone more smoothly than anticipated. I wouldn't call it racial justice Nirvana, but we really have come together well. We had trainings for facilitators from each congregation so that they felt confident wading into these waters. It took time and intention to help set that up. In the initial Courageous Conversations, each program dealt with a different community issue. I think there was angst and frustration that, “Yes, we're talking about racial justice and housing, education, and criminal justice, but how do we have more action and impact?” Out of that process came the Racial Equity Action Groups, and those are much more organic. As with any organizational structure, the challenge is communicating, getting people all on the same page, figuring out together the best action steps and keeping the momentum going.

DeLishia: I think the work that the Racial Equity Action Groups are doing continues to motivate others. This has not been Nirvana, though. When we started this work there were several questions of me, “Why is that important in Arlington?” So there was a little pushback initially, because not everyone sees the value in that. But we'll see it in the long run and that’s what’s happening in our community. We're all in this together to make our future a lot better — for ourselves as well as our children and generations to come.

[This interview was a part of the October 2023 Interwoven Congregations Quarterly on "Congregations Doing Racial Justice." Catch the full issue here.]

"Find one thing that you're going to ... do to make a difference"

Rev. Pat Jackson, Interwoven Congregations Quarterly (ICQ): Thank you Michael for joining us for this conversation about "Congregations Doing Racial Justice" and the partnership between Calloway UMC and Rock Spring UCC in Arlington, Virginia. To get us started, can you share how you got involved with racial justice?

Michael Hemminger (President, Arlington County NAACP): I got connected to this work of racial justice from my own life experience. I grew up in California and was in and out of 12 different foster homes. I lived under bridges, in homeless shelters and in the back of a U-Haul truck at one point. So I grew up in circumstances that some people would say might predict a different life outcome for me. But throughout my life, strong mentors and people of faith have surrounded me and told me “You’re going to make a difference in this world, you’re going to be someone someday.” So I grew up believing that. My personal experiences led me to want to do my part and give back to people who look like me and might be in similar living conditions. I've been in Arlington since 2017 and signed up to do things that help me fulfill my purpose; and the NAACP is one of those avenues. I am six months into the role as branch president.

ICQ: What are you most passionate about in your role with the NAACP?

Michael: Criminal justice is my top passion and mass incarceration is the greatest civil rights injustice of our time. When you look at root causes, you learn that there are things at the systemic level causing these outcomes -- housing insecurity, food insecurity and inequity in education, employment and health care. These other systems are working together to produce a predicted outcome. So I feel compelled to do my part.

ICQ: How did you first connect with this project between Calloway and Rock Spring?

Michael: Pastor DeLishia Davis of Calloway UMC leads the Arlington NAACP’s Religious Affairs committee and is also president of the Arlington Black Clergy Association. She called me and said “You really need to check this out.” So I joined the Courageous Conversations and was really inspired by the work that was happening. I could see in real-time the lights turning on and I could see people connecting things and feeling empowered to make a difference.

ICQ: I understand you were a panelist for the session on affordable housing.

Michael: Yes, I helped unpack some of the racial history here in Arlington. I think a lot of people are surprised to learn that there are deed restrictions that exist even today that say things like “black people shall never be allowed to own here.” They didn't understand that in 1938, when black people were only permitted to live in rowhouses, Arlington County took explicit action to ban rowhouses and made those types of housing nonconforming so that the people that lived in them couldn't update them. People were also surprised to learn that the American Nazi Party was also founded right here in Arlington, or that Arlington used to be 40% black and now it's only 9% black.

ICQ: The Calloway and Rock Spring partnership is about helping people move from education to action to impact systemic racism. What would you say to congregations that are trying to do that?

Michael: It's the million dollar question. But we have to do something because these systems were designed that when we do nothing at all, they're going to continue to produce disparate impacts on historically under-represented or disadvantaged communities. The topics are very heavy, but we have to have enough courage to say, “Hey, I'm going to do even one small thing to make a difference.” What ends up happening, unfortunately, is two things. One, as I said, these systems end up running on autopilot because we don’t have personal awareness. But then when we do the book clubs and conversations, and we're trained to be more aware of what racism looks like, when we see it, the fight or flight kicks in. A lot of times we might say, “Oh, I know this is wrong, but I don't have the courage to speak up.” Dr. King spoke about this in his Letter from a Birmingham Jail when he talked about how the white moderate actually causes more harm than the racist people who are out there on the front lines. At the NAACP, we could say the same thing a 1,000 times as loud as we can, and then one person that has that relationship with the person who has the key to that door can have a very casual conversation, and that door is immediately unlocked. So it's up to all of us to use that privilege for the advancement of other people. So to answer your question: find one thing that you're going to commit to do to make a difference. It could be big or small, and if we all did that, I really think we would see progress.

ICQ: How does this partnership between Calloway UMC and Rock Spring United Church of Christ look to you from your seat in the community?

Michael: I love it. It reminds me of the history of the NAACP which was actually founded by both black and white people who were willing to be on the front lines for change. To have people of faith who are white say I'm willing to use my position and privilege in order to help our common cause and then black folks bring the real lived experience of what it's like to deal with racism and the toll that it takes on your entire wellbeing on a daily basis -- I think there's nothing that can stop that type of partnership, and I'm inspired by the change that can happen.

[This interview was a part of the October 2023 Interwoven Congregations Quarterly on "Congregations Doing Racial Justice." Catch the full issue here.]