The Multicultural Debate: Another Objector

While one leading Churchman was making waves, creating a furore and stealing the show over the last weeks, as a result of comments related to the subject of Sharia Law in Britain, another, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor’s was busy rejecting multiculturalism. Not that the Cardinal’s view has come as a surprise to me. As one Catholic commentator noted, this was merely a gradual adjustment to a long held view (Catholic Herald 15/2, 2008). I am, of course, always suspicious when leaders (church and political) pump up the rhetoric about multiculturalism. Not that I am against a healthy critique and discourse. While insights may appear well considered and intended, if one digs deep enough below the surface one may well find that some critics problem with multiculturalism is actually about the challenge it poses to their power base and their normative stake in an all white and class orientated society.

Why would the Cardinal, whose See (Westminster) is located in the heart of one of the most cosmopolitan cities in the Western world, come to hold such a position? As I considered this question, I wondered what all the Black and Asian faces of the Catholic Church in Britain will make of his comment. Will those involved in racial justice and multicultural work in the Catholic Church in England and Wales be reconsidering their commitment to work towards a truly inclusive church that values diversity and celebrate differences?

It would be no surprise that Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor seems to be drawing from the experiences of his Irish immigrant ancestors and their integration into English Society. What is a better starting point than one’s own experience and that of one’s people? This is a fundamental starting point for doing "Black theology". The relationship, however, is more complex than the Cardinal may be able to posit in an interview or a short piece. And a danger is comparing and equating the experiences of one group of people with another group – especially if the differences are more physically visible!

It would seem as if Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor is concerned that multiculturalism is the main culprit to the unity that England and/or Britain badly needs. Would it be unfair to deduce that an implication of this concern can possibly relate to the proclivity towards uniformity or oneness that refuses to give agency to and celebrate the manifold gifts of diversity and intermingling? Somehow the talk about “unity” takes me to the divided “body of Christ” and the Christian Churches that are still unable come to the one table of Jesus to celebrate a common meal. Much theological ink has been spilled over the "body and blood"!

The argument that foreigners and those who are different coming to England should decide to become part and parcel of the society by assimilating and integrating does have a number of implications. From my subjective and suspicious reading the following strikes me: is unity here about becoming like white English? When compared with our ecumenical conversations over Church unity, the similarity of thinking is quite striking: unity of the Church means that the erring Protesters and dissidents need to return home and become like the authentic/pure Church firmly and historically rooted on Peter.

Reading the Cardinal’s reported comments about his rejection of multiculturalism from a postcolonial perspective, I am struck by the subtle ways in which the colonial agenda plays out and is being re-inscribed in the discourse : for instance, there is clearly a strategy to “curtail hospitality” and deny diversity by wanting to homogenise everyone to fit into the mould of sameness. Further, the colonial mindset becomes evident in the desire to silence differences (especially theological) by articulating normative views. Those who are different especially the ones making competing claims and who refuse to fall into the mould of what it means to be English (compare with what it means to subscribe to the true faith) should be dealt with. They are the culprits who sabotage the ethos of authentic Englishness. Multiculturalism is dangerous as its company of hybridizers are bent at diluting English authenticity and purity. A problem is that if the narrative of this land is yet to find a way of including the narratives of those whose textures, colour, and cultures differ from the dominant group and if a homogenous kind of Englishness is what must constitute the dominant narrative then I am not sure what can make up for its absence!

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EATING MONEY and THE MYSTERY OF FOOD

I always wondered what my parents meant with the expression “you cannot eat your money”. They valued education to the extent that the ensured that those who wanted it achieved higher degrees, mostly to earn money and exit poverty. My father especially insisted that besides getting an education we each learnt to do something like carpentry, plumbing, making a wall and growing our own food and will not have to depend on the services of other. Among other things, I think he reasoned that one cannot “eat money”. I suspect he also meant we ought to save a lot for hard times. One of my brothers, who could not be bothered with education, a higher degree, or planting anything, often responded to my father with these words: “Sure, you cannot eat it, I can. Hand it over to me.” I am not surprised that he is a very thriving businessman.

He, of course does not earn the six figures salary as a third of a million people in England earn. Some of these embarrassingly rich earners do have a problem with their surplus income. They do not know how to spend their money. So guess what? According to Simon Jenkins [writing in The Guardian, Friday June 15, 2007, p.34] “They eat it, converting the process into a semi-mystical experience”. Their urine only tell part of the story!

My parents would be shocked to know that my brother may have been on to something. Here people are eating their money, but perhaps not the way my parents would have dreamt of. To eat their money, these rich folks have turned a loaf of bread into something mystical: sourdough, ciabatta, sperlonga, chollah, wheat-free or chickpea and a number of other fancy names that they will pay mind-boggling amounts for. Food for these earners, according to Jenkins, has crossed “a conceptual barrier from banality to intellectualism”.

Designer food shops and shelves - the new temples of the rich - combine chemistry, aesthetics, theology and spirituality to bombard shoppers with moral sayings and foods that travel in club class from remote corners of the world (without a thought to the environment) to upstage local varieties and products and to be renamed and purchased at exorbitant prices.

And, it is not only the high cost that is disgusting; it is also the amount that is thrown away occupying landfill spaces, not to mention how many people go hungry everyday while these folks luxuriate in their money. Besides the rich and expensive excretory products that pass out of the body exits, one wonders how many of these folks are happy and less anxious! Here is an opportunity to put a whole new spin on Jesus' comment about what defiles a person and how! So what next for these people who do not know what to do with their surpluses?

Jenkins offers a further thought that "after the soul food will come the soul, after the body the mind". One supermarket "will offer five minutes of oxygen inhalant flown in from the Arctic to raise Green awareness". Another "will hit back with 30 minutes Buddhist chants". And yet another "will invite shoppers to sit under a triangle to feel the vibrations of Omega 3" and what have you. "Whole foods will offer a choice of premade religions with ‘guaranteed happiness' " or instant refund. And do not even mention the "lectures, therapies, analysis, [talk-shows] and book signings” that will follow.

My parents, like billions of others, would continue to find all of this obscenely mind-boggling. My brother, on the other hand, may be thinking of and calculating ways that he can beat all those supermarkets offer with something cheaper from somewhere in Guyana and the Caribbean. In the meantime, I shall delight in my own easily cooked peas and rice, creole fish stew, breadfruit salad and washed down with the unbeatable sorrel drink tempered with a touch of 25 year old El Dorado rum! And my supermarket is the indoor people's market in Birmingham.

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Black Theolgy and US Presidential Primaries

I need to be upfront. I am quite cynical about American politics and how it impacts on the Caribbean. Historically, nothing has ever changed for the "backyard" (the Caribbean and the Americas) of the USA whatever the government. Democrat or Republican – the significant qualifier remains American. It is this that determines the rest – not even the gender, sexual orientation, ethnicity or colour will make a difference for the immediate neighbours of the USA.

I do follow, however, the political developments with keen interest as I think that the USA is as diverse and complicated as the Bible. And, I am especially interested in the chances of a Black man as the President hopefull of the Democrats or in whether the American public is now inclined towards “dynasties” (from Bush to Clinton).

One short commentary caught my attention: it was a piece in The Economist (January26th,2008) entitled “Holy Moly: Barack Obama’s Church”. Given that for the “holy” Christian American voters, Church going is significant, one would think that the fact that Obama has been a regular Church goer to Trinity United Church of Christ (Chicago) for over the last twenty years where he nurtured his faith and his identity would bring numerous affirmations. After all, no one really complained about Reagan, Bush Sr & Bush Jr or Clinton and their church attendance/membership. In fact their faith nurturing and journeys are given prominence in speeches and biographies.

It would seem, however, that Obama has been attending the wrong church, that is, a segregationist Church. His church is mainly Black and is pastored by Dr Jeremiah Wright Jr. a Black pastor and a Black theologian. Not surprisingly, White Conservative Americans are critical of the Church’s motto, “unashamedly black and unapologetically Christian” with the church suddenly labelled segregationist and possibly racist. The critique from this group and from public news pundits is that the theology is “racially exclusive”. One even suggested that if you replace “white” with “Black” he couldn’t imagine what outrage would result!

Even an idiot walking around on Sundays at 11am in the USA could tell that this is the most segregated hour in American life. So where and how did this evolve from? That should be the query of the pundits! Besides, what kind of churches do the Clintons’, Bushs’ and former Presidents attend? Are they not White churches? Are Blacks, Hispanics and Haitians welcomed there? Yes, they may not claim to be or have any need to state that they are racially exclusive – for White as a category was and remains the normative. Yet, White Churches were and are predominantly exclusive not matter how much they pretend to be otherwise.

At least, what happens at Trinity United Church of Christ (and through the minister) is an honest acknowledgement of the starting point for worship and theological articulation: the community’s experiences as Black people (free but yet to be equal) in the USA. In my view, this is worship and theology with integrity. Racially exclusive worship and theology on the other hand, is one that pretends to be inclusive, operates as normative, universalises the “other” and cannot even recognize its own “whiteness”!

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Image Credit www.tucc.org/images/home.jpg

Trinity United Church of Christ

LEFT, RIGHT, CENTER and IN-BETWEEN IDEOLOGY

Who said that ideology has had its day? Those intellectual pundits (sociologists and political scientists) need to revisit their theses especially after the demise of the struggle between fascism and communism. All over Latin America new governments, in spite of their re-invention, are unable to hide their ideological position. And who says that ordinary people are not interested in ideology or ideological concepts? Just try listening to conversations in the Indoor Market (Birmingham, UK) or a local barber shop on Sparkhill road.

Post 9/11, Afghanistan and Iraq have made clear the evident polarisations in Western societies with the person in the street quite familiar with the liberal and conservative lingo – though I must concede very fed up with some of the hot-air hypocrisies. All the conversations, blogging and writing around religions will suggest that ideology is here in the ever-growing list of differences between groups of people. But this has not been only the result of the post 9/11 happenings. There is globalisation, global communication and more people on the move (some by choice, others by displacement) with the result that Timbuktu’s are now more familiar and less (though still) threatening – moving loads of people to the “left”. No wonder that Castro and Chavez may have more admirers in the West and around the world. They are cool guys standing up to the might of the neighbouring Goliath!

Yet core differences remain between “left” and “right”. Writing in The Times Higher Education Supplement (June 12, 2007), John T. Jost notes that: “These differences may themselves be rooted in more basic psychological needs for stability versus change, order versus complexity, familiarity versus novelty, conformity versus creativity, loyalty versus rebellion.” [p.12] Wondering where you are in terms of ideological positionality? Why not start by taking a closer look at your bedroom layout! Jost suggests the following: “The bedrooms of conservatives…are more likely to contain organisational supplies such as calendars, postage stamps and laundry baskets” while “the bedrooms of liberals art supplies, books, CD’s and maps.” [p.15] I wonder where I will be located with piles of reading. Also, I would not be surprised to find books in a conservative bedroom. What may be different is what people are reading! Then there is the issue of whether Jost had in mind the bedrooms of people of the majority world or even the working class in his context!

I can see the merit of Jost’s argument [author of The End of the End of Ideology] that because ideology satisfies many of our social and psychological needs it may probably be what makes us human and will always be present in some form or the other. Yet humans, in my estimation, need more than “left” and “right”.This is too limiting. Ideological positioning is more complex than left and right and even center. Besides the essentialising of these positions, there are in the in-between spaces with its ripe possibilities to break through polarisations, to transgress boundaries and to experience transcendence through creativity, curiosity, tolerance, diversity, and open-mindedness.

In the meantime applying this to theology, theologians and biblical hermeneuts (especially western male ones) would do well to at least recognise that their interpretations and writings cannot be neutral or “objective”. We are all shaped by some form ideology which will influence our Christian writings.

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Image Credit:Jean Hérard Celeur
http://www.atis-rezistans.com/celeur.html