StAART
ST. ALBAN'S ANTI-RACISM TEAM

In response to an invitation from our Bishops here in the Episcopal Diocese of North Carolina, the St. Alban’s Anti-Racism Team (StAART) and Vestry have embarked on a journey of seeking repair for the ways in which our Church has been complicit in the enslavement and oppression of BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and Persons of Color) communities.

 

“This engagement is an essential expression of our commitment to Christ and to his call for justice and love, and thus to the mission, health, and well-being of each congregation.”

 

-The Rt. Rev. Samuel Rodman & The Rt. Rev. Jennifer Brooke-Davidson, December 2023

 

The first stage of our journey was spent learning more about our history and discussing different approaches to the sacred work of acknowledgment, repentance, and seeking repair for the injustices perpetrated by the Church. The next stage of the journey involves putting our learnings into practice in tangible and meaningful ways.

 

 

LOOKING BACK: OUR PARISH HISTORY

 

As a predominately white, southern Episcopal parish founded in the mid-1950s, our story is both like and unlike the stories of our peer parishes. St. Alban’s has been a predominately white congregation for its entire history up through today. While we do not know all the sources of funding that enabled the establishment of St. Alban’s first as a mission, and eventually as a parish, it is likely that at least some of the parish’s households through the years were able to amass their wealth in part due to their ancestors’ participation in the slave trade and the unpaid labor of those whom they enslaved. The same is true of any resources that have come from the Episcopal Diocese of North Carolina. The historical complicity of the Episcopal Church in upholding and defending slavery and white supremacy is well-documented. While we give thanks that the bricks of neither our first building, nor our current one, were made or laid by enslaved hands (like those of some of our peer institutions) we know this does not mean our hands are clean. The economic and social injustices of chattel slavery in our region and nation are so deeply embedded that they cannot be avoided.

 

We acknowledge that St. Alban’s has struggled to become a racially diverse community. This is partially a result of the particular demographics and history of our region, but other factors are surely at play, including the often-unacknowledged ways that racism and white supremacy can show up, even in institutions that desire to grow and change for the better. We do not have any simple solutions for becoming a more diverse church, but we pray for God’s wisdom and insight to guide us, and we hope that in honestly assessing our complicity, we might demonstrate a true commitment to listening and learning.

 

We celebrate the BIPOC members that are part of the St. Alban’s family, and we give thanks for all the ways in which their presence and participation enriches this community. We state unequivocally that we long to be a racially diverse congregation, one that more accurately reflects the full diversity of humanity made in God’s image.

 

 

 

MOVING FORWARD

 

Even as the exploration of our history as a parish continues, we have entered a new stage of this journey. We are now putting the majority of our time and energy into two main areas of focus, with the creation of two working groups formed under the auspices of StAART, with support from the vestry:

 

• SHINING A LIGHT: Learning to Understand Our Racialized Past and Present

 

• WEAVING A NEW STORY: Building Relationships with BIPOC Communities

 

 

SHINING A LIGHT

 

Our Shining A Light working group is tasked with planning opportunities for our parishioners and the wider community to deepen our knowledge and understanding of the uncomfortable history and continuing reality of racism and white supremacy locally and globally. The work of anti-racism requires being an ongoing learner, and there is always more to discover, especially since so much of our nation’s history with regards to race has not been taught truthfully or robustly.

 

We seek to extend the reach of the St. Alban’s Anti-Racism Team by offering an array of programs for learning more about racial issues, including book discussions, bible studies, guest speakers and preachers, workshops, field trips, and other programs that will invite an ever-growing number of people onto this learning journey with us. Additionally, we encourage participation in the plentiful array of Diocesan offerings such as Sacred Ground, Dismantling Racism, pilgrimages, and more. The StAART Library is also maintained by this working group. By “shining a light” on the truth about our racial past and present, we can educate ourselves and continue to bring others into the conversation, so that we can be well-informed disciples in the work of repairing relationships that have been broken, and trustworthy allies for BIPOC communities.

 

 

WEAVING A NEW STORY

 

Our Weaving a New Story working group is tasked with developing and deepening relationships between our parish and local BIPOC communities. In these relationships, we hope to build trust as allies and partners committed to listening deeply to our BIPOC neighbors and, when appropriate, taking full responsibility for the ways the Church has not lived up to our Baptismal Covenant. We believe that these relationships are precious in and of themselves, but we also believe that the nurturing of these relationships may eventually lead us to potential partnerships and projects, thus weaving new stories of collaboration and repair.

 

Using the model of columnist and author David Brooks’ Weave: The Social Fabric Project as our inspiration, we seek to join with our neighbors in weaving a new, inclusive social fabric as an antidote to the divisions and isolation that plague our communities.

 

As weavers and relationship builders, the members of this working group step beyond our parish boundaries to listen and learn from members of local BIPOC communities and organizations. The work of relationship-building can be slow, but it is essential that we proceed with humility and cautious intentionality, building real trust and avoiding the common harms of tokenism, paternalism, and white saviorism. We go about this work in collaboration with the St. Alban’s Outreach Team and other parish ministries involve in fostering friendships with neighbors and the wider community.

 

While there are many different BIPOC-led organizations with whom we might partner to strengthen the fabric of our community, we are beginning with the following local groups:

 

1. The Historic West Davidson neighborhood and Davidson Housing Coalition

2. The Smithville Community Coalition

3. The Catawba Nation

 

The first two groups are each hubs of community with deep roots in historically Black neighborhoods in our immediate vicinity. They are already weaving new stories for their residents while also preserving the precious history of their neighborhoods and families. The third group were the original inhabitants of the land upon which St. Alban’s and all the surrounding communities now exist. In seeking to become trusted allies and partners with them, we hope to weave a new story for St. Alban’s as well, one of collaboration and humility rather than exclusion and paternalism.

 

Other predominately or partially BIPOC organizations with whom we stay in close contact through our parishioners and clergy include Unity in Community, La Escuelita Bilingual Preschool, Carolina Migrant Network, the Ada Jenkins Center, the Neighborhood C.A.R.E. Center, Galilee Ministries of East Charlotte, and Gethsemane Baptist Church of Lake Norman.

 

We hope to make inroads in establishing and building relationships with even more predominately or partially BIPOC organizations such as the Catawba Nation, St. Michael and All Angels Episcopal Church in Charlotte, Chapel of Christ the King Episcopal Church in Charlotte, Davidson Presbyterian Church in Davidson, and Reeves Temple African Methodist Episcopal Church in Davidson.

 

The key to being effective weavers is to show up and listen with consistency, compassion, and flexibility, and then to connect and collaborate rather than dictate or dominate. This working group must be much more committed to staying faithful along the journey rather than reaching any particular destination.

 

 

SUMMARY

 

As we move into the next phase of our journey, we endeavor to stay open to the ways in which God calls us, the ways in which the life and teachings of Jesus guide us, and the ways in which the Holy Spirit is at work among us. We understand that the structures we establish and the goals and tasks we set for our working groups may need to shift and change along the way, in order for us to remain faithful and effective in this work.

 

Shining a light and weaving a new story are both deeply theological concepts with strong biblical roots. Psalm 139 imparts that we are each “intricately woven in the depths of the earth” and in the Gospels, Jesus, the Light of the World, teaches that we all have a light to shine. Our God is the ultimate Shiner of Light and Weaver of New Stories. As God’s beloved children, we too can be participants with God in the work of shining a light and weaving a new story as we seek repair for the evils of racism in our Church, our nation, and our world.

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