KJ Ramsey is an enneagram 4 like me. She is also an author, poet, and a licensed Somatic+Trauma-informed therapist. Her latest interview with Suzanne Stabile on The Enneagram Journey is excellent. I highly recommend.

This past year I have had to tap into this courage. To stand up to abuse and say I (we) are worthy of love and respect, will get you in trouble. To say “I matter” makes people and systems raging mad at you. It is a visceral response; they are not aware they are doing this most of the time. They were taught this same toxic message of self denial. Systems want people to be disconnected from themselves and easily shamed so they can be controlled. When I look closely at how most churches are run and how it is part of dominant culture, I can pinpoint how the church is a big part of the problem in what happened. There is so much more I want to say, but now is not the time. I most likely will be writing a book. My seminary training and my own healing work (prior to needing to heal again!) addressed everything that happened, and now I have a message to promote healing to help end this cycle of abuse. And I can help people reconstruct their faith so they do not have to leave it, if they so desire.

One thing I heard in the podcast is Enneagram 4s demand to be listened to. 🙂 I have no idea who would describe me this way. LOL! But there is something really important about that. KJ Ramsey is a 4 who is married to a 9–so am I. Nines are a bit different. Glennon Doyle, another 4, said it best: the only reason this world has any stability going on at all is because 9s exist. She is right! But 9s also struggle to believe they can assert themselves. This is where a 4 is beneficial. No problem there.

For all the stereotypes about enneagram numbers, which really drives me bananas because it devalues the strength the person carries within them, I would like to highlight how this is not a bad quality of the 4. The demand to be listened to is not a weakness. Of course it can be. Everything good can be a weakness. But what we fail to mention enough is this: Fours remember . Fours will stop when the time calls for stopping. It is because we are self-reflectors by nature.

When 9/11 happened, I knew nothing about the enneagram. But now that I know, it makes sense when I remember my response: Why are we moving on so quickly? We should stop.

I also lived through the Oklahoma City bombing. At that time we sort of did stop for tragedies. I remember we drove with our car lights on in solidarity for a while. I love symbols when they bring us together, especially when the grief is more than we can process at that moment. I will never forget we did that. I felt this same feeling when we wore masks during Covid. Whether you believed masks were effective or not (they were!), they were a symbol of solidarity during a traumatic time. To me they represented more than safety. They were a symbol of “we are in this terrible situation together.” That is what unity means to me. Not fake agreement between two sides.

Back to Oklahoma. Maybe it is because the 4/19 attack was closer to home for us that caused us to have a slightly more tender response toward one another. But it is wild how we rarely talk about it being domestic terrorism—our first instinct was outside terror. We were quick to name it when the terrorism was not with 9/11–and to even name these countries the “axis of evil.” Um, no! Unless we all want to be labeled that way. But all-in-all, we were not as hardened after 4/19 as we were 9/11.

Neither response to these attacks would I recommend again, though. The killing of Timothy McVeigh was the wrong response, because the problem was bigger than one person. We were quick to eliminate one person and not dig deeper into the roots of what drove him and others to plot this attack. The Iraq War and the Waco bombing had a lot to do with it. Post-9/11: we have killed more black and brown bodies post-terror attack than we lost in the actual terrorist attack. Also, I worked with people in New York at the time. The people in New York were calling for mercy, and several worked in the World Trade Center! The people in Oklahoma mostly were not calling for mercy. The people in New York were closer to the situation. They knew violence does not bring peace to a situation like this. They were right. We all should have listened.

The reason I am sharing this is because when we are disconnected from a situation and are on the outside looking in, it is easy to think we have the answers—both good and bad. In times of trauma, when we respond with violence, we make the situation worse than it was to begin with. Especially when there are people close to the situation (or people who understand situations like this) crying out and asking to be listened to, and they are not. What would the world be like if we actually listened to the people closer to the situation who know a lot more about what is going on?

This is why I do the work I do. The same is true for individuals. When we are not going deep inside ourselves and learning our own stories, doing our own healing, and living our own truth—we will transmit our pain. We will also listen to outside sources tell us who we are and what is happening to us. That will never be true. Outsiders can only tell you what they see on the outside looking in; it may not be anywhere close to what is true. We will then project what is going on inside us onto others and cause deeper damage for all of us as a community, and healing is delayed. It is never about one person.

That is what Jesus life shows me as well.

courage #healingjourney #loveistheonlyway #hatecannotdriveouthate #endpunitivesystems #enactsystemsofaccountabilityandhealing #repentandrepair

Once again this week, Scott Erickson is showing up as my teacher at this moment in my life. His Stations of the Resurrection series is fantastic and is helping me see what I am going through in a different light. Transforming my despair into hope.

This past week, the trauma we went through almost a year ago came back with a vengeance due to both amazing and horrific memories at the same time. Good memories—The Sachse soccer team doing so well in the playoffs and reconnecting with our friends we have missed so much. Bad memory: the hospital bill (FROM SACHSE-like, what the hell?!) that came right after paying taxes, which made me angry for various reasons. But it most of all reminded me of what caused the ache. Despite my best efforts to just let it be using the tools I have learned from my spiritual training—I still relived the trauma; and now, damn it, I am recovering again. The intense feelings of both joy and sadness at the same time were a lot for my body, and it sent me into a PTSD attack. Yesterday, on my walk, I had to sit down halfway through the walk b/c I am not strong enough to complete the walks I have been doing. Trauma is no joke, friends. I also want us to take that more seriously. It affects our bodies. Unseen wounds are wounds.

I am considering alternative ways to handle my trauma. Because even with all the tools I have in my toolbox, I still went through intense pain again. But I write this post for a larger purpose than to share how I am going to treat my trauma; what I really want is systemic change. Me considering an alternative source of healing is a great solution for me, but it will not be necessary for others if we work on healing our systems.

Ram Dass, who reminds me all the time to be at peace, even when what comes to me is negative, because what I will learn from the suffering will end up being a source of grace. I can testify he is right. He learned this from having a stroke. His stroke was not the means of grace; what he learned from the suffering was grace. It led him to a quieter life and deeper connection with people than he had before traveling all over the place speaking to people. But he also says we must challenge systems. The pain and trauma I endured is not be continued indefinitely just for the sake of the gift of grace people may gain from the suffering. Makes me think of Paul when he says: Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! (Paul was a mystic, don’t you know.).

Listen, I know what it is like to be reactionary. Seven years before our most recent trauma, there was another trauma. It was different, but also the same. We were warning about this very issue, and no one listened. The danger was not in one person; it was in the whole system and how we justify just about anything. So, wouldn’t you know the work I have done the last seven years would turn on me and my family?! It is an unreal and wild turn of events that I never in a million years imagined would happen. But, this event did make me look back at that time and consider if maybe I was too punitive. I, too, was reactionary and trying to make a quick fix before we really understood what was going on. I still stand by what I was warning back then, because I saw with my own eyes it was true—but, what I did not know was how we as a culture do not understand the signs. (Now the gospel of John is in my head) We either ignore it, or everybody becomes suspect. Neither position brings us to a better and more healing future.

I realize now that a punitive mindset only brings weeping and gnashing of teeth for everybody, and it will come for everybody. Jesus went through serious anxiety wanting God to take away his need to keep going by the way of Love in a culture of death. He was sweating blood, and his disciples fell asleep in their grief (Luke 22). I understand this a lot better now. It is hard. And when the culture is not set up for healing and learning, we will continue to inflict trauma that will never allow us to grow and learn. And the one fighting for love will die.

In my family, my body was hit the hardest. If you know me at all, you know I was the one fighting the hardest with my whole body—because I could. I was going to public offices and calling people to account, emailing everyone who I felt should be standing up and taking responsibility with us, and just trying to get anyone to care and take a damn stand on our behalf. That knocked me out. I became the advocate I so desperately desire for me too.

But I needed to learn when to surrender sooner. Just like right now. What I did took a toll on me in a way that is hard to recover from, and I am getting tired again. I know what I have learned is vital for the work ahead, and I need to rest again so I can prepare for it—b/c I am more than ready to get in the game of life. But not yet. Already (all ready), and not yet has never felt so real to me. Sometimes the best thing to do is let it play out, and then we learn, TOGETHER, before we do better.

That is my work right now. This post by Scott Erickson about doubt and wondering if love is worth the risk again is on point. Since Elsa is my prophet, the song “Into the Unknown” is playing for me right now.

Thanks for listening. I am off to rest.

This morning I was talking to my dearest friend Teri King. This is a friend I met through Twitter in 2016/7 who says I saved her life through my LGBTQIA+ advocacy work. We met for the first time in person in Washington DC at an Alliance of Baptists conference in 2019, and our friendship has only grown stronger and more vibrant through the years—even though we have only been together in person once.

I can also say she has saved my life. She was a professional pastor for forty years through the SBC (Southern Baptist Convention). She also had to resign when she finally could no longer go on living a false life. So now she is in an unofficial role as a pastor dedicating her retired life to helping young/mid-age women grow in their gifts as a minister. She says this is her best ministry yet. I am one of the people she is guiding through the process. She mentored me through seminary and has written me incredible poems, both for me personally and when I have asked for poems to help with Bible classes I taught at church. Her gifts are incredible, and I cannot believe for such a time as this I get a Teri in my life. This is why I will not ever give up on believing there is a place for me in ministry as I am. I also will not give up on fighting for LGBTQIA+ rights and their full inclusion as friends in both the church and in our society.

This morning we talked about many things, but one subject in particular came from the gospel of Mark in chapter 9–“The Healing of a Boy with a Spirit.” This passage has come back to me in light of the ridiculous “thoughts and prayers” (Ts and Ps as the Bible Bing calls it) response from both conservative faith and political leaders who are using it to avoid any meaningful change in our gun legislation—even though our kids are dying in schools! And they dare call themselves pro-life. Bullshit.

This morning, Teri was intrigued by my interpretation of the Mark 9 passage and how it speaks into a current and pressing situation in our culture—guns. I am happy to come to your church/group/institution/etc to present my interpretation, if you are interested. I have gone to school to learn how to interpret scripture and I would love to use it. I am here and available. I also promise it will be open for dialogue too; it is not a lecture. I use scripture to figure out how to create much-needed and often difficult conversations, because it is a common source we have to dialogue together when our lived realities are different. We can tell our own stories both culturally and personally through scripture. This is how the word still breathes life today. If used the way I use it, it can teach us how to struggle and figure out where we think God and our ancestors’ stories can help us in our day and age in order to bring life in a culture of death. You might call it a pro-life approach.

The truth belongs to each generation. Scripture is a resource. It is not an answer book because it was all figured out in the past. It was not. And we are still killing Jesus systematically.

In our discussion, Teri asked if any other gospel tells the Mark 9 story too. So I pulled out my Gospel Parallels book from seminary for an easier reference. I know you can do this online, but I love books still. And I like how I can see the different wording side by side in this book. Matthew 17 and Luke 9 also tell this story. There are similarities and there are differences. Mark gives more details than the other two, but what they all have in common is Jesus’ words here: You faithless generation, how much longer must I be among you? How much longer must I put up with you?

Teri noticed what is actually being said by Jesus—How much longer do I have to put up with this shit?

Ha! It is true. Solidarity, Jesus. And by the way, cussing is in scripture. Paul cusses. Not sure where people think cussing is a worse offense than causing harm to people in the multitude of ways we do it, and also seem to never have to apologize for it either. Just pay money and no reparation work is needed (Fox News is a prime example of a real cultural and systemic problem—systemic narcissism is a public health crisis). And they try to use scripture for their justification. Well, friends, for such a time as this I was placed upon this earth.

Systemic narcissism is what happened to my family. See my last two blog posts. https://lindsaybruehl.com/2023/04/17/looking-at-our-neighbors-woundedness/. This one in particular. We did not get a money settlement either, only public shame—and it was allowed. That is what frustrates me and is causing me to speak up.

I am over the incident that should have never happened to my family. It was a shadow, and it taught me/us a lot about suffering—which has turned into grace. Our ego, which is only a dream, is dying and we are connecting to our soul—the only thing that is real. I would not go back and fix the past, even if it were possible. I would not do it now that I have done the healing work necessary giving me a different perspective. But, it does make me adamant the system needs to change. What is infuriating is watching the system move on like we are some acceptable loss who should have lived a less connected life and hated ourselves for not understanding the system. We are not the cautionary tale; the system is.

So with that said, I want to end this post with the reason I wrote it. What I wrote before is to show you how real scripture is to me in doing the repair work that is necessary to create a better future and a new order that will be more inclusive. It will also include repentance. High-trust systems have on thing in common: repentance is a spiritual practice.

I told Teri how the tentacles of the past tried to invade our lives again just recently. Of course this was going to happen. I am having to ground again and remember that is not where I belong anymore. But, that same system is in Oklahoma too. What I learned back there is guiding me now. The principality needs to be spoken to and here is what I want to say to my friends and family in light of what happened to us:

When a system abuses you, or someone you know was unjustly abused by it, do not sit idly by and believe this is how it is. And do not use the victim’s story as the cautionary tale. They are not the problem. The abusive system is the problem. And the system is more fragile than you may realize. A reactionary system is not a confident or grounded system. This is why it gets rid of the good people it believes to be naive first. Or if it sees a good trouble maker in its midst who is easier to discard because they will not fight back because they are typically self sacrificial. How we tell the Jesus story matters.

Here is a scripture story to maybe help you better understand what it is I am trying to say to my people in both Oklahoma and Texas.

Think of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane in the Luke 22:39-46. This story comes as the plot to kill Jesus thickens in the Lukan narrative. Jesus is going to the Mount of Olives to pray. His disciples followed him, and he tells them he hopes they are not met with a time of trial before he withdraws from them to pray. His prayer is for God to remove this cup from him. It becomes so intense his sweat became like drops of blood falling on the ground. (That is serious anxiety and despair, friends. Jesus knows these intense emotions we feel, and he wanted out also!). When he finally surrenders to the will of God and goes back to the disciples, he finds them sleeping due to their own grief. (See, this is not new. This is hard. Our ancestors know this and are sharing their story with you about it. The amount of grief we are feeling is exhausting. The desire to check out is not unheard of—they experienced it too). Jesus wakes them up and once again says to pray they do not come into a time of trial.

As I read this passage again today, a lot of new things stand out to me. As I mentioned earlier, you can see it has always been hard for Jesus dealing with the extremely dangerous absurdity of their death-dealing culture. He understands this despair and the temptation to go to sleep because the grief is too much. But you do need to wake up. (Gives a whole new meaning to woke theology). If you do not, you may be met with the same trial too. The cautionary tale is not that being kind and helpful to people can get you killed; it is that a system is ready to crucify those who do. That is what we need to be aware of and realize we are part of that system. The system is people. Ask yourself how you are serving it and the ways you may also be allowing these things to happen because you are going to sleep in your grief.

You are not alone in this difficult struggle. Scripture, our cloud of witnesses, and people like my family are here to help you not feel alone. We all know it is hard and exhausting. There is joy, even with the scars, in the rising up and asking for a new order. We are saying it is better to go by the way of God. The way of what is good and holy. The way of love. Do not go by the way that leads to weeping and gnashing of teeth because the system makes you believe that is what will keep you safe. It will not.

Side note: I know this story comes right after the sword verse that gun-rights lobbyists use for their own agenda. I can refute that too, but not in this post. I just find it funny since I talked about guns in this post that it would line up that way. Spirit knows, and it is no accident. I mention this so you know I am aware. I am listening to the oppositions’ rhetoric and I can clap back.

I wrote this reflection after spending some time contemplating the interconnection of the three examples I gave in this blog post: https://lindsaybruehl.com/2023/04/17/looking-at-our-neighbors-woundedness/

One of the reasons we went through, Jesus went through, Ralph Yarl went through, trauma is because we live/d in a culture that dissociates from its humanity. This is why I find it fascinating the gospels wrote about a God who became human. and he (it had to be a he for people to care. It’s not bc God is a He) lived a limited life, bc humans are limited. This happened when Rome was the biggest empire the world had ever known and was operating without limits. Jesus’ limited state as a human was powerful enough to scare the empire, and it got him killed.

It’s funny. We act like it’s the glory of God that’s too much for s person to take in. What if it’s our full humanity, wounds and all, that’s the most threatening. Very few do their inner work in our culture. The empire draws us outside ourselves. Faith is doing the same thing bc it’s captivated by empire.

A man who countered the narrative of Caesar by becoming vulnerable, a boy innocently riding his bike to pick up his siblings and despite all odds still believed in the goodness of life, and a teacher who cares about kids and will sacrifice their time to make sure they are safe and passing their classes—these things scare people who have disassociated from their humanity. These simple acts of human goodness scares those who are going by the way of empire that tells them everyone is an enemy, of a potential enemy.

This is a huge reason we are a lonely nation. We are scared of how deep it is to be human. We strive for some unknown perfected state, and we crucify people to hide our own failings bc we do not live in a world that welcomes growth, mistakes, or transformation. We don’t live in a world that allows us to say “I’m limited.” That’s not the way of empire. And it’s what’s killing the few who are remaining human enough to help. The ones who can look at pain and not run away. The ones who still innocently ride their bike and not think twice about going up to a house and ringing the doorbell.

I was listening to an actress on a talk show recently. She’s actually not a person of faith and she’s also quite fearful of what AI is going to do to our humanity. But she said something so wise about both faith and AI.

Actress (I don’t remember her name or I’d write it): I think faith and AI were both created to inspire curiosity and wonder about a world we cannot comprehend on our own. It’s an avenue for the imagination to go beyond what we can see. But instead, both have fallen into the same trap: they became about having all the answers and certainty about life. That’s dangerous.

She’s right.

When I graduated seminary, the preacher said the most important thing we can be doing right now at this place and time: we need to discover what it means to be human.

Scott Erickson (@scottthepainter),a Visual Curator for Spiritual Thought, just wrote a beautiful reflection on “Woundedness” in the Stations of the Resurrection series he has created. This reflection is Station 6 of the series. Many of my friends will know Scott Erickson from his Honest Advent work. I have several of his drawings framed in my living room from that series contemplating the vulnerability of the incarnation. They are stunning and inspire a renewed spiritual imagination from the stories in scripture many of us are possibly so familiar with we no longer know what they mean anymore. Or, dare to believe we can experience and believe differently about them in light of our lived experience.

After I read his post on “Woundedness,” which I will include in this blog post for you to read for yourselves because it is too good to summarize, I knew I had to write my own reflection or I would not be able to sleep tonight. There is a stirring within me that needs to be aired to my online community and in-person community. It is not for revenge or for pity; it is for healing. And this reflection gave me the spiritual imagination to tell my own story in such a way I will not be too triggered by sharing, or fall into the trap of over sharing details that are not for everybody. That is so easy to do for trauma survivors. It is because our trauma came from those who had no boundaries.

This post is also inspired by what has happened to a 16-year-old black high school junior, Ralph Yarl, who just survived being shot because he went to the wrong address to pick up his siblings. I am not comparing our events as one and the same, but they are cut from the same cloth: the devastation that happens when you have no idea you landed in the hands of hate. And you were just trying to do what you were asked to do. The wrong people, the wrong location—these circumstances can change your life forever, for good or for worse.

I am not going to go into great detail on what happened to my family online. This is not the place for that and is largely what caused the problem in the first place. What I am going to do is attempt to reveal enough to show that when a powerful system harms you, there will be a scar(s) from that wounding—even after you are resurrected and living a life surrounded by those who love you the most now. My aim is to show you my wounds like Jesus did for his disciples. I like how Scott Erickson states that the resurrection is not he same thing as perfection, because perfection means without blemish. Jesus, too, had a scar from his brutal wounds inflicted by empire violence, even after his resurrection. Jesus was not the same after trauma. Ralph Yarl will never be the same. The Bruehls will never be the same.

One thing all three people/situations have in common: all were and are innocent but punished in some way anyway. It is because the system that guides our shared life together is corrupt. It does not mind when the innocent die—not all deaths are physical. The system is too busy protecting itself to care about the people who are dying at its’ hands because it does not want to die or look bad in public. Our inability to be wrong is also a pandemic! It is a systemic problem, too. Sorry to sound like a broken record, but a spade is a spade.

Here is a quick summary about my family.

This Easter, the whole weekend, was especially brutal for my family. A reminder of the worlds we once were an integral part of resurfaced. The event that changed our lives forever, which happened almost a year ago and took away one of our greatest passions, came to a head on Easter weekend this year. (I can write about how this is also a blessing, but not in this post). I do not look forward to May 3, 2023. That is the date our lives changed forever in 2022. I am quite certain it will be a dark day for me remembering the travesty, cruelty and abandonment that happened that day.

I want you to hear this and take it to heart. What we went through was brutal, and it is time to take the wounds we cannot see seriously. The black community has been asking us to do this for a very long time. They have been and are watching people from their own community die or brutally tortured at an astronomical rate at the hands of hate. And we still have political and faith leaders acting so atrociously by resisting our need to study racism and teach a more complete American history account in school. Also the resistance to Black Lives Matters is so revealing. Our political leaders are also preventing our ability to make any meaningful systemic change politically. That is also violence—even if they are not the one shooting the gun, hanging someone on a cross, or making the false accusation. Our stories are not complete if there are things we cannot talk about that are also part of the story. Hiding human evil done systematically does not prevent future systemic evil from happening; it guarantees it will happen again. And our systems allow it by design hoping to live another day by not being able to name it communally.

I was also unable to enter a church on Easter. I have never done that before, and I both grieve and do not regret it. I had to give up everything post-seminary because of what happened last May to my family. I still need some time to process this loss. I finally had one friend reach out and name what this cost me. I needed someone to see me and what it cost me too. I was probably too tired to move on to what I was going to do anyway, but this wounding has set me back quite a bit. I do not know how long this healing will take for me. I am a highly sensitive person and I see the fatal flaw in the system, so it is especially hard for me watching the system continue on as it were with no recourse.

Right now, I am looking for my people to address the fatal flaw in the system with me in a way that heals. Many are quoting Audre Lorde with Ralph Yarl’s case: The master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house. I know this is true. I will not use the same systems that brutalized my family to attempt to carry out justice on our behalf. That will only end up in more trauma for more people, just like it did in our case. This is not what God or anyone in my family wants.

The thing is, I saw the system. I not only saw it, but also experienced it. It does not care about the individuals it is supposedly set up to be taking care of; in reality, it cares about itself. “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts” logic Aristotle promoted is being used in a way that promotes terror instead of unity. I studied this in seminary too, before this travesty happened. This is not an unknown phenomenon by anyone who understands systems. There is also no one in any of our systems looking at/for the deeper root(s) to learn and understand the actual problems we are facing. Everything is done in reaction instead of being proactive. There is no funding or staffing being provided as a resource to make this a possibility either. So we punish, because that is easier than having hard conversations and admitting things are not black and white. But it is NOT more cost effective—I have data on that truth. We just really do not care who gets hurt as a community. We would rather trivialize or spiritualize than admit what we are doing is not only devastating individual lives but also the lives of whole communities. You never take out one person without affecting the whole community.

I know this pain is hard to look at and hard to hear. There are so few places we allow for public grief and lament. We are not used to this. Death has always been an exception to us culturally—not a reality. It makes us feel what we have been taught not to feel—pain. We were supposed to bypass pain—not go through it.

We need to look at the pain, or we cannot get to the healing or true joy. I believe this is why Jesus showed his scars. What we do to each other leaves a mark. We can survive it, and heal, but the scars will remain.

I hear people of faith quote this verse a lot: and He himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, so that we might die to sin (Sin) and live to righteousness; for by His wounds you were healed” (1 Peter 2:24). Can Ralph Yarl and the Bruehl family, and everyone else who bears scars, seen and unseen, say the same thing?

There is this thing called slide tackling in soccer. It is when a player slides to take the ball away from you. It looks vicious and is a move that will easily hurt someone if you don’t do it correctly. It has to be all ball (your slide can only touch the ball) to be legal; if not, it is a foul. Being taken out by the ankles is no joke.

I have not always been as political as I am now. I, too, like many of you was raised thinking caring about that was of this world and not the world I was working for. I also used to say Jesus was not political. Oh, how wrong I was. I will re-share the post I wrote last week to show how deeply confused (can’t really say wrong b/c I was taught this and you can’t just pick up a Bible and know what I wrote) I was.

2016 felt like a slide tackle that was all body and no ball taking me out. 2022 it was a slide tackle that was not only illegal but it deeply injured my family. It needed a red card.

In the words of Justin Pearson: Would you want to be spoken to (about) that way? For helping chidlren!!!

Both of us fighting for justice and treated like we were children who needed to be scolded. Acting as if they are the ones fighting for kids. Wrong! What the system allowed to happen to my family was unconscionable. What happened to Justin Pearson was unconscionable. Now is our moment to speak.

Friends, I need you to hear me with love. Otis Moss III says people who experience unthinkable injustice heal not by themselves; it is when they are in a community that gazes upon them with love. That determines if this story turns into a movement of hope for humanity’s healing, or if the person harmed turns into a villain. He gave a powerful example of how the legal system creates these scenarios. It picks and chooses who gets a chance and who are thugs to be thrown away.

I think what Justin asked is the question of our time.

After what my family went through—which was a huge mistake to target us b/c they targeted a family who knows what they are talking about and knows about these issues. I have done the work the last seven years to address this very thing, only to see the system turn on us. Now I know why on that end too. The state watches justice movements and makes a joke out of them by design. So, no, systems of oppression, you cannot target us. I have done the work and your response is atrocious. I wish people could have heard how we were treated. And over nothing. And the systems knows it. Every single person in each system knew it was bullshit but acted like there was nothing they can do about it.

That was so traumatic. We did not matter at all. Individually, yes. Systematically, no. I want both.

I am here today to talk to you as someone who believes I have learned something from this atrocious experience to make our humanity better. But I need you to listen to me, not pity me. Friends, I can name five teachers in Norman alone who have quit before the school year ended this year. One was right from the start. A Mustang teacher was also publicly humiliated by our State Board of Education. Do you remember that? This is not not normal. This is how oppressive systems make it. You think this is just how it is.

Here is where I need conservatives and progressives to hear from me. Please listen with love and lay down your defenses. Had I not gone through what I just did, I would not know to tell you this. Experience matters.

People who are more conservative will hear us and will show empathy. But when it comes to saying this is the system and we need their help, they are out. Systemic injustice is not in their vocabulary. Everything is about the individual. The individual sin problem in our evangelical churches. (That is something I am addressing in the friendship movement). Even if it is not our sin, we are viewed as an unfortunate incident that just happens in life. What can you do about it?

People on the progressive end have no problem seeing this as a Sin of the system, but most tend to not want to come along side you while you heal. They call it giving you space.

Let me stop right here to let you know I am not saying this in anger. I am saying this because I want to help people understand that when someone is in agony and it is your friend, your job is to show up. If they need space, let them tell you they need space. Don’t assume that from the start without asking. Grief and trauma are already extremely lonely and isolating—presence is the most important thing we can do in someone’s healing process. It is not about getting anything right. No one even knows what that is. Pain does not make one stronger. If it does not kill them physically, the desire to isolate and cut yourself off as a helper becomes a real temptation. The resilience is formed in the repair work.

In the progressive world, the individual is not valued as much as the whole.

So, I will end with this, and then I am going to stop for a while because I have said so much and Dr. Thema is right, see quote below. I am glad there seems to be some consequences happening for Trump and Ryan Walters. I am also aware the same systems that traumatize so many unnecessarily are also handling this. Trump and Walters are individuals in a much bigger picture. Getting rid of them is not going to solve the problem. Making individuals pay for a bigger problem does not work.

But, please God, lets remove them from office at least. The people need to be free of them and then we address why the system formed them.

I know not everything is mine to weigh in on publicly. I have been thinking about this one a lot, going back and forth on it, and I can’t let go of what Tennessee just did without saying something. Since this is ultimately about a school shooting and a highly conservative and toxic system trying desperately to do nothing about it, so much so, they made an unapologetically blatantly racist move to get our minds off off the shooting. I am going to weigh in on this one. There is a reason it happened. I am studying systems and this fits the pattern.

Side note: Just when you think Oklahoma and Texas are the worst, Tennessee and Florida come and show us up. But what do these states all have in common? I will let you answer that for yourselves. Rhetorical question.

First, let me quote Adrienne Maree Brown who wrote the book “ We Will Not Cancel Us.” A book heavily influencing the formation of a Friendship Retreat that will take place one day. A retreat that is aiming to transform our systems into places of deep connection and uplift for everybody. Every. Body.

“I want us to adapt from systems of oppression and punishment to systems of uplifting and transforming.”

If you have been following me for even 5 minutes, you may know I have been saying public schools are not getting any presence from public officials to help solve the many forms of terror that have entered our public schools. And they are issues that can be addressed. They are not a “thoughts and prayers” sympathy and pity sentiments that require no presence or action from you. They need your presence—everybody’s presence.

These three Democratic representatives from Tennessee did exactly what I have been crying out for from our public officials. They became present in a meaningful way. They marched against gun violence. Hallelujah. Their names: Justin Jones, Justin Pearson, and Gloria Johnson. They are being called the Tennessee Three. Praise the Lord for these true guardians who are sparking hope for us all. Their actions will win the day over what the TN House just did to fail them, divide them, and systematically give the middle finger to their public and PRIVATE schools. If you do not think your vote or policy can be an act of violence, then you are participating in the worst form of lying of all: Lying to yourself.

Wouldn’t you know, the powers that be came in to destroy their righteous and holy work?! It was right on queue and did exactly what you would expect if you have been studying patterns as I have been. I know it was a shock to many, but it is not shocking. They knew they could divide the unity by racism. Adrienne Maree Brown addresses in her book how the state is watching justice movements. It knows where the weak spots are, and it will go in for the kill where it sees weakness. Let me do a quick sermon on that, because a preacher has gotta preach.

Knowing now the state intentionally looks for the weaknesses in justice movements, a verse came to me to turn what the state is doing upside down. Look at 2 Corinthians 9-10 (I recommend NRSV translation): Paul is boasting about his weakness. He is content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ—b/c whenever I am weak, then I am strong. Friends, when you read that as political defiance, and it is, that statement takes on a whole new meaning. Thank you, TN, for pointing out the weakness to all of us. Now that we are all looking at you and paying attention, let the healing begin and our strength grow stronger.

By the way, our legal system is the reason all of this can happen. The legal system enables the state, and it has no check on it. The legal system is not available to everyone, and is more of a trap than a help for the average person. The state wins. It is time to transform the legal system too. But this issue is not the point of the post, but is worthy of mentioning because it is the culprit. Our system is racist and sexist. Both/and. It is trying to control bodies, but not save them.

This is all I will say for now. I hope this helps people trying to figure out how we went from protesting school shootings to now seeing how racist the system is. That is because it is related. And this is why we do need to study CRT!

Someone needs to hire me in their justice department, I tell you. I can spot this from a mile away. I have been studying this for the past seven years.

Thought I would share some fun news today.

I just got off the phone with the Norman Transcript talking about The Big Band Dinner Dance coming up on April 1! Thank you Bianca Gordon for the help in finding a contact to report on this event for us.

Friends, we have almost sold all of our tickets and we have met our sponsorship goal. Glory.

What makes this event so much fun for me is this is truly a community event. I gained confidence in reaching out to businesses asking for their support. Everyone is so nice—even if they could not help this year. I found a few new sponsors myself, and one of them I went to Middle School with! We discovered this after we had a deep and meaningful discussion about life (fun story I shared a while back). And one is the nonprofit I am now working with—Rewilding Ministry, sponsored by The Center for Courageous Compassion (until rebranded officially as Rewilding Ministry). And one is my SIL’s company.

I am so grateful to be a part of something that is connecting us to one another. This is the vision I see of the world that is to come, and it is happening right now. From family and friends, to businesses, to journalists, to students, directors, and contributors (current and past)—it is all of us making this happen. I love this interdependence.

This event is also student-focused. The jazz band will be playing for two hours while we eat, dance, and enjoy a community event that celebrates Norman’s well-documented tradition of excellence in the area of Fine Arts.

This is me looking all official for a phone interview. LOL! I am dressed in my NHS colors. I will be at a choir concert tonight too, so it will be seen in person.

I believe in Public Schools!

I was doing a checklist item for our Big Band Dinner Dance today. I went to one of the establishments that handles our request and was again honored to listen to someone’s amazing story in the store. We should not take the gift of receiving a person’s sacred story lightly. They want to be seen and known. They also want to know they matter as they are working through some things that do not add up for them anymore. What a gift to be there as an understanding presence to help them work through some of it, even if it is just skimming the surface. Maybe skimming the surface is something I need to learn! Ha. Because I am always in the deep. These conversations are more than your average surface-level convos, though. These dialogues are awakening me to the reality of what so many people have been through or are going through, and they are making me a more compassionate presence too.

When I first moved to Texas, I found a book series I loved called The Mitford Series by Jan Karon. I have no idea how I would respond to this series if I read it for the first time today, given how many Lindsays that was ago. But I do know that I still have lasting memories from it, and these memories still make me feel warm inside.

The main character is a 60-year-old minister (Episcopal priest) who lives and serves in a town called Mitford. He is quirky, sweet, sometimes irritable, and downright lovable. I still say phrases I learned from this book like, “there’s the rub.” He reminded me so much of my SIL’s father, Father Joe Ted Miller, aka Pappy (also an Episcipal priest). I loved how he made house visits and was so present in the lives of the community. He was also a beloved community member and was treated as such. Joe Ted Miller was a similar presence in Norman. I fell in love with the town of Mitford and the minister. Norman is making me feel like I am a part of town like that right now–and I am working on being a minister in this capacity, following in the steps of Joe Ted Miller and the fictional character Timothy Kavanagh. We, Joe Ted and I, had so many deep theological conversations right here in Oklahoma, and we had no idea these convos would eventually send me to seminary. I was having a conversation with my friend–no agenda. Instead of serving as an Episcopalian, I am doing it as a Baptist. You know, a female Baptist pastor is a lot more familiar. LOL!

I think about public school teachers a lot these days. I am married to one. So there is that. But I have been married to him for 21 years and have never thought about school teachers as much as I do at this moment. These people get built up in public narratives as beloved people in the community but are treated as anything but that. It is like they are supposed to be superhuman, and when they can fix or do not respond to situations in a way the public feels is acceptable, the forces of hell go after them. Yesterday I heard some stories that made recent trauma memories resurface.

Oklahoma and Texas are giving it their all to destroy public schools. Public schools are the cornerstone of our democracy and what brings us together with our local communities–more than the church. People spread out all over to go to church, and I kind of like that. I like the going in of public schools and the going out to faith-based institutions. Both/and. But unfortunately, the church seems to be one of the biggest obstacles to public schools’ ability to thrive and grow.

Texas and Oklahoma both want to take money away from public schools and give it to private schools–and the amount given would just be a crumb of what a private school requires. (And private schools think this money will not come with public opinion?!) Also, private school teachers are paid shitty. Going private is not helping there either. And many of them have to sign agreements to agree to a certain theology and will be reprimanded, if not fired, if they go off script. For all the drama about rethinking how we teach history and what books kids can or cannot read, can you imagine if we challenged Christian schools to look at their history and what books are being read?!

But beyond just those facts, public schools desperately need MORE resources. They cannot afford to lose a thing, and what they have is insufficient! Teachers are not trained and cannot be trained to handle the massive amount of trauma these kids are carrying. The teachers are also carrying trauma, and no one seems to be looking out for them. When I hear what some teachers are saying as they walk out the door–even if I think what they did was not okay–I can see and hear they are breaking. That is not who they are. The pressure the public, politicians, administration, and students place on them breaks people. Even we, my family, are carrying trauma from public school life, and we have a high pain tolerance. But this is beginning to be too much for us too.

But I won’t give up. I have a solution.

Public schools need presence. A loving, kind, and gentle presence to hear and receive stories. Therapists cannot even handle all of this, either. And sometimes, it is not a therapist that we need. Sometimes what we need is a friend. That is who I am. That is the movement I want to help foster in our community.

I have been inspired by good people–real and fictional (fictional is real too–it is how real the imagination can be). I still believe.

This post was written as a Facebook post on 3/14/2023

Okay, I have gone back and forth on how to respond to the failure of Silicon Valley Bank.

First, I need space to laugh at absurdity: The banks failed because of “WOKE.” The way Michael Kosta said that was hilarious.

Come on, GOP. Give me a break with your anti-woke sentiments that are anything but loving.

Okay, now to the serious talk. Do you all know I have a business degree as well? Because I do. When I started work in the oil and gas industry, the show “The Apprentice” began. It was fun to watch for about two seasons, and then I saw the really yucky side of a former president. Also, there was nothing ethical about the business practices on the Apprentice. That show was pure entertainment and revealed itself when it became Celebrity Apprentice. It gave the former president an illegal competitive advantage in the business world. But now I know rich people are not held accountable.

I thought I would never have to see this person again when I turned off my TV after two seasons. OY! Not only did I have to see him again, but I had to listen to him abuse us as a nation and pass laws that have had devastating effects that we are still paying for today. One is pulling back on regulations implemented after the bank failure of 2008! A bank failure under a GOP president, so please stop with the woke nonsense blame game that is only proving to be racist, sexist, and homophobic/anti-trans.

One of the greatest ironies about the posture of the GOP party is this: most people who make up the GOP party who are evangelical Christians tend to believe that humans are created sinful, untrustworthy, and are no good until they find God–their only escape from hell. But they only carry that belief spiritually because no laws on earth need to be in place to save us from hell on earth. And they claim to be the party of responsibility, but that is only for people without power.

On the flip side, people who tend to not be conservative (Not all. This is in general. There will always be exceptions, but, as a whole, this is how it is playing out) typically believe people are created good. I do. But we also DO need to be protected from ourselves. The same goes for businesses. These regulations implemented after the 2008 failure did a lot of good in keeping banks from taking advantage of people. Regulations are implemented for our protection. This is how I interpret God in Hebrew Scripture when the Israelites are being delivered from oppression and sent to the wilderness. God is trying to keep them safe. The allure of comfort is so great, and for good reason, but it takes away people’s humanity every time. God wants us to stay human. This is how I interpret God sending Jesus, whose faithfulness was not in paying for our sins but in remaining human all the way to the end.

This is why I am trying hard to create high-trust systems (friendship as a political movement) to help us thrive as our most authentic selves while being held accountable too. The temptation to be lured into the way of money is absolutely a human nature thing we must be aware of. Money is something we need, but it is a terrible God.

Okay, that is my Lindsay Talk for the day. Feel free to chime in if you want.