Faith, Love, and Justice: Q&A with the Very Rev. Dr. Kelly Brown Douglas
This May, Harvard Divinity School hosted the inaugural Religion and Public Life summit, “Lead with Love: Just Peacebuilding and Moral Imagination,” with a keynote address by the Very Rev. Dr. Kelly Brown Douglas. Douglas is the Interim President of Episcopal Divinity School and the author of many books, including Sexuality and the Black Church: A Womanist Perspective; Stand Your Ground: Black Bodies and the Justice of God; and Resurrection Hope: A Future Where Black Lives Matter.
Douglas spoke with Deborah Jian Lee, RPL’s journalism fellow and the senior editor at the Economic Hardship Reporting Project, the only nonprofit dedicated to supporting journalism about economic inequality in America.
Deborah Jian Lee: The theme of the summit is “Lead with Love: Just Peacebuilding and Moral Imagination.” We're entering the summit against the backdrop of student encampments taking place on campuses, including this one. Can you tell me a little bit about how you're feeling and how you're showing up in this moment?
Kelly Brown Douglas: First, I can't believe it. Yet I can. I'm old enough to remember Kent State. The militarization that is happening on our campuses is undeniable, and it reveals the militarization of our society. The other thing is, students aren't perfect protesters, if you will. The purpose of our universities and colleges is supposed to be to help educate our students, to help them become even more nuanced and critical thinkers. What is appalling to me—and appalling is an understatement—is that instead of helping students elevate the conversation to deepen their thinking . . . we're penalizing them. This does not mean that we should ever tolerate antisemitism and Islamophobia, as well as any other violence—we should not. Our campuses must be places that respect the humanity of all students and where no student should have to tolerate any form of bigotry. And, our campuses must also be a place where students can learn and grow, make mistakes and become better human beings. Colleges and universities have to be places that help us to change an unjust status quo.
It's no different from the Black Lives Matter movement when saying, “Black lives matter,” was met with people saying, “Oh, that means you hate white people.” That’s not what that means. We have to affirm the life that doesn't matter to society so that we can affirm that all lives matter.
The other thing is the politicization of these protests and the way in which the support of one people is seen as being against another. To support the humanity of, in this instance, Palestinian people is not the same as being antisemitic. The point is to affirm the humanity of all peoples. Moreover, to be against the actions of a government is not to be against the people of that government. I would hate to be held accountable for the things that Biden or Trump do, but I can critique them, and they need to be critiqued. And Netanyahu, and what's going on, needs to be critiqued. That should not be equated with being against a people.
And as much as our democracy is failing, our humanity is at stake. I can't believe we're here though I know why we're here. I’m overwhelmed by it. I’m at a loss of how to at least stem the tide. And the only thing that I know to do is to continue to speak loudly the truth as I know it—and it may not be the whole truth—to follow a moral compass that says that every single human being is cherished and is to be respected. Every single human life is to be honored and cherished. And that means Palestinians and Israelis alike. And to speak out against what I know is wrong—that which is going on over there in Gaza. It is as wrong as what happened on October 7.
DLJ: As we enter this weekend, we're talking about leading with love. What do you hope will come out at this time together?
KBD: Justice has to flow from love. It is in this way that retributive justice is an anomaly. It's an oxymoron. Retributive justice does not flow from love, but typically from a place of revenge. It doesn’t bring people together, but typically creates opposition. I will challenge people to leave this place not simply talking about leading with love, but doing it. Finding ways to show up, to show up fighting for justice. That's what it means to lead with love. Love isn't passive.
DJL: You're engaging with people from all different walks of life. Can you give just a few examples of people that you've seen recently, who are showing up in creative ways, that might be a model for the rest of us?
KBD: Jacqui Lewis gives a conference every year in New York. She brings together people of all walks of life to help people not simply think through what’s going on but to provide different perspectives. There's always a call to action. I also think of a former student of mine, her name is Gabby Rivera. She was the first Latinx queer person to write for Marvel Comics. She was the amazing writer-creator of “America.” She does a podcast called “Joy Revolution.” She’s working in her community and through that podcast to really create a different narrative for folks. She empowers, inspires, and helps to broaden their sort of moral imaginary of justice.
DJL: In the opening of your book "Resurrection Hope" you write about struggling to understand your faith in relation to your blackness and the sense that “the God to which black people had pledged allegiance had not really pledged allegiance back.” This question intensified during the pandemic as the visibility of violence against black people increased. I imagine that throughout your life, this question has come up at different pivotal moments. Can you walk me through this, starting with your earliest memory of this? And what role has moral imagination played?
KBD: During the 60s, I remember seeing on the TV the dogs attacking children. I was seven years old. I remember my parents whispering about the bombing of the Birmingham church. I grew up in Dayton, Ohio, a very segregated city. You knew your place as a Black person in Dayton.
I can remember this like it was yesterday. We're standing in our living room. And I said, “Daddy, why do white people hate us? What did we do?” I don't remember what my dad said. What I do remember is . . . going to bed, trying to figure out what we did, because if I could figure out what we did, then I thought, I can make it right. And they will stop treating us so badly.
I don't know how much time passed. My dad and I were going out somewhere. I stopped on our front porch, and I said, “Dad, Dad I figured it out,” as if we were having this long running conversation. And Dad said, “What?” And I said, “What we did to make white people treat us so badly.” My Dad asked “What?” And I said, “We didn't do anything. They treat us that way just because they can. It could be anybody, but it just happens to be us.”
It was freeing because I figured out that there's nothing wrong with us. This was an important stage in my journey of really being proud of my Blackness. In those days you had three channels on the TV, and you had to get up and turn them on. I was home from school; I must have been sick or something. I was flipping the three channels and there was this Black man. It was James Baldwin. I'm sure it was Phil Donahue who asked Baldwin why Black people were calling themselves Black. Now, I hadn't quite decided yet that I was going to call myself Black. And I don't remember what Baldwin said, but I remember the eloquence of the way he said it and the power. And I thought, this Black man is not only gorgeous, but proud. Seeing and hearing him made me proud. And from that day on, I started calling myself Black.
When I began college I asked, “What does this white Jesus have to do with my Blackness?” This was in the 70s, and I was really coming into an even deeper awareness of what it meant to be Black and deeper pride in it. And I'm like, “Take this Christianity mess, and this white Jesus mess, and you can shove it,” because I was more willing to give up Christianity than I was to give up my Blackness. These feelings were intensified as we faced various racial issues and incidents at Denison University, where I was a student. Just about that time, the white college chaplain, Dave Woodyard, introduced me to James Cone’s book A Black Theology of Liberation. He knew what I was going through. We were close. I went home that weekend and I read it twice. That was the turning point for me.
DJL: What did that do to your faith?
KBD: I had been wondering if I could be black and Christian. Those two were diametrically opposed to me. And after I read this book, it was no longer, “Could I be Black and Christian?” It was, “To be Christian is to be Black. And to be Black is to be Christian. And my story was God's story. And God's story was my story.” It put me back in touch with my grandmother’s faith. That book helped me to understand the relationship between my Blackness and my faith and pulled me into the Black faith tradition that I didn’t know.
DJL: There is this relentless influx of information and of tragedy and of people's rights being taken away and of bodies piling up. It puts a huge strain on our humanity to witness this kind of inhumanity on such a mass scale. And it can lead to despair. I would love to hear more about your thoughts for those of us who are experiencing this weight.
KBD: The way out of despair is working for justice. And I really mean that. There's always this witness of God somewhere, moving us toward justice. And that's the way it was for me. At the end of “Resurrection Hope” this germaphobe that I am went down to Black Lives Matter Plaza in DC. That pulled me out of my deep despair—to see that there are people that recognize that this isn't the way it's supposed to be, fighting for a better way. Our task is not to wait for the justice of God, but to be accountable to that future that we know—a more just future—which means that we have to not wait for justice, but to do it.
When I'm in deep despair . . . I think of my great grandmother, whom I knew. We call her Mama Mary. When she died, she was 100 or so; I was maybe six. She was born into slavery. And obviously, she didn't die in slavery. When I think of her, I think of those folks who were born in slavery, who died in slavery, who never ever breathed a free breath and never ever dreamt that they would breathe a free breath. Yet these people fought for freedom anyhow. They fought for freedom that they knew they would never see, but that they believed would become a reality because they believed in the promise that was the freedom of God. They fought for the children like me that they could not see.
DJL: It's like we are connected across time, even if we can't reach back and touch the person who has passed. It goes back to what you said earlier—showing up. When we show up in the capacity that we have, using the skills that we have, we are connecting with people across time, across geography. That does lighten things, even though it's still heavy.
We had this great conversation in the fall through the Religion and Public Life program. There was a Diné storyteller, Sunny Dooley, talking about storytelling through the lens of healing. It reminds me of “leading with love.” If we're doing this through the lens of love, if we're doing it through the lens of healing, that is a powerful framework that points us in the right direction. The work that I do as a journalist at the Economic Hardship Reporting Project is advancing conversations about economic inequality. And I feel like in spaces like this, with people like you, other storytellers, it's inspiring to see this robust movement of people getting stories out there and inspiring other people to see that there are other ways of doing this. What are the books or films or comics that are pointing you toward a better future?
KBD: I just picked up Percival Everett's book James. It's about Jim from Huck Finn.
Black Panther. I mean, this vision of Wakanda and the power of that as it resonated in the young Black community, for young kids, and how they felt empowered.
Bless Me, Ultima. It's a film about Mexican workers and this little kid really sort of coming into his own and probably also coming into his sexuality. There's such an innocence to it, even in the complexity of it.
Books that I’ve read: Tony Morrison’s The Bluest Eye. It’s on the banned list. One of my favorite novels, of course, is Toni Morrison's Beloved. When I’m with young people—middle-school-on-up kids—I always read that sermon declaring “Love yourself. Love your neck, your arms. Love it, because folks out there aren’t gonna love it.”
DJL: When you look into the future, what is your hope? What do you want to see happen?
KBD: My hope is that we're at a time where every single solitary human being is truly respected and affirmed for who they are, and they can live free. And boy isn’t that a pipe dream?
When people say, “So what do we do?” I always ask this question, “Do you want a decent home to live in?” Now I don't know anybody that doesn't raise their hand. I asked them, “Do you want enough food to eat? Do you want a decent job? Not just so that you can survive but so that you can thrive? Do you want educational opportunities? Do you want health care? Do you want to be able to fulfill your dreams and feel affirmed and loved for who you are?” Everybody raises their hand.
Then don't withhold from another that which you would not want withheld from yourself. Then go about creating a community, a society and a world that doesn't withhold from another that which you would not want withheld from yourself. And so every time you vote, every policy, every law, everything that comes about, you ask yourself, will this withhold from another that which I don't want withheld from myself? If people would just go about building that kind of society, then that would be a future.
by Deborah Jian Lee