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THE TSAR’S LOCKET, by Ken Czech
Nations must ally themselves against external enemies, but what of enemies within?
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Fieldnotes on Allyship: Now in Print
It is a truth universally acknowledged that America is centered on the success, promotion, pleasure, and whims of white people.
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THE CHRISTMAS EVE PROMISE—Interview with Elyse Douglas
Do those people change history all that much as they live their little lives? We come and go like passing clouds.
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Fieldnotes on Allyship is Launched!
Fieldnotes on Allyship is launched—an anthology of eighteen writers from three continents writing about allyship for the Black community.
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THE CHRISTMAS EVE PROMISE, by Elyse Douglas
What if you could return to the past to correct a mistake in the present?
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When Church Becomes the State
Sometimes we think that by making our country an explicitly religious one, we will solve our problems. But the results are always worse.
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To My Evangelical Faith Family
To my white Evangelical family: You birthed me and raised me and gave me principles and sent me out into the world. I owe my character development to you. But now you’ve gone insane. I’ll just say this: a man, woman, or child does not need to be perfect in order to be treated as a human being who, according to our theology, bears the Imago Dei — the image of God. We were taught as Evangelicals to believe that all human beings are gloriously unique and valuable. This is embedded into our very theology of the Incarnation: we believe that Jesus was — and is! — not only God…
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Making the Past the Past
“The past is never dead. It’s not even past.” ~ Wm. Faulkner It is a difficult thing to think that one’s own faith might itself be in need of redemption. While I got “saved” into the Christian faith during the Jesus Movement, I still found the Billy Graham Crusades to be helpful. Yet it felt funny to see BG side with Republicans. It was discomforting to see how little BG dealt with the racism of the church—even when I wasn’t aware of what was going on, really, I remember thinking it odd that BG would be so, so careful on how he handled MLK, Jr. and his memory. I found…
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The Confidence of Ignorance
It’s really sad when white guys don’t get it. There’s a sui generis difference between the experience of Black Americans and everyone else. I was in a discussion with some people, including some white guys, one who demanded to include his own viewpoint into any discussion about the value of Black lives, often expressed by the phrase “Black Lives Matter.” It was . . . an interesting discussion that went nowhere, because the discussion started from ignorance by this gentleman and never went any further than what he already was convinced was the whole truth. The sad thing isn’t so much that he didn’t listen. (Reader: he didn’t listen.) The sad thing is…
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REVIEW: Just Mercy
I got this book for Christmas, and it sat on my pile of “To Read” books because there were a dozen or so books waiting for me before I could get to this one. But I picked it up, and started reading. This is an extraordinary book, not only for the masterful construction of a story (I’m always looking for that) but also for the deeply personal and intimate way of telling us this story that brings us into the lives of these men and women and children who have been pushed onto a conveyor belt that leads to the extraordinary cruelty of the death penalty in the United States.…
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REVIEW: So You Want to Talk about Race
So you want to write a review . . . I was initially reluctant to read this book by Ijeoma Uluo. I had heard it was “hard” to read. But I had purchased it, and had it sitting on my desk for a few months. “I’ll get to it.” One day. Just not today. So then I was challenged by a friend to read it. I did—and found out that my fears were unfounded. This is a deep, rich, emotionally transparent book about race and even . . . how to talk about race. I need to be absolutely clear here, as absolutely clear as Oluo is in her own…
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From Levittown to Black Lives Matter
We built the ground for protests when we broke ground for Levittown
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My Life in Music: Day 10
Music is the color of life I was given the task by a friend of choosing 10 songs that greatly influenced me. I will post one song per day, for 10 consecutive days. Each song draws the picture more clearly, showing what has inspired me or just given me solace. TODAY the cycle is complete. Ten things I know about me. I selected the songs to develop a story, and now we come to the part where the sun is rising on a new day. I started with music as pure color — as sound and rhythm and feeling, of seeing through my mind the world of beauty around me.…
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My Life in Music: Day 9
To uncover the pain I was given the task by a friend of choosing 10 songs that greatly influenced me. I will post one song per day, for 10 consecutive days. Each song draws the picture more clearly, showing what has inspired me or just given me solace. Today’s song seems unusually prescient, but perhaps it is simply a song that is relevant every day in our America. I built out this list much earlier to explain the songs that are important to me, and here we are and the songs are contextualized by the events of this month, this week, this day, this hour, this minute. This life. “Rose…
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My Life in Music: Day 8
To cover the soul I was given the task by a friend of choosing 10 songs that greatly influenced me. I will post one song per day, for 10 consecutive days. Each song draws the picture more clearly, showing what has inspired me or just given me solace. Today is a song whose words were written by a 16th century Spanish soldier-poet — one of the more famous of them, Garcilaso de la Vega. His poem was set to music several years ago by Z. Randall Stroop, and the resulting song is sometimes performed in concerts. The music is gentle, sometimes soaring, sometimes plaintive, but it wraps the words of…
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My Life in Music: Day 7
Awake, lyre and harp I was given the task by a friend of choosing 10 songs that greatly influenced me. I will post one song per day, for 10 consecutive days. Each song draws the picture more clearly, showing what has inspired me or just given me solace. Today is a week of music. And this is a turning point. Stay with me. I’ve come along through 50 years of living and the kids are heading off to college. Soon the house will be empty, and then the next part of life will start. I guess. We’re at the February choir concert in the community college where our youngest son…
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My Life in Music: Day 6
The spinning world stops I was given the task by a friend of choosing 10 songs that greatly influenced me. I will post one song per day, for 10 consecutive days. Each song draws the picture more clearly, showing what has inspired me or just given me solace. Today is “A Love Song,” from the group Love Song. I was a teenager in Southern California. Like teenagers everywhere, I knew everything and knew nothing. (Please. I’ve grown a little since then. I still know nothing but I’ve stopped believing I know everything — on my good days.) But I was in the moment living during what later became called the…
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My Life in Music: Day 5
The unawakened heart I was given the task by a friend of choosing 10 songs that greatly influenced me. I will post one song per day, for 10 consecutive days. Each song draws the picture more clearly, showing what has inspired me or just given me solace. Today is Sam Cooke. I heard him sing, in brief snatches, on the radio. I didn’t — and still don’t — listen to radio much. When I’m doing something, I tune out almost all noise, including music. It was the way to survive in a hectic family of six very active mischief-seeking children and parents who are doing their best simply to keep…
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My Life in Music: Day 4
Music is human connection I was given the task by a friend of choosing 10 songs that greatly influenced me. I will post one song per day, for 10 consecutive days. Each song draws the picture more clearly, showing what has inspired me or just given me solace. Today is getting into first gear. What with instrumental pieces like Bach and Holst there was the enjoyment of being in the music. But then with these songs the words also begin to become more important. Without the music and the rhythm, perhaps the creation would have been powerful still. Put them together and it becomes a new thing. This is James…
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My Life in Music: Day 3
Music can move us I was given the task by a friend of choosing 10 songs that greatly influenced me. I will post one song per day, for 10 consecutive days. Each song draws the picture more clearly, showing what has inspired me or just given me solace. “Move Over” (from “Through Children’s Eyes,” The Limelighters). I grew up in the 50s and early 60s. Before there was rock and roll, before there was an explosion of tightly produced music that you listened to, there was folk music. You sang along with folk music. The entire album was led by the Limelighters, a popular folk music trio, but behind them…
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My Life in Music: Day 2
The envelop of emotion I was given the task by a friend of choosing 10 songs that greatly influenced me. I will post one song per day, for 10 consecutive days. Each song draws the picture more clearly, showing what has inspired me or just given me solace. “Jupiter — The Planets” (Holst). Before there was Star Wars and John Williams there was Holst who wrote the themes lifted for the film. This suite of songs was about something but I could not put it into words. Listening was simply an experience. Here was music and here was emotion and it was ineffable. I don’t have the vinyl anymore, and…
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My Life in Music: Day 1
Order and Beauty, Mixed I was given the task by a friend of choosing 10 songs that greatly influenced me. I will post one song per day, for 10 consecutive days. Each song draws the picture more clearly, showing what has inspired me or just given me solace. The first day’s offering is “Bach: Brandenburg Concerto №3 in G Major (Parts 1, 2, and 3)” Wendy Carlos 1968. This is the second album of electronic music that I collected. (The first is lost in the mists of time, an album I picked up at discount store back in the 60s as well.) Classic rhythms, harmonies, structure with impossible instruments. Sorry.…
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13 BILLION TO ONE, by Randy Rush
I was given an advance reader’s copy of the book 13 Billion to One, by Randy Rush, and asked to create an honest review after reading. My thoughts are below. This is a wild and fascinating ride through the experiences of a man plucked by fate from his ordinary life into the world of fantasy–the fantasy of suddenly having enough money to do just about whatever you want to do. Go see your favorite team! Fly to Europe! Travel to Africa! Buy the car that you’ve always wanted. Two cars—or even more! But along with fantasy comes the reality of dealing with the people who surround you hoping to use…
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Interview with Jamie Lisa Forbes
I agreed to read and review Eden, by Jamie Lisa Forbes. I found the book fascinating and deep (you can read my review here), and I got to ask the author some questions about the book and about the inspiration for her creation. It’s interesting to look back at the timeframe of the authorship as well as my reading of the book—prior to COVID-19 and the current social unrest in the United States, there seemed to be little reason to believe that leaving secrets buried would become harmful in the present. The strategy has worked so well for us in the past. But here we are in a time of…
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EDEN, by Jamie Lisa Forbes
WHAT IS EDEN AND WHERE CAN WE FIND IT, we sometimes ask. A place of creation for some. A place of rest for others. And yet Eden is the garden that we lost because of the choices we made long ago. We were cast out, and we cannot return though we ever yearn to be there in the cool of the evening when the first stars appear. Rowen is there at the beginning, of course, when he first meets Eden—a young girl who must testify of extraordinary and violent crimes she witnessed that rocked the small town of White Rock, North Carolina. She’s a wisp of a thing, the kind…
- #WakingUpWhite, American Exceptionalism, Celebrate Recovery, faith, history, justice, Life Recovery Skills, racism
#WakingUpWhite Chapter 46: Whole Again
I’ve been blogging with friends as I read through “Waking Up White,” by Debby Irving. We’re committed to reading, thinking, and then writing about our thoughts. For a complete list of posts from my own journey, see https://stephenmatlock.com/category/writing/wakingupwhite/ Quote from Ms. Irving’s book appear using a format to distinguish them from my own words in response. Race is not a cause, it’s a part of becoming fully human. —Billie Mayo Goodness. Interesting and provocative! One of the great temptations of white people when confronting racism is to wish earnestly that it would go away as a difficult and troubling topic. And yet—here it is. I write and edit for Our…
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Words of Apology
One of the most critical things I’m learning is that a conditional apology is worthless. An apology leading with an “if” is nothing at all. It is words that afford us no responsibility to understand or change, and we can offer such an “apology” with no sense of insight about the person who we are. Instead, this “apology” pushes the offense to the victim of the offense. “I wasn’t clear. You didn’t understand. You’re too sensitive. I didn’t mean that.” Love is at stake here. The meaning, the purpose, the expression. We might think we “love” people, and we might think we really mean it. (“I feel so sincere!”) But…
