Spirituality and Community: Keeping Hope Alive- Reflection+ a page from Toi's journal

3.21.10

Sunday after a delicious breakfast which was lovingly prepared by two prominent MEAN members for the whole SLC posse, we all went off to different churches in which the organization members are involved. There are various denominations prevalent in Mossville. The churches attended by SLC students were the Pentecostal, Catholic, Christian Methodist Episcopal, Baptist, and on Saturday Rebecca Johnson attended the Seventh Day Adventist church.

Josh and I attended the CME church which one of the MEAN leaders, Miss Dorothy, attends. The preacher delivered a powerful message to the congregation. He said that there was "room at the banquet for everyone." Meaning that none are excluded from the love of their Creator. He addressed the fact that Miss Dorothy had brought Josh and I and weaved this into his sermon. The music was uplifting and scriptures were read by two young boys. The preacher said that "we" (meaning the whole community) have to bring them up in a way that they'll never stray from spirituality and their community.

Spirituality is very important in most communities of color and I honestly believe that Rebecca wanted the SLC students to understand how important faith is in these communities. It is the bedrock for the majority of social justice movements. People need a reason to keep going- to survive. Also, going to the different churches showed that we were interested in belonging to the community and helped build trust among community members.

MEAN is all about compassion for their community. The understanding I have of compassion as it pertains to spirituality stems mainly from Buddhism but I believe is very similar in Christianity. Compassion in Buddhism is a recognition and effort to alleviate suffering. All of MEAN's efforts come not only from this particular place but also from a place commonly identified by Buddhists as "loving-kindness". This term loving-kindness is also similar to the Christian concept of compassion. It is defined as the quality of being warm-hearted, considerate, and humane and extending good will, care and consideration to all. It is motivated by a feeling of affection for a person or even a cause and is extended to all beings without exception. The members of MEAN have exhibited an enormous amount of compassion and loving-kindness to the Mossville community. MEAN has decided to take on multiple roles as protector, informant, and liberator because of the innate sentiment of loving-kindness- that magnetic pull to serve their community in a compassionate way. To not only find answers and solutions but also to breathe enthusiasm into, and kindle hope for, a community that has begun to resign its well-being and quality of life to a cold-hearted, money-driven industry who refuses to see this community as human. And who refuses to see the effect to their cause.

After the church services we had dinner with MEAN and some of the community members who had received fliers to attend. The turnout was minimal but there was much wisdom shared by Miss Dorothy and Mr. Mouton. After dinner they spoke about how far MEAN had come and about what I interpreted as the importance of awareness and our needs assessment. Then Mrs. Richard from the Concerned Citizens of Norco delivered a fiery speech telling about how her past organization was able to overcome environmental injustice in her community by being relocated. She went all the way to Europe (and also traveled to D.C. and many states) to be heard. She spoke a lot about voice and compassion. She was deeply religious and all of her theological quotes were poignant and spot on . She has so much passion, and passion is the key element to getting your voice heard. It is the driving force in creating change.

Mrs. Richard spoke about not doing this kind of work for the money, she said that you could never succeed if you got into it for monetary gain. She also spoke about her meeting with Ann Klein- a holocaust survivor and talked about the similarities between them. Mrs. Richard said “Struggle is Success," while Ann Klein said “Pain is success.” WelI, I believe that these two are parts of it at least but at some time during the path to success this pain and struggle must be transformed. The first step is awareness of injustice, the next acknowledgement of the pain which is generated by this injustice, the third step is formulating a solution for the transcendence of such and another step is implementing strategies to address the injustice. But that's not it- the community must be involved every step of the way. After all, the individual consciousness is the collective consciousness and vice versa. There can be no movements from a single person. Yes, one person cannot make an entire movement alone. An individual can be a catalyst for a movement but others are needed for the propulsion of the movement. This is why Community Based Participatory Research is so effective. When a community rises up in order to confront their oppressors, transformation is inevitable and injustice cannot and will not prevail. Spirituality is the backbone to many movements associated with people of color in this nation. Churches create a sense of community, spirituality strengthens by giving hope in the face of oppression which is continuously handed out at birth.

In communities of color, people vie for attention and self-worth in various ways because they have been conditioned to believe that they are worthless in every aspect of their lives. What does it mean to a community when an industry, sanctioned by the government, begins to buy up cheap land from an area that is predominantly Black and poor. What is the existential message when even though people are dying and crying out for help, the government takes decades to even acknowledge that something "may" be seriously wrong. How can a community keep the faith that justice will prevail when the blind lady of justice has never tipped the scales in their favor? And what does it mean when community residents who are also plant workers become the gatekeepers of their community and when people know that their job is hazardous to the community but have no other way out? When relocation is not an option, because their whole life is the memories tied to their home? Yes, there are many layers to the "situation" in Mossville.

In our work as advocates working with MEAN we provide a glimmer of hope by sharing not only tools and expertise, but also by listening to the stories that have gone unheard for so long. After becoming involved by witnessing people's stories there is no way that we can step away from the community unchanged. It is imperative that we retain the hope that we can and will help MEAN to bring about change in Mossville in the way that the community sees fit- whether it be a community health clinic, relocation, or some other solution. With every action we take in support of MEAN and thereby the community, we are helping to usher in a new era in which refineries and plants are held accountable for their negligence, just as the government is held accountable for their intentional and unintentional oversight. True, this journey is arduous and at times painful for us as SLC students, but we must bear in mind how difficult it has been for generations and generations of families in Mossville and how we have the opportunity to break that pattern by advocating not on their behalf, but in their favor- or by standing in their corner. We must all keep the faith and never lose hope- for success is imminent when communities unite to break down the barriers that divide them and challenge the oppression and oppressors that marginalize and subjugate them, all in the name of power and profit.