Few things are more telling about a person than a long speech. The speech strips away all the pretense and showmanship put forth by the preceding press release or the media kit. The speech-giver delivers more than words. He or she delivers the good, bad, and ugly things that brought them to that moment in time. Between the lines, they deliver the truth.

A good speech-giver is entertaining. They are engaging and enlightening. A great speech-giver adds challenge and a call to action. Many people give good speeches. Shirley Sherrod gave a great speech. One that can be studied, in its entirety, for what it adds to the discussion of what racial reconciliation looks like.

Over the years I’ve seen so many different examples of racial reconciliation. Most of them boil down to what I think is kumbaya-around-the-campfire rhetoric. Case in point, electing a black president was not racial reconciliation. This event, though momentous, was no more racial reconciliation than allowing a black man to vote or own a home or publish a book. President Obama has done all these things.

Racial reconciliation requires much more than solitary acts or events with racial overtones. Real racial reconciliation is tough. It’s an active cycle. It starts with admission, moves on to submission, and gets sealed by ongoing commitment.

The ill-fated two minutes and forty-three seconds snippet of Shirley Sherrod’s speech that got her fired was her admission. She admitted to doing something. In and of itself that snippet had really bad racial implications. But …

Thank goodness Shirley didn’t end her speech there. She went on to share about a complete change of heart, in fact, a God-directed one-eighty. Recognizing her wrong, Shirley had submitted to One higher than herself. And in turning over her will to God, she turned the situation around for herself and the white farmer she was tasked to help. She did not allow anger to overrule her convictions. Right is right, no matter what. In this we see just how seriously she took her God and the values of the rural folks that raised her.

Shirley’s submission led to a lifelong commitment to change the situation for not only poor blacks, a natural inclination for a black woman who grew in the rural South, but also for all poor, regardless of skin color. Shirley committed to being a change agent, risking her reputation to recruit other change agents. What boldness!

She could have been called an Uncle Tom and a sell out, but she was going for the ripple effect. She saw an opportunity, a possibility, however remote, within that sea of black faces at the NAACP meeting and perhaps thought if God could change me, maybe He could change someone else.

These are the traits of a reconciler, a true bridge builder.

Are you a bridge builder?

Four years ago, I posted this about the World Cup:

Here we are on the heels of the World Cup (2006) and already there are a lot of grown folks calling dark-skinned soccer players monkeys. These “offensive” players are being pelted with peanuts and bananas, slapped, hit, and spit upon. In the name of gaining a sporting advantage (supposedly). One player, Oguchi Onyewu who plays for the Belgian soccer club Standard Lige has been harassed and physically attacked more than once. He and several other African and black American players have been called the M word. But to them it just “goes with the territory”, as black U.S. team player DeMarcus Beasley put it.*

So if you play soccer in Europe and you’re dark-skinned be expected to be called a monkey. In a way, I understand it. On the surface, soccer is life to many Europeans. It’s business. Big business. But there’s also the hate factor too. Hate that’s too familiar to Americans. The type of hate that can’t be legislated away. Hate that just goes underground … read the rest

*Source: USA Today

With South African hosting the FIFA World Cup this year, it seems that things are way different this time around. From GlobalNewsBeat.com:

While apartheid’s demise in 1994 led to little immediate change among fans — whites still tend to favour rugby and cricket, while soccer remains a largely black sport — the almost tribal lines dividing sports are fading.

Whites have come out in support of South Africa’s national team, nicknamed Bafana Bafana, and with the team’s early exit from the World Cup, black and white fans alike don their bright yellow jerseys to see the 16 surviving teams.

Bars and pubs, once the haunts of either a black or a white crowd, now are brimming with both.

Let’s pray this lasts far beyond the last goal. God bless South Africa. God bless the world.