​​Faithful Fridays (by Richard B. Easley…) I was asked if I would share some of my ‘faith’ story for this Friday.  I thought about it and decided to accept the invitation.  At first I didn’t know what to talk about because there are so many things in my life that have been outright blessings OR they have been really low points … that actually turned out to be even bigger blessings!  What an awesome God!!  So, what do I share this Friday?  After some thought, I decided to share what has been weighing heavily in my heart, tugging at my faith, and in some cases making me physically ill.  I will share with you a difficult story that I hope helps you as much as it will help me by telling you.
I’m an Army brat and I was born in Okinawa.  A beautiful place that I was fairly recently able to take my beautiful wife to visit – and show her the floor on the Army hospital where I took my very first breath of life.  I’ll tell you that story sometime if you ask me.  As a brat, we followed my dad from military assignment to military assignment around the world.  My mom, my dad, my older brother (3 years older) and little old me. We lived in Presidio in San Francisco…. Ankara, Turkey… Roswell, New Mexico… Philadelphia, PA… White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico… San Antonio, TX (twice)… Camp Zama Tokyo, Japan… Walter Reed Army Medical Center (Washington, DC)…  Those were the places where we lived as a family when I was growing up.  As an adult and married man, Sharon and I have now visited 48 of the United States and 44 countries around the world.  Very, very blessed.  I have been places where they have never seen a black person before.  Never touched curly hair before (there’s another story there…). We have even been to a place and met people that had never heard of the United States!  All this to say that I have been treated like a superstar in some places.  I have been treated like I carry the plague in other places.  I have always held my head up and I have always felt that God had me there at that location, at that time for a purpose.  I have never been anywhere that I have not learned something new and am better off for it.  We have established friendships around the world that started out as two strangers sitting at a table and ended with ‘please come to our house and stay with us as long as you’d like and be our guests’.  Friends that we still keep in touch with today!  God is good.
So, what’s troubling you Richard?  Well, as you know, there is a tremendous amount of racial unrest and exposed ignorance in our country and around the world right now.  The fact that there is systemic racism in every part of our country is nothing new to me.  The fact that there is racism and prejudice in countries around the world is clear to me.  What is most troubling is that so many people I see are actually denying its existence.  People that I think would/should know better.  The fact that everyone is not speaking up in the face of injustice for ANY group of Americans is testing my faith.  Would God allow his children to sit idly by while evil rears its head among brothers and sisters?  Should I, as one of His children, stand up to evil?  Should I, as one of His children, love my brothers and sisters that perpetrate that evil upon me and people that look like me?  There is a saying that you should love the sinner but not the sin.  That takes a very strong person with a very strong faith.  I fear, that is a faith much stronger than mine.  Sometimes I’m OK with the counterpoint-of-view of shaking the dirt from my sandals and leaving those that harbor racist views toward peaceful, loving, good people of color in my rear-view mirror.  Another murder…. another killing …. another not guilty… another justifiable homicide… another ‘stand your ground’…  I’ve seen this all of my life.  It’s not new – but I thought the people I go to church with, the people I have known for many years, the people I care deeply about, would never stand for such events and would ALWAYS know that when racist acts prevail, we do not remain silent. It hurts deeply to know that this is not the case.  It’s sad to see that politics can so deeply distort human rights and justice into a liberal or conservative fighting point. 
I remember when my dad would take me to visit his friends that he grew up with.  They were all very old men.  I’d ask him if they were his teachers or some other elder.  He would tell me they were classmates and that most were actually younger than my dad!!  He explained to me that being black in this country takes a great toll on a person and ages you beyond your natural years.  That really makes sense to me now more than ever when we see who is most affected by COVID-19.  Life is hard both physically and mentally when you are constantly struggling with prejudice and racist conditions.
What most people don’t know about me is that I have five first cousins.  Debbie, Lamar, Leon, Timmy, and Michael.  As a military brat, between changes of station for my dad, we would make brief visits to my parents’ home town in Marietta, Georgia (right outside Atlanta).  I love my cousins.  They were pretty cool and all of them were older than me with Debbie being the oldest.  Of my five cousins all of the boys are dead.  One died of brain cancer.  3 were murdered.  All but one spent time in prison.  Debbie’s husband faced attempts made by people that tried to murder him – he is an aerospace engineer. My cousins all stayed right there in Marietta.  I think about my cousins.  There but for the grace of God go I… My dad took us with him on all of his military assignments (except two tours of Vietnam).  God is good.
Back to my faith… There is also a tremendously bright spot in my life these days. Many, but not all, of my friends and brothers and sisters at St. David’s actually want to learn more about my life and other people of color that have endured racism all of our lives.  As a black man, I have many stories of racist experiences that have impacted my life.  Those stories are not shared.  They are painful, they leave very nasty scars. They have created sleepless nights. But really, how do I sit at a restaurant with friends talking about the weather and the low carb diet and then bring up the story of how a truck load of ‘Bandidos’ (an outlaw gang in Texas) pulled up alongside of me and my wife.  We were on our motorcycle going 70 MPH on the freeway and they shouted racist things from the back of their truck and started throwing full cans of beer at our wheels and tried to lodge a can in my motorcycle chain drive so we would crash in the middle of high-speed traffic?  That’s not exactly a story that folks want to hear.  So, I never tell the many stories like that.  But now we have the Building Beloved Community racial reconciliation classes at St. David’s.  My heart soars. I feel seen. I feel heard. I no longer feel alone when I’m in the midst of people that want to be part of the solution.  I feel loved. I feel Christ.  Black Lives Matter.  I matter. WE matter equally and those brave souls taking the BBC class are doing their part to actually get us to the point where we REALLY DO matter equally.  God is good.  I’d like to say that my ‘Faithful Friday’ is a positive story about how strong my faith is but as I write this, I know that my faith wavers at times.  My faith is hidden at times. One thing I know… I may not have the strongest faith to keep God’s Peace in my heart when I hear of yet another murder based on the color of a person’s skin.  I may not have God’s Peace in my heart when I hear another ‘friend’ or politician proclaim to the world that racism no longer exists in this country. I may be struggling to find my faith at times but I always know that God sees me.  God hears me.  God loves me and that this is one of those points where two sets of footprints in the sand goes to just one set of footprints.  God is carrying me through this.

The past few months, the world is on another level that no one can understand. It is at the point where people are wondering if the world is coming to an end Politically, Economically, Geo-politically, just to name a few. People at times relate to every situation as the end times. My faith in God is just believing that all bad times do not mean the end of the world.
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Since the death of George Floyd in Minnesota the world has taken another turn. Police officers around the country are between a thin line of trust with citizens. During the recent protests around the country, including Washington, DC where I serve as a police officer in the Rapid Respond Unit, I saw things that were very unpleasant, however with orders and commands we had to execute our duties. I was asked by family members and friends, “How you do it?” My answer to many is FAITH and just believing in God, applying my conscience, work ethic and training. Faith is key in every aspect, be it a Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Buddhist, etc. We wake up each day looking at the bright light of the rising sunshine and say “YES, thank you LORD.” It is not just ourselves, it is a supreme being at work, and it is by faith we are able to utter those words or phrases. As stated earlier, since the death of George Floyd, my faith and work have been tested in so many ways. I had my work schedules shifted rapidly, with extremely long hours, because of the ongoing situation in the country regarding racial inequality and police treatment towards certain racial groups in America.

On July 12th when I reported to work that afternoon, few of my colleagues and I were told that one of our officers was showing symptoms of COVID-19. We were separated from the rest of the other officers and told to go home and quarantine. On July 13th I couldn’t wake from my bed. I was sweating, high fever up to 103 degrees, extreme body pain, headache, diarrhea, chills, everything was just very extreme. I’ve never experienced anything of this kind. I instantly felt and told my wife, I think I have the virus. I was in close contact with my colleague who later that Sunday before we were sent home had tested positive for COVID-19. Annette said, “Trust God; you do not have COVID-19.” I was like, “Okay, I know how I feel, and this is not just about faith, it is about the reality of life, the science is real, COVID-19 is real.” I was in isolation and started taking lots of home remedies.

I called my isolation room my cell block (laugh). I was very sick and many days and nights I thought that was it, but I kept the faith knowing that I’ve survived a war in Liberia, made it to America, served as a police officer in one of the best and also one of the busiest cities in America. I was not ready to give up on life and my faith played a very important role. I am blessed. I received my test results 5 days later and it was positive. I knew I had COVID-19 but I was broken. I have read many other stories of how COVID-19 treats people differently, which was my fear, but I also had faith. However, faith comes with work and believing, so I had to trust and go with the power staying strong and keeping faith alive.
I started to feel a little better but went downhill after a week. I went to the ER where I was admitted. I was not put on a ventilator but given some medicines, some breathing assistance and airways machine and kept for few days for monitoring.

With all that is going on in the world, especially in America, faith is important. Faith comes with one’s own belief and how we hold on to faith is to be left up to us. My faith is helping me through my ongoing recovery but sometimes I wonder about the other people that died. I cannot question others on their faith, but only pray that their souls rest in peace.
As I am going through a full recovery from Covid-19, I thank God for his many blessings and countless love towards me and my wife Annette who dearly took care of me during these times, my family, friends, work colleagues, my St. David’s family and many others including Sister Maureen Carey who reached to me with prayers and hope and trusting God. She also shared her experience with me regarding son who had Covid-19.

It is my prayers that we see the reality of COVID-19 and many other world problems as real. I was very close to death however God got me here for a reason and I plan to keep of going with having faith in our almighty father. We should trust God but also take actions that good see fit to do God’s will and not stay under the disguise of being a Christian and don’t act against wrong. God give us the knowledge, wisdom and understanding of love to keep his work going to all corners of the earth through faith but we need to see that speaking the truth that also comes faith and God’s love to protect us will only be granted if the truth from our hearts are real in what we believe in and do for the betterment of mankind. Have faith but also use his wisdom which is teachable us all his children.

Amen

​Church is meant to be a place where we experience the loving and healing presence of God through members of the mystical Body of Christ coming together in this time and space. But it can also be a place where people take God’s name in vain to wound each other through exclusion and abuse of authority. I have experienced both, and it has taught me how critically important it is to find a good church family, and to be the kind of church member who shares the love of God with everyone we encounter.
 
My parents were both deeply wounded by family circumstances in their childhoods, and each in their late teens thought they could fix their worlds by being part of the “right” church. Then they met while working summer jobs at a televangelist’s conference center, and got married the next summer. When I came along, they turned to the advice of Dr. James Dobson for “Christian parenting,” which told them to break my “sinful will” even as an infant by ignoring my cries and desires, and using corporal punishment if I didn’t immediately obey them in everything. This didn’t teach me to respect authority, only fear it, and it prevented me from having normal early childhood bonding with my parents. It’s fair to say I was born into toxic religion.
 
And yet, at the same time I was reborn into the universal Christian family that contains so much more love and grace than my parents were able to give. I was baptized when I was two weeks old and have gone to church nearly every Sunday (and sometimes daily!) for the rest of my life—at least until the pandemic hit. I started going to Christian school for preschool and continued all the way through college. On Sundays and at school, I often heard that God loves me, and I never had any doubt this was true. No matter how lonely and sad I felt, I could retreat into my own heart at any time and any place and talk to my Heavenly Father, and feel some measure of peace and love when I did that. I am very grateful to the church members who taught me about God’s love and prayer.
 
Even though my childhood church environment wasn’t toxic, I was always hungry for something more. Though the churches my family attended were always Presbyterian/Reformed, for educational reasons I had gone to Catholic school for 4th-5th grades and then Lutheran school for 6th-8th, so I had learned a lot about the variations in theology and worship in the Christian family by the time I entered my teens. Though everywhere I went I heard preaching about the love of God, and about how we were supposed to love each other as brothers and sisters in Christ, I never felt like I really fit in anywhere. In retrospect, I think a lot of this had to do with me being expected to be friends with other girls and share their interests, but that wasn’t me. Nobody had the language to understand or support kids who were nonbinary or gender-nonconforming in the 1980s, and honestly, most of the churches I went to then still wouldn’t be affirming now. But I couldn’t see the issue clearly then, so I spent my teens sampling as many different churches as I could, hoping to find the “right” combination of theology and worship style and fellowship that would satisfy my hunger for belonging. I always felt fed with just enough Jesus to keep going, but never enough to find healing.
 
Around the time I graduated from college, I got around to sampling Catholicism from a more mature perspective. I was drawn to the sacramental theology and the liturgy focused on the Word of God and Eucharist. It also felt like a very stable rock to stand on at a time in my life when my parents’ marriage was breaking up, and I was building a new life for myself as a young adult in the DC area, far from any of my former friends and classmates, who mostly stayed in the Midwest. So I went through the Rite of Catholic Initiation for Adults and became a Catholic when I was 21. I soon realized that the fellowship and belonging I wanted so dearly was practically non-existent in every Catholic parish I tried. But I consoled myself with the conviction that I had the Real Presence of Jesus every time I went to Mass, no matter how little I felt like the parishioners were being the Body of Christ to each other.
 
Over time, my experiences with local Catholic churches turned from merely disappointing to toxic. Poor marriage preparation and false promises about what I should do to have a happy and holy family life did incalculable damage to my intimate relationships. A beloved choir director was fired for giving a favorable quote about women’s ordination in a Washington Post article. It was suggested that I was damaging my children, and not following God’s will or trusting Him enough, because I worked outside the home when they were small. A women’s study group regularly devolved into off-topic bashing of homosexuals. A priest frequently gave homilies containing partisan or racist comments. Another priest bragged about having children visualize Hell in their religious education classes, and yet another told them that wanting to eat candy when they are instructed not to is a temptation from the Devil. I kept speaking out on social media about what I perceived as abuse of authority, and trying other Catholic parishes where I could pray peacefully without being infuriated by the homilies. A local man who is a prominent Catholic writer started stalking me with fake accounts on social media, and then in person to each new parish I fled to. It was too much. If a church isn’t a safe place for me or my children to be and learn about God, that can’t possibly be where Jesus wants me to go to spend quality time with Him.
 
So one weekend early this year, I decided to check out a local Episcopal church. I chose St. David’s 11:00 am traditional service because I figured it would be the closest to the liturgy I was accustomed to and still loved. As soon as I walked in the door, I was warmly greeted and invited to sit next to the head of the Welcome Committee. Perfect strangers walked over and hugged me at the Sign of Peace. For the first time in my life, I witnessed a woman baptize a baby, with such warmth and joy to welcome a new child into God’s family! I was invited to receive Communion without any conditions about where I was a “member,” or whether I had a particular theological understanding of the Eucharist, or whether I was holy enough. After the service ended, I had a chance to talk with several people about different ministries and activities in the church, and got the impression that the members of St. David’s have a strong sense of ownership of their church, as well as inclusion. I was definitely coming back, and hoped to bring my family too.
 
My kids were reluctant to try something new and come with me yet, and unfortunately the pandemic closed the physical doors of the church a few weeks later. But the St. David’s community has stayed very much open, and continued to share the light of Christ even more broadly. My kids enjoy watching the Sunday services on Facebook Live with me, and I’ve continued to get to know people through the Zoom “Coffee Hours” afterwards. I’ve also participated in a book discussion group and Becoming Beloved Community through Zoom, sharing spiritually nourishing and vulnerable conversations with dozens of people in the St. David’s community over the past several months. Though I miss the Eucharist, I am fed richly by knowing that, when it is safe to return, we can celebrate St. David’s having continued to be the Body of Christ—as best as we can as imperfect but loved people—all along.

​Each faith journey begins with a particular people in a particular place and leads where our questions guide us. I come from a people who were conservative and steeped in American evangelicalism. But I come from a place where conservatism and evangelicalism were not the norm. So, questions of who God is, how God shows up in the world and how we should join in God's work have guided my journey. And that journey brought me to St. David's in the summer of 2018.
In my childhood we were members of a Bible Church, which is like being a Southern Baptist from New Jersey. We were conservative evangelicals living in the 'burbs of New York City. Most of the kids in my school and neighborhood were either Jewish or Catholic. So, when religion came up and they asked, "What are you," I didn't have an answer that fit their categories. "I'm a Christian," I would say, hoping this would answer them. It didn't.
Church was the central organizer for my early life. Each week we went to Sunday school and Sunday morning service, then headed home for supper which was usually preceded by a chorus:
"Thank you, Lord for saving my soul. Thank you, Lord for making me whole. Thank you, Lord for giving to me, thy great salvation so rich and free."
After supper we read the funnies and goofed around. TV was forbidden on the Lord’s day. Then it was back to church for the Sunday evening gathering, which was my favorite of all the events in the church week. That was the night we spent the whole service singing.
Sunday evening was way better than Wednesday night prayer meeting. That was always boring to me as a kid, at least until I figured out about girls. The rest of the week was filled with Friday night youth group, Thursday night church league volleyball during the summer, and the occasional Saturday night movie about the end times shown on a large sheet in the church parking lot.
Most of us who grew up evangelical in the 1970s watched the end times movie, A Thief in the Night. The basic premise is this: Jesus returns, and those who have been saved are taken to heaven while those who have not asked Jesus into their hearts are left behind to face a time of tribulation.
Now, imagine being ten years old and having watched this movie three times in the past few months. You return from the beach and expect your mom to be at home as promised, but she is not there. Suddenly the lyrics of a song begin to play in your mind: “Life was filled with guns and war, and everyone got trampled on the floor, I wish we’d all been ready.” You are sure you’ve been left behind.
At college I majored in biblical studies and communications, believing that I needed to learn how to defend my view of God, a view I believed was the only correct one. In addition to my studies, I was given the task of preaching at open air rallies and telling people why they should ask Jesus into their hearts. I also began traveling with a singing quartet to churches throughout New England; they would sing, then I would preach the good news which, in this case, was that the listeners needed either to get saved or face eternal damnation and separation from God in the fires of hell.
I entered college expecting that my training would lead me into ministry at a church. Instead it led to me to the field of politics. I spent much of my twenties traveling throughout Virginia and other Southern states working to get individuals elected at the state and federal level. I believed that if I could get the right people in office, they would win America back for God. They didn’t.
At 30 years old I left politics and entered my desert years. I had staked my identity on the belief that my role in this world was to convince people, even compel them, to accept my view of God. That desire had led me down a path of sowing seeds of discord, some of which became the weeds that currently crowd out our conversations about reconciliation. I began to wonder: What if the answer is peace, not power? What if God was up to something I had not yet seen? And what if the way to point people to God is not proclaiming the truth or garnering political strength, but it is living in the way of Jesus?
A major milestone during those years was reading a book by a former missionary named Lesslie Newbigin. One of his big ideas was that the good news of Jesus was constantly being interpreted by the actions of the Church. This blew my mind. If truth didn’t stand on its own, then belief, including belief in God, couldn’t stand outside of the actions of those who professed belief in God.
I found myself asking questions I had previously assigned to the unorthodox and the troublemakers. I also found other good troublemakers on similar journeys of exploration. These new companions were forming intentional communities that sought to demonstrate what the Sermon on the Mount and the discipleship of Christ could look like in the middle of the hard work of creating community. At 40 years old, I sold my house in the suburbs of Baltimore and moved my family into an intentional community in Lexington, KY.
If my faith journey were a made-for-TV story, the next chapter would be the part where everything was perfect, and I finally found my rest. But like all true stories, the next chapter is more complex. I learned so much about myself from my time in intentional community, including the fact that my need for certainty was keeping me from experiencing God. I also sensed that my tradition – white American evangelicalism – may have blinded me to some things God had been up to, things that would require me to take a much longer view on my faith.
That longer view is what led me to the Episcopal Church. After being a part of that intentional community for 8 years, I turned to what was literally my neighborhood parish, Good Shepherd, in Lexington, KY. It was around the corner from my house. What I found there was a deep sense of community rooted in the much larger history of the Church.
Two years ago, my wife and I relocated to Ashburn. We didn’t choose this area randomly. It was close to our work and friends. St. David’s also factored into our decision about where to live. We visited with friends and fell in love with the church. When we decided where to live, we purposely found a location five minutes’ drive from St. David’s.
I hope and pray that my journey is not complete and that I have many more paths to travel. What I have learned most clearly in my faith journey is that we all come from a people and a place, but, by God’s grace, we can choose the people and place where we feel God at work, and where we believe we can demonstrate the way of Jesus. For me, that is St. David’s.