Who are your people?

​Emmanuel Episcopal Church, Greenwood, Virginia
Trinity Sunday
June 7, 2020
The Rev. John Taliaferro Thomas
 
Who are your people? 
 
That is an old game we play throughout the South to find out that, basically, we are all related -- or if not, to discover that we know someone who is related to someone related to us.  The game is particularly popular in Virginia.  I enjoy the game. 
 
My first name is John.  The family gets it from John Marshall, the first chief justice of the Supreme Court.  He is my fifth great grandfather.  My middle name is Taliaferro, spelled like it is should be talia-pharoah.  That is an old Virginia name, going back to Williamsburg and all that.  On the Thomas side, we have lots of ancestors who were around in the mid 1700s in America.  We still have a small family farm, 20 miles northeast of Richmond called Chestnut Grove where a modest house was built in 1759.  The land came from a grant from the British Crown.
 
Both sides of the family have well researched genealogies and we have a fascinating heritage.  We also have a problematic heritage.  Marshall was the great legal architect of judicial review.  He spoke out against slavery, but he owned slaves for most of his life.  Chestnut Grove had slaves too.  We know this because there are family references an old slave burying ground on the property, but we have no idea where it is because there were no permanent markers or fences. 
 
To be able to know about my family, and to be able to know about my family’s history and connection to the early republic is it own brand of privilege.  In contrast, relatives of African slaves who served some of my relatives were bought and sold as property.  They are not afforded the opportunity to trace their lineage as they were given names of their master’s choosing.  They were split up as a matter of convenience and economy.  There are plenty of African American Taliaferros and Marshalls.  In fact, the African American educator and activist, Booker T. Washington, and I share the same middle name.
 
I believe it important to acknowledge and explore the whole of history.  As a baptized Christian and priest, I believe that confession and contrition are essential elements of living my faith.  I cannot go back and fix what was done, but I can speak, act, and work to see that the sin of racism is not perpetuated.
 
George Floyd’s televised death brings so much pain to the surface.  While there is always more to every story, what we witnessed is horrific and provides yet one more example injustice and inequality for black Americans.  So many of the protestors have insisted that we say the name: George Floyd.  We do this to acknowledge his humanity, to see him as one with a family, and to appreciate the personal tragedy.
 
I learned something about the significance of the name George this week.  The wealthy white American engineer and industrialist, named George Pullman, invented the railroad sleeper car.  What became known as the Pullman car made it possible and comfortable for wealthy whites to travel across the country to expand business and social connections.
 
To serve as stewards, servers, and cleaners of his train cars, Pullman hired newly freed slaves, paying them very low wages and requiring them to work long hours with no real breaks.  Passengers on Pullman trains were told that whatever they needed, all they had to do was ask George to assist them.  Every black man working on the train was called George.  They were seen as interchangeable. Passengers did not need to learn their names or tell them apart, because, simply, George was there to serve.  Their struggle was chronicled in a 2002 movie called 10,000 Black Men Named George.
 
To speak the names of black men and women who have suffered oppression and injustice is just one part of the work that needs to be done.  To acknowledge one’s name connects us to our unique identity as children of God.  When we welcome new Christians we speak their name, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  And we make the sign of the cross on their forehead, saying their name and saying “you are sealed by the Holy Spirit in baptism, and marked as Christ’s own forever.” 
 
That Trinitarian formula is as ancient as the rite itself.  And as today is so designated as Trinity Sunday, it is most poignant to reflect on what that means.  While it may be mysterious and befuddling to explain, the doctrine of the trinity holds that the three persons of the trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, are coequal and coeternal.  How all of them are related, and how they interact as one in three, and three in one, is the stuff of volumes of theology.  It is no wonder that rectors of parishes with associates or seminarians ask them to preach on this day.
 
What interests me in this time and place today is that the different expressions of the divine are all called “persons.”  The Creator, the Redeemer, and Holy Spirit are all persons of the One God.  The takeaway here is that our belonging in God is personal.  We do not have a removed sky god with little demi gods as earthly agents.  We belong to One who relates and acts personally.  When Jesus is about to ascend to heaven, he tells them to make disciples of all nations in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  He says all nations - not just you and your people - but all of God’s people - of all sorts, types, conditions, and colors.  It’s personal.
 
According to our baptism, our faith, and Jesus’ command, our people are all people.  It is nice to know to whom we are related in the vastness of the family tree.  It helps us connect and understand.  Nevertheless, we also ought to tell our story whole.  We may have a family tree, but we dwell in a family forest.  We are all connected and we are all created through God’s love.
 
Who are my people?
Emory, Fran, Janice, Sam, Emily, Emory Junior, Laura, Julia, and Marshall. 
 
But really, who are my people?  All of us: black and white, fathers and mothers, sons and daughters, protestors and police officers.  We are each other’s people, gathered in the persons of God.  As we seek to love and serve God, we must ground ourselves in honoring, respecting, and upholding the dignity of every human being.  Every. Single. One.  That is our faith.  And it is personal.  Amen.