Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Empathy Mining

Home
Progressive Christian
Born in Simpler Times

Born in Simpler Times

Last updated on: March 8, 2020 at 3:04 pm by Shane Phipps

Born in Simpler Times 2020-03-08T15:04:07-04:00 Shane Phipps

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Born in Simpler Times

March 16, 1967:

That’s when I became a U.S. citizen.

I didn’t enter the country after a long ocean voyage.

I entered after a short trip through a birth canal.

That makes me special.

That means I didn’t have to do anything to earn my freedoms here.

They are my birthright because I won a race to an egg that happened to be inside an American woman.

But it’s more than that.

In winning that race, I also won a lottery.

That American woman, and the American man from whose loins I left the starting line, were both white and middle class.

That meant that I had the privilege of never having to fight for freedom from the color of my skin.

I’ve heard it said that I grew up in simpler times.

It often feels that way when I look back.

But I’ve come to realize that those times were only simple because I won that race and the lottery that accompanied it.

The kind of freedom I inherited is the freedom of being insulated from the harsher realities of the world; the freedom of growing up in a bubble.

I grew up in a small, white bread town in the rusty buckle of the Bible Belt.

Everywhere I looked I saw people who looked like me, lived in similar houses, went to similar churches, and held a similar world view.

We had our problems because life isn’t perfect, but our problems came despite who we were, not because of it.

And because we were who we were, living where we lived, working where we worked, worshiping where we worshiped, and learning what we learned, it felt like the whole world must be like us.

What else were we to think?

We were taught that our nation was pious; that to be an American was to be patriotic; that the growing problems of our country were the result of too many ingrates asking too many questions about too many things.

They should shut up and be proud.

Our nation was better off, we were told, in the era that preceded ours; back when America was a well-oiled machine keeping the world safe for Democracy.

We had a way of shutting up question-askers back then.

Democracy is wonderful if you’ll just fall in line.

Stand for the pledge.

Stand for the anthem.

Stand up, stand up for Jesus.

Step up when Uncle Sam calls your number.

Step out and kill those who don’t want freedom like ours.

Stand up or get out.

March 16th, 1968:

My first birthday party.

I was smeared with cake from head to toe.

People were bringing me gifts.

People were singing me songs.

I didn’t have a clue why.

I was just basking in my unearned freedoms.

On that very same day in “Pinkville,” the Quang Ngai Province of South Vietnam, in the tiny Hamlet of My Lai,

there were other one-year-olds and infants and toddlers and teens and parents and grandparents.

They were smeared with blood from head to toe.

Charlie Company had brought them guns and grenades and flame throwers.

Hundreds were massacred.

They had no clue why.

They had won their race to the egg, too, but they had lost the lottery.

Charlie Company were following orders:

“If it’s growing, cut it down,

if it’s a building, burn it to the ground,

if it is a well, poison it,

if it is alive, kill it.”

And so it went.

Back in paradise, my party went on uninterrupted.

Nobody ever marched into our hamlet.

We had won the lottery.

We were protected by our freedom; insulated from the harsher realities of the world.

We were living in our simpler times.

April 4, 1968:

Less than three weeks after my first birthday party, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was gunned down.

He, too, had won his race to the egg.

He, too, exited the birth canal as an American citizen.

But he didn’t win the lottery; his skin was dark brown.

He spent a lifetime in the same country I did.

He grew up in that era when our nation was better off, we were told, but he didn’t have the birthright of whiteness.

So he became a question-asker.

America knows how to shut up question-askers.

Fall in line, or get out, or die.

Ah, but those were simpler times.

Multiple Perspectives

Previous Post

March 5, 2020

We are a nation of cannibals: What changed?

Next Post

March 13, 2020 The Age of Trump has Prepared Us Well for Social Distancing

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category 150 word story 2nd Amendment AARP abortion addiction aging alcoholism Anderson Wigwam Andrew Jackson Appalachia Basketball bias bigotry Black Lives Matter Christianity Christmas, Constitution, Bill of Rights Civil War Clinton cloning confirmation bias Conservation Constitution Controversial Creationism Creepy tales David Bowie depression Dogs Education Election Electoral College Empathy Environmental Evolution exvangelical faith Family Family History Fantasy Genealogy Genesis George Washington Ghetto Global Warming Gun Control health care High School Basketball Hillary History Hockey homosexuality Hoosier Hysteria Hoosiers Hunting immigration income inequality Interview ISTEP Jurassic Park Kaepernick Ken Hamm Kids say the Darndest things LGBTQ Love MAGA Manifest Destiny Merit Pay Mike Pence Muhammad Ali Multiple Perspectives Music Music Review Nashville News media NHL No Child Left Behind NRA Paradox Parenting Pence Perspective Politics POTUS Poverty Predators Race Religion religious freedom Sci Fi Science Secret of Life sexual harrassment Short Stories Slavery Small Town Indiana Smashville Social Commentary social media sports Stress technology Terrorism Thomas Jefferson Trauma Trump Turning 50 Uncategorized war Washington DC White Privilege wooly mammoths words in red Writing Writing Process Writing, Writing Process Young Earth

Select a Month June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 August 2021 May 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not ____ it.

Select your answer to see how you score.

Accepted Understood Comprehended Extinguished

Support this
Column