The following is a guest post by Leslie Benfield, the Medical/Surgical Unit Chaplain at Mercy Medical Center.
After completing her B.A. in Government & Politics from the University of Maryland, Benfield taught English as a Second Language to international students from Africa, Asia, and the Middle East. Her involvement in campus ministry led her to work and pursue a missionary calling in South Korea, where she supported the cause of social justice for the poor and disenfranchised. After graduating from Alliance Theological Seminary with her MDiv, Benfield worked in the red light district of Kolkata, India, helping women who had escaped the sex trade.
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As the Medical/Surgical Unit Chaplain at Mercy Medical Center, I have the privilege of hearing dozens of stories every day from very diverse groups of people. Although I love what I do, often people question why I do it. The questions go something like this: “Isn’t it hard to be an Evangelical minister if you cannot proselytize?” or “Isn’t it hard to listen to all those sad stories?” To me the questions coalesce, and the answer to both is a resounding “No.” No, because the good news of Christ is love and love can heal pain. No, because to walk with another along their journey of life, even though painful, is mutually healing.
Since age 18, I have enjoyed growing in understanding of Jesus Christ and what it means to be a minister of the gospel. That journey began with the pain of loss. At the age of 16, my father died unexpectedly— he was murdered—forcing me to grow up fast. Left grieving, scared, and searching for answers, I wrestled with question of justice and love in the face of loss. It was that search that led me to faith and to my current profession.
I found community on the campus at Maryland University with a group of peers in Maryland Christian Fellowship. They helped me to recognize the value of spiritual and emotional suffering as an avenue to unifying community, deepening faith, and fostering resilience. They did so by living the gospel as explained in 1 John 3:16-18, “We know what real love is because Jesus gave up his life for us. So we also ought to give up our lives for our brothers and sisters. If someone has enough money to live well and sees his brother in need yet shows no compassion-how can God’s love be in that person. Dear children, let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions.” I learned to view this basic tenant of Christian faith as paramount to how I live out my faith and work, even in chaplaincy.
So when the ICJS’ Imagining Justice in Baltimore Community Conversations began, I eagerly awaited opportunities to meet people striving for social justice in practical ways. What I discovered exceeded my expectations. First, I found they were also motivated by suffering. Second, I discovered the complexity of injustice. I also experienced a degree of healing for wounds of injustice. Lastly, I acquired the knowledge of historically effective tools used in three Abrahamic religious traditions to bring about positive change in society.
At the first community group meeting, each member talked about what he/she deemed sacred. Members ranging in age from 18 to 70+, from various ethnic groups, diverse life experiences, and religious traditions each told stories of how their understanding of what is sacred formed in adversity. Each noted how losses, pain, and tragedy helped uncover what really mattered in life, i.e. what was sacred. It meant, for every one of us, finding hope or becoming a source hope in the midst of personal tragedy or public crisis. For me it meant applying what I had learned about God and His provision after my father’s death to caring for myself, the sick, homeless, and marginalized in my community. Many noted how their experiences, like mine, deepened their faith in God and their ability to contribute to the betterment of other’s lives.
The second community meeting revealed the first layer of injustice and tools found within the Jewish tradition to address it. After learning about Rabbi Abraham Joshua Herschel’s life and work, members discussed the impact of the ‘sin’ of structural racism and importance of using agency to deconstruct it. Although initially unfamiliar, as we unpacked concepts of white privilege and its tragic impact on American society reflected in the school to prison pipeline, racial wealth divide, and healthcare disparities, many acknowledged how racism has become such an integral aspect of the American cultural fabric. Members of my group who had once rarely thought about the role they play in perpetuating injustice began discussing ways in which we could stop tacitly endorsing structural racism. Thanks to this discussion, many of the Caucasian members of my group gained insight into how to deal with what Herschel labelled ‘a bad conscience.’ And I, as an Afro Caribbean-American, realized how I can proactively leverage privilege to use my voice to educate and improve my community.
The next group addressing economic injustice occurred ironically right after the results of the 2016 election aired. Thankfully the ICJS scholars had the foresight to provide time for the group to process the shocking election results and its impact on economic injustice. Not surprisingly, everyone at the table, Muslim, Christian and Jewish alike, spoke about their fear that the new administration marked a major setback in the fight for restorative economic justice in America.
As each spoke about how our diverse traditions addressed economic injustice and the common sense of grief we felt, we found solace in the fact that we still had ample resources to heal the wounds of economic injustice. Material from podcasts, lectures, and readings about the work of Dorothy Day allowed us to critically examine and deconstruct phrases like the ‘undeserving/deserving poor.’ What we found were unsupported stereotypes that had prevented us from seeing the poor as human putting up walls between those who struggle and those who can help catalyze change.
Dorothy Day’s work challenged the norm of demoralizing the poor by making clear the moral obligation of those with ample resources to care for them. Her work reminded me of the importance of living with the understanding that when “the health of one member [of society] suffers, the health of the whole body is lowered[Office1] .” (Hinson-Hasty, Elizabeth L. Dorothy Day for armchair theologians. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2014.) Now I readily take more opportunities to challenge those who perpetuate such false ideologies in my arena of influence, and I seek opportunities to make a lasting impact.
The last meeting brought to the fore the problem of gender inequality’s impact on families. As we discussed Amina Wadud’s work, members of the group were hard pressed to point to theology which empowered women or spoke out against gender discrimination. Even though biblical treatment of Jesus shows him interacting with women in a very counterculture manner as free-willed individuals, Protestant Christianity often turns a blind eye to gender injustice. Of course, Catholicism’s veneration of Jesus’ mother Mary has made room for great women like Mother Teresa at the table. However, both lack a well-developed pro-female theology. Wadud’s book, Inside the Gender Jihad, forced me to consider, as a female minister, how to engage others in developing a theology of women towards eradicating injustices which target women in a way that negatively impacts family.
There is still much work left to do to establish a more just society. As a female Christian minister, I am called to participate in God’s work of defending those who suffer at society’s margins. That means using all resources at my disposal and enlisting all who are willing to join me in doing so. Thanks to my participation in ICJS’s Imagining Justice in Baltimore, I have a few more tools in my belt, knowledge at my disposal, and have gained additional co-laborers in answering the call for greater justice in the city.
The city of Baltimore is part of a national conversation around questions of justice, race and community. At this pivotal moment in our city’s history, indeed our nation’s history, the Institute for Islamic, Christian, and Jewish Studies highlights the continued importance of bringing diverse religious perspectives to address civic and social challenges. In the initiative Imagining Justice in Baltimore the ICJS will contribute the perspectives of local Jews, Christians and Muslims to the public conversation about justice, and injustice, in Baltimore. Each contributor represents her or his own opinion. We welcome this diversity of perspective and are not seeking a single definition of justice between traditions, nor denying the multivocal nature of justice within traditions. The long-term goal of the Imagining Justice in Baltimore initiative is to create a model of interreligious learning and dialogue around differences that demonstrates how a robust commitment to religious pluralism can shape public life.