Gracism in Georgia

It was a beautiful service Sunday at North Decatur United Methodist Church. A baby girl, backed by a huge entourage of family and friends, was baptized. A beaming Pastor Dalton Rushing tenderly carried her up and down the aisles as the whole congregation sang a sweet lullaby to her:

Caroline, Caroline, God claims you, God helps you, protects you, and loves you too.
We this day do all agree a child of God you'll always be. 
Caroline, Caroline, God claims you, God helps you, protects you, and loves you too.
We your family love you so, we vow to help your faith to grow.
Caroline, Caroline, God claims you, God helps you, protects you, and loves you too.
We are here to say this day that we will help you on your way.
Caroline, Caroline, God claims you, God helps you, protects you, and loves you too.
And if you should tire or cry, then we will sing this lullaby.
Caroline, Caroline, God claims you, God helps you, protects you, and loves you too.

I'm new to the Methodist tradition, so I don't know if this is standard baptism procedure. Regardless, it was beautiful and touching.

After the service ended, I walked through the narthex to say hello to the pastor in the open doorway before heading home. Dalton said he had a book for me and asked me to wait a few minutes while he finished greeting folks, so I stepped out onto the church's large concrete porch in the autumn warmth.

A tall, well-presented young man was standing just behind and to Dalton's left on the porch. The young man immediately greeted me with a firm handshake and a smile and introduced himself as George. He was clean-shaven, had a conservative but attractive haircut under a navy blue ball cap, and flashed a set of perfectly straight, perfectly white teeth. He was impressive. I guessed he was in his early 20s.

We exchanged polite small talk as people continued to file out of the church. Because I am new to this church and still haven't met many people, I asked George if he attended there regularly.

"No sir," he responded earnestly. "Actually, I'm homeless and I was waiting right over there for the bus, but I needed to use the bathroom so I came into the church."

I tried not to look as stunned as I felt as he continued his matter-of-fact description of his day so far:


"I got fed!" (George happened to show up on the day the church was having a pancake breakfast fundraiser.) "The pastor and everyone else were so nice, I stayed for the service. It was a really good sermon. Really good."

Just then another man, a bit older than me, stepped out and joined our little conversation. I had never seen him before; he may have been on Caroline's extensive guest list, or not.

The man extended his hand and greeted me with words to the effect of, "How ya doin', buddy?"  He then dropped his hand to his side, looked George up and down and greeted him with a single word that left me even more stunned than I already had been:

"Boy."

Did I mention that George was black? Do I have to mention that this other man was white? Even though this is the Deep South and I am well aware that racism is very much alive, I could not believe that in 2013 I had just heard a white man call a black adult "boy" as if it were his name. 

George smiled politely and extended his hand to the man. "Nice to meet you, sir. My name is George." The older man engaged in what appeared to be a reluctant finger-pinch. He may have realized his faux pas, because next he tried to find conversational common ground.

"Say, did you see that Georgia Tech-Georgia game last night? Boy, that was somethin', I tell ya."

"No, sir, I wasn't able to catch that," George replied. "Was it good?"

"I tell yew, Georgia has this running back -- can't think of his name -- he busted right through that line. They couldn't stop him. He just plowed right through there into the end zone. Colored fella. But them other guys seemed to love him like he was one of them."

I glanced around for signs of hidden cameras, expecting the "What Would You Do?" crew to pop out from behind a tree at any moment. People were still greeting the pastor, so no one else had heard any of this.

As I continued to calculate when would be the best moment to cut this man off and what would be the best way to do it, he changed the subject and went into a long ramble about being an ol' country boy and having to get up at 4:30 in the morning to feed the chickens and Mama makin' breakfast two hours later and on and on somewhat incoherently.

I was finally beginning to catch up with George. This guy was a few eggs shy of a dozen. Dementia, perhaps. While I was working up my outrage and indignation, George was practicing grace and compassion.  

Dalton finally got done greeting people, turned and invited me and George to meet him down at his office, where he had the book for me and some "food for the road" for George.

"Well, I guess I better git goin'," the man said with a satisfied smile.

And then George astonished me further.

"It was nice meeting you," he gently -- and genuinely -- told the man. "Thank you for that story."

Yes, Dalton delivered a really good sermon Sunday. But George's was better.