Learning to Bring Our Whole Selves: Nurturing Holistic Healing in Biblically Based Race Education
When I only engaged my mind, I was limiting my own and others’ healing.
by Megan Lietz, Director, Race & Christian Community Initiative (RCCI)
This is the second article of a three-part series on critical lessons RCCI is learning in its first five years of ministry. RCCI focuses on providing biblically based education to white evangelicals to nurture racial healing and justice.
"I can't let you present like that again." That's what my supervisor at the time, Nika Elugardo, told me right after I gave one of my first presentations at the Emmanuel Gospel Center. I had shared on power dynamics in multiracial congregations, a topic I wrote about for my master's thesis while serving as a research fellow at EGC.
Nika's comment blindsided me. Walking back to my seat, I felt good. I had shared how white culture can unduly influence multiracial congregations and challenged people to consider how their congregational culture may uphold barriers to authentic community.
I soon learned that it wasn't what I had presented that was the problem; it was how. I had offered a presentation with all the correct data, cited my sources, and delivered it like I'd been trained. But somehow, in the process, I had forgotten that I was speaking to whole people. Not just minds. Not just degrees. But to people who needed to be nurtured with resources beyond my narrow academic toolkit.
In retrospect, I realize I had dishonored the whole people that God created these image bearers to be.
I hadn't asked them how they were doing, and I hadn't engaged them in reflection or given them time to process what I shared. There wasn't any dialogue. There wasn't creativity. There wasn't spiritual practice. There wasn't a shared experience other than me passing on information like they were minds in the chairs.
When I walked away from the podium, I felt my presentation had been a success. But over the last five years of ministry with the Race & Christian Community Initiative, I've come to define success differently. It's not only about engaging people's minds or having a polished presentation. It's about nurturing holistic transformation.
If you had asked me five years ago how to disciple people, my answer would not have reflected my practice. I would have thought it did — because I believed it. I'd written all the papers — and gotten A's. It was in my head, but it hadn't been worked into my approaches, postures, and experiences. For all the "right answers" I could give, I didn't know how to nurture transformation.
One thing I needed to learn in this journey was how to use more effective methods of adult education: I needed to treat everyone as valued collaborators and make more room for dialogue and application. Another growth area for me — which this article focuses on — was learning how to engage people in heart, mind, body, and spirit.
Pearl via Lightstock.
Learning the impact of whole-self discipleship
Piloting our first cohort was a great learning experience for me. I was catching on to what transformative learning really looked like and how to nurture it in practice. The cohort provided a space where I could test this out.
Some of the ways this showed up in the early days were opening with spiritual grounding practices (e.g., Scripture reading and prayer), centering our time on dialogue or shared experiences, and leaving plenty of time for self-reflection. As we leaned into this, the cohorts bore fruit.
Over time, I invited others to shape the curriculum. As I did, I learned intentional practices and tools to help people engage their whole selves.
“Like any sin, racism doesn’t infect only one part of us. It seeks to make its home in every part — and it will consume us if it can. ”
I was coming to see that racism wasn't something that could be addressed by appealing solely to one's head. It wasn't only about "right knowledge." If it were, perhaps racism would have already been eradicated. The fact of the matter is that the sin of racism impacts not only our minds, but also our hearts and bodies and spirits.
Like any sin, racism doesn't infect only one part of us. It seeks to make its home in every part — and it will consume us if it can.
As a result, we need to bring our whole selves into this work so we can experience holistic healing. If we only engage our minds, we miss the greater work we need the Lord to do in us and the personal healing necessary for healthy multiracial community.
Below, I share some of the ways I’ve brought my spirit, body, and emotions into the work of racial healing and justice and encourage you to think how you can do the same.
The deeper I go, the more I recognize my own need for healing. And the more I acknowledge my brokenness and invite Jesus to help me, the more I see his healing work in my life.
Laura Cruise via Lightstock.
Bringing my spirit into addressing racism
First and foremost, racism is a spiritual issue. I say this not to over-spiritualize the problem — a tactic that has been used to uphold injustice throughout history — but to suggest tools to make practical action more effective.
One of the tools I implemented early on was a monthly day of prayer and reflection for RCCI. I use this time in many ways, from praising God to seeking his direction for ministry. I often find myself sitting with the Lord and having him reveal how I've been marred by racism or need to grow to lead RCCI more effectively. As I invite the Lord to do this work, he speaks abundantly.
Especially in the early years, he imparted lessons I needed to learn to counter the sin of racism and the impact it had on my life. He reminded me of the value of relationships and community.¹ He helped me to abide in Christ, focus on being over doing, and strengthen my God-given identity. I learned to evaluate success by obedience to him versus the standards of this world.² Though these were lessons I had learned earlier on my Christian journey, he was bringing me to a deeper level: helping me shift from being a person who knew principles for reconciliation to becoming the person who he called me to be as the leader of RCCI.
He still reveals how my ways of seeing, thinking, doing, and being have been marred by racism. He does so through his Spirit, his people, and my experiences in the world.
Through the power of his love and grace, he is changing me, healing me, and helping me relate differently to the body of Christ.
“As white people, we like to think of ourselves as free agents, independent from the impact of history, socialization, and broken systems. But in seeing ourselves as such, we are underestimating the effect of sin and the freeing power of Jesus. ”
This growth isn't something I could have thought my way into, and it's not somewhere I could have gotten by just following my heart. This is fruit born from spiritual practices: prayer, worship, reflection, fellowship, Scripture reading, and soaking in the presence of God.
These spiritual practices — and engaging these practices with people whose cultures, worldviews, and experiences are different from my own — are helping me see the ways the sin of racism influences me. The way it has distorted my perception, my assumptions, my reactions — the ways it has me bound.
As white people, we like to think of ourselves as free agents, independent from the impact of history, socialization, and broken systems. But in seeing ourselves as such, we are underestimating the effect of sin and the freeing power of Jesus.
As I invite God's liberating power into my life, the Lord helps me become more aware and mindful of how racism impacts me. This awareness helps me better evaluate if I’m following God’s way or ways that feel right because of my socialization and cultural conditioning. For example, the Lord helped me see that many of my standards for what is good or excellent have been shaped by white dominant culture. These standards aren’t necessarily bad per se, but they took on an outsized role when I imbued them with a sense of goodness, righteousness, and normalcy. This role wasn’t because of their alignment with God’s will, but because of their broad acceptance and familiarity. I used these standards to judge myself and others, following what I thought was “good” without realizing that my moral judgment was being shaped less by God’s Word and more by my cultural conditioning. Jesus helped me become aware and mindful of this in ways that helped me follow him more freely.
These days, the Lord is not only showing me areas of my boundedness and discipling me into freedom, but giving me glimpses of what it looks like to do things differently. He is expanding my imagination and inviting me into new ways of "fixing" that don't uphold racial hierarchy but nurture the radical, creative, and redemptive work of Christ.
By bringing my spirit into this work, God is changing my values, postures, and ways of being. He is doing transformative work in me. And as he does, it gives me faith that he can nurture transformation in our sin-sick society.
Pearl via Lightstock.
Bringing my body into addressing racism
In the work of racial justice, my body helps me stay honest. It offers physical indicators of what's going on inside. The churning in my stomach, heat in my chest, trembling of my hands, and dull ache in my head reveal that, for as much work as I've done to show up well in certain spaces, I'm still experiencing anxiety, tension, and stress.
Let me clarify that, as a white woman, racism will never impact me the same way it affects the bodies of people of color. The physical manifestations of discomfort that I experience are nothing compared to the embodied generational trauma, the chronic stress that contributes to disparate health outcomes, or the daily violences that accost my brothers and sisters and dishonor the image of God.
That said, all bodies can offer indicators that testify to the cost of racism. All bodies need to take time to care for themselves if we are to be sustainable in the work of building shalom.
Eating healthy, sleeping well, exercising, and seeing a doctor or mental health professional can go a long way in caring for our bodies. Creating rhythms of rest, recreation, and celebration mirrors not only biblical examples, but also supports whole-self sustainability.
When I don’t do these things, I can be stressed, irritable, unproductive, too sensitive or not sensitive enough. I’m also more likely to act out of unhealthy defaults, emotions and brokenness instead of God’s truth and will for my life. When I do take time to care for myself, my whole ways of being with God, self, and others are healthier. God uses my self-care as a part of the long but faithful healing process made possible by Jesus Christ.
I used to think of caring for oneself as good, but now I've come to see it as necessary. While I know there are many obstacles to self-care, I now pursue them less as good things to do and more as acts of worship. Acts of worship that honor God and give life.
Bringing my emotions into addressing racism³
Of all the parts of myself that I've found most challenging to engage in, it has been my emotions. Feeling seems like such a simple thing. A natural thing. Something we all learn about at an early age. But I've found that my ability to feel around race-related issues has been distorted.
I don't mean my ability to care. I feel deeply called to engage God's redemptive work across racial lines. But that said, feeling passion is only the first step. And once you take that first step, discomfort will not be far behind. Persevering through that discomfort is a much more complex challenge many white people have to learn how to navigate over time. It's this that prepares us for the more challenging work — the ongoing work — of acknowledging our own brokenness, entering into the pain of others, and lamenting before the Lord.
“While engaging the mind is needed, doing so by itself is not enough. If we only engage our minds, we miss the deeper work the Lord wants to do in us and the deeper work that is needed for us to see healing in our communities.”
Though I'm an adult, I feel like sometimes I could learn from the books I read to my 3-year-old. We talk about being happy and sad and expressing these emotions. But I'm still working on allowing myself — even learning how — to feel the pain I see in the work of racial justice.
Not long ago, I met with a Black brother who had been deeply hurt by racism within a Christian community. I wasn't meeting to talk about this experience per se, but I could sense his deep pain and saw that it impacted how he showed up in our conversation. I remember getting off the call and feeling the weight of my brother's pain.
Part of me wanted to stop and lament right then and there. But another part of me felt obligated to move on to the next thing. I had a busy day.
I did take some time to pray. As I got back to my desk, I noticed how good my work was at distracting me from my emotions. It made me wonder how often I use my work to numb the pain.
I wonder how much — even when we think we care — we are so deep into generations of socialization that has functioned to numb our consciousness that we experience invisible obstacles to feeling at all.
But by the grace of God, I notice this temptation in myself and ask the Lord to help me. At this point in my journey, I'm just working on allowing myself to feel. As I do, the Lord calls me more and more into lament, which draws me closer to him, his healing power, and his community.
Prixel Creative via Lightstock.
As I engage my emotions, I’ve taken steps toward restoring my humanity: toward feeling, towards grieving, towards doing these things that are a part of the human experience and help connect people in their humanity. As I engage my body, I feel the cost of racism and learn how to care for myself in sustainable ways. As I engage my spirit, it makes all the difference, and the Lord shows me my brokenness and does the work that only he can do to help me — to help us — heal.
While engaging the mind is needed, doing so by itself is not enough. If we only engage our minds, we miss the deeper work the Lord wants to do in us and the deeper work that is needed for us to see healing in our communities.
Reflection Questions
To what degree have you engaged your heart, mind, body, and spirit in the work of racial healing and justice? Try not to judge — just notice where you are.
What is one part of yourself you feel an invitation to engage more fully?
What might it look like for you to engage your heart, mind, body, or spirit more fully in the work of racial healing and justice?
What is one thing you can do to more fully engage that part of yourself?
Take Action
Check out these resources to nurture different parts of yourself.
HEART
Listen to songs from the Porter’s Gate, an ecumenical and multiracial artist collective, that offers songs for justice and lament (scroll down on the webpage to find) or other songs addressing racism, resistance, and justice. Notice how you’re feeling when you listen to them. Where do you resonate? Where do you feel uncomfortable? What gives you hope?
BODY
Try these grounding practices excerpted from “My Grandmother’s Hands”: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway for Healing Our Hearts and Bodies. These practices can help increase our body awareness and navigate discomfort.
Use Abby VanMuijen’s slide about how emotions can manifest in our bodies as a tool to discern what feelings you may be experiencing based on your physical responses.
SPIRIT
Use this daily examen for living as an anti-racist person as a tool for self-reflection and discipleship.
Here is a liturgy of lament focusing on racism and how it has been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Though the pandemic seems to be lifting, the scriptures and underlying issues transcend particular circumstances. They speak into and could be adapted for current events.
Read this 40-day devotional by the Repentance Project that focuses on repenting of the history of anti-Black racism in our country. You can sign up for daily emails or download the whole guide. While written for the season of Lent, it is appropriate all year long.
We want to learn from you. What do you do to engage your heart, body, and spirit in the work of racial healing and justice?
¹ Versus being a lone ranger or so oriented on accomplishing a task or achieving that I don’t tend well to my relationships with others. These are both behaviors that are shaped by the individualism and narrow views of productivity and success that have been used to sustain racial hierarchy.
² This helped me become more aware of where social norms and practices I used to not see or find acceptable are not in alignment with God’s will. It gave me the courage to challenge them and practice a different way of thinking, doing, and being that is in greater alignment with the Great Reconciler, Jesus Christ.
³ White folks’ emotions around racism have been distorted. On the one hand, white people can become engulfed and immobilized by their emotions. For example, there is a long history of white women using their emotions — specifically their tears — to center themselves in race-related conversations and avoid uncomfortable issues. In urging folks to bring their feelings into this work, I do not intend to encourage "white tears" or other inappropriate emotional expressions. Instead, I am inviting readers to consider another way white people’s emotions have been distorted: a lack of feeling influenced by how we’ve historically turned away from the horrors of racism. I hope that in acknowledging and inviting others to reflect on our emotional numbness, we may be able to express ourselves in healthier and more constructive ways before God and community.
