It was a cold December weekend in Chicago, and I was excited. One of my best friends was getting married, and to top it off, he had asked me to officiate the wedding. I was honored by the invitation, though a bit intimidated. What if I botched it and ended up being the guy the editor tried to remove from all the film footage? I was a brand-new pastor and had been in vocational ministry for less than a year, and this was my first wedding.
My friend, the groom, was of South Asian/Indian descent, and he was very proud of his cultural heritage. He had promised that the reception in particular would take guests on a deep dive into Indian culture and that we should prepare ourselves for a culturally unique experience. The reception lived up to the hype, and I had a night to remember. My personal highlight was the dandiya dance, a group of people moving in two circles counterclockwise, holding two colorful sticks. I’m typically hesitant to get out on the dance floor, but the beauty of the dandiya was compelling.
When the dance ended, I was still feeling festive from the amazing experience. So I found my friend and shared with him how much I had enjoyed every bit of that wonderful night. Then I innocently added a comment: “I’m jealous of you. You have such an amazing culture! It must be such a privilege to be able to reflect that beautiful culture during your wedding weekend. I wish I had a culture too.”
I had no idea how much was packed into that little statement, but it sure wasn’t lost on him. He suddenly got serious, placed his hand on my shoulder, and looked me straight in the eye. “Daniel, you may be white, but don’t let that lull you into thinking you have no culture. White culture is very real. In fact, when white culture comes in contact with other cultures, it almost always wins. So it would be a really good idea for you to learn about your culture.”
I found myself revisiting this conversation often. My friend was known for avoiding serious topics, so I had been surprised by the spontaneous intensity he had displayed. Most unsettling about it was his commentary on my “white” culture. First of all, I felt he was lumping me in with every other white person he’d ever known. I thought, He can’t seriously think there’s just one white culture, can he? In an attempt to piece together the confusing message he’d sent my way, I reflected on the Irish heritage on my father’s side and the pride many of my relatives took in it. Then I thought about the German and French heritage on my mom’s side. I knew less about those cultures, but still, they were three very different backgrounds. Was he suggesting that those three distinct cultures could be mashed into a single category: white? That seemed like a major stretch.
Then there was the even more unsettling suggestion that my culture wins whenever it comes in contact with another. Not only was he lumping all white cultures into a single group, he was also proposing that this single conglomeration consistently dominates other cultures. How would this not come off as insulting to a white person?
What seemed utterly obvious to him was utterly confusing to me. But I wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt, and I searched for where I could find agreement with him. I could readily acknowledge that some white individuals exhibit dominant or even racist behaviors. Certainly that was common ground.
But even then I found myself thinking, Just because certain white individuals demonstrate prejudice or racism by their behaviors doesn’t implicate an entire race. I guessed that he would respond poorly to the suggestion that certain individuals of Indian heritage represent their entire race. Yet he seemed comfortable with the idea of poorly behaved white individuals representing all white people.
This monologue continued to live inside my head longer than expected, and I anxiously awaited its end. Instead it grew in intensity. I wasn’t sure why, but it was becoming clear that God had provoked something in me through this brief encounter. My friend had opened a monumental door and had left me to decide whether or not to step through it. He had opened me up to a whole new world, but I was unable to navigate it on my own.
Compelled by these unanswered questions, I began reading books and articles, listening to TED talks, and talking with anyone who appeared knowledgeable about this topic. While a number of interesting ideas were planted in the soil of my mind during that time, a conversation with an eventual mentor led to my initial epiphany. I’d had no previous relationship with this mentor, and after a steady series of my requests, he kindly agreed to meet with me. I wasted no time; I immediately peppered him with questions. I told him about the conversation with my friend at the wedding and shared my confusion about the claim that I was part of a larger white culture that dominates every other culture it comes in contact with.
He patiently sat there, listening as I verbally sorted out my thoughts and feelings. When I finally finished, I pulled out my notebook, eager for answers. I was curious to hear his insights into these dilemmas and was ready to engage with his ideas.
But he didn’t respond to my questions at an abstract, intellectual level. Instead he issued a personal challenge in the form of a reflection exercise. To help me begin my exploration, he invited me to catalog carefully the primary voices that informed me as a person and shaped my thoughts and values. To simplify, he organized the exercise around four groups of voices: my closest friends, the mentors I looked to for guidance, the preachers/teachers/theologians I relied on for spiritual guidance, and the authors of the books I was reading.
The instructions were simple:
I started with my friendship circle, just as he’d asked. Though I had some acquaintances in my broader network from diverse cultural backgrounds, I couldn’t include them as close friends. So I made my list, and everyone on it was white.
Next up were my mentors, those I looked up to for advice during challenging times. It didn’t take long to develop this list, as I quickly surmised that I consistently went to six different people when I needed guidance. When I listed them and noted what culture they represented, I realized they too were all white.
The third category took the longest. I had become a serious student of the Bible by this point, so I listened to many preachers, teachers, and theologians. I wanted to ensure that my accounting was comprehensive, so I meticulously filed my way through the full archive of cassette tapes and CDs I’d accumulated. I had been encouraged to explore a diverse range of theological perspectives, so I had been influenced by everything from Pentecostals to Presbyterians. But I was stunned to discover that, with the exception of two preachers, the entire roster was white.
The last category I had been instructed to assess was authors, and by that point I was sure of the conclusion. I followed through on the exercise just to be sure, but the results in all four categories were the same: the voices shaping me were overwhelmingly white.
There’s no crisp way to summarize all I learned during that self-assessment. I was awakening to a reality that had always been there, hidden in plain sight, but I finally had the eyes to see it:
Just like all moments of genuine awakening, the discovery was both liberating and terrifying: liberating in the way truth always is, lifting you out of the fog and into the light, and terrifying because this revelation of truth demanded changes.
I no longer had the luxury of living in ignorance, feeling good about myself while being blissfully unaware of the cultural influences in my life. I had naively thought that my personal transformation had happened the moment I chose to follow Christ. But I saw clearly in that shifting season of my life that the work was just beginning.