When I was in Germany with international partners from 16 different countries, part of our task was to introduce one another to our home countries. We shared our national flags and discussed the meaning of the symbols and colors. We named some of the most pressing headlines from our national media. And we talked about the top questions our churches were facing in our context. It was such a gift to learn about other countries’ history and current events, and a blessing to meet people from Tanzania, the Czech Republic, Papua New Guinea, Columbia, and more.
But as I listened to my global neighbors speak about their homes, I was struck by the pride and the devotion some of them felt to their country, how it was a part of their sense of self. And if I’m honest, I was envious. The feelings I have for my country are complicated to say the least, and in the US where we are experiencing a renewed nationalist movement, the thought of full-throated pride makes me uneasy.
This uneasiness increases each year around this time, as we prepare to celebrate the 4th of July, and I’m never quite sure what to do with it. National pride has become such a ludicrous litmus test for the right wing, that I cringe at the possibility for myself. It feels especially challenging this year with the Supreme Court decisions rolling back protections for the LGBTQ community, women, and people of color and granting legal protection for bigotry and disenfranchisement. What does national pride look like in light of this level of disappointment and betrayal?
I am always on the look out for ways to restore and reclaim things that are broken, distorted, or lost – this may be part of my continued devotion to the church – and I’m curious if there is a way for me to reclaim pride in my sense of place that doesn’t parrot nationalist sentiments and the glorification of empire. And I’m curious about how that pride interacts with my most foundational identity as a Christian.
My first instinct is to go local, to reflect not on the myth of my nation, but on the people and the community where I live. God has been gracious in calling me to live in this neighborhood, in this city, among these neighbors. I’m proud of the ways that this community cares for one another, welcomes one another, and more often than not, devotes their time and attention to the common good. This community life is practiced in small and grand ways, but mostly in the small and regular interactions between neighbors.
This neighborhood, where I live and worship, is the context where God has called me to live out my life of faith, and that means in and through the culture and the stories that have formed it. The culture and the stories of NE Minneapolis have been crafted, first by Indigenous neighbors – the Dakota who lived and gathered along the Mississippi, and then by European immigrants from Poland, Sweden, Germany, Ukraine, and Norway. And more recently by immigrants from Somalia, Loas, Mexico, and South America.
While the stories of this neighborhood are not all lovely and peaceable, they are borne of a diverse and eclectic collection of communities trying to live well and contribute to the common good. This diversity and these stories form me as a neighbor, form the unique way I live out Christ’s call to love the neighbor in this place at this time as a citizen of the US. I love my neighborhood and my neighbors, and that feels well worth celebrating on a day for national pride.
I also have so much appreciation and love for the social movements that continue to call the United States to live up to her ideals and embrace her better angels. For the leaders and activists at the Stone Wall Riots who gave birth to the modern Pride movement. For farmers and farm workers who continue to challenge us to think holistically about our food and our agricultural practice. For the civil rights movements across the generations demanding that America resist and eradicate the sins of white supremacy, and the myriad voices who remind us that we are stronger for our diversity and our ability embrace difference.
Social movements in the United States continue to influence and transform our communities and neighborhoods, and even influence movements in countries across the globe. When I was in Germany a couple of weeks ago, I saw George Floyd’s name written in spray paint on the side of a building, a reminder that our movements for racial and economic justice can spread worldwide. That grassroots efforts, which often start with just a few neighbors working together, can have that kind of global impact is astounding and reminds me that courts and legislators are not the sole arbiters of our life together and what it means to be citizens.
Jesus is not a nationalist, and patriotism is not a Christian virtue. But God has called us to be the neighbor in a particular place, a particular neighborhood, city, and country. For me this call is not about national pride, but about national and neighborly love for the sake of the common good. I have no illusions about the myth of America and the nationalist fervor that undergirds it. I know I don’t feel the national pride that I often feel like I am expected to on the 4th of July. But I do love this community where God has called me to live, and I do love the people I have the privilege to live among. And I’m grateful for a long history in the United States of neighbors coming together to make their communities better in opposition to systems that only want to divide and disenfranchise.
And you know, I think to truly love one’s country may be a more challenging but fulfilling call than to possess what we often mean by national pride. Love challenges us to tell the truth and to bear the weight of our collective successes and our collective failures. Love asks us to listen to one another, and to seek our neighbor’s wellbeing more than our own justification. Love invites us to pay attention to the small but meaningful ways the Spirit animates our life together and to take responsibility for our role in the movement.
And in this moment when I’m feeling so much disappointment and so much pain from the national headlines, I think digging down into my love for the neighborhood and my neighbors is a place for me to rediscover something like hope in the power of US citizens. So tomorrow, my plan is to walk around the neighborhood where I live, to refamiliarize myself with the blocks closest to my house. Talking with neighbors, getting curious about their lives and their gifts. My plan is to immerse myself in the community where God has called me to be neighbor and citizen.
A single day won’t make up for all the pain and disappointment I’m feeling today, but I believe it can be a small simple act of resistance. Resistance against despair and the lies that breed isolation and division. I want to pay attention to the goodness and the connection of my community, to the animating work of the Holy Spirit among my neighbors, to remind myself that another way is possible – that truly loving the places and the people where we live can help to undercut the toxicity of nationalism and injustice.
I pray that one day I’ll feel something like pride for my country again. That I’ll be able to point to our collective and national efforts to do better and say well done, America. But in this moment when that feels so distant, I’ll embrace the call to love my neighbor, to work together so that our small part of the country does better, and to pray that God will make all things new. Amen.
