Solidarity & Community

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Hayley and Vince dig deeper on how a solidarity mindset is distinct from a charity mindset, with a focus on the role and promise of community.

(Illustration by Lauren Rolwing for The Southeast Center For Cooperative Development)

SPEAKER NOTES

Solidarity & Community

Intro (Hayley)

Last week we started a new series on moving from a charity mindset to a solidarity mindset

  • This is a move of addressing struggle and suffering from the outside to from the inside
  • Vince walked us through part of Philippians 2- which encourages us to have the same mindset as Christ in our relationships with one another
    • This is a self-giving mindset of consistent solidarity; echoing a God that is close, not like the distant, top-down Greco-Roman gods
    • You used the language of “Having some skin in the game”
  • Today we’re going to keep talking through the shift from charity to solidarity
    • This is a mindset shift for our church and for us as individuals, and it takes time and imagination
  • Today’s discussion will focus on: Solidarity & Community

Anything you’d add, Vince?

Questions from Hayley

Transition: I’d love to help guide us through some questions this morning:

I. Changes in solidarity

  • You presented us with a helpful diagram of different ideas of ways to participate in solidarity- put image up here?
  • For some of us, the possibility of moving to solidarity instead of just charity may seem like a great idea, but is it actual possible in our society today?
  • I think of systems in the past when exchanging goods— removed from any exchange of $ — was a lot more common
  • Has the possibility for solidarity changed over time? Does it need to look differently now?

Vince response

  • I think it is important to acknowledge the timeless nature of this struggle (well before capitalism there were empires and economic injustice)
  • AND I am learning also how solidarity is uniquely challenged now in ways it never has been before
  • Last 30 years
    • Loss of trust in institutions (government, economic, civic, and religious) - especially post 9/11 and post 2008 recession - millennials and Gen Z do not have the optimism of “my life will obviously be easier than my parents’”
    • Individualism can feel like a refuge from corrupt institutions,
    • but then our concept of help for those most in need stays a charity mindset (because charity is individualistic, and doesn’t require investment in community building like solidarity)
  • Larger snapshot
    • I worked a lot for us last year this idea that Modernity, the last 500 years in Western Culture, is a story of time speeding up — and that acceleration is so breakneck today that it is dehumanizing — the fatigue of maintaining and curating our selves to stay current
    • When that is absorbing our energy, relationships become instrumentalized as means to the end of keeping up, not ends in themself for the purpose of human connection
    • again driving toward individual acts of charity as the solution to problems, rather than communal acts of solidarity
  • So the individualism of charity vs solidarity that’s found in community
  • I think individualism can also limit us because we can shift responsibility to others.
    • This sounds nice, I’m sure someone else with more power can make an actual difference.
    • This idea that “someone else” is better equipped, more well-resourced.
    • Or even just being busy and tired — I can’t prioritize this right now
  • This is the difference between just a community of individuals vs a true collective that you feel inextricably tied to. Where your participation matters and does make a difference
    • There’s a helpful graphic I saw recently that was an encouragement to make a list of things you are skilled at, things you could offer others- like childcare or cooking a meal. And then make a list of things you are need of/ aren’t skilled at. And the hope would be to initiate trading those skills, goods, and resources to help one another out.
    • This was an encouraging practice to me

Vince response

  • Yeah BLM has the great phrase — “get in where you fit in”
  • But the popular collective imagination of ways to “fit in” efforts of solidarity is still pretty limited.
  • We mostly only imagine activism and protest (showing up and speaking up)
  • Those ARE key ingredients to solidarity movements
    • Like Ben used our discord to amplify this CTA town hall on Saturday the 27th — perfect example of solidarity effort — folx across the 99% who have to work for a living rely on public transit — the middle class and working class and poor are on the same team!
    • If you feel some activist energy, showing up to something like that is a great outlet!
    • It’s actually is the same day as the first meeting of the “From Charity to solidarity” small group I’m organizing, but we can walk and chew gum at the same time, so if you have energy for that, just come to our group’s second mtg
  • BUT that said, activism and protest are NOT the only ingredients to solidarity — NOT the only ways to “fit in”
    • and that can come as a relief to some, because activism in America favors extroverts, and young people, and people without kids
    • Those of us more socially anxious or in older stages of life might be tempted to shame ourselves for not being activists or protesters
  • Part of the reason for this series is expanding our collective imagination of ways to fit in beyond only activism and protest
  • Could you clarify, is solidarity best experienced/ given outside of an exchange of funds? Is charity more financial giving and solidarity is beyond that?

Vince response

  • A Solidarity mindset is NOT anti-capitalism; it’s anti- “capitalism that only serves the few on top”
  • Capitalism can be exploitative or it can be democratic… we mostly use that word to talk about political democracy, but the idea here is economic democracy
  • This cohort I’ve been a part of, Solidarity Circles, is big on co-ops, employee owned businesses — profit sharing, democratic power in terms of decision making is built in to how a business is run —
  • And you can still have reasonable organizational structures in these models
    • It’s completely reasonable for a leader of a business, long invested, to make more than someone who was just hired at an entry level position, by a ratio of like 10 to 1 (maybe more ?)
    • But 398:1 (the stat we brought up last week) is outrageous!

Transition: Let’s talk more about how solidarity plays out in community

II. Different starting points in community

  • You spoke to different experiences with solidarity based on class/ access to power. And we are a community of people made up of different stories and experiences:
  • If I am a member of the working class or poor, what does participating in solidarity look like?

Vince response

  • Stay focused on the communal fight against systems and structures; don’t get distracted by overly individualistic discussions that say the problem is individual greed
  • That can feel tempting because when you’re exploited you want someone to blame - Trump, or Jeff Bezos, or fill in the blank
  • But my instructor for this Solidairty Circle cohort Dr. Joerg Rieger, says: if a ceo individually decides to be generous but the system is left untouched they won’t be a ceo for long
  • Because it is systemic structures that need to be dismantled, not single greedy individuals
  • The individualistic blame game distract from the real work
  • St. Paul’s line from the Bible, which we’ve referred to before, is: “our fight is not against flesh and blood, but principalities and powers”
  • Individualistic blame distracts from the real work— that’s helpful to keep in mind
  • On the other hand, maybe this conversation is helping you realize, I do have significant resources and I’m feeling drawn to make changes and act in some concrete way. If I am someone that does hold a significant amount of power & privilege, where do I even begin?

Vince response

  • If you own a business, or are high up in a organization, you can consider converting that business to a co-op, where employees are all part owners
    • Through this solidarity circle cohort, BLC has access to business coaches who have helped many businesses do just that!
    • So come ask me!
  • or other steps in the direction of
    • considering employment a social contract
    • Taking on risk as an employer, instead of offloading it to employees
  • If you’re a supervisor or middle manager, you may not have power over people’s salaries,
    • but you have power over how those underneath you experience a huge percentage of their waking lives —
    • how can you operate as though part of their team, not weded to the systems that drive the benefits up?
  • “We’re on the same team” has become a mantra in my family (mostly as a reminder during conflicts or power struggles with my 3 year old)
    • But it’s a helpful reminder here— how does being on the same team shift and reallocate access to resources and power? It’s a helpful question to ask
  • And then do you have any encouragements for the middle class?

Vince response

  • This is where it’s helpful to distinguish between power and privilege (it’s common in progressive circles to refer to them together but that can be problematic)
    • Privilege: Questions you’re not asked, safety nets
    • Power: Decision making impact, access
  • The experience of the middle class is usually a lot of privilege, but not much power
  • And not realizing that is a major reason people of good will burnout or struggle with shame about not doing enough
    • To go back to the example of activism and protest, we assume that because we have privilege, we must also have power and so our Activism and protest (showing up and speaking up) will change things
  • BUT without other efforts, speaking up doesn’t always automatically translate to power for your cause
    • My instructor Dr. Rieger says “when you speak truth to power, you may have the truth, but they still may have all the power”
    • Sometimes nothing changes
    • and, thus, we burn out
    • or internalize the lack of change as shame for not doing enough
  • Again, activism and protest is def an ingredient to solidarity; it’s very important!
    • But IF the goal of solidarity is building power — bottom up power to counter top down power —
    • THEN we have to expand our imaginations beyond only activism and protest
  • Organizing is another important ingredient
    • And more equal opportunity than activism and protest
    • the active listening in one-on-ones or small groups that build commonality and community,
    • the talking to your kids about this to shape what values will be passed on,
    • or any of the things you do that try to bring other people along in living out your values, not just doing so individually -
    • that’s how power in numbers is built
  • Our “from charity to solidarity” small group is an organizing effort - meant to brainstorm on building power
    • Because the middle class’s lack of power is a connecting point with the rest of the 99%
  • “Community” as “together” (co) and “power” (munity has same root as “munitions”) — nonviolent power in numbers

That power & privilege distinction is really helpful

Transition: Let’s move into talking about some scripture as we think about solidarity & community. Today we’re going to focus in on 1 Corinthians 11 and 12:

III. 1 Corinthians 11-12

(Paul is testy… Why? Because the meals in Jesus’ name in Corinth are furthering economic divides, not furthering economic solidarity!)

11:17 In the following directives I have no praise for you, for your meetings do more harm than good. 18 In the first place, I hear that when you come together as a church, there are divisions among you, and to some extent I believe it. 19 No doubt there have to be differences among you to show which of you have God’s approval.

Is verse 19 sarcastic? I think so! (Otherwise it makes no sense with larger argument.)

20 So then, when you come together, it is not the Lord’s Supper you eat, 21 for when you are eating, some of you go ahead with your own private suppers. As a result, one person remains hungry and another gets drunk. 22 Don’t you have homes to eat and drink in? Or do you despise the church of God by humiliating those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I praise you? Certainly not in this matter!…

27 So then, whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of sinning against the body and blood of the Lord. 28 Everyone ought to examine themselves before they eat of the bread and drink from the cup. 29 For those who eat and drink without discerning the body of Christ eat and drink judgment on themselves…

  • So these shared meals (communion) in Christ’s name— are meant to be a unifying, collective meal.
  • And yet, those who have more than enough are taking too much, and those who have little are still going hungry.
    • Sound familiar?
  • Paul is encouraging the community in Corinth toward solidarity and away from the norm of meals and gatherings that are divided by social status and economic class

And then jumping ahead to Paul’s famous elaboration on the “body of Christ” in chapter 12 — what’s most important to know is Imperial Rome used the image of a body as well in their propaganda — but for Rome, the head, Caesar, is in charge, and all other body parts must fall in line.

Against that backdrop for his Corinthian audience, Paul writes this:

12:12 Just as a body, though one, has many parts, but all its many parts form one body, so it is with Christ. 13 For we were all baptized by one Spirit so as to form one body—whether Jews or Gentiles, slave or free—and we were all given the one Spirit to drink. 14 Even so the body is not made up of one part but of many.

15 Now if the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. 16 And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. 17 If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? 18 But in fact God has placed the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. 19 If they were all one part, where would the body be? 20 As it is, there are many parts, but one body.

21 The eye cannot say to the hand, “I don’t need you!” And the head cannot say to the feet, “I don’t need you!” 22 On the contrary, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, 23 and the parts that we think are less honorable we treat with special honor. And the parts that are unpresentable are treated with special modesty, 24 while our presentable parts need no special treatment. But God has put the body together, giving greater honor to the parts that lacked it, 25 so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. 26 If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it.

  • This distinction between how the “less respectable” “unpresentable” are treated and how the “more respectable” are treated is in the text
    • And it seems like a character judgement.
    • But we could look at honor as a distinction of economic status, not a character judgment
    • And it can also be translated as more or less “esteem”- which reads as a more as differentiation of power and privilege, not character
  • It’s an example of God’s preferential option for the poor- liberation theology language from James Cone
  • Last line esp. helpful: “If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it”
    • Quote you tied in last week: If you have come here to help me, you are wasting your time. But if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together.”
    • The Body is an example of being collectively bound up together, it’s a helpful visual for solidarity
    • Liberation, inclusion, honor, access- all are intertwined with one another
    • Or MLK quote: We are tied together in a single garment of destiny

IV. Concluding thoughts

Pitch group again

Prayer: Body scan prayer

Get comfortable in your seats and take a few deep breaths

If the words are not helpful for you, you can take this time to just focus on your breathing

  • Consider your starting point in this conversation of embracing solidarity
  • Are there any changes in your life, conversations you want to have, moves you want to make that are coming to mind for you
  • Jesus, would you guide our understanding and bring to mind these potential shifts we can make and embrace
  • As you think about moving into solidarity— scan through your body and notice how it feels
    • Notice any tensions you are carrying
    • How are you feeling? Do you feel uncertainty? Hope? Stress? Excitement? Curiosity?
  • How do these feelings show up in your body?
  • Take a moment to solidly plant your feet on the ground and pay attention again to your breathing

God of solidarity,

would you center us and ground us. Would we look to you not as some distant, top-down God but a close companion and co-sufferer. Increase our awareness of your presence— that you are with us as the story actively unfolds. As we embrace change and new understandings, would you sustain us and encourage us. And in the face of burnout or anxiety, shame or grief would we return to rest in you. Would being a collective, a community woven together, One Body, offer us a deep sense of hope.

1 CorinthiansVincent BrackettFrom Charity to SolidarityComment