In a new post over at Experimental History, Adam Mastroianni has this to say:
When I was in high school, I used to volunteer with this group that, basically, held car washes and then donated the money. The organization wasn’t explicitly Christian, but Peggy, the woman who led it, was. She used to tell us: “People see bad things in the world and ask why God doesn’t do something about it. But God did do something. He sent you.”
We can argue about whether this is a theologically sound solution to the problem of evil, and we can ask why a supposedly all-knowing and all-powerful God would entrust anything to me, a guy who can’t even do a single pull-up. But I always appreciated this attitude. Yes, things are bad. No, it’s not your fault. Unfortunately, the world was under no obligation to straighten itself out by the time you arrived. These are the problems we got. Would you like them to be better? Then here, grab a sponge and start washing.
I love it, as I love all calls to action where you are, with what you have. The focus on “Yes, things are bad. No, it’s not your fault” is how I have described antiracism since reading Stamped from the Beginning by Ibram X. Kendi. Granted that some problems are conceptually bigger than others, but we have to start somewhere.
Oh, and the “grab a sponge” line? Just brings me back to Barack Obama exhorting people to stop standing on the sidelines and “grab a mop.” (2009, what a time it was!)