I TOLD JESUS IT WOULD BE ALL RIGHT IF HE
CHANGED MY NAME:
A MEDITATION
ON THE NAMES WE WONDROUSLY WEAR
We have the
memory of
“Mary, what
you gonna name
your pretty
little baby”
being called
every thing but
“A child of
God”
boy bastard
girl pig cow
fool nigger
and so
on and
on the torrent
of
filth fell
upon the
heads
of those who
would stand
mute and
unforgiving
“think I’ll
name him
Jesus”
Oh yes
names are important and we do not need a seminar in linguistics to
understand the reason. African Americans (or Africans? Or Americans? Or
Colored? Or Negro? Or Colored Americans? Or Negro Americans? Or....?) had/have only the luxury of grace, and the
memory of the people of God when it comes to owning the name we/they are/were
known by.
SOMETHING
WITHIN ME/ I WISH I COULD EXPLAIN
I’VE GOT
SOMETHING WITHIN ME/ THAT HOLDETH MY REINS
That
something, they call it God’s Holy Fire, filled the void of meaning when the
devastation of enslavement took the ground out from under the souls of the
African men and women (there could never be a child in such a circumstance –
not if childhood depends on innocence. The capture destroyed all innocence) who
were cast upon the waters of greed and abasement. They searched the scriptures
that were used as weapons of submission and found the names of liberators; the
names of faithful servants; the names of warriors and kings and prophets and
vision-seekers. They found Deborah and
Samuel, Daniel and David, Mary, Martha, Hannah and Elizabeth.
They spoke
the saving names in the ears of the children, they sang the names (Moses,
Joshua, Elijah, John, Paul, Peter and Samson) in the dances whereby they called
down the divine power. African women and
men who were being called everything but a child of God, understood the story
of Jacob better than many a theologian, then or now.
When the
embodiment of God’s power, hereafter known as the Angel, confronted the
dissembling, thieving, opportunistic Jacob, the hero faced, in the midnight
hour on the plain of Peniel, his worst nightmare: his own weakness. When the struggling, the sweating, the
wrestling with the power of God was called to a draw, Jacob was halt and no
longer what he had been. He encountered God and was not vanquished. What did he
get out of it? A damaged hip, the
promise of countless descendants, and a new name.
The people
of the new enslavement chose their God wisely.
They invoked the power and settled upon themselves names that carried
the shimmering aura of the spirit-blessed. And you think it is an easy thing to
take my name and “nick” it? You think it is a sign of friendship to slip your
tongue under my inheritance and trip my name on your tongue until my reality
stumbles on your presumption?
Oh, no. I
told Jesus it would be all right if HE
change my
name.
And Jesus
told me that the world would hate me, scorn me, abuse and crucify me. I told
HIM that it was a bargain worth the making, as long as HE
knew who I
was and how to speak to ME
that no
storm can assail, no tempest can assault.
The woman
who cleans the filth of strangers day after day after day, walks into her
church and is called “sister,” “daughter,” and “saint.” On the street and in the homes and hearts of
her neighbors she is called, Miss or Mrs.
And she knows the worth of her name, her calling. So, too, the man who is “boy” and “nigger,”
and “Sam” and joke, day after day in the street and on the job (if he
has one, and is not known simply by a string of numbers). Oh, Lord, let him
walk into the sanctuary, where he is “brother,” “father,” “elder,” “sir,” “deacon,”
and “reverend.” And revered are they
all. It’s all in the name, the true name, the sweet name, the proper name.
“Don’t ever
call me out of my name,” is shouted on the streets all over the African world
of childhood.
Why? Because
we have the memory of the homeland left only in our words, in our songs, in the
ways that make us a “folk.” And we know
that we have to live up to our names, bestowed as they are by people who wanted
to weigh us down with history, music and promises.
Every tongue-twisting
name that shows up on the census and school record-book is a warning and
declaration. This child will have attention
paid to her, to him. You may not want to waste a glance or breath on my baby,
but you will, by God and his mama, take the time to say his name and to spell
her wondrous identity correctly.
After
all, God told Adam and Eve to name
everything set before them in creation, and whatsoever they name a thing, that
would be its name.
So, I got a
name, you got a name. Written in the book of life. I got a name that makes music
on my mama’s tongue, that lights up my granddaddy’s eye when he says it.
Don’t even
think about doing nothing about my name except
to make it a
sacrament.
After all I
am a child of God. Thank you, very much.
[prepared for M. Annette Turner and the
Archdiocese of Louisville Office of Multicultural Ministry. December 1997]
