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If every child were my child

When my wife and I arrived in Richmond in 1980, the schools were experiencing white flight to the counties and to private schools. Living in the Carillon neighborhood all three of our sons attended the local John B. Cary Elementary School, which began as a “model” school, open to people across Richmond and designed to reflect the racial makeup of the city. Places were in high demand and student selection was by lottery based on racial and gender quotas. There was no sibling policy, but all our sons were lucky enough to be selected.

By the time our youngest son, Andrew, entered Cary, it had changed to a neighborhood school. The demographics began to shift. I recall a PTA meeting where a white father stated, “We are proud of the diversity in this school, but we don’t want too much diversity.” In the late 1980s white parents “rediscovered” Mary Munford Elementary School which at the time was 96% black although it was situated near some of the wealthiest neighborhoods in the city. (Black kids were bused in.) Many white Cary parents, who were dissatisfied with a new principal, transferred their kids. Today, Munford is about 73% white and 12% black.

By the time Andrew graduated from John B. Cary he was the only white male in his class. This story is typical of swings that occur as white middle-class parents who have the privilege of mobility seek the best options for their children. (Incidentally, all three of our sons say that when they went to college, they were better prepared for the real world than many of their peers who had attended largely white schools. Andrew won a two-year Harvard Fellowship with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and is now on the foundation staff helping them redesign their support for public education.)

In recent years, Richmond has attracted increasing numbers of young white families, many of whom express a desire to live in a diverse urban community. I had hoped that they would approach the question of schooling with a less racially biased lens than earlier generations. So, I was disappointed by recently reported comments by some parents at William Fox Elementary School that a proposed pairing with Cary (just a few minutes’ drive west) to create two racially balanced schools would force them to choose private schools or move to the counties. According to the Richmond Times-Dispatch, Richmond Schools Superintendent Jason Kamras termed some of the initial reactions to the preliminary plans “Massive Resistance 2.0,” in reference to the state’s opposition to desegregation in the 1950s and 1960s. It seems that many white parents still want diversity on their own terms.

Some years ago, our Hope in the Cities team launched forums and city-wide conversations about education with the question, “If every child were my child, what would I do differently?” 

This question raises discomforting moral issues with which we as a community must grapple if we are serious about building an education system that is worthy of every child in Richmond.

Naming as an act of healing

On Saturday, June 22, several thousand Richmonders celebrated under a clear blue sky as state and city leaders dedicated the Arthur Ashe Boulevard to the city's most distinguished native son. The event also highlighted the opening of an exhibit at the Virginia Museum of History & Culture depicting the struggle for black equality and marking the 400th anniversary of the arrival of the first captive Africans to English North America.

We heard the veteran Civil Rights leader John Lewis delivering a rousing keynote. “We cannot remake what happened 400 years ago,” said the Congressman from Georgia, “but we’re here today as one people, as one family." Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia called the name change "an act of healing." 

Ashe grew up in a segregated Richmond. As a young black tennis player, the future Wimbledon and U.S. Open champion was barred from playing on the Byrd Park courts at the south end of the Boulevard and was confined to practice on segregated courts in the north of the city.  

Honoring Richmond’s true heroes has been a long struggle. Twenty-two years ago, after an intense public debate, a statue honoring Ashe – who won international renown as a civil rights activist and humanitarian – was unveiled on Monument Avenue, previously the exclusive domain of massive sculptures of Confederate generals who had fought to maintain slavery. Senator Kaine was serving on the city council at the time. He recalled a seven-hour meeting following a public hearing at which more than one hundred people spoke. 

Kaine and other speakers paid tribute to the late Senator Benjamin Lambert, III, a distinguished African American state senator who raised funds for the statue, and Tom Chewning, a white business leader, who led the campaign to put it on Monument Avenue. Chewning said afterward that some people with whom he had close relationships were upset, but “That’s the price you pay.”

Now we are at another historic moment for Richmonders as we work to create a new narrative for the city. "This is truly a spectacular and momentous day," said David Harris, Jr., Ashe's nephew who led the drive to rename the road formerly known simply as the Boulevard. Previous attempts had failed in 1993 and 2003. Harris enlisted the support of Kimberly Gray, an African American council member whose district includes a portion of the boulevard. Her tireless efforts paid off.

Mayor Stoney proclaimed that the Arthur Ashe Boulevard symbolizes the city we want to become. The boulevard bisects Monument Avenue and is a principle gateway to the city. “Richmond is at a Crossroads: Will Arthur Ashe Boulevard Point the Way?” asked a New YorkTimes commentary. 

“I think that the renaming shows that even though it took a long time, these things can be done,” said historian Ed Ayers, president emeritus of the University of Richmond, in an interview with Richmond Times-Dispatch columnist Michael Paul Williams. “People understand that memorialization matters; that the names that we give things have consequences.” The crowd applauded when Mayor Stoney announced that an elementary school formerly bearing the name of Confederate General Jeb Stuart has been renamed after Barrack Obama.

My one brief contact Arthur Ashe was in January 1993. We were preparing for the Healing the Heart of America national conference the following June which featured Richmond’s first public walk through its racial history. My wife’s godfather, “Bunny” Austin, the celebrated British tennis player, a Wimbledon finalist in 1932 and 1938, was a close friend of Ashe. Bunny encouraged me to call Arthur and invite him to play a role in the conference. I knew Arthur was ill but to my surprise he picked up the phone himself. He listened politely and expressed some skepticism that Richmond would ever have an honest conversation on race! However, he suggested I get back in touch once plans for the conference were firmed up. One month later he was dead. With our young sons we stood in line with thousands of Richmonders to pay tribute to him as he lay in state in the Governor’s Mansion.  

I am told that some members of the Ashe family were initially hesitant about the renaming of the boulevard. They felt that Arthur, a remarkably humble person who had a passionate conviction for education, would have preferred to see the money spent on schools. However, I believe he would have rejoiced to see his hometown at its best last Saturday and to feel along with the jubilant crowd that Richmond could show the way to a nation much in need of hope and healing.

New beginnings

Forty years ago, Susan and I came to make our home in Richmond, Virginia. This summer we will move to Austin, Texas. Last week 40 friends, including neighbors, work colleagues and others from across the city crowded into our home, to celebrate my 70th birthday. We also came together to give thanks for the remarkable journey we have shared together. 

We have loved this diverse community known as the Carillon where we raised our three boys. Our walks in the park are a highlight of most days. Richmond looks its best in April. Dogwood and azalea are in full bloom and the brilliant green leaves on massive oaks and tulip poplars provide shade. Just a mile away is Cary Street with cafes and boutique stores and the historic Byrd Theatre. Down the hill the river beckons.     

People sometimes ask us, “Why Richmond?” The answer we give is that we somehow felt God was doing something special in this city and we wanted to be part of it. Of course, we had no idea what that would mean! Our lives were changed by individuals who became our friends and who offered a level of trust far beyond what we had any right to expect. It has been our privilege to accompany them and to learn from them. They have had the courage to start a change process in their own lives; and they are building a new vision for a city scared by a history of slavery, civil war, and racial discrimination. 

Over the years, visitors from as far away as Northern Ireland, Lebanon, and Guatemala have come to study this city’s approach to healing wounded memory and building partnerships across traditional divides. Rajmohan Gandhi, grandson and biographer of Mahatma Gandhi, was among those from 25 countries in 1993 who joined Richmonders in their first public walk through the city’s racial history. He wrote later, “June 1993 was the start of a remarkable revelation. Resolving (with some difficulty) to face a painful past, Richmond discovered that concealed inside that pain was the seed of a great promise – a promise that an America that seeks healing will be sought after by a hurting world.”

Despite the odds, Richmond continues to build networks of trust that stand the test of time. The trustbuilding process begun here is now the foundation for pilot projects in several countries launched by Initiatives of Change International.

When we came to Richmond in 1980 we made a commitment to colleagues that we would stay for five years.  At the time it seemed like a lifetime. Neither of us had ever lived for more than three years in one place. Now we are following a new call to a new city and a new home. We have a five-year-old granddaughter eager to welcome us to Austin.

We will leave with mixed emotions, leaving so many dear friends who have become like family to us. As we discover a new community, we know that we will be led to people who are working for change. As we often say, “the team is waiting to be discovered.”

At this Easter season of new birth, it seems fitting that robins have laid eggs in nests in bushes at both ends of our porch and on the day of the party last week three of them hatched!

It's a time for new beginnings. Watch this space for updates on our adventures.

He walked the talk

By my desk there is a photograph of Walter T. Kenney, the former mayor of Richmond, who died in January. The portrait features on the very large printed program for a 1995 banquet honoring Kenney’s 18 years of service as a councilman. The text reads, “Politicians seldom get their just desserts, but Walter Kenney will get his tonight.”  

Rev. Dr. Paige Chargois, a lead organizer of the event, comments on the picture:“It symbolized his stature and capacity. But the measure of the man was never his height (although he stood well over 6 feet); it was, instead, the depth to which he loved Richmond which reflected in all that he lavished upon its citizens!” 

Chargois writes that Kenney’s civic concerns took him well beyond his official duties into the corners of citizens' lives that many political leaders consider not safe for their political careers. “Although Richmond's racial dilemma had been around for decades with many politicians preferring a ‘hands-off’ policy, Mayor Kenney did the opposite, including a deep dive into the work of racial reconciliation.” At his invitation, delegates from cities across the US and from 25 countries came to the former capital of the Confederacy in 1993 to launch “Healing the Heart of America: An honest conversation on race, reconciliation and responsibility.” The landmark event was jointly sponsored by the City, Hope in the Cities, and the Richmond Hill ecumenical retreat center.

Two years later I was with him when he spoke at Brooklyn Borough Hall about the Richmond community’s courage in coming together to tell the truth about our history by marking sites associated with the city’s history of slavery: “It is often the thing from which we hide that eventually wounds us – from the inside out – and such had been the case in Richmond….We did not highlight these places in an effort to hand out guilt or to vent anger. We wanted to acknowledge their existence so that we could close the door and move forward.” He continued, “The mentality of victimhood or guilt-ridden shame anchors us in inaction...Regardless of past or present injustices, we are all responsible for shaping our common future."

Walter encountered Initiatives of Change soon after joining the city council in 1977. One of the IofC network, a retired secretary invited him and his wife to tea. Walter said it was the first time he had been invited to a white home. He had worked for many years in the US Postal Service, rising to become the first African American to be elected as a national officer of United Federation of Postal Clerks AFL-CIO, and then one of Richmond’s first black councilmen. When my dad, a former trade unionist from Scotland, came to visit me in Richmond he would call on Walter who joked about being a labor leader and elected official in such an anti-union state.   

He entered politics when the city was experiencing a dramatic and sometimes tumultuous transition and as the white establishment confronted the reality of power sharing for the first time. He understood that trust is built by those who are prepared to look at their own leadership style:"If I change, if I learn how to care more deeply, or listen more intently, then I bring that to virtually everything I touch, whether it is regional discussions, the national agenda, or settling a neighborhood dispute," he once said. Henry Marsh, Richmond’s first African American mayor, said of his long-time friend and colleague, “He had no hate for anyone.”

It was Walter Kenney's inspiration to create the annual Metropolitan Richmond Day, a breakfast forum which for many years convened hundreds of representatives of non-profit organizations, corporations, local government, educational establishments, and faith communities.

At a celebration of his life, fellow church members, politicians, friends and family stressed his care and support for every individual he dealt with. As one person put it, “When he talked with you, you felt you were the only one in the room.”

His care extended to his car which, according to his family, he washed every day. When my wife and he were both serving on the IofC Board he would often pick her up in his prized Lincoln Town Car for the drive to Washington. And no day was complete without an ice cream stop!

Walter was a man of infinite grace. Shortly after losing his city council seat by just a handful of votes, I travelled with him and a few other Richmonders to Chicago where we were preparing for a national Hope in the Cities forum. Among the group was the person who had defeated him at the polls, Shirley Harvey. I will never forget the sight of Walter and Shirley sitting contentedly side by side watching sports on the airport TV monitor during a layover. Another member of the city council was in the arrival area when we flew back to Richmond. His face registered shock and disbelief as the two former political opponents exited the flight together.

After leaving office Walter continued as Richmond’s ambassador, taking Richmond’s message of healing across the US and Canada as well as to Europe. In 1996, I travelled with him to South Africa where he shared his experiences with newly elected black leaders. I also recall a meeting in Paige Chargois's home with Rajmohan Gandhi and the famed civil rights lawyer Oliver Hill. 

He was a man of deep integrity. In a loving tribute a granddaughter said, “He walked the talk. He taught us to do the right thing all the time.” His executive assistant, Cricket White, told me that on one occasion she was given an envelope said to contain damaging information about a potential political rival.  When she put the sealed package on his desk, Kenney was visibly angry and told her to destroy it immediately. 

Walter believed in the power of presence. You could always count on him to show up at an event, even if he had no official role to play. This probably accounts for the remark I heard from one elderly African American woman: “He will always be my mayor.” As his brother said, “He was a man in love with his city.”

Hospitality of our hearts and minds

This month, Richmonders from many parts of the city celebrated twenty-five years of work for honest conversation on race, reconciliation and responsibility by the Hope in the Cities network. “It was launched in perhaps one of the worst racialized locales: Richmond, Virginia – given its Confederate history – a city that became the capital of racial contempt and enslavement with a racial war to prove it,” said Rev. Dr. Paige Chargois. “But where else in America could such work have become more significant or productive!”

Senator Tim Kaine sent a message in which he recalled his words eight years ago at the launching of my book, Trustbuilding: “Racial discrimination remains with us, and we will continue to need the help of Hope in the Cities to conquer our lesser instincts.” He wrote, “While I am saddened that this observation holds true today, I am heartened by Hope in the Cities’ work to confront our lesser instincts…This commitment has spread across the world where activists work to create more peaceful, just and equal communities.”

Recalling the first public walk through Richmond's racial history, Kaine said,"In an age of heightened bigotry, my advice to you is to keep on marching as you did twenty-five years ago."

What lies behind the depth, dynamism and durability of this movement in Richmond? The answer can be found in the lives of many of the individuals present at the celebration. In different ways, each of them made choices to step beyond their fears, pride, privilege or hurt and to reach out to those who are different. Audrey Burton, an African American community activist, told how she and her husband, Collie, built a friendship with a man they had suspected of racial bias, the senior assistant city manager, and opened their home to people of all backgrounds.  

Audrey also enlisted her friend Paige Chargois. “Hope in the Cities resonated with me for several reasons,” said Paige. “Most importantly, it had moved beyond simplistic approaches to more serious efforts of racial reconciliation. The challenge of reconciliation is brokenness. To reconcile, a relationship must be broken from its old way(s) of relating superficially – or with historical bias – then put back together in a different, healthier, and lasting way. Without disruption, the work of racial reconciliation can become superficial or placating at best, non-existent at the worst. 

“Within the work of racial reconciliation and seeking to end racism, we realized that we could expect to be wounded, offended, and diminished at times as we fought to make the work successful!”  As one of her former colleagues I can attest to some of the struggles!

The Hope in the Cities team determined that relationships were more important than projects, and over the years they have accompanied each other and many others in the wider community who needed support, often acting as silent partners without any demand for public recognition.

This accompanying role was highlighted in a letter from the chairman of Initiatives of Change USA, Alex Wise, who was chairman of the Museum of the Confederacy when he first encountered Hope in the Cities. He came to realize that “people like me were used to telling the story of the Civil War with blinkers on, and that this was contributing to the South’s racism and resistance to change.” He began to imagine a new museum where the whole story could be told from all perspectives. “Gaining the support of Hope the Cities was a key to our success.” Thanks to the trust Hope in the Cities had built, “we were able to gain a hearing and win the support of enough black opinion leaders to get the American Civil War Center at Historic Tredegar off the ground, and to help to change America’s narrative of the conflict that still shapes our nation.”

As Tim Kaine noted eight years ago, “Hope in the Cities focuses on the 'still small voice', not loud and flashy approaches, or neon signs…Listening is a lost art in this world. Hope in the Cities is creating a space where people can talk. It is incredibly important work…That listening thing is needed more than ever, and not just in racial issues."

Creating space for change requires us to create places of hospitality in our hearts and minds. For many of the Hope in the Cities founders like Audrey Burton and Paige Chargois it meant welcoming diverse groups to their homes. Hospitality means laying aside our preconceptions, bias and prejudices and learning to listen. Listen to the story of the other person, the other group; and listen to the voice of the Creator. None of the breakthroughs that have come through the efforts of Hope in the Cities could have occurred without the willingness of individuals to listen deeply to that inner voice.  

According to the historian Philip Boobbyer, Frank Buchman, the initiator of the Initiatives of Change movement which birthed Hope in the Cities, once said, “If you break the power of your instinctive actions and reactions by obeying the Spirit, you are on track.”  Susan and I have benefited recently from reading Listening to the God Who Speaks by Klaus Bochmuehl. It contains a wealth of insights about the guidance of the Spirit, which, according to St Bernard of Clairvaux, “admonishes the memory, teaches reason and moves the will.”  Bochmuehl highlights the "liberation" of listening: liberation from the "dominant cliches," the "clamoring voices of our culture," and a "return of creativity and spontaneity." Those who listen to their inner voice become "spiritual resource people, constant sources of inspiration rather than irritation." 

At this season of new birth, what could be timelier than to make our hearts and minds places of hospitality for the Spirit? I am reminded of the final verse of a carol that I wrote for our eldest son’s first Christmas:  

Tonight, across the world, ‘midst hunger, hate and war,

In each heart He’s knocking softly at the door.

Through pain and darkness there shines a light

For all mankind to share.

Top photo: Rob Corcoran and Mayor Walter Kenney in the late 90s by Karen Greisdorf. 

The key to a new beginning

Recently I was in a retreat with colleagues in a committee leading a History & Reconciliation Initiative at St Paul’s Episcopal Church. This initiative has done ground-breaking work in uncovering and documenting the church’s central role in Richmond’s slave economy and in promoting the "Lost Cause" mythology.

We came together to assess progress and to look at the challenges facing us as we build on what we have learned. What might this mean for St Paul's and for Richmond's need for racial reconciliation and equity? We also recognized the need to strengthen our own teamwork and to do our own healing work (we are a group of capable and strong-minded personalities), and to support the necessary teambuilding and reconciliation within the congregation so that we might be an authentic model for the wider Richmond community.

We found ourselves meeting under a portrait of the late Dr Syngman Rhee, the former Moderator of the Presbyterian Church (USA). in 1950, he escaped from North Korea through winter snow, joined the marines in South Korea and later  came to study at Chicago and Yale. He served as a campus minister at the University of Kentucky, marched with Martin Luther King, Jr, and devoted himself to reconciliation between North and South Korea.

Syngman was a friend and mentor. I recall him saying, “One stick does not make a strong fire. If we are going to carry on a vision for justice and peace we must learn to be a team. However brave and talented I may be, without a container or framework, compassion and commitment can become wrongly directed.”

I also remember him telling us that the most powerful lesson he learned from King was the idea that "the oppressed have the key to a new beginning.” 

He said, “This touched me deeply because I considered myself oppressed. I had turned my back on Korea." (His father had died at the hands of the communists and he never saw his mother again.) "But the oppressed have the choice of revenge or of forgiving and working for a new society for everyone.”

Teambuilding is intimately connected to forgiveness. Jean Vanier writes in Community & Growth:“A relationship is only authentic and stable when it is founded on the acceptance of weakness, on forgiveness and on the hope of growth... If we come into community without knowing that the reason we come is to discover the mystery of forgiveness, we will soon be disappointed.”

I have spent most of my working life in efforts for racial healing and justice, often in highly polarized situations. But my most challenging and painful experiences have not been in addressing conflicts around issues of race or politics but with my own team, close colleagues and friends. In some of these circumstances I felt let down, obstructed or unfairly judged. Others may have felt similarly about me. At times the stress impacted my health. Ultimately, I was always faced with the need to accept my part of the responsibility for the breakdown in trust.  

But we have long memories. Despite my decision to let go of a resentment or disappointment, there is sometimes a temptation to revisit the experience, to unpack the wound, to look at it again and to indulge in self-pity or self-justification.

Richard Rohr writes in Breathing Under Water that “to surrender ourselves to healing we have to have three spaces opened up within us – our opinionated head, our closed-down heart, and our defensive and defended body." What opinion am I unwilling to reconsider? To whom have I closed my heart? What am I defending?  

Our families, communities and nations are divided and torn apart by individuals and groups who feel oppressed, wronged or wounded. There are no winners in these cycles of blame. But as Syngman Rhee reminds us, we can all choose to be part of a new beginning.   

Liverpool and Richmond: partners in healing

Hope in the Cities can trace its roots back to a relationship with Liverpool that began in 1983. Alfred Stocks, the city’s chief executive (city manager) and other Liverpudlians committed to the principles of Initiatives of Change invited us to bring an interracial group from Richmond to meet with local officials. As described in my book, Trustbuilding, Liverpool had experienced the Toxteth riots just two years earlier and was also still recovering from vicious political warfare after Trotskyites had taken control of the city council and had bankrupt the city as a protest to Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s policies. In this polarized atmosphere Alfred Stocks was one of the few people trusted by all sides. 

The Richmond group had never worked together before and there was a history of deep distrust among several members. But a remarkable transformation took place during that shared experience in Liverpool. As one person said, “We came back a team.”

Over the years the relationship with Liverpool grew. In 1993 Gerald and Judith Henderson came to Richmond for three months to help with preparations for the landmark "Healing the Heart of America" conference, which included Richmond first “walk through history” and the inauguration of what is now the historic Slave Trail.

This month we spent two days with the Hendersons. Liverpool has changed greatly since the 1980s. It is far more international. In 2008 it was declared Europe’s “Capital of Culture.” A remarkable slavery museum tells the story of Liverpool’s leading role in the transatlantic trade. It was during a visit there that my colleague Tee Turner met John Franklin, a cultural historian and senior manager at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture. John has become a close collaborator with Hope in the Cities.

An hour’s drive from the city we visited the home and workshop of the sculptor Stephen Broadbent who specializes in public art. He remodeled Bridge Street in Warrington with a "River of Life" following a bomb blast that killed two young boys. His "Reconciliation Statue" stands in Richmond’s Shockoe Bottom, site of the former slave market. Stephen and an official delegation from Liverpool were present in Richmond in 2007 for the unveiling.

We also visited Hope University, Europe’s only ecumenical university, which has grown dramatically under the dynamic leadership of Gerald Pillay, the vice-chancellor and rector. I first met Pillay in South Africa in 1995 when he was teaching at the University of South Africa in Pretoria. His forebears were brought from India to the British Colony of Natal. He told the Guardian newspaper: “One of the powerful ways that people like us could articulate the liberation story was through theology, because in South Africa theology was a living discipline, not an ivory-tower discipline...Theology and my interest in Gandhi drew me into the promotion of equity and change.”  He has carried this same philosophy to his work in Liverpool. Impressively, 98 percent of graduate students were employed or further education six month after graduating.

Pillay invited Initiatives of Change to help develop a "School for Changemakers" on the campus. During a previous visit in 2011, I led a lively discussion and a trustbuilding workshop with students. 

Sadly, Gerald was in South Africa when we visited this time as his mother was very ill, but his wife, Nirri, a law professor, showed us the immaculate campus. She joined us for lunch with Omnia Marzouk, a distinguished doctor recently retired from a senior management role at the UK's busiest children’s emergency department. Omnia's family is from Egypt and her father was ambassador to Australia where she spent her teenage years and studied medicine. She has served as President of IofC International and we have worked together on many projects over the years. 

The Liverpool-Richmond relationship is an example of friendships and partnerships that have endured over many decades and the unique global network of trust that is Initiatives of Change.

Notes from the road in Britain

We are mid-way through a month of travel in the UK, visiting family and friends. It’s our first extended visit since 2005.

We are delighting in the beauty of the British countryside and the multitude of historic sites which seem to appear at every corner of the towns and cities. So far, we have visited three UNESCO World Heritage Sites! 

The color and texture of the cloud formations and the soft late afternoon light are unlike anything we see back home in Richmond, Virginia. We enjoyed hiking in the Yorkshire Dales and the Lake District with drystone walls and stunning views over the passes.

British B&Bs have improved immeasurably over the years with very comfortable beds and immaculate ensuite bathrooms. (Today we are comfortably ensconced in a wonderful Airbnb overlooking Loch Tay in Scotland with cows and sheep grazing outside our window.) But be warned, most Airbnbs do not offer breakfast! And curiously, we often found it difficult to find regular restaurants in country towns which are dominated by pubs and by tearooms that only open at 10am and close at 5pm.

We hired a car on arrival and have covered several hundred miles in England and Scotland. The road surfaces here are far superior to those in the US; even on tiny country lanes (including some incredibly steep and winding ones) I scarcely encountered a pothole. Also, it is nice to drive in a country where people do not pass on the inside lane and trucks do not ride on the fast lane.

We must add a word about Britain's intrepid cyclists. This seems to be a rapidly growing sport and we were awed watching scores of bikers climbing almost verticle passes often hemmed in by tour coaches and campers and without the protection of dedicated lanes. 

I am reminded of Britain’s love of dogs. The owner of a pub in the Yorkshire Dales had an enormous St Bernard which sprawled across the area in front of the bar so that customers had to step over it to get to the tables!

As soon as we crossed the border into Scotland we were impressed by the vast reforestation projects visible on previously bare hills. This is obviously a growing industry in Scotland and must be helpful to the climate. Equally noteworthy are the number of windfarms.

Britain is experiencing some of the same challenges and need for trustbuilding as the US. There is considerable anxiety at the ineffectiveness of the central government and uncertainty over Brexit. Despite fierce opposition to immigration from the far right, it is nice to see the increasing diversity of the country in many sectors and to hear black British speak with broad regional accents. Just yesterday the country celebrated as Dina Asher-Smith smashed the 200m record to win gold in the European Championships having won the 100m a few days earlier.

We were hosted in Leeds by Peter Vickers, godfather to our eldest son, Neil. Peter heads Vickers & Sons which specializes in the development and manufacture of lubricants for the textile and marine industries. For generations the family has run the business on principles of integity, teamwork and responsibility. Peter's father was a good friend of my dad who came from a trade union background. They worked together to overcome class warfare in British industry.

We were inspired by our visit with Elizabeth Carson, at 90 still spry and keen of mind. Although she lost her house to a freak fire last month, she is amazingly cheerful in her temporary flat and she took us to dinner with neighborhood friends in the historic town of Haddington, near Edinburgh. Would that we all could be so resilient in the face of adversity! Her steadfast faith on God’s practical guidance for daily life and her care for others is an example for us all.

A trip down memory lane

A highlight of this week was a visit to Hill Farm, about an hour and a half drive from my sister’s home in Wenhaston, Suffolk.  My mother worked as a land girl there during World War II. In the mid-fifties our family spent several years in a cottage on the estate which was owned Peter Howard, the journalist and leader of MRA (now IofC). I had not set foot on the farm for sixty years and looking across the rolling fields many memories came flooding back.

The farm was a perfect playground for my brother and sister and me. We rode the massive Suffolk Punch draught horses and the milk wagon down to the gate, burrowed tunnels into the haystacks, helped with the harvesting and sledded on the slopes. We attended the school in the neighboring town of Hadleigh.

The Howard children, Philip, Anne and Anthony were in their late teens and early twenties. They were like older cousins to us and they involved us in many games and pranks. They taught us how to play cricket. Our cottage, "Corrie," lies at the foot of a hill below the main house. I recall Philip climbing in our bedroom window and reading The Hobbit.

The main house itself is a 16^th Century listed Tudor building with an unspoiled view across the hills. Today it serves as a holistic “inner guidance” retreat center run by Jo and Dominic De Rosa. They specialize in an approach to addiction which they call “quantum sobriety,” based on meditation and Jo’s own experience of going from addiction to freedom. As well as five-day retreats they offer monthly meetings, online courses and day workshops. They offer healthy food, much of it grown in the grounds which Dominic manages.

Back in Wenhaston, there is ample evidence that my sister has inherited my mother’s green thumb. Every inch of her garden is bursting with produce and flowers, and my brother-in-law tends their flourishing allotment a short walk away in the village. However, the extended period of unusual heat and lack of rain has turned everyone's lawns brown. 

On Friday we head north to begin an extensive driving tour. First stop is Leeds, Yorkshire, to visit our friend Peter Vickers who is godfather to our eldest son, Neil. 

 

Behind every opinion there is a human being

We've just concluded the forum on Addressing Europe's Unfinished Business (AEUB). Yesterday we heard Jo Berry, whose father was killed by an IRA bomb, tell how she met the man responsible for the bombing and how they have worked together to build peace. Two days after the bombing, she said, "I made a vow that I was not going to have an enemy. I wanted to understand the man who killed my father." Sixteen years later after Pat Magee was released from prison, Jo arranged to met him. He began by justifying the bombing as an act of war, but as the conversation went on it became more honest and emotional and Pat finally said, "I am sorry I killed your father." At that point, said Jo, "I felt my father became a human being, not a legitimate target." 

Two Romanian organizers of the forum, Diana Damsa, founder of the Centre for Social Transformation, and Simona Torotcoi, a Roma activist, described their very different experiences growing up and their paths to a new understanding. "I was brought up to believe that Roma were dangerous and unreliable and that I should keep my distance. I felt superior." At a forum in India she was faced with the question, "Who are the people you are afraid of and why?" She was challenged to acknowledge the history of hundreds of years of slavery and discrimination suffered by the Roma people. 

Simona grew up in a two-room house which was better than most of her relatives who lived in shacks near the rubish dump. At school she felt ashamed of being Roma and tried to blend in with the majority children, but as she grew older she became a strong advocate for equality and justice. She and Diana now work closely together as partners.

It is fascinating to learn how Richmond, Virginia, has played a small part in inspiring and encouraging the work of someone like Diana who spent several months in Richmond some years ago studying the Hope in the Ciites approach to dialogue and reconciliation. Yesterday I met with Olena Kashkarova from Ukraine who also interned in Richmond. She has developed dialogues with people of diiferent views about Ukraine's history, and also with people of different political persuasions in the 2014 Euromaidan revolution; and she co-founded a network of of facilitators. She told me that her Richmond experience gave her the courage to do what she is now doing. 

Earlier in the week we heard another remarkable story from Peter Sundin from Sweden who grew up in a racist family with Nazi traditions. "White power music was the only music played in our house." His mother worked as a cleaner and blamed foreigners "for taking our jobs." The family believed that the holocuast was a fraud. As a young man he was jailed for taking part in a brutal assault on an immigrant. His transformation over five years was supported by a friendship  with a police officer who today is his colleague. He has cut ties with family and friends and says, "I learned that behind every opinion is a human being." 

In the training track that Ebony Walden and I led there were several Roma participants as well as Ukranians, Swiss, French, Germans, a Sudanese immigrant and Muslims from various European countries. Over three days we worked intensively on questions of history, identity, and narrative; we explored experiences of being part of dominant and non-dominant groups in our countries; and the participants developed dialogue questions around their key concerns and began to consider how to build teamwork with others. 

Last night we were treated to a magnificent concert by two brilliant Romanian musicians. As the sun set over the mountains, five conference participants joined them in singing "The Whole Wide World's On Tiptoe, Waiting for Something New." 

Addressing Europe's Unfinished Business - Notes from Caux

We arrived at the international conference center for Initiatives of Change in Caux, Switzerland on Saturday morning. Our room has a spectacular view over Lake Geneva. There are 181 delegates here from 32 countries, most of them young people, who have come to begin a three-year exploration of the link between personal and collective identities in Europe, the rise of populism and nationalism, the need to address collective trauma and build more cohesive societies.

Among the participants are 11 young Muslims from several European countries who are part of a program called Learning to be a Peacemaker. One of them said, “Within our communities we have sometimes forgotten the essence of our religion; and in the wider society there is often misunderstanding.”

Tatjana Peric, from Bosnia Herzegovina/Serbia, is Advisor on Combating Racism and Xenophobia for the Organization for Security and Co-Operation in Europe. Speaking at the opening of the forum last night she said the biggest challenge in Europe today is the merging of anti-immigrant feelings with racism. There is a great need to support civil society organizations.

Lord Paddy Ashdown, politician, diplomat and author, noted that power is shifting to the Internet, global finance, and satellite broadcasting which are outside the rule of law or accountability; and economic power is shifting from the West to the East. "It is the end of 400 years of Western hegemony." He warned against the contagion of populism; and he stressed that "the rule of law is the first thing that must be in place." Drawing on his own experience from growing up in Northern Ireland, he called history "the most political issue in any reconstruction." Who tells the story? And how is it handed down generationally? Language is important. Don’t fall into the trap of saying we are fighting for Western values. We are fighting for universal values. Above all, "Get involved. Don't leave it to someone else."  

Barbara Hinterman, Secretary General of IofC Switzerland, stressed the role of silent reflection and storytelling as two key ingredients of the Caux experience.  "It can be a trigger for honest conversation and developing trust."

Today we launch into a variety of training tracks. 

The power of narrative

I am writing this as Susan and I prepare to fly to Europe. We will be attending a forum titled Addressing Europe’s Unfinished Business at the Initiatives of Change conference center in Caux, Switzerland. While there I will conduct a training workshop with my colleague Ebony Walden. Our theme is "Trustbuilding in a diverse world: history, identity and equity." Based on a quick look at workshop registrants we will have young leaders from Ukraine, France, Switzerland and Germany.

From Switzerland Susan and I continue to the UK where we will spend the month of August visiting family and friends and exploring parts of the country we are not familiar with such as the Yorkshire Dales and the Lake District. It is more than a decade since we spent any length of time in the UK and much has changed in recent years, not least the present chaos surrounding Brexit. It will be interesting to get a first-hand impression of what people are thinking and feeling – not just in the major urban center like London but in the small towns and rural counties of northern England and  Scotland.

It seems that the US and Europe face similar challenges with the rise of authoritarian leaders, populist movements, anti-immigrant sentiment and distrust of central government. As Roger Cohen pointed out in the New York Times, “A vigorous counterrevolution against the liberal-democratic orthodoxy of diversity and multiculturalism is under way.” This movement is characterized by attacks on the media and independent judiciary and the growth of a new elite through crony capitalism. It energizes "a national narrative of victimhood and heroism through the manipulation of history." “Nobody stopped to ask whether the market and liberal democracy were necessary eternal twins. Turns out they were not." We see the growing attraction of Russia, Turkey and China as strong-man models in opposition to values based on universal human rights that are portrayed as "Western." But as Obama pointed out so eloquently in South Africa recently, Mandela demonstrated that these are not just Western values. 

Key to this populist and authoritarian trend is the power of narrative. Trump may be an appalling president but he does know how to control the narrative. One of the focal areas of our workshop in Caux will be how to understand and disrupt false narratives that divide. Recent events illustrate that when people feel they are not being heard they may act in ways that are harmful their own long term interests. They won’t listen to “facts” if they feel their stories are not respected. So we must learn to listen, even to those we find difficult to hear.

Another thoughtful insight is given by David Broder who notes that while national politics takes place through the filter of the media circus, "localism" is thriving in many places. In Washington, DC, politicians throw insults at each other. Local mayors and citizen groups are actually getting things done. “We are in an era of low social trust. People really have faith only in the relationships around them, the change agents who are right on the ground.” 

When localities learn to appreciate their shared history and find ways to work together on practical needs, we may be surprised by what can occur. I can attest to this from our ongoing experience in my hometown of Richmond.

Over the next few weeks I will be sending occasional “notes from the field” as we travel and listen and learn.