This is Elijah McLain. Elijah was killed by Aurora police officers in August, 2019 while walking home from work.

As I pulled up to the curb, I reached over and hit the button that activated my emergency flashers. Even though I was illegally parked, I figured it would only take me a second to run into the library, return the book, and be on my way again.

That was the moment I looked up and saw him.

Actually I saw two young men walking toward me on the sidewalk. The guy on the left wore a light-colored pair of pants and a winter coat that was completely unzipped. The weather was finally warming up after a bitter cold snap, so I guess he was celebrating. 

But it was the sight of the guy on the right that gave me a moment’s pause. His coat was zipped to the top. A faux fur lined hood was pulled over his head. Sunglasses covered his eyes. But the thing that really caused me to stop a minute and imprudently stare was what seemed to be a black, N95 COVID mask covering the lower half of his face. 

“Dude!” I thought to myself. “It’s OK! You’re outdoors! You really don’t need to wear that thing.” 

And then suddenly he smiled. And I took a closer look. As it turned out, he was not wearing a COVID facemask at all. 

The guy was black. As in, African American. 

And suddenly I felt as dumb as I have felt in a long, long time.

I felt dumb because my recognition error reminded me – in one quick, forehead-slapping moment – just how lily-white this community really is. This place, Fort Collins, Colorado, is bereft enough of color that old white guys (if you can believe this) sometimes see young black dudes and at first DON’T UNDERSTAND WHAT THEY ARE SEEING!

According to figures from the 2020 census, the African American percentage of the of the city of Fort Collins, Colorado is 1.4%. 

1.4%!! To put that into a national context, according to the 2020 census, African Americans make up 12% of the total U.S. population.

And I thought the Kansas City suburb we came here from was uber white!

Yes. It is true that the entire state of Colorado is sadly lacking in melanin at just under 5% African American. But Fort Collins is slacking even by those abysmally low standards. 

Why does this matter? 

First, it matters because it means that when you live in Fort Collins, Colorado, you live inside a highly skewed picture of the world. Every day you see a world that is very homogenized. It is a picture that CAN (and in many cases DOES) lead a white person to believe that the rest of the world looks pretty much like ME! Which CAN, (and often DOES) in turn, lead that person to believe they do not need to extend themselves to try and understand any other racial or cultural perspective than their own.

It is a little akin to the way being MARRIED or being SINGLE affects a person’s thinking. I will readily admit this metaphor is stretched pretty close to the breaking point, but hang with me a second if you would, please. It’s like this: in a marriage setting, it’s not just YOU. You always have to consider how your decisions and actions effect another person. And woe to you if you don’t. 

In contrast, in a household that consists of me and me alone, I don’t have that constraint. If X is good for me, I do it. If it isn’t, I don’t. Throw my clothes into a pile on the floor? Leave the toilet seat up? Only watch movies I want to watch? No problem!

When our world is homogenous, we are rarely stretched or challenged. And when we are not stretched, we don’t grow. Of course, we can always decide to resist growth even in a gloriously rainbow-hued world. But I don’t believe that approach is consistent with God’s design for us. Right there in the beginning of the Bible, God speaks and says, “It is not good that the man should be alone…” (Genesis 2:18, NRSV). 

And yes, we can choose to see this Divine Decree as God’s “seal of approval” on the institution of marriage. Many do see it exactly that way. 

But I think we can go a step further. We can also choose to understand it as God’s endorsement of the beauty of diverse, complex, messy, interdependent, human COMMUNITY. 

Abundant blessings;