Deconstructing Deconstruction – Felicia Murrell (w/Brad Jersak)
Editor’s Note: The following interview is a partial transcript of one for four forthcoming podcast interviews on “deconstruction” at Stephen Backhouse’s Tent Theology Podcast. Bradley Jersak will be serving as co-host in interviews with Brian Zahnd, David Hayward, Felicia Murrell, and Judith Moses (recorded in that order).
Bradley
Definition: First, the word “deconstruction,” popularly used today, has become a catchphrase for a range of experiences from voluntary to involuntary, from liberating to traumatic, from personal to social, that involve a dismantling or restructuring of one’s belief systems (religious or ideological). Understood this way, one may experience a process of disorientation and reorientation that holds its own perils and possibilities. In your world and your story, what other words or metaphors might best describe this phenomenon? What might that look like in the communities you work with? Examples of both the pitfalls and breakthroughs are most welcome.
Felicia
My work is largely one-on-one spiritual companioning and it’s the work of accompanying, of listening, of sharing and bearing witness, being human in the presence of one another with all of our eff ups and complexities and beauties and joys.
In carrot on a stick religion that uses your imperfections to keep you chasing healing, chasing wholeness, chasing blessings, too often we hand our power over to something outside ourselves. We are always looking for external validation, external permission. Led by the opinions of others — what others think, what others say is true and right…how others say we should live, dress, talk…who we should love or sleep with…what we should read, what movie we can watch…what we are to believe— it feels natural to “let someone else control us,” to unconsciously hand over the reins and allow someone else guide us externally. Honestly, it’s not something we often question because most of our lives, whether our parents, our religious leaders, our coaches, or our bosses, someone outside of ourselves has told us what to do and how to be. So, it feels natural …until it doesn’t. Sometimes this rupture, this process of deconstructing, happens naturally and sometimes unnaturally, sometimes by way of invitation, sometimes by way of force.
But I’m struck by the portion of Psalm 32:8, “…I’ll guide you with my eye.” And for me, it seems like an invitation to be led from the inside out instead of the outside in. So the process of deconstruction becomes something like allowing the pillars of certainty and arrogance to collapse so we can join Love in a dance of unknowing that requires humility and trust. This in itself is its own homecoming, moving from an external guide to internal guide, the eye of Love.
Bradley
Past: In Out of the Embers, Jersak appealed to key voices from the past who engaged in their own versions of deconstruction across the centuries… Moses, Plato, the Cappadocians, Voltaire, Nietzsche, Dostoevsky, Kierkegaard, and Simone Weil.
In your personal experience, who have been your most trusted influences—historically or recently—the guides who have shaped your own journey? This might include the voices you’ve most internalized, including great names from the past or personal mentors along the way.
Felicia
While I’ve always read and held a deep admiration for Black women writers, particularly, Maya Angelou, Toni Morrison, Alice Walker, Angela Davis, and bell hooks. If I’m honest, I was probably shaped more by what other people thought than my own thoughts. So, I’ve had to learn how to sit with Love and figure out what I believe to be true, what resonates with me. How has the wisdom of my ancestors shaped me? Where am I in the voices and opinions in my head? Whose guidance feels most like love even when love is convicting or offering a stern correction? I’d have to say in recent years, I’ve largely been shaped by and internalized the work of Paul Young, Howard Thurman, and Valarie Kaur.
However, as I sit with this question, I’m struck by the fact that most of my teachers have been men, particularly white men. And I think in some ways, this has had to be part of the unraveling. To be intentional about seeking out voices that are not only masculine but also feminine and non-gendered. Through the process of deconstruction, I’m more able to see systems and policies in play that promote and market certain voices over others, thereby making male voices, largely white male voices more accessible. So, it’s understandable that we reference Paul and not Mary Magdalene, Gregory of Nyssa and not Macrina the Younger, Jung, Plato, Teilhardde Chardin and not Simone Weil… I could on, but for me what Spirit invites me to see is that we have to be intentional about seeking out thought leaders and looking for resonance in the ideas of people whose voices may not be as widely marketed or readily accessible.
I would have never reached that place without going through the process of deconstruction. I was too rigid about who I believed was right.
Bradley
Present: In the communities you represent and serve, it’s fair to say that significant crises are afoot at this moment in time. Could you tell us about what is presenting most intensely at the moment? How might we best address these challenges, both the communities themselves and those who would love to be better allies?
Felicia
I worry about people, about the thread of cause and effect. I worry about housing and heating and feeding small children with the rising cost of food and gas. I worry about people getting evicted and how it’s all tied together. I think what people often miss is the cataclysmic change of events that happens as a result of one thing. And the fix isn’t always simple. (CLICK HERE for an example of the cause and effect).
What would I like others to see and know about that: 1)To not look away. To let it break your heart. Don’t try to rush in and fix to salve the discomfort. But do target your community and infiltrate it with love and hope. 2) Don’t get overwhelmed. Seek to understand the need. Be concerned about what matters, who matters…and also know that everything is not your problem or your call to rescue and fix.
Ask Spirit: Who do I not see? Whose struggle is invisible to me? How can I help someone lay down tonight and sleep without fear? Spirit, what does love, expressed through my life, look like? Spirit, how do I stand in solidarity with the hurting?
Specific Calls to Action might include:
- For those of you who feel called to simply pray, great. Go prayer-walk in an indigent neighborhood with gloved hands and a trash bag and pick up trash as you pray.
- Spend an hour in a Title I school as a tutor or teacher's helper.
- No time in your workday to be hands-on? Take a twenty-dollar bill and offer it to a teacher in said school to help her buy classroom supplies. Or give it to the cafeteria manager and ask her to put it on the books of a child who is struggling to pay for lunch.
Bradley
Assuming that one aspect of “deconstruction” often includes detachment, alienation, or even exclusion from one’s previous family or community of origin, where do we begin to find a renewed sense of belonging, healthy attachment, and trusted community?
Felicia
Belonging to me is unconditional acceptance. I think that’s the foundation of every healthy relationship. I want to exist in communities of safety that allow for the full expression of a person’s humanity, that doesn’t immediately move to marking them with a scarlet letter because of their character defects. That requires humility, compassion, and mercy.
Where do I have value? Where do I add value? Where do I feel safe? Where do I offer safety? Where am I free to express myself without censor? Where do I allow others the freedom to express their opinion without censor? Who has prepared the bread and wine, spread a feast before me and laid out the welcome mat? Who or where feels like home? ultimately, is there welcoming, mutuality, reciprocity and room for particularity in our connection.
As we find the answers to these questions, we need to allows ourselves the freedom to deconstruct our pictures of what community looks like.
Bradley
Future: Based on your observations and intuitions, what do you foresee or suspect we need to prepare for down the road (in the next few decades)? What is being baked into our future right now and how can we begin to ready a healthy response (rather than a knee-jerk reaction)?
Felicia
I think we need to prepare for life springing up within the rupture. Perhaps the chasm is too big to bridge the divide of binaries, but Jesus is in the rupture too.
My friend Brie Stoner has a podcast called Unknowing and Season 3 has specifically been focused on the theme: Composting Christianity and I’m stuck on the word compost. That manure, waste is used as fertilizer to create the environment for new life to spring forth. Or that we could take scraps and create a byproduct. All that to say, I’m pragmatic in admitting at times things do feel heavy and bleak, and I’m filled with hope for what’s on the other side or even at work during crisis. I trust the work of Love. I’m reminded of growth cycles where we only see sprouts and icebergs that only reveal the tip of something. In both scenarios, there’s a lot going on beneath the surface than we can see. And one thing I’m sure of, love is always working.
A healthy response: I manage me. What does that look like internally? How do I stay grounding and connected to Love? How do I stay open to hear how Love is leading me to live and be and to respond?
That’s not a formula; it’s more like a dance. Different tempos require different steps. We don’t know how we’re being invited to participate until the music starts. What’s required of us is to have done the necessary preparation and discipline to have the skills and presence of heart we need to show up when an opportunity presents itself.
I think of Octavia Butler’s book, The Parable of the Talents. Lauren’s family had a garden; they hid money; the kids were taught all kinds of survival tactics and when it became necessary for her to respond to what was in front of her, she was ready to do that. That’s not to invite fear, it’s to invite us to ponder: What disciplines and practices do we need to curate and develop to be ready?
One discipline I’ve developed is the practice of Greeting the Day. It’s a simple welcoming prayer:
All that is eternal within me welcomes the wonder of this day. As I turn my heart, face to face to face, may Love flow to me. May Love flow through me. May I set my face to see where Love leads and follow.
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