Healing from oppression and racism

The Healing From Oppression and Racism Conference on Friday, April 27, was an event put together in partnership with several ecumenical organizations, such as FSW, Faith Commons, SMU Perkins, Baylor Scott and White Health, and ACPE, to hear the redemptive story of Father Michael Lapsley (see profile below), who fought against South African apartheid. He was persecuted by the apartheid that mailed him a bomb that changed his life completely. While he lost both hands, sight in one eye, and critically burned, it was through the process of healing that led Father Lapsley to a movement of healing and liberation. Father Lapsley focused on the healing value of acknowledging trauma, but it must first come with the knowledge of what happened. In the healing of trauma, one is holistically liberated.  

The conference also focused on Sandy Ovalle (see profile below), who contextualized the trauma of racism immigrants and the Latinx community have historically and currently experienced. Sandy noted the shooting in El Paso as an example of the cultural trauma that the Latinx community holds, as it was the Latinx community who was targeted because of the rhetoric around replacement theory and the invasions at the border. Sandy emphasized the need to be story-holders, to stand in solidarity with the Latinx community by believing in their journeys and trauma and expanding our vision of who we see as the "Us.”

Stephen Reeves closed the conference with a benediction in which he wove themes from the day:

God of grace and justice,

We are citizens of a damaged nation full of damaged people. 

But we first belong to you, oh Lord, and you are a God of healing, resurrection, and liberation.

The roads we’ve traveled to get here are different, but we’ve all experienced trauma, heartache, and pain.

Give us the courage to share our stories, and to become storyholders - not just to hear others, but to believe them, be changed, and be moved to action.

God we ask that you reduce the power of fear, pain and greed in our world and in each of our hearts. 

When we raise our voices for justice, let us not forget the still small voice inside in need of healing. 

Expand our “us”, oh God, until neighbors are sisters and brothers. 

As we go, help us not practice backwardness, but become participants in your dream.  

We know that when we do, you are with us. Help us feel it everyday. 

Amen.

Father Lapsley

Alan Michael Lapsley was born on June 2, 1949 in New Zealand. He was ordained to the priesthood in Australia where he joined the Anglican religious order the Society of the Sacred Mission (SSM). Lapsley is a graduate of the Australian College of Theology, the National University of Lesotho and the University of Zimbabwe.

In 1973 he arrived in Durban, South Africa, as an undergraduate student, he became a chaplain to students at both black and white universities. In 1976, he began to speak out on behalf of schoolchildren who were being shot, detained and tortured. 1976, was the year of the Soweto Uprising, which sparked protests across the country. Fr Michael, as he was known, took a stand as national chaplain to Anglican students, a position he held at the time.

In September 1976, he was expelled from the country. He went to live in Lesotho, where he continued his studies and became a member of the African National Congress and a chaplain to the organization in exile. During this period he traveled the world, mobilizing faith communities, in particular, to oppose apartheid and support the liberation struggle.

After a police raid in Maseru in 1982 in which 42 people were killed, he moved to Zimbabwe. It was here that in 1990, three months after ANC leader Nelson Mandela's release from prison, he was sent a letter bomb by the apartheid regime. It was hidden inside two religious magazines. He lost both hands and the sight in one eye in the blast, and was seriously burnt.

In 1993, he became Chaplain of the Trauma Centre for Victims of Violence and Torture in Cape Town, which assisted the country's Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC). This work led to the establishment, in 1998, of the Institute for Healing of Memories (IHOM) in Cape Town. The IHOM aims to allow many more South Africans to tell their stories in workshops where they work through their trauma. The IHOM is based in Cape Town, South Africa, but Fr Michael has worked in many other countries, in Africa and across the world. The organization now works with groups including those affected by political violence; those affected and infected by HIV and AIDS; refugees and asylum seekers; prisoners and war veterans. The IHOM is also a not-for-profit organization in the United States.

Sandy Ovalle

Sandy Ovalle Martínez is a table-setter and space-curator, rooting her work in the deep faith and strength of Chicanx and Latinx spiritual teachers. She is a native of Mexico City. A mujerista theologian and an organizer, she currently serves as the director of campaigns and mobilizing for Sojourners in Washington, D.C., leading SojoAction, the mobilizing arm of Sojourners. In her role, Sandy oversees mobilization and activist engagement around different justice areas including climate and environmental justice, immigration, women and girls, and peace and nonviolence. She speaks regularly on misión integral – integral mission, connecting to our ancestral roots, spiritual practices of healing, theological frameworks for advocacy and the theology of migration.

Past notable events in which she had been involved include the North American Association of Christians in Social Work: 71st Annual Convention Plenary 2019 Justo and Catherine González Lecture Series, 2021 San Gabriel Valley Immigration Resource Center Speaker Series, 2018, 2019, and 2021 CCDA Workshop Presenter, Refugee Resettlement and the Church, training others to come alongside refugees, U.S. Immigration 101, History of U.S. Immigration, 2019 Christ Church Cathedral Guest Preacher, English and Spanish and Guest Preacher at Peace Fellowship in Washington D.C

Before her work with Sojourners, she worked with immigrant and refugee communities, providing direct legal and resettlement services as well as mobilizing faith groups for advocacy around issues that impacted these communities. She has worked in campus ministry with college students in Texas and California. She holds an M.A. in theology from Fuller Theological Seminary. Sandy loves writing poetry and gathering people around a table full of homemade pozole.