Ministering in the Midst of Chaos

Spiritual Practice + Black Lives Matter

Ten years ago, in Ferguson, Missouri, police officer Darren Wilson killed Michael Brown, an unarmed Black man. The shooting triggered a wave of organized protests, which would be known nationally as the Ferguson Uprising, and what would come to be known as The Movement for Black Lives—or as we know it today, Black Lives Matter.

In the midst of that movement was a minister, Rev. Dr. Starsky Wilson, who served the protestors and provided them physical, emotional, and spiritual support. Rev. Wilson was a leader in the effort, and was appointed co-chair of the Ferguson Commission, which released Forward Through Ferguson: A Path Toward Racial Equity.”

Since then, Starsky has become a national leader, serving on boards for Duke Divinity School and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and as President and CEO of the Children’s Defense Fund. During my first months working at the Aspen Institute, my boss and Aspen’s President, Dan Porterfield, pointed to Starsky across the room and said, “You should get to know that guy. He’s the real deal.”

I took my boss’ advice and have taken the opportunity to get to know Starsky over the years. And I’m here to share the good word. Starsky really is the real deal. I’m so grateful to have the opportunity to sit and learn from him on so many things, including how spiritual practice informs how and why he shows up in the world.

I’ll share an excerpt of our conversation below. To listen to our full conversation in Wisdom & Practice, click here. †

Simran Jeet Singh: Are there any particular teachings that you draw from your tradition that you apply in your daily life for yourself as opposed to for your work?

Starsky Wilson: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think I try really hard to live in practices, right? The practices of prayer, practices of meditation, and cycles, practices of fasting, all things I learned in the life of the church.

My desire to kind of be a good, faithful, husband and father, are deeply informed by my practice of faith and the lessons of the scriptures around what that leadership looks like or at least the interpretation that I was given over time. 

So my daily practices of prayer, my engagement in family are all informed by my read of calls to sacrifice for my family and the love that God has for the church. To live in an upright manner, which again, my translations for that have much more to do with relations to others than different kinds of constraints.

But very much having this commitment to what it means to be in the right relationship with others. And a searching, right? This sudden humility around what is truth. I read through, say for instance, the Gospel of John–both a practice of Jesus engaging in self revelation, but I also think self exploration, right? There's a series of rhetorical “I am” statements where he's kind of teaching himself and his identity to his disciples. But I also think that's like a self revelatory practice that I integrate into not just my prayers, but journaling and writing to get a sense of who I'm showing up to be in the moment, and who I'm ultimately becoming. And 46 years old Starsky is a very different dude than Starsky. It's not just like hanging around. Like I don't think you get credit or get better for just hanging around. You get more clear by engaging the questions, by reflecting, by listening to God in prayer and meditation. And so these are things I try to do, regularly, routinely, and still yet not enough.

Simran Jeet Singh: Is this practice of self exploration that you're drawing from something that could benefit society as a whole?

Starsky Wilson: I think folks could benefit from it. I think young people, especially, could benefit from it. Because there's so many other efforts that seek to define us. But I also think this introspection is a valuable complement to the interdependence, and the social formation that I also think is valuable.

I think about my own sons, and I remember conversations where I was attempting to invite them, as early as 10 years old, to resist labels that people wanted to put on them or resist characteristics just because they were exposed to them in wider society. What I usually had to counter that is what I was trying to offer them in the house.

And frankly, I'll just say, Simran, I think this is much more from my spiritual journey than from my religious teaching. It was in my kind of spiritual wrestling outside of and reflecting on religious teaching about Jesus, where I come to understand Jesus as one who has a perfect, God consciousness, and that coming out of practices of prayer and meditation, connection with God and self revelation, self exploration, right?

I didn't get that in church. And so this is why I think most valuable to young people is some form of accompanied exploration of faith, and its resources for one becoming in the world. I think the sense of self is a valuable bulwark against some of those challenging realities. But more so than anything else, just as one seeks to become, I think that becoming alongside well being are great gifts of practices of reflection that come from spiritual journey.

To listen to our full conversation in Wisdom & Practice, click here. †