We're good at putting out fires of all kinds. For me, it's heartwarming every day to read about first responders and others who are keeping us relatively safe.
But responding and deep down problem solving are two different things.
Yesterday I read a devotional written by my friend, Tonya. She heads up our church's Diversity Team. Among other things they are tackling the book, Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson. Tonya shared how important it is for all of us to read hard stuff and own up to who we are and what we were taught to believe. One of the things she quoted has stuck with me for the past 24 hours. I can't get it out of my head.
She referenced the mass incarceration complex which is set up to imprison one out of three black babies born.
Truly solving problems is much harder than this. Most of us know that massive fires, multiple deadly hurricanes and extreme heat are caused by climate change. And we know how to fix it.
Most of us know that our overcrowded prisons are largely filled with people who were born into circumstances that helped shape them into who they became. We know that solving these problems needs to begin before they are born. Any of us who've ever been involved in tutoring can tell sad stories of children who've never had a book read to them.
I'm grateful for first responders but sometimes by the time they get there it's too late. And the attempt to address crime by setting up a prison system to accommodate one in three black babies born is, well, too late.
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