Page 1 of 3

Service May 8, 2022

Erin Berry

Good morning. I am very grateful to have been given the opportunity to speak to you

all today! I know I feel very underqualified but I felt it was important for me to challenge

myself to not only write, but to also deliver a sermon. You see, this makes me very

uncomfortable. Standing up here with everyone's eyes and ears attentive and

observing. This is actually my nightmare. I have been painfully shy since childhood. I

barely spoke in any of my high school classes and when asked to describe me, my

classmates unanimously decided that “Quiet” was the only appropriate term.

So why have I forced myself to be this uncomfortable? I could be sitting down in the

pews, relaxed and content to listen. Listening is my favorite thing to do! However, I

have challenged myself to do this in the hopes that through this discomfort, I may be

able to grow. In fact, I believe that the only real way to grow is to be uncomfortable.

Respected author and researcher, Brene Brown says in her book Daring Greatly: How

the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead

“[...] we need to cultivate the courage to be uncomfortable and to teach the people

around us how to accept discomfort as a part of growth.”

Thus the reason I am up here today. I am trying to be an example for others in how to

challenge yourselves in the best ways. Me, just a quiet, shy, stay at home mom, artist,

poet, plant enthusiast, and dreamer. I am attempting to inspire and inform. All of us are

teachers and students in this, the school of life, and I intend to learn from and teach as

many people as I can.

Let’s imagine an uncomfortable, awkward, unpleasant moment in your life. It may have

been while you were laying in a hospital bed trying to push out a nine pound baby. It

may have been having to confront your grandfather about his use of the n-word in your

home. It may have been having to have a talk with your child about the birds and the

bees. Whatever the situation, however uncomfortable, it forced you to grow. It,

hopefully, allowed you to open your mind and your heart. We are who we are because

of the challenges we have faced and our responses to those challenges.

One of my most uncomfortable moments was during my sophomore year of college. I

was enrolled in a Social Justice class with a great professor who happened to be

black. This class ended up changing my perspective on everything to do with race in

America. The change all started when I had to come to terms with the fact that I was a

Page 2 of 3

racist. Saying it out loud now, gives me pangs of guilt and makes me feel very

uncomfortable. But that is the point. My professor forced all of us in the class to look

with new eyes. Maybe we had never said anything racist, or been mean to any black

person but racism itself was deeper than that. Racism, at its core, is about power. We,

as white students, had benefited from our place in a racist society. For example, she

pointed out the color of band aids. A flesh tone, but whose flesh tone? Another

example my professor gave was the fact that even over the phone, if we sounded

white, we were more likely to be called back for a job interview or be more likely to

secure the lease on a nice apartment.

Black people in America have to deal with racism on a daily basis. Just as an example,

I saw on Facebook the other day an illustration of a black fetus inside the womb of a

black mother. I realized that though I have given birth to three babies and had seen

countless diagrams and medical illustrations of pregnant moms, I had never seen a

black woman and their baby illustrated this way. Arguably, black women have been

giving birth longer than white women, and yet this illustration by Chidiebere (chid-eye- a-beer) Sunday Ibe, a medical student from Nigeria, is the first of its kind. A pregnant

black woman had never seen herself represented in that way. Something that I took

for granted. This medical representation could force people to see black moms as

human beings and could potentially save their lives. The mortality rate for black

mothers in this country is horrifying. According to the CDC, in the U.S., black women

experience maternal mortality at a rate two to three times higher than that of white

women. All the more reason to strive to consciously see other humans as PEOPLE

with lives and loves, and then we can work to make sure their lives are protected.

Quote - John A. Powell

“The thing that's really slick about whiteness, if you will, is that most of the benefits

can be obtained without ever doing anything personally... There are a whole set of

assumptions that flow from being white, just like there are a whole set of benefits that

flow from being male—you know, being a man doesn't mean that you have antipathy

toward women, but if society is patriarchal, which a lot of people say it is, it means that

the way resources are distributed in society benefits men. In that sense, men are not

innocent, even though they may not personally have antipathy toward women. In the

same way, in that sense, whites are not innocent. They're given the spoils of a racist

system, even if they're not personally racist.”

So what can I do as a white woman in America? Well, I can at least allow myself to be

uncomfortable. I won’t be offended if someone calls out the racism inherent in this

society. I will sit in my discomfort and allow it to open my eyes to new perspectives and

Page 3 of 3

new opportunities to grow as a human being. We are, after all, the universe

experiencing itself! The experience of being uncomfortable is a very important one and

one that should be practiced. After all, people of color have been and continue to be

very uncomfortable in many places in this country.

So for homework, I would like you all to go home and think of something

uncomfortable to do. We often get too comfortable in our usual patterns. A change in

our routine will allow for a change in perspective. For instance, we tend to interact with

people who share our own views. We stick to habits and activities that we’re good at

and that offer us predictability. But often these circles of comfort keep us small. Think

of new ways to make yourself uncomfortable. There are a ton of options to choose

from: eating food you’ve not tried before, public speaking, engaging a family member

about a hard issue you’ve long avoided, asking someone out on a date, watching

NASCAR if you’ve never watched it before, or the classic, parachuting out of a plane!

If you are politically liberal, you might push yourself to listen to a conservative news

source for a week. If you hate exercise, then maybe a few long hikes make sense. If

you are not the artistic type, how about signing up for painting class. Or maybe you are

a poet who has never shared their work. Well, this is your chance to do it!

A good standard to know if you’ve picked an adequately challenging choice is if your

friends say, “I can’t believe you’d do that!” when you tell them about it. Be sure to

make time to reflect on - and maybe write about - your choice. Why do you think you

chose what you did? What need or hunger was behind the selection. What did the

process of doing it teach you? How are you different having done it? Sit in your

unease. It will be ok. What’s the worst that could happen? We should all try to step

outside our circle of comfort. I have just stepped outside of mine! My homework is

done, now I have to find a new way of being uncomfortable.

May you be well and may you grow in love and light. Thank you.