Right now America is storming - and this is a good thing.

In the dynamics of group process, there are four fundamental stages: forming, storming, norming, and performing.  When a group is forming, its membership is getting to know each other, but it is not quite properly performing, as there are many truths - norms - that are left unsaid.  It is only through conflict - the clash of incompatible assumptions and ideas - that a set of norms can develop for the group as a whole.  Each individual brings their own set of truths.  But for the group to function, it must have its own set of truths, which will not be identical to any individual member's.

America has been putting off the storm for hundreds of years.  On many issues, when things begin to foment and tempers rise, there is a tendency to put off difficult discussions for later, a later which often never comes.  In the aftermath of a mass shooting, we are told not to have the difficult discussion when we are in the throes of the moment.  There hasn't been a mass shooting for more than one hundred days, and the discussion - so vital in the moment - has not been opened, nor will it - until the next shooting reminds us, and we will again decide to wait.

Racial inequality is a conversation that has been avoided for the entire existence of the United States of America.  And now, finally, the nation is storming about it, and new norms - negotiated through the process of impassioned discussion - are emerging.  Companies that never said a word are suddenly coming out in favor of racial reconciliation and a reexamining of their fraught histories.  Individuals and families and corporations are being held accountable for their past actions.  Words, suddenly, seem to matter.

So I am hopeful.  We are taught that all humanity is descended from a single human being (made in the image of God) to teach us that each of us is infinitely important, unique, and holy.  I am looking forward to the day when we can see in each other a reflection of the very best that is within ourselves, and recognize in each other all that is holy within humanity.