From Your Associate Executive for Racial Justice

“Mami! My friends!” —Anouk-Aimée Belonni-Rosario Govens

“There is nothing on this earth more to be prized than true friendship.”

—Thomas Aquinas

“A friend is one of the best things you can be and the greatest things you can have.”

—Sarah Valdez

“…I have called you friends...” —John 15:15

“What are you teaching your child about what friendship requires?”

—Kimberly Seals Allers

Friendship is a widely digested and consumed concept. Simultaneously, it often needs resurfacing. Tragedies like the loss of yet another Black life and Black child, Nolan Wells, prompt a conversation about friends and friendship. What is friendship? Who are my friends? Who am I a friend to? My three-year-old refers to any child she sees as her friend. Her face lights up when she sees other children. She immediately calls them “friends.” She exudes contagious joy and relentless trust when she meets other children. Typically, she approaches them and says, “But do you want to play with me?” She likes to play and talk with them. Sometimes she follows their lead; most times she leads. As cute and sweet as that may seem to some of the readers of this article, for a mother-daughter of color, it is not that simple.

We do not both get to experience and enjoy the world that simply. 

As a woman of color who is on a journey of motherhood alongside a Black, Afro Puerto Rican, Afro Caribbean, and African American child, I found myself with conflicting emotions and thoughts every time she so fearlessly and equally vulnerable thrusts into the world, calling every child “her friend.” On the one hand, I celebrate her energy. On the other, I cannot unplay on repeat the history of violence, discrimination, and ongoing erasure attempts of Black bodies and Black women in this world. I am unable to silence a wealth of information that historically points to the unsafety of Black girls in general and predominantly white environments in particular.

Much content has been created and shared about Nolan Wells and his death. One of the most common comments regarding his death is that Nolan Wells was with his friends while showcasing a picture of Nolan Wells being the only Black human surrounded by three White young men. For most of the Black and Brown communities, the part that is striking, to say the least, is that the media continues to refer to the three young White men surrounding Nolan Wells as “his friends.” “His friends,” a comment on social media, named what many people of color know instinctively, by experience and have learned to suppress all at the same time to survive: “I hate that they are still being labeled his friends like ***.” Everyone in the comments section understood those words. Friendship does not carry a common definition. Often, for various communities, friendship is associated with betrayal, denial, rejection, consumerism, access to “cultural capital” (Kimberly Seals Sallers), dehumanization, violence, and, in the case of Nolan Wells, death. 

Throughout my Christian faith journey, I have found it difficult to grasp a romanticized and apologetic understanding of friendship. One of the most quotable bible verses on friendship is from John 15:15, “I have called you friends.” We know that these words are portions of a larger text. The larger text itself has been long debated and exegeted. On their own, these words suggest that friendship is one-sided, especially when images of Jesus’s disciples abandoning him, neglecting him in his hour of most need, denying him, hiding, and shielding themselves from his message rush in. Before the brain starts to defend or explain away the Jesus-disciples friendship dynamic, I invite us to reflect on the underlying messages, the non-verbal messages our interpretations and actions carry about friendship and about how to be friends. Friendship through a racialized lens invites us to educate ourselves about unredacted history, learn from and about systemic injustices in the court scaffolding, and reflect vulnerably on our decisions to be and how to be friends with anyone who has been othered. 

Friendship is a gift. Being a friend to someone is a responsibility. Seeking and choosing to be friends with members of historically othered communities can be a matter of life or death. As we, as a denomination, in congregations, sessions, mid-council, and national church, explore efforts to diversify, engage in interculturalism, and progress on the antiracism journey, let us be courageous friends to each other, extending Christ’s love, kindness, and compassion to all. Every life is precious, especially the lives of those who have historically been treated as disposable. 

Let us pray:

God, help us to be a genuine friend to all. Grant me the courage to stand up, speak up, and embody genuine love, care, and affection towards all, especially the othered. Remove the sin of friendship cosplay from our relationships, churches, and Christian environments. Gift us with vulnerability, wisdom, humility, grace, and kindness. May you be the Center that grounds us and invites us into relentless community with one another. In your mercy, Lord. Hear our prayer. May it be so. Amen. 

Peace and blessings! 

Ruth-Aimée (Root-Eh-méh)

Ruth-Aimée Belonni-Rosario

Associate Executive for Racial Justice

248-752-3697 (cell)

ruthaimee@synodofthecovenant.org