Moving from Private to Public Faith: an interview with Jody Manning – Tara Spuhler McCabe

Guest Director’s Note: Jody and I met as mothers bringing our children to speech therapy four years ago.  We could sniff out we were church ladies of a similar strand.  But as a Lutheran and Presbyterian, well, there is just so much we can talk about.  Then, 2 years ago, an organizer from VOICE: Virginians Organized for Interfaith Community Engagement, http://www.voice-iaf.org/, connected us.  Together, we have been navigating and rallying our respective faith communities and our local school community around affordable housing.  I did what is known as a relational meeting through Industrial Areas Foundation with Jody for her interview.  This is how we engage with the community around us.

Tara:  Thank you for this time Jody.  What drew you to engage with VOICE and the Affordable Housing campaign?

Jody: Typically, our church is always involved in social concerns ministry.  Small groups of members are making the sandwiches, volunteering at the shelters, and writing checks.  This is vital.  Yet I felt something was missing in what we do around the social concerns in our community.  Then I was connected with VOICE.  Through my church, VOICE became a chance to address the systemic issues of the social concerns, without having to be a lead organizer for all of it.  We started meeting other churches who had similar concerns.

Tara: You mentioned that something was missing for you in engaging with the social concern ministries of your church.  What is that about?  Can you explain a bit more?

Jody: I admit that making sandwiches is not a way I felt engaged.  Others do but it has not been for me.  While I was noticing this in myself, I also noticed that significant economic changes were happening in my neighborhood and community that I have concerns about.  The gaps of people seem to be getting wider and I have a lot of concerns and questions like, where are my neighbors going when the complex was torn down?  With VOICE, I recognized my skills in diplomacy were a perfect match for the organizing that could be done around particular issues in our community, like affordable housing.  Then I saw the connection in providing sandwiches and standing with others to address systemic changes.  As people of Christ, we need to be about the relationships that are not only hurting but are also being hurt by others, including our systems.

Tara: I know that you have been to a few VOICE trainings around organizing.  It sounds like in the trainings; you found a strong connection with your faith and things happening in your community around economic issues.  What has surprised you in these trainings?

Jody: For one thing, I found a new voice from within myself.  I have to already be a strong advocate for my family pertaining to my kids and others who share similar family realities.  But until these trainings, I had never really been an advocate out of my faith.  With my church life and with VOICE, I felt that connection in being the advocate.

Then, in the same training, I was really surprised to hear church folk like me say, “as a Christian, I am not comfortable with being so political”.  I found myself speaking up and offering that being political is not being partisan.  For me, as a lay person, we have to understand how the secular world operates, act as a people of faith, and employ these methods in engaging in the power that can be about God’s justice.  How else is the church going to be relevant in and to the world?  Through the trainings and with my church community, I understood the role and responsibility I have in utilizing the power of Christ for others.

Tara: I saw that in you, especially at the Action in June 2013.  You were a guest at Mt. Olive Baptist Church in Arlington, VA.  There were over 1,000 community people in that sanctuary.  You were invited by VOICE to share your agitation with our community.  Can you share a bit about what that was like for you?

Jody: It was exhilarating!  For the first time I was the witness.  I had to be “out there” with my faith, connecting the personal with the public!  The personal story that I shared and the personal story from a teacher who cannot afford to live where I live but teaches my kids, this is relevant in our community and needs to be relevant to the churches.  Us standing up there together, we share story and opportunity by yielding and shifting power towards God’s justice.  As a mom, my kids need to see my faith in action inside and outside the church.  I brought my kids and husband, they saw me standing, I took our kids to the rally in turning in the signatures, this is our life in faith.

Tara: Since the trainings and since the exhilarating action, where are you now?  What is happening now in your actions of personal faith and public faith?

Jody: Life!  Kids, their school, and church responsibilities are a constant.  But now I know what we can be doing in our community as a church.  Unfortunately, there is always the tension of a desire and invitation but sometimes, people just do not come.  The struggle with knowing this is a calling for me as a Faith Lutheran member, and that to get the congregation integrated has been really slow!  I have a concern growing in me.  I am ignited, but this is not growing as much in others at my church.  I will always go to church.  I do feel though, if my church community cannot show up in a more public way about what is happening around us, I can see myself taking my energy elsewhere.

Tara: What does that mean for you?

Jody: It means that we will worship with our church but I will also need to find a community that engages the relevance and power of Christ with people and for people.  I cannot stay in my church “box” anymore.  I cannot show up at every organizing meeting but I can be a bit bolder in connecting with folks in our school and neighborhood about my faith in this way.  Christ meets people where they are at.  I think I need too as well.

Tara: I thank you Jody for this time together and sharing this part of your journey with me.  Is there anything else you would want me or others to know or consider when it comes to being church in a public way?

Jody: I still recognize the church to be natural place for fellowship and relationship that can be transforming.  I just do not want us to miss out on how lives are being transformed out there as well.  I now know that another way I can delve more into my faith is by delving into the stories of what is going on around my church.  I hope more of us can do the same for the church.

Jody Manning and her husband are parents of two children adopted from Kazakhstan. Prior to this she enjoyed a 15-year career in the fields of international education and diplomacy.  She draws frequently upon her background in diplomacy and negotiation in navigating both the worlds of parenting special needs children and as a leader at church and with the PTA.