The Sound of Silence: The Joseph Complex by Kelle Brown
“When we are committed to doing the work of love, we listen even when it hurts.” – bell hooks
Mary sings. She sings of being blessed. And she sings a womanist manifesto, asking God to cast down the proud and arrogant. She sings of justice for the vulnerable, food for the hungry, good things for those who live constantly on not-so-good things and somehow survive. She sings and her voice still rings through history, despite our war games, prevalent oppression, despite the patriarchal standard maintained loudly. She sings.
And her partner, Joseph is never heard from directly. He comes into the story in silence. He was visited, spoken to by God through a messenger. Joseph is submitting in silence and obedience. Today, I submit to you that Joseph is offering another way forward on how to be a person with implicit power, a posture for how to be in the world. He shows what decentering can look, as well as how to lay down one’s privilege. I call this the Joseph complex.
To be clear, I’m using the term complex to mean consisting of many different and connected parts, rather than the psychoanalytical definition. I am suggesting that in silence, Joseph redefined “manhood” and “husband”. As to the context of decolonizing and liberating the church, this is an issue of intersectionality and connection within oppression. Give Kimberly Crenshaw’s definition. For postmodern people of faith, we must remember that our lessons of liberation come through the treatment of women in scripture. In a moment when women are
Joseph is a model and should be sought out as a transformed way to live into what it means to be a healthy, loving and loved, relational man in this world where masculinity is too often defined by hierarchy, benevolent patriarchy, and habitual misogyny. Somehow, he wasn’t literate in mansplaining. He also does seem to have the practice of over-speaking women or taking credit for their good ideas. Joseph knows his fiancé is pregnant but chooses not to shame her. He decides instead to maintain her dignity and break up with her quietly. Joseph was already doing God’s work in his just treatment of Mary before being visited, and when an angel of God visited, he didn’t negotiate or protest with a litany about his manhood. He listened, understanding that one could be fluent in silence. He took the words to heart, joining the movement of the spirit in beautiful, interior ways. Joseph loved Mary deeply and without condition. This Joseph is complex!
Joseph is a beautiful example that one doesn’t have to be afraid when one finds oneself in some other position other than first. Joseph redefines many of the Biblical images of manhood and masculinity through his silent obedience. He reminds that men can do away with the fear that won’t be remembered or respected if you aren’t in control. He is an example of cool confidence rather than arrogance. He is multidimensional, whole, and vibrant—fully alive.
My contention is that Joseph is actively doing justice, modeling that it is not our work to fill every gap of which we are aware, but to allow silence and mystery to dwell in the church and in us. It is not in being a human of the highest form, but in breaking down the patriarchal structures upon which many have relied too long. The patriarchy doesn’t just diminish, silence and abuse women, but dismisses the possibility of men to be whole. bell hooks, scholar, author, prophet helps us today, as she always has, by saying, “The first act of violence that patriarchy demands of males is not violence toward women. Instead, patriarchy demands of all males that they engage in acts of psychic self-mutilation, that they kill off the emotional parts of themselves.”
In other words, I am asserting that Joseph was living into the vision of bell hooks, and the loving vision of Mary’s Magnificat, her song, that all of us should be people of justice who lift the vulnerable and the voiceless, that we should all be feminist, that for the sake of the world and how we are together. I contend that Joseph shows that is but a laboratory for such God-work. I am suggesting that the story of Christmas is not about peace on earth in the sense of comfy chairs and hot cocoa, but is the birth of revolution, and with Joseph, a redemption of manhood and manhood’s posture in the world through a feminist revolution.
Author Cole Arthur Riley posited on social media, “I take so much delight in the silence of men in the Christmas story. Zechariah can’t speak. Joseph doesn’t speak, while the words and emotions of Mary and Elizabeth are unapologetically centered. The sound of Advent is the voice of women.” Women’s voices and the voices and presence of all vulnerable people do not displace, they raise the voices of everyone to include men of every identity. For us to be together in healthy, just and equitable ways, we have to listen.
If we believe that God is still speaking, let us acknowledge how difficult it is to listen while constantly talking, often without context or invitation. If we believe that God is still speaking, there has to be a great amount of faith, discernment and trust to listen and believe that what God is saying is something to which it is worth listening. I believe Joseph heard Mary’s song, her asks for the hungry to be fed with good things, for the proud to be sent away. Perhaps he didn’t want to risk being on the wrong side of things. Nevertheless, I believe her joyful singing to the One who creates made Joseph ready to receive and participate.
In tribute to bell hooks who died late last year, Parker Palmer remembered her profoundly loving influence on the world. He offered, “Among other things, belle was a fearless critic of the white supremacist patriarchy that holds the U.S. in thrall. I know those words are anathema to more than a few white men people, especially men, who reject them out of hand.” Parker continued, “Today those people are making sure that American schoolchildren will not learn the truth about race in the U.S., thus proving conclusively that the white supremacist patriarchy is alive and well. As a white male, I want to say that being open to what bell hooks wrote on this topic, allowing her words to interrogate you and your view of the world, is one of the most lifegiving things a white man or woman can do.”
There has to be an economy of justice and an analysis of power and participation to follow Joseph as an organizer of a justice movement. Article after article, book after book, sermon after sermon, my church and others have been learning and unlearning how systems of oppression are born and how they operate. Many churches are learning how systems live in tradition, bylaws and unspoken policies that favor some and leave out others, and how inclusion is not equity, especially when some believe justice should be negotiated per the readiness of the dominant power structure.
Some boldly declare with their words and sometimes with their protest of leaving altogether that either they don’t believe it is possible in some places or that it is impossible for them to participate in such systems. The cognitive dissonance rises along with the constant, unfaltering privilege as some become angered at the declaration or even the suggestion of complicity and participation. Some declare emphatically, “You can’t tell me who I am!”
Actually, one can. This is the reason relationships based in justice and equity must exist. The prophets must tell those interested in transformation about determining your forest from your trees. The ones who see beyond the veil are called to tell those who celebrate at mile 5 as if they finished the marathon that there are 21 more miles ahead. Discomfort forces microwaved outcomes. Atrophied faith requires participation trophies to appear as expertise. The church is promoting the mediocrity of those who represent the status quo, while dismissing the voice of God that comes through bodies and experiences that are unfamiliar.
The church can only transform as it leans in to listen and believe the testimonies of the vulnerable. The Beloved Community grows as we learn while ritually and honorably retiring the things that are no longer required. How can the cultivators and sustainers of anything also be responsible for its change—without a visitation from the Divine by way of the oppressed?
If one is worried about displacement, loss, or their influential power, I say with great love and compassion that many liberal, progressive institutions are not truly different from conservative, fundamentalist ones. Organizations of every kind are often concerned about the “browning” of the nation and the institutions within; however, while one group invokes racist dog whistles and ancient fearmongering about Black, Brown, and other minoritized groups with passionate emotion, those on the “other side” shape their similar fears, but in ways that appear intelligent, thoughtful and free of emotion. There can be racist intent on both poles of this spectrum.
Our lack of trust and imagination in God and one another keeps the body of Jesus from paths of liberation in gender and racial justice concerns. People reflecting on such things assume that turning the world aright, as Sojourner Truth imagined, means that women will do to men what men have always had the power to do to women. However, if you look at matriarchal societies historically and around the world, that fear doesn’t bear true. Matriarchal societies aren’t concerned with revenge but invite those who identify as masculine to participate in ways that enhance flourishing. Matriarchal societies aren’t killing men, but welcoming men of every expression to live into the Joseph complex of compassion and just participation in the world. The truth of the church’s reluctance to live into freedom and righteousness is in the bowels of misogyny and violence that play out moment by moment. Margaret Atwood reminds by saying, “Men are afraid that women will laugh at them. Women are afraid that men will kill them.”
To the courageous ones in my context who are concerned that things have simply changed too much, how do you define manhood? Do you believe there can be generative opportunity in silence? Where do you make space for those you invited to come? Where do you step back and allow women; Black, Brown, Asian and Indigenous ones; queer, trans and nonbinary siblings; youth, middle-aged and elders to inhabit with you? What do you do with your anxiety when there aren’t white men leading? Do you believe a church is only successful or effective when led by white men? Would you rather leave the church and community than take on this conversation, because of your fear that you will be labeled racist?
Friends, God is breaking things open. God is making room for transformed voices. The Holy One is making feminists, and there is room in the inn for you, cisgender, able-bodied white men. There is room for us all. Follow the silence of Joseph and be heard through the span of history for the sake of love.
Rev. Dr. Kelle Brown is the Senior Pastor of Plymouth Church United Church of Christ in downtown Seattle, Washington. Kelle is a gifted creative artist and a thinker; a Womanist public theologian who is a curator of equity, justice, and adaptive change.
Dr. Brown earned her BA in Psychology from Atlanta’s Spelman College where she was a featured soloist of the renowned Glee Club. She later attended Seattle University School of Theology and Ministry, where she went on to receive a Master of Divinity. Kelle completed her Doctorate of Ministry from San Francisco Theological Seminary in 2018, focusing on eradicating homelessness through solidarity.
She facilitates conversations on dismantling oppression and offers ways to reflect on white supremacy, privilege, bias, prejudice and bigotry, particularly on racial, ethnic and LGBTQ justice. She had been a vocal presence for justice and equity in Seattle, participating in the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for a Moral Revival; the 2019 Women’s March leadership team; and traveled to Tijuana, along with a contingent of Black and Brown women of color of faith. as a moral and faithful witness in the face of oppressive immigration legislation.
Kelle desires to resist moments by participating in movements that shift the narrative toward freedom. She believes in people and that redemption and reconciliation is possible, and imagined in her lifetime, the world will turn for the better, and imagines a world where all people are valued and extravagantly loved. She invites those she meets to follow the advice of Howard Thurman: “Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”