How I Failed Brandon Webber and Other Black Youths Who Died Violent Deaths

I never met Brandon Webber, a young Black man killed by US Marshalls who were attempting to serve a warrant for his arrest. I know from news reports that he was a classmate of my son at Central High School. I know while there he was an honor student with a bright mind and a bright future. He will never have his day in court so there is no way to judge guilt or innocence in his case. What I do know is this- his death and the death of countless other young persons of color in this country are my failures.

           I failed Brandon from the comfort of my suburban home, my comfortable worship center, and my all too easy life. When Brandon died the community of Frayser, feeling they were under attack, took to the streets. They were there not to riot but to come together in their anger, confusion, frustration, and shared fear. They were there because no one should face the death of a young man alone. They were there, I believe, because “you just have to do something” with all that frustration. But I wasn’t in the streets of Cordova. I wasn’t rallying my neighbors to grieve the senseless loss of a young life. I failed Brandon because I kept him and his life at a distance. So much at a distance that his death didn’t cause me to drop to my knees in either grief or anger. I failed Brandon because he was less a person and more an instance of a systemic problem. I failed Brandon for just this reason: that young persons of color, caught in a cycle of generational poverty, are seen as “problems” to be solved not “persons to be mourned” or “neighbors to be loved.”

           I failed Brandon because I have not helped to make Memphis a city that mourns in unison the loss of any young life regardless of the circumstances. When I arrived in Memphis 3 years ago it was on the heels of a Black Lives Matter protest of another death of a young black man. The protestors took to the bridge and were met by then-Interim Chief Rawlings who heard their concerns, gave assurances that Memphis was different from those other cities and walked with the protestors off the bridge. I remember thinking what a great place Memphis must be if that kind of dialogue can replace the police responses that occurred in Ferguson, Charlotte, and other cities. I thought about how proud I would be to call myself a Memphian. Then, three years later, Brandon was shot and tear gas filled the air in Frayser and I woke up to realize I had been sleeping and had done nothing to make that day on the bridge a universal reality in our city. I failed Brandon because I thought, wrongly, that we all genuinely cared. That Memphis was somehow different. I love my adopted city but it is not a city that loves all it citizens equally and not addressing that lingering inequality is not the failure of a system, a mayor, or a police chief. It is a personal failure. It is my failure.

           I failed Brandon because, even though, I run a college meant to provide better opportunities and futures for young men and women just like Brandon. I allowed Brandon to fall through the cracks. My head will no doubt try to reason that “you just can’t save everybody.” But my heart, exercising the better wisdom, will say there is no excuse for the ones we miss. Brandon’s life mattered while he was an honor student at Central High School. It mattered while he lay dying in Frayser. And it matters no matter the reason for his death. If I am going to spout lofty goals about providing educational opportunities to “Memphis’ urban core” than I must also be willing to accept Brandon’s death as an indictment of my own personal failure. Brandon was my mission and his death is my failure.

           I failed Brandon because I failed in my commitment as a Christian to truly follow Christ. Regardless of any theological differences, I have with James Cone I have to admit that he is right when he intones that “Jesus did not die on a alter between two candles but on a cross between two thieves.” If I claim to follow Christ I am claiming to follow a savior who wasn’t white and rich or comfortable. But was a brown man, who though innocent was criminalized for crimes he did not commit by the religious, political, and popular powers of his day. He died not an easy laudable death, but a violent death delivered at the hands of a political system in the name of justice. He died not inside the city gates in a comfortable bed but outside the gates as an outcast; while all around Him people whispered and mocked His name. I fail Brandon every time my Christianity becomes an excuse for my own comfort. I fail Brandon every time I box Jesus into the walls of a church building. I fail Brandon every time I fail to acknowledge that the Christ who died for me, more importantly, died to make me the type of man who cannot look away when a young black man dies in the street. Christ died not only to reconcile us to God but to reconcile us in love for one another. Love cannot rest when it realizes that its inactivity is causing the death of countless young people. Because I did not know Brandon, because my efforts missed him entirely, because my Christianity has not pushed me out of my own comfort zone, I have failed to be Christ to Brandon who most assuredly has more in common with Jesus than Jesus has with me.

           Tomorrow I will attend a Vigil of Lament, not as an act of protest, but as an act of self-chastisement. Not to beat myself up but to remind myself that in all the work that has yet to be done I cannot sleep, I must work so that no one falls through the cracks and as if every life lost is my responsibility. I don’t know what Mayor Strickland, or Chief Rawlings, or our city’s men and women with economic power and means will do to assure that no other young person has to die a violent death in Memphis ever again. I only control myself and as for me, I choose to follow Christ outside the city gates, away from the halls of power and into the lives of the other Brandons in our community to assure I don’t fail them the way I have failed him. How about you?