TOKENS PODCAST: S3E15
An interview with Eugene Cho, founding pastor of Quest Church in Seattle, now president and CEO of Bread for the World, and recent author of Thou Shalt Not Be a Jerk: A Christian’s Guide to Engaging in Politics. We discuss his experiences as an immigrant to the United States at age six; his journey to Christianity; and how both those realities have given him insight and possibilities for service to the world, as well as put him at odds with both the right and the left in America. And he shares a moving story of courage, about his 17 year old high-schooler self that, alone, makes the episode worthwhile.
LINKS TO LISTEN:
ADDITIONAL LINKS:
Eugene’s Book: No Longer Strangers
Eugene’s Book: Thou Shalt Not Be a Jerk
ABOUT THE GUEST
Rev. Eugene Cho’s many passions involve leadership, justice, the whole Gospel, and the pursuit of God’s Kingdom here on this earth. He travels throughout the world to encourage churches, non-profits, pastors, leaders, missionaries, and justice workers – whether this happens in churches, arenas, conferences, universities, or as a guest in underground churches or refugee camps.
Eugene is the President/CEO of Bread for the World and Bread Institute, a prominent non-partisan Christian advocacy organization urging both national and global decision makers to help end hunger – both in the United States and around the world. Bread has been engaged in this critical discipleship of advocacy for the hungry and vulnerable since its inception in 1974.
He is also the founder and visionary of One Day’s Wages (ODW) – a grassroots movement of people, stories, and actions to alleviate extreme global poverty. The vision of ODW is to create a collaborative movement that promotes awareness, invites simple giving (one day’s wages) and supports sustainable relief through partnerships, especially with smaller organizations in developing regions. Since its launch in October 2009, ODW has raised over $8 million dollars for projects to empower those living in extreme global poverty. ODW has been featured in the New York Times, The Seattle Times, NPR, Christianity Today and numerous other media outlets.
He is also the founder and former Senior Pastor of Quest Church – an urban, multi-cultural and multi-generational church in Seattle, Washington. After 18 years, Eugene stepped aside at Quest in 2018.
For his entrepreneurial work, Eugene was honored as one of 50 Everyday American Heroes and a recipient of the Frederick Douglass 200 – included in a list of 200 people around the world who best embody the spirit and work of Frederick Douglass, one of the most influential figures in history. Eugene was also the recipient of the 2017 Distinguished Alumni Award from Princeton Theological Seminary.
Eugene is the author of two acclaimed books, Thou Shalt Not Be a Jerk: A Christian’s Guide to Engaging Politics (2020) and Overrated: Are We More in Love with the Idea of Changing the World Than Actually Changing the World? (2014)
Eugene and Minhee have been married for 23 years and have three children. Together, they live in Seattle, Washington.
ABOUT TOKENS SHOW & LEE C. CAMP
Tokens began in 2008. Our philosophical and theological variety shows and events hosted throughout the Nashville area imagine a world governed by hospitality, graciousness and joy; life marked by beauty, wonder and truthfulness; and social conditions ordered by justice, mercy and peace-making. We exhibit tokens of such a world in music-making, song-singing, and conversations about things that matter. We have fun, and we make fun: of religion, politics, and marketing. And ourselves. You might think of us as something like musicians without borders; or as poets, philosophers, theologians and humorists transgressing borders.
Lee is an Alabamian by birth, a Tennessean by choice, and has sojourned joyfully in Indiana, Texas, and Nairobi. He likes to think of himself as a radical conservative, or an orthodox liberal; loves teaching college and seminary students at Lipscomb University; delights in flying sailplanes; finds dark chocolate covered almonds with turbinado sea salt to be one of the finest confections of the human species; and gives great thanks for his lovely wife Laura, his three sons, and an abundance of family and friends, here in Music City and beyond. Besides teaching full-time, he hosts Nashville’s Tokens Show, and has authored three books. Lee has an Undergrad Degree in computer science (Lipscomb University, 1989); M.A. in theology and M.Div. (Abilene Christian University, 1993); M.A. and Ph.D. both in Christian Ethics (University of Notre Dame, 1999).
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TRANSCRIPT
Lee: This is Tokens. I'm Lee C. Camp.
Eugene Cho: I don't know of a single Asian person in my life who's not heard the phrase “go back home.”
Lee: That is Eugene Cho, founding pastor of Quest Church in Seattle, current president and CEO of Bread for the World, and author of Thou Shalt Not Be a Jerk: A Christian's Guide to Engaging Politics.
Eugene Cho: We're called to be servants and not the saviors of the world.
Lee: On today's episode, Eugene and I discuss his various vocations in ministry and justice, how they have intersected with his experience as a Korean-born immigrant in the midst of a rising climate of racial and political hostility in the United States, and the ways in which, as he puts it...
Eugene Cho: You cannot love your neighbors if you don't know your neighbors. And you can't know your neighbors if you don't understand the art of being a human, which means to share stories and to listen to stories.
Lee: All this, coming right up.
Interview
Lee: Eugene Cho and his wife Minhee live in Seattle, Washington. Eugene is the founding pastor of Quest Church, which he began in 2001. He's been highly involved in work pertaining to justice, such as being a founder of One Day's Wages, an effort to make a lasting impact in the fight against extreme poverty.
Then in July of 2020, he became the president of Bread for the World, an organization with a mission to help end hunger by 2030. Welcome Eugene.
Eugene Cho: Hey, thank you so much for having me. It's a pleasure to be with you.
Lee: It's a pleasure to be with you and grateful to get to connect with you in this way. So new role. New work that you're doing. What prompted this sort of change for you?
Eugene Cho: Oh man. Good question. That feels like a different podcast, maybe a seven part series about transitions in life. But you know, in some ways I feel like it's the same calling, you know, for it's about wanting to make the world a more compassionate, more just place. Hunger has always been a very personal issue.
And so Bread for the World, it's a Christian advocacy organization. It’s all that we do. Its advocacy. It’s every single day showing up to come alongside women and men and neighbors in our nation and around the world who are struggling with hunger and poverty. So that's what I'm doing right now.
Lee: Yeah. As you've noted, this is not something new for you. You started a nonprofit called One Day's Wages.
Eugene Cho: You know, I think I started that probably about, my wife and I planted Quest Church in 2000. So we pastored that for about 18, 19 years and, about nine years into Quest, we also started this organization on the side and the vision of One Day's Wages is very simple. We're trying to inspire people around the world to consider giving one days of their wages, at least once a year.
Maybe once a quarter, once a month. And we invest all of that and carefully vetted projects and partnerships around the world. So as not to reinvent the wheel ourselves, we're trying to, again, raise resources, invest them properly. And, with vigor because we do believe that ultimately it isn't money that's the answer to complex issues. It's really investing in people and communities.
Lee: I recollect reading that, one of your commitments in that was to give a year's wages of your own salaries. Is that right?
Eugene Cho: That's right. You know, it sounded better in our minds when we first conceived the idea, but I had forgotten that, uh, when you have young kids and teenagers, they don't stop eating. They just keep eating and eating and eating and.
Lee: And more and more and more.
Eugene Cho: Oh, it's, it's crazy. I'm afraid to stop feeding my son lest he eats us.
But, uh, that's a bad cannibalism joke there for your podcast. But a crazy part of this story is we did not anticipate how hard saving a year's wages would be. It took us three years. And during that time, I hope this doesn't sound overly boastful, but it was just a part of this journey that we did not anticipate, but we had to move out of our home and couch surfed for about two, three months, in order to save resources. Because I put up an ad on Craigslist to see if anybody will be willing to pay astronomical rent, subletting, our home.
And I really thought no one would take up on that offer. And here's the craziest thing. I did not tell my wife this. Uh, I just did it thinking that nobody would respond. There's a reason why my wife is a marriage and family therapist. She has plenty, she has plenty of stories to share with people.
Lee: Yeah. So I can imagine what was the, what was the conversation like that like, hey sweetie, we're, we're moving out.
Eugene Cho: You know, I'm not sure if I can repeat that conversation on your podcast. I don't know what your ratings are. Uh, if it's family friendly, let's just say it was very uncomfortable. There was some elevated noise pitch levels, but, what was important to again highlight is that it wasn't my vision or her vision.
It was our vision, it was collective, it was our family. So we learned a lot. We really did. And sometimes I think when you do justice work in this larger convictions, sometimes our ego, our Messiah complex. Sometimes our inclination is, hey we're going to change the world.
We're called to do these things. And that's true. But you know, we learned very quickly that in that process we were changed. Our marriage was changed, our relationship with our children, our perspective of gratitude and simplicity, all of these things that we struggle with, particularly in the West, where we live with such excess and yet live in such a culture of scarcity at the same time.
Lee: Before I go to the, kind of the next section, I do want to pick up on one of the things you just said about the savior messianic complex. I've told my ministry students for years that we have a Messiah who did not have a messianic complex. But it seems so easy for people who go into ministry or who go into helping professions whether they be so-called secular or so-called ministerial to fall prey to that sort of messianic complex. What are some things that you've learned about letting go of that or navigating that?
Eugene Cho: Man. Gosh, I feel like we're having seven podcast interviews in, in one interview. I mean that question I think should in itself be a class for those who are entering into vocational ministry, because I really do think it is one of the most dangerous alluring temptations because it's so masked now we all want to help.
We're called to help. We're called to make a difference. We use language like change the world. We're changing people's lives, transformation. Those are really significant callings and words that we use, but it's such an important reminder to juxtapose those things with the acknowledgement that we're ministers and not messiahs. We're called to be servants and not the saviors of the world.
There's some good in acknowledging a desire to help, a desire to make an impact. But it's when we ultimately think everything hinges on me, myself and I, we begin to have the self elevated view of spiritual narcissism and I think it could lead to things like paralysis. It could lead to cynicism, it could lead to burnout, and it could lead to some times us abusing power. And I think we certainly see examples of that throughout history, including sadly in today's world, where we see spiritual leaders in all walks of life, in all different streams of theological institutions, abuse of power.
Lee: Yeah, you've spoken publicly about some of your experience and your family's experiences as Koreans, coming to the United States. Was it your great grandfather who was living in Korea and became a Christian? That's where your family was introduced to Christianity?
Eugene Cho: Yeah. It was my great-grandfather. And it's really interesting that you, appropriately identified where he was from and what I mean by that today, everyone knows that there are two Korea’s. There's North Korea and South Korea. When you ask my father, who's 85 years old , where he's from, he'll say Korea, and then people will automatically want more clarification.
And they'll say, are you from North Korea or South Korea? And it doesn't quite compute for him because when he was born and lived a good chunk of his life, there was only one country before a war tragically ravaged that land and separated millions of families. But yes, it was my great-grandfather who first heard about this person named Jesus Christ, came home, shared that good news with my great grandmother. Uh, it's like the book of Acts, that story of the whole household coming to faith. They experienced, I'm sure a sense of peace, a sense of purpose, but they also experienced persecution, because of the rise of communism and the rise of people, perceiving Christianity as a threat to the powers to be during that time.
So they experienced some persecution. And as a result my family decided to flee South for a safer climate. And this was them not knowing that a war would break out at some point. Some family members decided to stay and they lived in a small town outside of a larger city called Pyongyang.
And for those that might be familiar with Korea, Pyongyang is now the capital city of North Korea. So we are one of many families that have family members that were, left or stayed. And as a result of separation, it's a source of deep trauma for so many in that Korean peninsula.
Lee: In the sense of persecution, any kind of clarity for you on what that looked like or what that was like for your, your family?
Eugene Cho: You know, I get bits and pieces of stories and I'm still gleaning and absorbing some of those stories whenever my father and mother feel they have the emotional bandwidth to share some of those things. I'll just give you an example of what I mean by emotional bandwidth. About three years ago due to my work with One Day's Wages, I was on my way to Iraq, Jordan, and Lebanon, to do some work with some of our refugee camp partnerships there.
And my father was just berating me. He was so upset. He thought it was irresponsible that I would be leaving my wife and three kids to go to a quote unquote, dangerous place. And certainly there are pockets of those nations that are hot zones as some would call it.
But again, he was furious and urged me not to go. And eventually I had to reassure him. Everything is safe. I'm being hosted by people. I'm not traveling alone. But eventually, you know, he came around and he said, very emotionally. He said, Eugene, you know, to be truthful, I'm very proud of you. I'm proud that you are doing what you can to care for people. And it was at that moment at the age of 82 years old, he had shared with me at that moment for the very first time in his life that he had spent some time as a child in a refugee camp, separated by his family. And I was shocked. I had never heard these stories.
And so when I asked him, I said, appa, which means father in Korean. And I said, abeoji, why haven't you ever shared this story with me? And in his imperfect English, he basically said some things are too painful to share.
And I'll never forget those words. You know, I think all of us are walking a hodgepodge of joys and pain, triumphs and trauma.
My circuitous way of answering your question is, you know, I think they received a mixture of persecution that was not just because of their faith, but because of the rampant rise of communism at that moment, in that part of the Korean peninsula.
Lee: Were you born in Korea?
Eugene Cho: Yep. I was born in Seoul, South Korea, immigrated when I was six years old. I'm the youngest of three sons. My parents robbed me of the privilege of potentially becoming a K-pop star, that is not possible anymore. Uh, they weren't able to go to school. They experienced extreme hunger and poverty. My father, you know, occasionally shared stories of having so much hunger pains that memories of having to pull out grass from the ground and to consume it. And so, you know, it's an example of one of those immigrant stories where they were seeking a better opportunity for their children.
That's really all that they wanted. And in some ways, you know, I don't want this to be a personal therapy session, but education has always been there, big idolatry, if I can say that respectfully, because that was what was denied to them. And they pursued and wanted a chance for their three sons to go to college, to become educated and to have a better life for themselves.
Lee: So you come with your parents at age six. What are some of your memories as a young boy of being an immigrant to the United States?
Eugene Cho: There's many even though simultaneously I think I've also repressed some of them because you experienced hardship and challenges being seen as an other. But some of my most vivid memories, number one, it's getting on the airplane for the very first time in Seoul, Korea to San Francisco. I had never obviously been on an airplane, getting in on one that in itself was the most terrifying experience
The second, most vivid example is getting off the airplane and seeing for the very first time white people or anyone that's not Asian to see white and black and brown. So that was shocking to the system. And then one week later to be on the public bus system in San Francisco called the muni bus system and to be a student in the first grade at Sherman elementary school, that was traumatic.
I became incredibly reclusive because I was so afraid to raise my hands during class. And I share this because I think I've made some peace with it now. There's probably another reason why I married a therapist who's offering me free therapy for life basically.
But you know, I flunked first grade. I was held back, because while I worked hard, I remember my parents receiving a report card with the words, Eugene has very deep, intense social issues, including the inability to go to the restroom.
And here's the thing. It was the fear of raising my hand as a first grader in a room of 25 other people, not knowing how to speak English. And so on the one or two occasions a week when I could not hold my bladder. I would pee my pants and you know, first graders, kids, teenagers can also be very ruthless and blunt.
And so I had a very bad reputation as being peeing Eugene. So it was hard. And eventually these things led to me wondering, you know, who am I, where do I belong? Where is my home? And the phrase I heard ever since I was an immigrant often probably said out of ignorance. I don't want to just obviously accuse people of being racist when you're six years old, but out of ignorance or meanness.
But the sad thing is this question that I'm about to say never subsided. It actually only intensified. And in the past 14 months, 15 months of the pandemic, this question has been posed to us again and again and again, and the question goes like this. Or the comment, the statement, goes like this: “go back home.”
Yeah, I've spent the last, gosh, I'm 50 years old now. So about 44 years hearing that comment or question, where are you from? Or “go back home.”
Lee: What does that look like as you become an adolescent?
Eugene Cho: Well, I think you begin to really ask that question, then, then where is my home? Where do I belong? What is my identity? And, you know, I think some ways every adolescent begins to have identity questions. But not one that I think speaks directly to belonging. You know, where is your home?
So I really began to wrestle with that, which then began to spiral me into some anger issues. I was really angry at my parents for making the decision to immigrate, to bring us to the United States. And so when I was in middle school, I actually had the opportunity to go back to Korea, to visit for the summer for the first time.
And I looked at that as my source of deep liberation, in a sense of meaning, if you will, and what was shocking to me, which then only ratcheted my identity crisis even more, was that what I was in Korea for that two months, I actually heard that very same statement said to me, by native Koreans, “go back home.” And thus, this is the complexity and the joys of what it means to be bicultural.
My ultimate home isn't necessarily America. My ultimate home isn't the United States. And then obviously later on as an adult, I became a Christian. And so, theologically, it helped shape some of that perspective as well. But middle school, high school, I, um, became very angry. I was voted the shyest kid in middle school, developed a stuttering problem, was just afraid of people, so afraid of people.
Those are, you know, again, not necessarily unique to maybe my experience, but those were certainly my reality.
Lee: Yeah. So you've given us a number of very specific experiences of your own being othered. So looking back at that by a number of decades, whether theologically considered or socio-politically construed, what are, what are big lenses for you now in thinking about the practice of othering?
Eugene Cho: Well, that's a great question. And I think that's a question that, as a human being, we should be asking that question, but theologically for people that come from a faith lens, that should be one of the most essential questions that we ask. Because, for me as a Christian, Jesus summarizes all the commandments with two things, to love God with all of our heart, soul, body, and mind, and to love our neighbors.
That's not optional. It's not tertiary, it's not an elective. It's the very core and I think Jesus is very intentional to parallel that commandment with examples and parables and obviously his own embodied life. Many of his examples that he shows with his life or his teachings through parables happens to be human beings that were marginalized, ostracized, forgotten, the vulnerable. And it's not just the poor, it's the women, it's the children, it's the Samaritans, it's the tax collectors. It's the lepers and the list goes on.
It kind of goes back into some of the, in my opinion, the ridiculous debates that society has about all lives matter and black lives matter, and brown. I mean, we obviously believe that every single human being created in the image of God matters to God. We should never deviate away from that.
So I can proudly say emphatically, say that yes, all lives do matter. But as we proclaim that we can also acknowledge that there are communities and individuals that experience othering, not just interpersonally. But even systemically and structurally as well. And I think as Christians, we've got to do both. Both really matter.
Sometimes I get really frustrated with individuals, Christians, or non-Christians who think that fixing structural injustice in itself is the totality of all things that will usher in the shalom of the kingdom of God. And I think that's naive. I think it's ridiculous. And then vice versa. I think there are some Christians or non-faith folks that are oriented into thinking that, you know, if like individuals hearts change and everything will be fine, both really matter.
And that's how it's really, I think, shaped the way that I want to live my life informed theologically, not just by scripture, but by the person of Jesus Christ.
Lee: Yeah. I think that's immensely helpful. If you go back just to somebody like Aristotle, you know, where you've got the four cardinal virtues, courage, prudence, temperance, and justice.
One of the things among many that I like about a virtue approach is that it insists that you have to hold both of those things you just mentioned together, right? It's clearly personal and one cannot flourish as a human being, unless you spend a great deal of attention attending to one's formation as a human being.
And it's also clearly social and communal, so even for Aristotle to say, we are social animals and therefore, without attending to the social nature of our existence, we cannot possibly be flourishing individuals. And it does baffle me that we've gotten into this situation where it seems like you have to choose one or the other. And it clearly seems that we have to always be attentive to both. And there are Christian and non-Christian observations about, yeah, we really do have to attend to both of those.
Eugene Cho: Well, you know, I think and again, depending on your audience, whether or not Jesus is seen as savior or just a good moral teacher, let's just say, I think there is wisdom for everyone who's listening, but in my opinion, one of the most scandalous things that Jesus does it's mind-boggling is that he chooses to eat with people that he was not supposed to be seen in public with.
And I think in our world today because of the polarization, we see this increasing, not just division of thought and cultural lens, but now there's even the fear of even being seen in photos or rooms or in conversations with people that we're not supposed to be in conversations with.
I have been in too many meetings where I have been asked to sign non-disclosure, NDA statements so that I can't disclose who else is in that room. And they're all Christians. And I think to myself, what is going on? That we're so afraid of our constituents, our donors, whatever it might be that we can't be seen with others.
And so I want to keep being reminded of that, to follow Jesus. Yes. We fight for justice. But, ultimately I don't worship justice. I worship a just God. Those are two very important distinctions because if we're not careful, even good things like justice, and I'm having my air quotes on now, for those who are listening, even good things like justice, if we're not careful can become idolatrous, dangerous things as well.
Lee Camp: You're listening to Tokens: public theology, human flourishing, and the good life. We’re most grateful to have you joining us.
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We do love hearing from folks listening in: shout out to Ana in Cairo; and to all the good folks listening down under in Australia, our third-largest audience so far as country is concerned.
You've been listening to our interview with Eugene Cho on his experience as a young Korean-born immigrant in the United States. Coming up, we'll hear more from Eugene about the ways in which both his upbringing and his faith have informed his pursuit of justice that is neither right nor left; and how, as he puts it:
Eugene Cho: You cannot love your neighbors if you don't know your neighbors.
Lee Camp: Part two in just a moment.
HALFWAY POINT
Lee: You're listening to Tokens and our interview with Eugene Cho.
Your recent book, Thou Shalt Not Be a Jerk: A Christian’s Guide to Engaging in Politics, gets at a lot of these things, right? Including this sort of desire to have conversation and so one of your chapters is “Thou Shalt Listen, and Build Bridges.” What do you think is central in learning practices of discourse?
Eugene Cho: So going back to Jesus's words about love your neighbor. It sounds really good. I can't imagine meeting Christians and even non Christians who would not be in support of the idea of loving your neighbors, but you cannot love your neighbors, if you don't know your neighbors. And you can't know your neighbors, if you don't understand the art of being a human, which means to share stories and to listen to stories. It's incredibly dignifying when you choose to listen to others and vice versa. I feel seen and valued when someone says, let me hear what you have to say, even if, and especially if we understand that we approach things from a different perspective. Now I do want to acknowledge. Yes. I think there's a reality that there are certain conversations that are so outside the realm, you know?
And so when somebody wants to speak about inflicting violence and harm, we have to be emphatically clear that in any healthy civil society, we can't leave room for violence and abuse. But I also want to acknowledge that I think a good chunk of our society, who may be seeing things differently. It's just that we're now being dictated by headlines rather than the actual opportunity to engage in friendships and relationships.
Lee: In publishing that book, you seem to be articulating a third sort of approach yourself, that you don't want to get reduced to right or left. And you're pointing to these practices of this Jesus that seemed to be truly socially, culturally, politically relevant to the world in which we find ourselves.
But still not wanting to reduce it to the stereotypes of right or left. What kind of feedback are you getting?
Eugene Cho: Gosh, it’s been mixed. I don't want to make it sound like woe is me. You know, I think it resonated with people that understand that our current system and our current rhetoric is not good for the human soul. It's toxic, it's dangerous. So I'm certainly getting some affirmation.
However, I would say, I'm probably getting more criticism than I had anticipated. From both sides, including, and maybe more from the left who feel like I'm being too soft and too accommodating and the criticism of your being a, both cider wrist, I don't know if that's the phrase or not, but, I think it is very important.
We have to keep pushing back. You know, we have to keep suggesting that there is room for thoughtful, robust dialogue and engagement, that there is something scandalous about choosing to engage in relationship and friendship and disagreement and discourse and debate.
That's not just good for society and for the public's fear, it's also good for the human soul as well. Lest we find ourselves in a place where these echo chambers that many of us have not heard about. Those aren't just mere analogies. I really believe that many of us are in bubbles of our own, where we're simply affirmed in our own thoughts and views.
So there's a lot, but those are some of the initial observations for me.
Lee: I was flashing back to. You know, my childhood experience and sort of highly sectarian church context and the South in the Bible belt. We had these mechanisms of guilt by association. If you even were on the same program with someone therefore you were guilty simply by being with them.
And along with that was a highly refined mechanism of shame in the sense of isolation. If you didn't fit, if you didn't submit to the expected norms of who you would and would not associate with. There were these mechanisms of shame by which you could be isolated, and, or alienated, or, or, you know, literally cast out in significant ways.
And so I've always been in my adult life, highly sensitive to that. That there's nothing that can quite make me angry as quickly as seeing someone publicly shamed. But what I'm increasingly paying attention to is the fact that that's not just a Bible belt fundamentalist sort of thing, you can find good secular right-wingers and good secular left-wingers that are refining these strategies to themselves, or so it seems to me, what do you make of that?
Eugene Cho: No, I absolutely agree. Growing up, having been a Christian at the age of 18, you know, I began to hear and learn about fundamentalism and it being a product particularly of the Bible belt in the United States in the South. I know it's a real thing, but what I've learned having lived in this very left progressive city and state Seattle, Washington, I've learned very quickly that fundamentalism is not just reserved for those who are very conservative.
It's also reserved for any sort of camp that basically says, this is our dogma. This is our doctrine. This is the way or the highway. And if you deviate away from these things, you know, there's mechanisms, as you shared, both organic and structured that seek to suppress that voice or that person. And again, it's not healthy.
Lee: I wanna harken back to some things you shared with us earlier, and I can imagine, you know, I have, in my mind, people that might be listening to this podcast and some who precisely, because of the reasons you said, there's going to be some on the right, who are going to be frustrated with you.
And there's going to be some on the left, who just heard what you said that are going to be frustrated with you, but I want to shift it to a different consideration that I think transcends both of those. And that is this question. How does someone who as a first grader had a fear of raising their hand in class, such that it led to sharp embarrassment in front of your classmates, who then as an adolescent develops a stuttering problem because of your social anxiety.
How does one move from that to being someone who has the capacity to stand publicly or to write publicly so that you're going to get castigated by people on either the right or the left? How does that happen?
Eugene Cho: Yeah, that's a great question. It's one that I ponder sometimes, and I don't want to over spiritualize my answer, but this is my most authentic answer. This is my truthful answer, small T truthful answer by the grace of God. I truly believe that, you know, to go from a very angry, suicidal, depressed young man who was struggling with all of those things.
I think having an encounter with God, with the Holy Spirit, had a deep impact on my life. And in high school, and this was as I was wrestling with kind of the more existential questions in my life. During high school, I probably had one of those breakthrough moments of my life. Uh, I look back and if I could just pat myself for a couple events of my life, if I look back and say, here are a handful of defining moments of my life.
One of them would be, as a junior in high school, at the zenith of some of my fear and anxiety. I realized that I needed to confront some of my fears. If I didn't, it was going to paralyze me for the rest of my life. And so I identified the act, which I considered to be the scariest thing that I could ever do at that moment as a 17 year old. And that was to audition for a school play. And I did, I auditioned for a school play. It was A Midsummer Night's Dream, uh, by Bill Shakespeare. And it wasn't the fanciest role or the most robust role. It was a handful of lines at best, but I was cast for the wall in A Midsummer Night's Dream.
And I remember it very vividly, the emotional wrestling I had to do every single day for a three week production of plays on the weekends, but I look back and I'm so proud of that moment. I was not expecting to get so emotional sharing this story. It's been a while since I shared this story, but, you know, I think if I had the privilege of speaking to 17 year old Eugene, right at this moment, I would just say, I'm so proud of you. Because I know how much it took for me to do that. That's one of the big moments.
And then, the phrase of being fearless I think is ridiculous. No, one's fearless. I think we're all afraid. Courage is when we choose to acknowledge our fear and choose to engage it, even if that means we're trembling in doing it. And so you know, now as a 50 year old, every single day, I struggle with my fear and insecurity every day and I'm being very truthful here. But I think this is what it means to be human. You know, we acknowledge these things and yet we decide to move forward little by little. Sometimes you take a couple steps back, sometimes you move forward, but that's been kind of the story of my life.
Lee: Hmm, thank you for that. That's very beautiful, grateful for you sharing those things. So in this time, in which we are continuing to see such polarization, such social anxiety, I would invite you to one or both avenues of response. What are things that give you hope? Some sort of sense of signs of grace or signs of possibility. Or second, what are daily practices, habits, wisdom that you hold on to as crucial for you in living a good life as a human being in a time like this?
Eugene Cho: Well, thank you for asking that question. Like you I'm fully aware even with our limited understanding and scope of the brokenness of our world and the last year and a half, 14, 15 months in our nation and around the world. I mean, it's unthinkable to try to grasp what we've experienced collective trauma, that global pandemic, social injustice, police brutality to see black and brown bodies slain, we've seen the unimaginable surge and rise of Asian American Pacific Islander hate and racism. I've had conversations that are just really painful.
So it's not just news. It's very personal. About six weeks ago I had a really bad fight with my father. And I'll get to your question, but I just, I want your listeners to know how deeply painful, the surge of AAPI hate and racism has been.
Lee: If you're unfamiliar with the acronym AAPI, it stands for "Asian American and Pacific Islander."
Eugene Cho: And it's been again, very dear, very close.
You know, I don't know of a single Asian person in my life who's not heard the phrase “go back home.” Or to be labeled and to shout at slurs over the past year. There have been churches in Seattle that have been vandalized with some of the most violent rhetoric. I just had a friend who was a pastor of a church in New Jersey during our good Friday services.
They got hacked in by folks that began to scream the most viral comments, bomb them with pornography. And this was a family good Friday service. Um, so I just want people to know that, you know, beyond these headlines, this is happening all around us.
But six weeks ago, I'm having a conversation with my dad. It escalates into a pretty difficult fight. Now I'm not afraid of my father anymore. He's 85. I can take him in a wrestling match if I need to. I just want him to know that in the case that he hears this conversation, but the reason why we're having this fight is because out of the blue, he is insisting on buying a gun. 85 years old, insisting on buying a gun. And of course, I'm asking what's going on? Why are you wanting to buy a gun? And, you know, there's something that just hurts when you hear your 85 year old father who literally shakes as he walks because of his age and how afraid he is. And he feels the need to protect himself and his wife, my mom. It just hurts so much to hear that. And you know, I don't share this too often. This year. Yeah, really weird. This past year was the first time since being a young boy post immigration, where after you hear the phrase, “go back home”, you know, my wife and I, for the first time this year, actually had a conversation. Is it time to leave? Which is ridiculous because this is my home. I grew up here. I love this country. I love Seattle. We're moving to DC. I've got a job that is hard, but it's making a difference in the world. But I think it's just, if anything, I'm not trying to overly dramatize, I'm trying to give people this sense that this is what a lot of AAPI folks are struggling with, which then I think makes your question that much more poignant.
Like what gives you a sense of hope during this time? And the reason why I wanted to first highlight some of these challenges is I don't believe in false hope. I don't believe in giddy hope. I don't believe in happy clappity clap. You know, that's Disney eyed, sanitize everything, kind of hope. I think that's dangerous.
It's not authentic. I think it's actually harmful. It doesn't lead us to lament and we need lament in order to experience hope. Theologically, every time, all day, 365. I will always say that the reason why we have hope is because of what we proclaimed just this past week and weeks ago as we celebrated crucified Christ and the risen Christ, that that is our source of hope, but we also understand that the kingdom is here and not yet fully arrived.
And I think we understand that tension, the kingdom is here. And so we do have hope, but we also acknowledge that it hasn't yet fully materialized. But I think at least knowing what the future holds gives me a sense of hope and perspective.
Jürgen Moltmann who wrote a seminal book on hope, the Theology of Hope. He once said something to the extent genuine hope is not blind optimism. It has eyes to see the suffering around and yet believes in the future. That's given me a lot of resolve.
I don't want to be blind to the suffering around me. That's dangerous fatalism. It's not a healthy spirituality, but at the same time, I don't believe that the answer to all things begins and ends on what we see and the circumstances around us. So that gives me a sense of hope and resolve. Also want to make sure that we leave plenty of room in our hearts and our minds to acknowledge the beauty around us, the joy around us, the hospitality around us, the friendship around us. It may not sell as well because our society runs on the currency of fear. But I refuse to believe that it is dominated by hate.
Cause I do not believe that’s true.
Lee: So on Moltmann’s twofold eyes that see and yet still the longing for in theological language, their kind of eschatological, consummation of the kingdom of God. Let's first point to those eyes that see for just a moment and ask what might white citizens of the United States, whether Christian or non-Christian. What might we not see that you would wish as a person of Korean birth we would see?
Eugene Cho: Hm. Well, first of all, Korean food is the best. Um, it’s the greatest. I'm biased but I'm just going to go out there and just say it. Uh, that's number one. You know, let me just try to take kind of a circuitous approach to this. You know, I think so much of what compels and drives human beings is the psychology of fear in our world.
I think so many people are afraid we're anxious. And this is everybody. I just think that's the thickness of air around us, especially now. And so when I speak with my white neighbors, my white friends, my white congregants, I think there is a fear that they might somehow be overlooked, that they're losing something that they no longer matter.
And I would just want to acknowledge that, in a culture where it's sometimes feels as if there's a lot of heaviness of accusation and pummeling of quote unquote, you know, white America and, for those who might identify as white evangelicals. My hope is just simply to, just to acknowledge that there is that psychology that's impacting them as well as so many of us and that when I, or others are speaking about wanting justice and equality, ultimately it's not just merely for ourselves or those that look like me or think like me, or feel like me, but it's really a desire to see human flourishing, be about human flourishing.
It's really about all of us. And for me as a Christian, then I'm now compelled not by merely my vision or my sentiments or my biases. I'm compelled by a kingdom imagination of what the beloved community looks like. And it has room for all of us. This is the reason why I think we can't operate with a mentality of scarcity.
We can't operate on a mentality of those who have, and those who don't have. We can't operate on a mentality of hate and injustice. So again, I'm going to just first begin by sharing that. But I would just say from an Asian-American, from a Korean, from an AAPI experience, if there is a handful of things that I would ask people to consider to see, number one is this, we're not making these things up. This is real because I still get this question. Whether it's said to me respectfully or disrespectfully, it's basically something like this. Maybe you need thicker skin. Maybe you're imagining things everyone's very traumatized right now. Maybe you're just imagining all of this violence, but when there's documented, you know, an organization called AAPI hate, they documented about nearly 4,000 Asian American hate crimes and incidents in the past year.
This is just documented. I know it's higher because my wife and our kids and our extended family, we've not reported some of the things that we've experienced. So I know it's higher. It's the tip of the iceberg. That's the first thing. We're not making these things up. Please don't tell us to get thicker skin.
That's just cruel. It's not compassionate. It's not human. The second thing that I would say is that Asian American history is American history. It's not something separate. We're a part of a larger collective in both its beauty. And also in it’s depravity as well.
We’re a part of that. And so when I speak about some of the AAPI hate, we're not just talking about what transpired in this past year, as a result of the pandemic, as a result of the rise in anti-Asian rhetoric. We're talking about history like people in Hall, in 1854, we're talking about the China massacre of 1871.
We're talking about the Chinese exclusion act of 1882. We're talking about the San Francisco plague outbreak. We're talking about the Japanese incarceration during World War II. We're talking about KKK, their engagement with Asian communities, particularly with the Vietnamese in Texas. We're talking about the LA riots.
We're talking about 9/11 inspired kind of hatred, particularly against Southeast Asians. It's a part of our American history. And so even as we acknowledge good things, we need to have the courage to acknowledge some of those painful things as well. And I guess the last thing that I would just say for the sake of being concise is I would love for people then to say, how do I stand in solidarity?
You know, and I think you can't do it without listening. You can't do it without listening, listen to our stories, listen to our pain and then listen to our desire to say, what does it look like for us to build a just society that speaks about human flourishing?
And during this time, one of the ways that you stand in solidarities. Yes, you listen, but you've got to speak up. You have to speak up by now. Some of us may have seen the video of a security camera that showed a 65 year old Filipino woman, grandmother, who was walking to church in New York about three weeks ago.
And she is kicked, I mean, pummeled with full force on the streets. And there are three security guards inside a building who see what's going on and they refuse to do nothing. In fact, one of them decides to close the door. So this is happening and we need everyone of every single ethnic group to speak about this, because, this sort of, anti-Asian racist rhetoric and violence.
It's not just happening from one small segment of people, it's being inflicted by black, brown, white. It's happening all around our larger society and nation and actually around the world. And so we need people to speak up. That when they hear things that are racist and denigrating, we've got to speak up and say, hey, that's not cool.
That's not right. That's not proper. That's not acceptable. And certainly when we see violence inflicted, you know, if one person and only one person feels the urge to act, I can understand why that could be intimidating. But if the entire subway all got up and said, hey, this is not acceptable. If all three security guards came out, there needs to be strength and solidarity in numbers.
Lee: On the second piece of Moltmann’s vision there that we see, we seek to see what what's really there, not a naive optimism, but grounded in reality. And then coupled with that, a anticipation of possibility. Who are some people or figures or historical incidents that you look to, that you kind of hold close to you as people who represent, whether it be a community or an individual that represents this sort of hospitality, sort of courage and speaking up this beautiful winsome, compelling vision of the possibility of just human flourishing.
Eugene Cho: That's a great question. And the reason why that's an important question is because it's this kind of conversation that also gives us hope. We have to keep focusing on these kinds of conversations.
Some of these individuals that come to mind, I actually highlight a few of these individuals in my book, Thou Shalt Not Be a Jerk. You know, Emmett Till's mom, is an example of someone who, despite everyone telling her not to show her son's body after basically his lynching. I mean, I'm just getting goosebumps, but her insistence on wanting to show her son's body, I think was a catalyst to a movement. Certainly Martin Luther King Jr. I don't think people quite understand because in our modern Disney eyes version of history, because now he's one of the most beloved human historical figures in the U.S. and around the world, people just don't realize that he was actually voted the most hated person in America during his time. He was stabbed, he was jailed. He was beaten. He was spat on. And so I'm just really moved by his courage. Malala is another person that I'm inspired by. Here's a younger woman who does not bow to the fear-mongering and the intimidation of the Taliban and the powers to be her refusal to swim in cynicism.
Like, I want to learn that, because I think it is so tempting to feel paralyzed or cynical or helpless. As unoriginal as this might be, and I'm not here trying to sound overly spiritual, but I think the more I grow as a Christian and the more I study Jesus’ life, he is hospitality personified in the flesh.
You know, his invitation to Levi, the tax collector. Who was hated by everyone for the obvious reasons. I mean, he was the worst of the worst, a betrayer of his own people who stole on top of the tax money for the other Roman villainous empire and for Jesus to befriend him, to humanize him, to have a meal with him, to love him. I don't know. That is, it's stunning. So those are some of the individuals that really inspire me about what does it mean to grow in hospitality, that contribute to human flourishing.
Lee: We've been talking to Eugene Cho, author of Thou Shalt Not Be a Jerk: A Christian’s Guide to Engaging in Politics. And most recently the president of Bread for the World, from his home there in Seattle, Washington. Thank you Eugene so much for the beautiful conversation today.
Eugene Cho: Thank you so much. And we've talked about this before uh, look forward to seeing you in the flesh. Cause right now all you are is a little image on my computer screen.
Lee: I look forward to that as well.
Eugene Cho: Thank you.
Lee Camp: You've been listening to Tokens: public theology, human flourishing, the good life.
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