A Dream About Cleaning Pigeons
Standing with Dr. Randy Woodley at Eloheh Farm (Oct. 2024)
Dr. Chris Townley has been a trusted friend, accomplice, colleague, and pastor for almost two decades, faithfully engaging in the good and challenging work of justice and community building. He is a gifted writer and recently completed his dissertation, A Trinitarian Vision for Shared Leadership: Embracing Hospitality as a Transformative Pathway, which will soon be published as a book! We are honored to count him among our dearest friends and to have him serve on our Board of Advisors for BLK South. Learn More
I want to tell you about a dream I had. But before I do, remember these BLK South reflections have been highlighting different saints or heroes important to the writer's life. Sometimes they’ve been named directly, sometimes indirectly, and sometimes they’ve served as the invisible inspiration.
And for me, sometimes those who most inspire me even inspire me when I sleep.
THE DREAM:
I had a dream that Randy Woodley was leading a group of people in the art of pigeon washing. Soap suds and brushes. The most sudsiness lather was needed. Bubbles floated around our heads. The birds were alive and receptive to the cleaning. Quite calm, cooing tender. Alive in our hands.
A large group of people were participating, diverse in both ethnicity and age. While I could not identify their faces, it sure seemed like the array of people Dr. Woodley draws to his unique ways of teaching.
We were eager to learn and participate.
The only other person I could picture was Pastor Tina Estes. She was active in this washing and learning that was going on, not the least bit surprised to be holding a soap covered pigeon. As the dreamworld expanded, I found myself stuck in place, on the periphery of the action. The sensation was that I was witnessing something meaningful, something that went deeper than what it appeared to be. I was both moved and awed as the smell of soap wafted through the room.
Then I woke up.
THE INTERPRETATION:
The more I reflected on the dream, the more the image of the pigeon began to surface as a dove. A pigeon is a dove. Doves are the symbol for peace and a pigeon is often seen as a dirty, trashy bird.
And too many times to count those who have taught us about the ways of peace (be peacemakers) have been classified as a type of “trash” bird, marginalized even as their effervescent colors flicker and their cooing soothes.
Randy, who is Cherokee, has been foundational in my life, helping me untangle myself from the systems of White supremacy, acknowledge the position of my privilege, and repent for my participation in such evil. Randy has infused my life with an Indigenous worldview as I continue to wash away the effects of my Western one. Randy has gone to great lengths to teach and live the way of peace, what he calls “the harmony way,” even as the powers that be threaten his family and his own life (oh the stories he can tell!).
He is still teaching me to clean up the pigeons, to care for them, and call them by their name. To see them as doves. To join in healing the land. Sometimes this happens when I read his books, or listen to him give a talk, or visit Eloheh Farms. This is when the transformation of my mind and heart tends to happen on a grander scales. A robust scrubbing, if you will.
But sometimes the words of those who work for harmony simply show up in the comments of a Substack post reminding you to keep working and writing because, as Randy noted in the midst of my struggle to move forward with publishing my dissertation:
“If you are like me, and you want to change the world, or at least what of it you can, it's worth it.”
Here, in my dream, was a vision of a Spirit-filled leader embodying both the harmony way and the active engagement in cleansing a country of their sin. We must care for the peacemakers, for they are not a trash bird, but a living symbol of harmony among the community of creation. We just join them, as co-sustainers, in healing the land.
THE ACTION:
And I for one, intend to keep scrubbing.
REFLECTION QUESTIONS:
Who in your life has taught you to see beauty and value in what the world often discards, and how have they shaped your understanding of peace?
What “pigeons” in your context—people, places, or ideas—might actually be doves in need of gentle care and recognition?
R E C O M M E N D E D R E A D I N G
