I fully expect that racists will be invited to the White House. Not just as symbols, either, but as part of the ongoing national conversation.

It will hurt my heart when it happens. Because I feel that racists should be treated as their ancestors treated the gentleman above, a slave in the south who was, apparently, beaten by his 'master' (cruel irony in that anyone who owned slaves in the South, I consider to be less than human).

Cliche phrases about fires and suns are pale descriptions of what I feel about racists, bigots, hypocritical Christians: the whole lot of people who think that my dark chocolate skin is a license to kill, if not my body, then certainly my mind, and doubly my spirit.

Any kind of bigotry is an insult to my person, whether I am the target or not. When I find it within myself, I deny it, then I am ashamed and look for remedies, because it is does not jibe with my image of myself.

But my Mom, who was a brilliant, compassionate, complicated Christian woman, was afraid of the concept of gay people. It was an incomprehensible thing to her, that people could be gay. Never mind that she thought she had been 'targeted' (we'd say hit on) by various members of the congregation (my Dad was a Baptist minister). She may or may not have been right about that: I wasn't aware enough to know. But she found the idea abhorrent.

Yet a succession of church Music Directors, especially at the prominent churches we went to, were not out but obvious. And she enjoyed their work, treated them with respect, and, because she wasn't a very social or gossipy person, I never heard her whisper about 'them' with anything but affection. It wasn't talked about.

So hard to reconcile. So hard to find a place for dialog.

What will I do when he invites the racists?