Summoned: Part 1
The true story below is the first of a multi-part series...
There were 52 of us summoned to appear that Monday. Two people were standing at the entrance of the courtroom with the doors shut behind them. One of them was an older man dressed in a police uniform. Beside him stood a lady wearing a dark navy suit, whose appearance was very professional. I would later discover these two individuals were the bailiff and the court reporter. Everyone was required to check in with them upon arrival to receive their official badge and number. My number was 43.
When I was in seminary, I received jury summonses regularly. As a student, I was excused from attending, so I consistently declined the requests. My curiosity was always piqued by what it would be like to serve on a jury, especially living in Los Angeles at the time. I imagined each decline was passing up on the opportunity to observe a trial involving a major celebrity. Common sense would eventually settle in and remind me the odds of such a trial were slim. As a result, the decision to decline was always an easy one. However, the regularity of the jury summonses led me to believe that one day my curiosity would be satisfied, and I’d be able to honor one of the requests.
Once I was out of school and we relocated to Texas, I expected it to happen quickly. However, sixteen years passed before I received my first jury summons in the state of Texas. When I saw the notice on the kitchen table the curiosity came rushing back. Given the flexibility of my work schedule, a sense of civic duty, and my renewed curiosity, I was eager and ready to respond to the summons. So, one Monday in March, in the Tarrant County Family Courthouse, there I stood before the bailiff and the court reporter, getting my badge and my number. Number 43. Slowly but surely, 51 other individuals joined me in the lobby of the 5 th floor as we patiently waited for the courtroom doors to open.
When the doors opened, we were filed in and told to take a seat in the order of our assigned number. This put me on the third row, left side of the courtroom, near the back. We sat down and saw at least 13 people standing in the front of the courtroom, facing us as we walked in to take our seats. My brain immediately began processing who I was seeing. There was the bailiff and the court reporter again. I recognized them now and their roles were becoming clear based on where they were stationed in the courtroom. Looking from my right to left I assumed the first two people were attorneys. The next group of three included two lawyers assigned to a man who stood before us but with his gaze mostly focused on the ground. Next to them were two more people. An older man in a button-up shirt and tie, standing next to a young lady. Her face was downcast. Her expression made it seem as though she was feeling both distress and frustration and couldn’t decide which emotion was the appropriate one to convey to those now entering the room. Finally, one more attorney stood next to another man in police attire. This officer was in very close proximity to a man in a jumpsuit, wearing shackles around his wrists and feet. A prisoner, somehow involved with this trial.
Presiding over the whole affair sat the judge. A strong, poised, middle-aged man who seemed to simultaneously depict both seriousness and warmth. He asked us to be seated and explained why we had been summoned. Much of the explanation was focused on the jury selection process that was about to unfold. The phrase that seemed to drown out the rest of the instructions was the phrase that answered the question of why. Why were we there? What was this trial about? His answer was heavy. Termination of parental rights.
When I heard him say that phrase, “termination of parental rights,” I looked back at the three individuals who I assumed to be the adults involved in this case. The details were still missing but that couldn’t prevent the assumptions from racing through my mind. The lady with the downcast expression of distress and frustration was clearly the mom. The prisoner in the jumpsuit was the easily identifiable “bad guy.” It was hard not to think he was the primary culprit who contributed to the need for this trial. Then there was the other man who barely looked up from the floor. What was his role? Maybe he was the one trying to step in and help these kids out. I couldn’t quite decipher his place in this story but I initially assumed he might be the “good guy.” The one ready to rescue these kids from a bad situation. I couldn’t be sure about any of it at this point, but these were the assumptions that initially ran through my mind. Other than correctly identifying the mother, I was wrong about every one of them. A sobering reminder as to why the lady of justice stands with her eyes blindfolded.
What I did know, is that the people who stood before me, surrounded by attorneys, were parents. The ones who were glaringly absent from the courtroom that day were the children. Five children whose lives would be forever impacted by the events that would transpire the next few days. 12 of the 52 people who were summoned would be selected to serve on a jury. A jury entrusted with the question of who gets to be mom and dad for these five absent children. We hadn’t even started the selection process and the gravity of that question was inescapable. I already felt the heaviness of it all.
I thought about the many children I know who were or are a part of the foster care system. I thought about my own adopted son. I thought about what it means to be mom or dad and how precious that role is. I wondered how anyone could abuse that responsibility and I wondered how anyone could strip those rights from someone else. I thought about the trauma that these children must have already faced if their parents were standing in this courtroom. I thought about the trauma these children would face as a result of the future decision of the jury. I thought about our church and our commitment to being a people who love justice. I thought about our church’s call to advocate for foster care and adoption. I was reminded of how important it is for believers and churches to take that call seriously. It is easy for adults to get lost in the assumptions and then when the questions get too heavy, just pretend like these children don’t exist. Keep them as a statistic. Keep them as someone else’s issue. But those children, they look beyond the assumptions and look beyond the system. They look beyond the judge or jury who determines their fate. They are looking for just one thing. They are looking for someone to call Mom and Dad.
This was the burden that was about to be entrusted to the jury. The truth is that it should be a burden shared by us all. We have all been summoned. Unfortunately, too often we let our current situation, and our commitments serve as reasons to decline this summons. We see a long list of excuses that we can draw from when needed. We let someone else carry that burden. But the power of the Gospel, the Word of God, and the whisper of the Spirit won’t relent. They continue to run after us, stirring our hearts, and reminding us of our obligation to love the other. We have all been summoned. The question is if we’ll respond.
These were all the thoughts that came racing through my mind and the jury selection process hadn’t even begun. All it took to get these thoughts going was that phrase, termination of parental rights combined with the faces that now stood before me. All it took was thinking about the five children, who no longer were a statistic, but the primary characters in the story that was about to be told. I thought my involvement in the story would end on Monday. I’d watch the twelve jurors be selected and they would head off to trial. They would venture into the depth of these questions while I would return home to combat the distractions that would steal them from my attention. I was sure, this would be a story that twelve other people would author. Eleven of the twelve jurors had been selected. Only one spot remained. And then the judge called out, “Juror number 43.”
To Be Continued …