This is Who I Am
Weaving Inter-Generational Threads
By Michele Turek, National Coordinator for Asian Ministries for the American Baptist Home Mission Societies.
It wasn’t that long ago when I was meeting with a handful of Asian American pastors when three of us shared that we were fourth generation Americans—myself a fourth- and fifth-generation Chinese American, and the others fourth generation Japanese Americans. It was the first time I was able to talk with a group of other Asian Americans who were like me. So often, the conversation about Asian American Christianity is from the perspective of first and second generations. I have often wondered to myself in these spaces:
Where do I fit in our collective, inter-generational story? Where do I see my experience? How are my experiences with others in our Asian American communities the same, or how might I differ?
In early adulthood, I was struck with an epiphany about my identity and heritage. If I believed God to be an intentional God, who has a hand in my very creation and being knit together, then God has an intention in making me who I am in my Chinese Americanness. It was the first time I considered my ethnicity to be a part of how God designed people aside from gifts and talents, as is the common focus in Sunday School curriculum. The work, now, resides in parsing out the different cultural influences made manifest in my person.
The reality is that, within me, there is a complicated mix of valuing my heritage and acknowledging the gaps between generations, of which I am very mindful of while holding on to the few Cantonese phrases I know. There is a familiarity with deeply rooted family traditions while also being a foreigner to it.
Yes, I still take off my shoes in my house and, of course, I know to always bring a gift if someone were to host me for dinner in their home. But I couldn’t tell you many details about classic Chinese literature or the villages where my family members migrated from. In my church setting, I know to address my elders as “auntie” and “uncle,” but I’m also not afraid of voicing my opinion even if it might go against the grain. I grew up only speaking English and trading my PB&J sandwiches for my friend’s umeboshi onigiri. I also loved watching anime and listening to music coming from Asia. In high school, I was a part of my school’s Chinese Club where I gathered with many other Asian American students to bond over shared experiences and values.
I share these reflections about my experience and family because it was and is my reality. I am not ashamed of how I am different from first- and second-generation Chinese Americans, and I do not carry with me the guilt of losing pieces of my “Chineseness.” Rather, it has fostered within me a natural curiosity of my ancestry and a desire to analyze where cross-cultural influences have poured into my understanding of the world and my belonging in it. Indeed, it is to know myself as embedded within the story of my family.
This is who I am.
I am my great-grandfather's optimistic imagination, leaving home dreaming for a better life while working tirelessly in unjust conditions to bring U.S. railroads westward. I am my paternal grandfather and grandmother’s sense of hard work and responsibility as they established themselves and their family as leaders in the community while running a thriving grocery store in Central California. I am my paternal grandmother’s courage, who was barely able to return to the U.S. amidst the China-Japan conflict in the 1930s while traveling to bring her father’s ashes back to his home village. I am my maternal great-grandfather's desire to help the community, creating jobs and opportunity for Chinese immigrants up and down the West Coast. I am my father and mother’s generous love and care, working hard to give me and my sister a life in comfort with a roof over our heads and three-square meals every day.
Learning the stories of my ancestors makes me want to learn more. It makes me want to see their childhood neighborhoods or see if we can find out which villages in China they came from. I want to keep my Duolingo streak going so I can keep growing that connection to them, despite them speaking Cantonese and not Mandarin.
Though I am far removed from my family’s first- and second-generation immigrants, I still carry in me the experiences of my ancestors. I carry with me the silent suffering they endured to show that they could earn their status here in the U.S. Even today, I carry within me that same desire to find home here, a place where they paved the way for me to be.
This is who I am.
I grew up in a single-family household in an affluent neighborhood. I was able to enjoy the privilege of going to school. And every Friday night, during football seasons, I attended as a dedicated member of the marching band. For dinner, we enjoyed a good casserole. I also grew up on American movies and American fashion. Because of these cultural practices, I never had to deal with feeling othered due to language barriers or different-smelling lunches.
Who I am is the result of the decisions and realities of my ancestors. Their endurance, bravery, hard work, and dreaming built the scaffolding I was born into. This is my reality: a messy but beautiful amalgamation of being a 90s kid in the U.S.: my fai chun in storage next to my Autumn and Christmas wreaths, my Duolingo app reminding me that it’s time for my daily lesson learning Mandarin, and my bi-racial children attending my Chinese American church. My experience as a fourth- and fifth-generation Chinese American is valid, as well as future generations as we go down the chronology of our family trees.
If I am a distinct creation and intimately known by our Creator, then none of these complexities are a surprise to God. Every piece of my Chineseness and every piece of my Americanness was knitted together in my mother’s womb. As I bring my whole self as a living sacrifice to God, I know that it is purposeful and beautiful, just as all children of the Most High. Finding where my unique personhood and giftings have fit has been a journey of much reflection, pursuit of self-awareness, and a joy in discovery. This is who I am.
In the context of the broader Asian American Christian conversation, I encourage us to “zoom out” and learn the plethora of experiences our families, communities, and older generations before us have collectively lived. It is through those stories that we learn the fuller span of our legacy, with all highlight reels and shared challenges to bear. The Asian diaspora itself, in its incredible diversity, becomes just a piece of the puzzle when we factor in the journeys of each respective generation.
So often many of our Asian American churches are siloed for a multitude of reasons, and when that happens, we rob ourselves of the opportunity to learn from each other. It takes humility to admit the challenges and shortcomings of our ministry leaders and institutions. But if we want to move forward and not repeat the mistakes of the past, we need to share with one another and learn each other’s stories.
To recognize the uniqueness of what it means to be an Asian American Christian, we can also recognize the uniqueness of the Asian American church. As intentionally created image-bearers of God, we can own every aspect of what it means to be the Asian American church, first-, second-, third- generation and beyond.
This is who we are.
The Rev. Michele Turek serves as the National Coordinator for Asian Ministries at American Baptist Home Mission Societies, resourcing, equipping, and connecting Asian Pacific Islander Americans in the American Baptist family and ecumenically. She finds great joy in being able to serve the APIA community in a space that her cultural identity and faith can flourish and intermingle. Michele is a deployed ABHMS staff living in Fresno, CA with her husband Adam Turek and their two sons.