Angela Mitchell-Phillips' predominantly white church had a "come to Jesus" moment on race last weekend.

Her minister leaned over the pulpit and said something like: As God is my witness, I better not ever hear of anybody in this parish calling another human being an animal.

The congregation turned pin-drop silent. Mitchell-Phillips looked around the pews.

"I bet somebody did it," she thought. "I bet he saw it on Facebook. And I bet he was pissed."

The moment points to how raw and tense the issue of race has become in St. Louis, and around the country, since Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson fatally shot unarmed 18-year-old Michael Brown, leading to volatile days of protests.

It can be hard enough when family members are yelling at one another in front of the television, or are met with stony silence at the dinner table. But it can be even worse when you come across a post or comment on social media that leaves you stunned.

It's hard to have a meaningful conversation in a limited, public space like social media. The aftermath of Ferguson has generated a rash of friend fallout.

"If you need to start a comment with 'I'm not racist, but ...' that's probably a comment you don't need to say (or write) out loud," wrote Mitchell-Phillips on Facebook recently.

Mitchell-Phillips, 43, is an eighth-generation Missourian from the southern part of the state, a region she describes as "very, very conservative." She now lives in suburban St. Louis, 30 miles from Ferguson.

She's been watching the news and reaction on social media since the shooting. It's been a heartbreaking week. A friend will post a provocative status, and she will read the comments. "It's like they gave permission for others to say every last nasty, racist thought -- stopping just short of the n-word -- they have ever wanted to vent," she said.

There have been more than a handful of friends and acquaintances, people she knows through her children's activities and schools, who have done this -- ones whom she considered good people and trusts to be in her life, around her children.

"Then, I see this person walks around with a heck of a lot of hate in them," she said.

She's hidden some people from her feed, tried to comment on a few threads and post her own Facebook statuses as rebuttals, but she's walking a fine line.

"I don't want some of these people who interact with my children to turn their hatred on my children because they know I don't agree with them. I'm trying to defend my own beliefs while trying to protect my (kids) at the same time."

She's hardly alone.

A poll released recently by Pew found that black Americans are almost twice as likely as white Americans to say that the shooting "raises important issues about race that need to be discussed."

A white woman in her 30s, who lives in St. Louis and did not want to give her name, had a tense exchange with a sibling over comments made on Facebook since the shooting. She has a very close relationship with her family, and deleted the offensive posts. She called her sibling and said: "I love you unconditionally; however, I can't condone this. I don't want people to think of you as a hateful person because that's not how I see you."

Her sibling became defensive.

"My feelings are horribly hurt," the woman said. "A lot of people are scared." Fear does not lend itself to clear, rational thinking.

The situation in Ferguson has forced race to the forefront for people who normally don't have to think about it. And social media is not the most nuanced place to have a discussion. It has led people to take sides, to spread misinformation, to surround themselves with people who validate racist thoughts.

Until someone challenges them.

"It forces you to be introspective," said the woman who called out her sibling. "You have never been profiled, have never been harassed (for your race). Trying to reconcile that with the fact that there are people who have been, that's a hard thing. It's hard to be honest with, 'I have had a privilege that you have not had.' That is a hard thing."

At some point, you let it go, realizing you can't change another person's personal beliefs, she said. But she had to say her piece.

Vincent Flewellen, an African-American middle school teacher in the St. Louis area, will be teaching a class on Human Diversity and Social Justice at Washington University this semester. Out of tragedy comes such a huge learning opportunity, he said.

It's a chance for people to speak out when they see hatred in their social media feeds.

"They need to call them out on that," he said. A starting point may be, 'I'm not sure you're intending to sound like a racist, but it's certainly what I'm hearing,'" said Flewellen. He said that his white friends have reported seeing a number of "quite racist" comments from acquaintances recently.

"I have friends who have been crying over this, and the fact they have to defriend their friends because they are now showing their true colors," he said.

People, especially in the heart of Midwest Nice, hate conflict.

"There are some things we are just scared of," said Mitchell-Phillips, a writer and part-time educator. There are people in her writing classes who are so uncomfortable with conflict, they have trouble even writing about it in a work of fiction.

There is a fear that power and dignity are somehow finite, she said. If someone gets a little more, someone else loses a little. Mitchell-Phillips has been repeating to herself a verse she read long ago: "Rise so we all may rise."

For now, the things she's read have changed some relationships.

"The next time I see those people, I won't see them the same way."

There's a moment when a child confronts an unfairness so big it changes the way they look at the world.

It could be a significant trauma -- abuse, a loss -- or a simple awareness that the rules don't apply to everyone the same way. There's a moment when we question what we've been taught or assumed to be true in a way that shakes the ground underneath us.

For the past several days, some children in Ferguson, Missouri have seen a slain teenager on the street, killed by a police officer -- a childhood symbol of protection. They've witnessed police in riot gear in clouds of tear gas, night after night; heard barking dogs used to try to control the unrest; listened to angry shouts from protesters and police. They have heard shots fired, a building burned, glass shattered.

"I know that in the coming days, weeks and months, children will continue to re-experience this," said Dr. Marva Robinson, president of the St. Louis chapter of the Association of Black Psychologists. And not just those living nearby, but also those who have been watching the news with their parents, she said. Children could have nightmares for years to come. They may be hypersensitive or hypervigilant around law enforcement.

From their parents, they may be hearing about how their community is treated unfairly, targeted or hated. Instead of new backpacks, they may carry a sense of devaluation, anxiety or fear with them as they head back to school.

What is the eventual impact of being exposed at a young age to violence and a feeling that the police can't or won't protect you? You build up a wall of mistrust. You are closed off to persons of authority. You find it hard to trust the guidance of school professionals or others who may want to help you. You see them as part of a system that killed someone who looks like you or doesn't care about children with your skin color.

"If they were innocent before this, the seeds are being planted in them of feeling dehumanized," Robinson said. Those seeds bloom into a cycle that perpetuates scenes like what we are seeing in the St. Louis area.

Isn't the loss of this innocence yet another injustice, which should outrage us and motivate us to do something?

The onus on parents will be to drown out the negative with the light of the positive. Reinforce to children that they do matter. Tell them and show them that the world is bigger than what's happening right now. Teach them that they can be the change that stops incidents like this from occurring again.

The responsibility of the local community will be to step up and increase mentoring so children have role models to emulate and road maps for how they can get there.

The imperative for law enforcement will be to work to change behaviors that target people unfairly. Make it a priority to identify the patterns that lead to this sort of escalation. Listen to the grievances from the community that you are there to serve with an open mind, and address those concerns. Treat people with a basic level of dignity.

Handle the investigation into what happened to 18-year-old Michael Brown, killed last Saturday, with the utmost fairness and transparency.

Those of us further removed from the situation also have obligations. There's a toxic mindset here: Their problem, not ours.

How many of us have taken a sustained interest in a child outside our own family, outside our most immediate circle?

I've had to take a look at my own life and priorities after spending time in Ferguson in the aftermath of the shooting. I care about this region deeply. These recent events may seem to have a weary familiarity to the cynics among us. It may look like these forces at play are much larger than us, these problems much deeper and bigger than we could ever hope to change.

That's just rationalization to sit back and wash your hands of a messy, heartbreaking situation.

This isn't just a tragic story unfolding in a suburb of St. Louis. There are children who lose faith in, and who are failed by, institutions and adults in every city.

I met Ronaldo Ward, 32, of St. Louis, outside the QuikTrip convenience store the morning after it was burned by rioters. There's a question he says he rarely hears from people quick to criticize the community:

"What can I do to make it better?"

As strange as it sounds, I had no idea how to feed my newborn. I couldn't figure out how to get my body parts to work as promised in the lactation class I took during pregnancy.

I was headed straight toward flunking that first big test of motherhood. You know, the one where a child's future health, cancer risk and IQ depend on the mom's mammary glands.

Overachiever that I am, I called in the experts. I hired a lactation consultant to help me figure out why my machinery was out of sync. I read an entire 300-page manual on nursing in the space of two days.

A dear friend saved me. She arrived at my home, watched my technique and gave me a pep talk. She told me not to give up.

I stuck with it and managed to nurse each of my babies for more than a year. But I couldn't understand why no one had told me the real skinny on breastfeeding: how difficult it can be.

Statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show that in 2004, 70 percent of mothers reported breastfeeding their infants; the numbers drop to 36 percent at six months and 18 percent at 12 months. No disrespect to the nursing advocates and La Leche League, but maybe more moms would stick with it if they were forewarned that things may not go as smoothly as planned.

Granted, in my case, everything that could have gone wrong, did. I'm glad I was able to nurse for as long as I did, and I wish other moms would, too. But there are a few things I wish I had known before I became an independent milk producer.

For something as seemingly natural and instinctive as feeding and eating, many moms and babies don't get it right away. It's hard enough to handle swollen, sore body parts you no longer recognize, but it's even harder when you've got a screaming, hungry baby in your lap. To make matters worse, certain circumstances, such as getting a C-section, can delay your milk from coming in for days.

I know some women who view formula as Satan's brew. But some babies legitimately need a bit of the other milk, and nursing should not be a zero-sum game. My lactation consultant advised me to divide an ounce or two of formula over the course of a day's nursing, which came out to a few dribbles after each feeding. It worked, and pretty soon, the baby didn't need it.

Nearly every mom will wonder if her child is getting enough milk. Unlike bottles, with their reassuring measurements and marked ounces, breastfeeding requires trusting your body -- a concept foreign to many of us. I took my child to the pediatrician's office in between appointments just to weigh her. To boost my milk supply, I rented a hospital-grade pump to fool my body into making more milk. I was completely convinced I would have to return my daughter to the hospital because I had been unable to keep her properly fed.

She survived. I barely did.

In the beginning, nursing hurts. You can get chapped and cracked and start to bleed. I hurt so badly that my hands would shake. The books say this only happens if you are doing it terribly wrong, but even when you do it right, you may get an infection.

Other things can go wrong, too, such as plugged milk ducts, which sound just as dreadful as they are. Many doctors are useless when it comes to helping in these cases. I called the trusty La Leche women, who know this territory. I ended up sterilizing a needle and doing a minor bit of self-surgery at home. Yes, it hurt.

And, for me, pumping was harder than nursing. The electric pumps sound like ancient farm equipment, which hit a little too close to home in this situation. My body refused to work under these conditions. A friend recommended a European manual hand pump, which worked better but also nearly gave me carpal tunnel syndrome.

I remember walking out of a small private office at work with a bottle of pumped milk in hand, and a male colleague looked at the bottle, then at me and said, "Did you just do that?"

It was as if I had been busted stealing from the supply cabinet.

Modesty changes during those months or years of nursing. These parts of your body become so de-sexualized that you forget how the rest of society views naked breasts.

But even when you've weaned the baby, don't get too excited. Things don't spring back to shape. They deflate for most women.

So, what would make a mama persevere in the face of any -- or all -- of these challenges? You get to sustain a life you helped create. Your baby instantly learns your smell. The milk nourishes her mind and body, while the love and trust feeds your soul. Eventually, both of you figure out the harmony of mealtime.

It seems like as soon as nursing becomes second nature, your child is ready to wean. That may be the last peaceful meal you'll share for some time.