THE COST OF RACIAL RECONCILIATION

 

 

In a Christian Post article Telling the uncomfortable truth about racial reconciliation and the Church's struggle to achieve it, Leonardo Blair has tried to present both sides of this highly charged subject. Sadly, many who are justifiably concerned about the plight of the black community have fallen in line with the secular narrative claiming:

 

·       Churches tolerate racial discrimination, it should never be tolerated, but … history shows that,” https://www.christianpost.com/news/telling-the-uncomfortable-truth-about-racial-reconciliation-and-the-churchs-struggle-to-achieve-it.html

 

While all forms of racism should not be tolerated, in my 43 years of navigating through white evangelical churches, I have never seen any evidence of these churches tolerating or endorsing black racism, not from the pulpit or from the pew. Therefore, when I hear about such instances in recent history, I tend to regard them as fringe examples – nothing that can honestly characterize the white evangelical churches.

 

Nevertheless, the article cites statistics that less than 30% of these churches are proactively engaged in racial reconciliation. However, it concludes by citing Pastor Francisco Vega leader of the A.R.C. (Awakening and Reformation Center) in Atlanta, Georgia, and co-founder of Conservative Clergy of Color:

 

·       “There’s a misnomer circulating that the Church in America has been silent and complicit regarding race relations and that all progress has been some secular movement outside of Christian influence. Historically, that’s inaccurate… Abolitionism was pioneered even in England before we established our colonies in the Americas … There has always been Christian abolition, there has always been Christian leaders who have influenced racial reconciliation movements, many of us don’t realize, as Christians and conservatives of color or otherwise that we may just as well be in chains today if it wasn’t for not only black Christians but really white Christians and white abolitionists, brothers and sisters who actually pioneered abolitionism, trained former slaves to read and to write.”

 

However, these facts are often ignored by the prevailing secular narrative, which seeks to place blame on the white church, by picking out their most egregious examples of racism. It then sets the bar so high that racial reconciliation (RR) is doomed to failure. The William Winters Institute for Racial Reconciliation illustrates one example of this:

 

·       "Reconciliation involves three ideas. First, it recognizes that racism in America is both systemic and institutionalized, with far-reaching effects on both political engagement and economic opportunities for minorities. Second, reconciliation is engendered by empowering local communities through relationship-building and truth-telling. Lastly, justice is the essential component of the conciliatory process — justice that is best termed as restorative rather than retributive, while still maintaining its vital punitive character."

 

To even begin a dialogue on RR, the participant or church must agree “that racism in America is both systemic and institutionalized.” This will eliminate most whites who do not agree with this. Instead, they see that all the laws against integration have been struck down, and blacks have been favored by other laws. Therefore, to prove that they are not racist and are genuinely concerned about their black brethren, they are coerced to adopt a belief that they do not believe. This violates their conscience with serious consequences: “For whatever does not proceed from faith is sin” (Romans 14:23).

 

The white evangelical is then further pulled asunder by the second requirement of “truth-telling.” If these fear and guilt-ridden whites can muster the courage to tell the truth, they are then bashed by angry blacks who accuse them of harboring racism. If they are silent, they are told that “White Silence is White Violence.”

 

The third requirement is to “pursue justice.” However, if the whites fail to see injustice, they will resent the insinuation that they really don’t care about the present injustices being perpetrated upon blacks. Nor are they serious about the Gospel. Instead, they are hypocrites. It is, therefore, no wonder that whites will shy away from such attempts at RR. However, this doesn’t mean that they are disinterested in the struggles that blacks go through. Instead, they’ve opted to express their concern in a Gospel oriented one-on-one basis.

 

Because of these problems, even my black friends wouldn’t join the RR group that I was starting and warned me about what I’d be confronting. They were right, and I had to disband the group after the first attempt.

The same article cites Pastor John Onwuchekwa, the black lead pastor of the predominantly black Cornerstone Church Atlanta, who also argues that RR participants must “define the problem the same way”:

 

·       “While the majority culture is often concerned with racial ‘reconciliation,’ minorities (who already have a ton of reconciled majority culture relationships) are concerned with something different — namely racial equality and justice. The gospel in action is needed to address these issues. And in order to understand how the gospel needs to be applied, there needs to be understanding as to what exactly is the problem. A proper diagnosis is needed,” he insisted. “In other words, before any conversation is helpful it’s important that both parties that come to the table are able to define the problem the same way.”

 

To achieve agreement on the definition of the problem is usually accompanied by coercion, sometimes subtle and sometimes not. It is also to place the need for political agreement above Christian brotherhood and love, as the BLM placards ominously read, “No Justice, No Peace.” In other words, if we do not get the “justice” we seek, there can be no peace between us or even brotherhood.

 

However, it seems that college age white evangelicals have been successfully manipulated by this narrative, to which they are now “taking a knee.” This should not be so for those who know the Scriptures. This reminds me of a brother who was seeking ordination within a denomination that subscribed to infant baptism. I asked him, “How can you do this if you do not believe in infant baptism. His answer surprised me: “I can learn to believe in it.” I was deeply disturbed by his willingness to put his career path above what he believed the truth of God to be.

 

Truth belongs to God. We have no right to play fast-and-loose with it, especially when it is the truth of the Scriptures. This racist, leftist narrative has divided people into the “oppressed” and the “oppressors.” It refuses to regard us as individuals according to our character and behavior, but according to color. They retort, “Blacks cannot be racist because they lack the economic and political power to be racist.”

 

They might also have also stated, “Blacks cannot be sinners as whites can be. They are the oppressed. They, not you, deserve to be heard.” Of course, this understanding violates the Scriptures on their most foundational level. It denies equality and individual accountability for our sins, no matter how difficult our life has been. Nor are we to be held accountable for the sins of our ancestors, as Woke theology maintains:

·       “Fathers shall not be put to death because of their children, nor shall children be put to death because of their fathers. Each one shall be put to death for his own sin.” (Deuteronomy 24:16; Ezekiel 18:20)

 

Fortunately, there are many blacks who also reject this victimization narrative, which has held their people captive to bitterness and unforgiveness. However, if they speak out against it, they become an object of contempt, especially in their own communities. Shelby Steele is a research fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution. In his book, White Guilt: How Blacks and Whites Together Destroyed the Promise of the Civil Rights Era, Steele argues that the black community now suffers more through paternalistic programs and the victimization narrative than they do from their legacy of slavery and Jim Crow. However, black leaders have invested in this destructive narrative:

·       Blacks, on the other hand, are very quick to see racism in situations, even many where it's not there, because racism is our power over whites. And so we tend to embrace it and see it. And if you want to make many of our black leaders angry, just tell them that racism is not the number problem that black Americans face.

 

According to Steele, times have changed. It is not racism that is holding blacks back but the victimization narrative:

 

·       I absolutely, 100 percent believe that if you want to do something in American society, whatever it may be--I'm not saying you will not encounter any racism, but racism will not stop you. When I grew up in segregation, racism cruelly constricted our lives and our opportunities, and you could not do things that might want to do. Today, that's over. One of the most remarkable things is how little we've appreciated the degree of freedom we have as blacks.

 

Even though people like Nat Turner had been Steele’s role models, he applauds this nation for the profound changes he has experienced:

 

·       What I've encountered in my life, most often in the white world, is good will, is people have who have wanted to help me. When I was younger and starting a career, people who mentored me, who really felt it was important to give me the best opportunity to pursue my dreams. And my sense is that that's really been an experience for most blacks who have tried to venture out and develop themselves.

 

·       One of the most remarkable things in all of human history is the degree of moral evolution, that white Americans have made from the mid-60s to this day. No group of people in history have morally evolved away from a social evil that quickly and to that degree in this sort of short span of time. And very often, in our calculations in thinking about race, we don't give whites credit for that.

 

However, there are strong political motivations for not giving any credit to this nation:

 

·       We keep wanting to sort of keep them on the hook as racist. But the fact is that whites see racism as a disgrace and something that they would do almost anything not to be identified with.

 

Steele argues that there has been an unhealthy partnership “between white guilt and the black power”:

 

·       …we have looked to whites so much in the last 40 years, in terms of doing things to help us advance in American life, that we inadvertently put ourselves back in the position of being dependent on the very people who oppressed us in the first place. One of my arguments in the book is that's the dependency that we need to try very hard to break and, again, rely much more on our own abilities and talents, which I think are considerable. https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5385701

 

Despite the great problems and costs involved in the pursuit of RR, it is imperative that we do not ignore the prayer our Lord for oneness within the Body of Christ (John 17:20-23). This requires courage and perseverance and will honor our Lord.