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Evangelicals, Reconciliation, Justice and the Powers that Be

Photo credit: All Nite Images — http://goo.gl/Jecd1l
Photo credit: All Nite Images — http://goo.gl/Jecd1l

“…the concept of reconciliation is empty of content unless it is built upon the firm foundation of justice.” 

— David P. Gushee

As evangelical groups like the Southern Baptist Convention start to address issues of race and reconciliation I’d like to remind us all that we can’t talk about racial reconciliation without first talking about issues of justice in and outside the church.

We can’t talk about racial reconciliation without first talking about justice in and outside the Church.

The injustices that have happened in Ferguson, New York, and elsewhere are finally coming to the attention of evangelicalism. Race has become a hot topic for conferences, meetings, lectures, sermons, chapels, and discussions. Books are being written. Blogs are being posted. We’re standing up and taking notice as an evangelical church culture.

But what I’m afraid of, as we talk about race, is that we will have a lot of discussions, say how sorry we are, and then never change/organize. I’m scared we’ll show up, have an expert come in, pray, end with a rocking worship song, feel better, and then leave the topic.

I think our hearts are in the right place (reconciliation of people) but I wonder if our feet will follow by addressing what splits us (by dismantling our systems of control and injustice).

Our hearts are there, but will our feet follow?

I heard it said today by someone, “I’m trying to deal with my own stuff on race but that’s all I can do.” That’s the American evangelical problem, isn’t it? We think we’re only as big as our hearts. It’s only our motives and thoughts that need to change. Race is an individual sin problem and the solution is conversion or repentance.

We think we’re only as big as our hearts.

Racism is bigger than our hearts. It’s ingrained in the systems we live in. It’s our politics. Our police force. Justice system. It’s the way we build cities, give out loans, educate. It’s wealth we’ve accrued as white people. Racism starts in our hearts and then leaks out into the world from there. Even when we have a change of heart we’re still living in a world built for white people and contaminated by white supremacy.

When I hear evangelicals say, “We have to change the individual” my response is “No. Everything has to change.” There are things bigger than the individual. There are rules, authorities, principalities, dominions — the powers that be, and the material reality they embody.

Everything has to change.

If we’re going to fight racism we have to fight injustice. Racial reconciliation demands justice. The powers that be, individually, collectively, systematically must be transformed or discarded. Policies must be changed. Accountability systems must be added. Systems will be torn down and reparative measures will have to be taken. Yes, that happens individually, but it also happens corporately. The body of the Christ, the Church, especially has a calling towards protesting the injustices of the Powers that be.

We, as the Church, have to call out, confront, and dismantle white supremacy wherever it exists: in our hearts, in our communities, in our churches, in corporations, in government, everywhere. That must happen individually and collectively in our communities. Evangelicals have to let our heart for God and neighbor move our feet.

We have to let our heart for God and neighbor move our feet.

I’ve been reading recently about the history of the Civil Rights movement in Portland, Oregon. During the 1950s and 60s Christians there were a part of the movement. Clergy members and lay people of many colors opened up their churches, listened, organized, educated, spoke out, advocated, and marched for Civil Rights.

We need to be reclaimed by that Spirit.

The Spirit that leads to a conversion away from ignorance and hatred of others and towards the just kingdom of God.

The Spirit that prays when we cannot, and inspires us to imagine and work for another world.

The Spirit that inspired the Scriptures we read and brought together a “great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb”.

The Spirit that fell upon Jews and Gentiles, breaking down hostility, and forming a people set apart and graced for reconciliation, justice, and love of all.

The Spirit that brought Christ to life after death on the cross and makes reconciliation and justice possible.

May the Spirit bring us to reconciliation and justice by inspiring us to organize. Listen. Learn. Educate. Advocate. Agitate. Pray.

The powers that be, the systems we live in, and our hearts must be changed by the Spirit. Let the wind blow.

John Lussier is a theology student in Portland, Oregon working on his Master of Divinity at Multnomah Biblical Seminary. Follow him on Twitter at @JohnLuce. You can email him at john m lussier at gmail dot com.

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White Theology, Part I

120723 CP Color BlindEvangelical theology in the United States is often racialized. Racialization pertains to race’s impact on education, health care, job placement, place of living, urban planning, and so forth.

When I speak of Evangelical theology as racialized, I am not thinking primarily of what we say and write about race, but of what we don’t articulate and possibly assume. In other words, it is not always the black print, but the white backdrop on the page that makes a theology white. Such racialized theology can occur in various ways.

A given theology might not address the issues of race. It may be the case that the theologian in question assumes that race has nothing to do with theology or that we live in a post-racialized society. To the contrary, theology had everything to do with America’s heinous, historic capitulation to racism and slavery. The Bible and theology were used as justifications for the promulgation and promotion of slavery. Moreover, if we don’t address race, but think that we live in a post-racialized society or that by addressing the subject, we only make matters worse, we fail to account for the tendency to proceed by way of our predominant, homogeneous tendencies and inclinations.

It is worth noting that according to Michael Emerson and Christian Smith, racialization does not proceed by way of “constants,” but rather “variables.” And yet, many Americans view racialization not in terms of its evolving nature, but in constant, static terms. Thus, Americans tend to limit racialization to a specific timeframe and do not comprehend that racialization is very adaptable and undergoes an evolution over time. Emerson and Smith maintain that there are “grave implications” for failing to recognize that racialization evolves over time. The failure to recognize the evolving nature of racialization has “grave implications”: the more we fail to account for racialization or think that we live in a post-racialized society, the more entrenched racialization becomes (Michael O. Emerson and Christian Smith, Divided by Faith: Evangelical Religion and the Problem of Race in America [New York: Oxford University Press, 2000], p. 8).

Race has everything to do with theology in American history and if we don’t address it theologically today as Evangelical theologians we reinforce dominant sociological patterns that shape the Evangelical movement… To be continued.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

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The Trayvon Martin Case: A Case for Race?

The Trayvon Martin case is back in the national news. The other night, an African American pastor posed the question to a group of people: why has the Trayvon Martin case captured the American public’s eye? Tragedies like this happen all the time. Why did this one shoot America in the face on the evening news?

In reflecting upon his question, I thought back on other high profile cases that raised questions about race: celebrity trials involving OJ Simpson and Kobe Bryant respectively and the late Rodney King. No doubt, each case was different, but each case attracted national attention. One of the striking features of this case is that an African American youth was shot to death by a Hispanic American man, who claimed he shot him in self-defense. In the Rodney King beating, captured live on camera, there was no way in the world that the police officers beat him to a pulp in self-defense. For some at least, this case is not so clear cut. And yet, why did Zimmerman—a community watch volunteer—pursue Martin, even when the 911 operator told him to stop? Was he racially profiling Martin?

It will be a long time coming before our country ever gets to the point of not considering race as a contributing factor to whether someone is charged as innocent or guilty. Remember how split the nation was over the Simpson trial? Was OJ innocent or guilty of killing his ex-wife and her friend? It seemed to many that people responded along black and white lines [For example, it has been reported that according to an ABC poll, 77% of white Americans believed Simpson was guilty;  according to the same poll, 72% of black Americans believed Simpson was innocent; see J. Chidley, “The Simpson Jury Faces the Race Factor,” Maclean’s 108(41) (1995, October), 69-70]. Whether or not race contributed to Zimmerman’s pursuit of Martin, race is still part of the conversation. We can’t avoid it.

America goes on trial as Martin and Zimmerman go on trial. Can our justice system right the racial wrongs of the past? No. Can we keep race out of the courtroom and out of people’s minds as a contributing factor in such shootings and trials? No. But can we at least learn from the trial that racialization—how race shapes us as a nation in a variety of complex dimensions—will not die with Trayvon Martin or George Zimmerman or the rest of us? Unlike people, racial suspicions and considerations live on long after people shoot them down.

The Institute for the Theology of Culture: New Wine, New Wineskins will be hosting a forum to discuss the matters of race raised by the Trayvon Martin case. Please join us for this important dialogue on Saturday, June 15 from 1 – 5pm at Irvington Covenant Church (4003 NE Grand Ave. in Portland).

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

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Jim Crow Immigration Reform and Eating Crow

This piece was originally published at Patheos on March 22, 2013.

Listen to this piece.

Poster Preview (4.5x6.5)Some Republican leaders like Jeb Bush have called for the legalization of undocumented immigrants without a pathway to citizenship. Other Republicans who actually oppose immigration reform leading to legalization argue that legalization without a pathway to citizenship would go against American values. One such representative of anti-immigration reform remarked that the legalization of undocumented immigrants without a path to citizenship would lead to a Jim Crow system of two tiers of Americans—those who have citizenship and those who cannot. While the group hopes that legalization of undocumented immigrants fails to pass, they are making a good case in view of democratic values on equality against the compromise position held by Jeb Bush and others.

One way or another, if one of these two positions wins out among Republicans, Republicans may end up eating crow during the next Presidential election. Some Republicans fear that the Democrats will be viewed increasingly as the representatives of equality and justice and the Republicans the advocates of a two class system. The Republicans have a long way to go to be viewed as a party that welcomes minority groups.

Last year, after the Presidential election, I wrote a post that included a discussion about what Republicans could do to become more open toward minority groups.  My recommendations still stand and bear on the present discussion. Among other things, I hope that Republicans make the shift and become more welcoming of minorities, including those who are undocumented immigrants. Such initiatives must not be based on political expediency and survival, but based on the firm conviction that justice and American values require such moves. If the only reason for avoiding Jim Crow is based on opinion poll appearances, then the rationale against Jim Crow is only skin deep. Minorities sympathetic to the concerns of undocumented people of minority status will likely be able to see right through such shallow moves and realize Republican views will change as soon as expedience goes in a different direction. Such minorities (who are becoming a significant voting bloc) will be sure not to vote for these political opportunists whose resulting diet of crow will be most fitting.

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Sojourners: Is The “Emerging Church” for Whites Only

The following is an article that recently appeared in Sojourners Magazine:

NOTE: THE VIEWS AND OPINIONS, PUBLICATIONS, AND ORGANIZATIONS REFERENCED IN THIS ARTICLE ARE THE SOLE OPINIONS OF THE ORIGINAL AUTHOR(S) AND DOES NOT NECESSARILY REFLECT THE VIEWS OF NEW WINE, NEW WINESKINS OR MULTNOMAH UNIVERSITY.

Is the Emerging Church for Whites Only?

To survive in a quickly diversifying global church, the emerging church movement must do a better job of opening up its doors — and pursuing justice.
By Soong-Chan Rah and Jason Mach, with responses by Julie Clawson, Brian McLaren, and Debbie Blue

At the turn of the millennium, I (Soong-Chan) began hearing a lot about the “emerging church.” It seemed that everywhere I turned somebody was talking about the emerging church. A clear definition of the term was elusive (see “What is the Emerging Church?” by Julie Clawson, below), but the emerging church seemed to reflect ministry and theology rising out of the generation after the baby boomers. In particular, the emerging church was Western Christianity’s attempt to navigate through the context of an emerging postmodern culture.

At the time the emerging church was coming into vogue, I was pastoring a multi-ethnic, urban church plant in the Boston area. It seemed that every brochure for nearly every pastors’ conference I received featured the emerging church. As I began to attend some of those conferences, I noticed that every single speaker who claimed to represent the emerging church was a white male. A perception was forming that this was a movement and conversation occurring only in the white community.

On one occasion, I was at an emerging church conference and was told directly that non-whites were not of any significance in the emerging church. Granted, this was one specific instance, but it led to the sense that the emerging church was not a welcoming place for ethnic minorities. At another conference, on the future of the church, one of the speakers invited up a blond-haired, 29-year-old, white male, replete with cool glasses and a goatee, and pronounced him the face of the emerging church. “This guy is a great representative of the future of American Christianity.” I cringed. In terms of the public face of the emerging church, white males dominated. It seemed like the same old, same old. As per the lyrics by The Who: “Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.”

When Professor Rah was writing The Next Evangelicalism, he asked me (Jason) to visit a number of Web sites for emerging churches. I discovered that the large majority of emerging church leaders were white 20- to 30-year-olds. Photos showed people in trendy clothing, sporting cool hairstyles and eyewear.

Some might respond, so what? If the majority of people to whom the emerging church movement appeals are younger people of European descent and stylistic flair, then so be it. But there is a larger problem. As I continued my research, memories from my own spiritual journey flooded my mind—memories of hopelessness and longing, of wanting to believe there was something more rich and diverse about Christian life than what I was experiencing in the white suburbs. There was a great sense of joy when I found an emerging church, a place where people from various backgrounds (so I thought) were gathered in one community. I quickly became a fan of the emerging church. But now, in the midst of my research, my excitement was beginning to fade.

The emerging church, or rather this particular expression of it, was in essence no different than the church environment in which I was raised. Younger and cooler, maybe, but still the same: white, middle- to upper-class, and reflecting many of the values associated with these categories. It became apparent to me that this “emerging,” postmodern church was simply the pierced and tattooed offspring of its older, modern parents.

Missing the Big Picture
Both of us, in our own cultural contexts, began to recognize that what was being presented as the future of Christianity was only a small sliver of larger changes in the church. Left out of the spotlight, and perhaps the whole discussion, was the fact that the church is going through change on a global level, not just in the West.

Part of the problem was the conflation of terms. The emerging church is popularly presented as a catch-all concept of a generational shift at work in the West, represented by specific brands such as “Emergent” or “Emergent Village,” a group of emerging church leaders who organized, established a board, gained members, and launched a Web site. There has been disproportionate coverage given to the emerging church in the Christian media and in Christian publications, exemplified by Emergent Village’s three separate book deals with major Christian publishing companies. As noted in The Next Evangelicalism, in 2000 only about 200 churches in the U.S. and the U.K. could be identified as emerging churches. Yet, there are more than 50 books with emerging church themes. In contrast, there are less than a handful of books written about, for example, the second-generation Asian-American ministry, which numbers as many as 700 churches.

Further complicating the confusion is the recent notion among some in the West that the emerging church as a whole has died. For example, in January 2010, one blogger wrote an obituary for the emerging church. The obituary characterized the emerging church as having made “many advances in the Christian church, including facial hair, tattoos, fair trade coffee, candles, couches in sanctuaries, distortion pedals, Rated R movie discussions, clove cigarettes and cigars, beer, and use of Macs”—a satirical characterization that nonetheless seems to hold a grain of truth.

Even in declaring the death of the emerging church, the focus is on its Western expression. The face and heart of the movement that was being lamented was defined by white Americans, furthering the perception that the emerging church is an exclusively Western, white expression. Even when the blogger notes the emerging church’s contributions to “women’s issues, conversations about sexuality, environmentalism, anti-foundationalism, [and] social justice,” they are put in the context of Western society.

Another example of the difficulty in understanding and using the term “emerging church” is found in a blog entry from December 2009. The blogger states that “history will most likely mark 2009 as the point of transition and maturation for the emerging church movement.” The “emerging church” being referred to is the Western expression of it; the history provided centers on events in Western countries and cultures. Yet found in the following sentence is this statement: “various streams within the movement will continue on for many years to come. For example, the biggest global emerging church event on the calendar for 2010 will take place in Brazil and be attended mostly by Latin Americans.” If the larger emerging church has many different streams, then why, if one of those streams supposedly has dried up, is the entire movement being declared dead?

In truth, the term “emerging church” should encompass the broader movement and development of a new face of Christianity, one that is diverse and multi-ethnic in both its global and local expressions. It should not be presented as a movement or conversation that is keyed on white middle- to upper-class suburbanites.

Finding a Balance
In search of some much-needed perspective, we spoke with a number of people in Emergent Village. Do they think the emerging church is truly dead? If not, where is it headed and what does it have to offer?

Emergent Village participants interviewed for this article held the same general belief: The emerging church is not, in fact, dead. Both David Park, who had previously been involved with the Metro Atlanta Emergent Cohort, and Anthony Smith, a member of the Emergent Village Coordinating Group, noted that if anything about the emerging church has died, it is the novelty, hype, and commercialism given to it by the Christian publication industry.

“Christian [publishing] took the emerging church from 0 to 60 in a matter of seconds,” Park said. On this same note, Rebecca Cynamon-Murphy, co-host of a Chicagoland Emergent cohort, said that “the emerging church has a number of people of privilege, and the Christian publishing companies handed the keys over to them.” According to Cynamon-Murphy, this led to difficult choices for those who wished to use the published materials as a means to effect real change. Waning attention from the media could likely prove to be beneficial, said Park, allowing more space for those in the emerging church to “get on with the work.”

Cynamon-Murphy and others, such as Julie Clawson, a member of the Emergent Village Council (Emergent’s leadership group), spoke of changes and shifts occurring within the church, both in its larger sense and in the Emergent context. “The conversation [in the larger church] is shifting from a belief-based system to a relationship-based system,” said Cynamon-Murphy, a perspective she believes matches that of Emergent and which will help bring about real transformation and liberation focused on people of all backgrounds, not only the privileged. In words echoing our own experiences, Clawson noted that the emerging church is moving away from its “initial expression as something cool, fun, and trendy,” and toward the “hard work of building its identity,” which includes recognizing the important role of missions in the life of the church.

So if the emerging church is still alive and well, what is the next milestone on its path? Many feel it’s the difficult and challenging work of racial reconciliation. Melvin Bray, a member of Emergent’s Village Council, discussed the importance of the emerging church working toward a “wider voice [being given to] a wider breadth of people.” More specifically, Bray said that the emerging church should seek to become an agent in “creating opportunities for those who, in the past, have been marginalized.” This would direct the conversation away from being centered “exclusively on a Western theological perspective,” giving those who have long been subordinated to colonialism an opportunity to “deconstruct non-helpful religious constructs” and engage God in their own ways.

In talking about racial reconciliation, Anthony Smith said there is a difference between racial diversity and racial justice. Simply including people from ethnic minorities in events and leadership positions is not enough. Doing so may create the appearance of racial diversity, but this would only be a surface solution. Instead, the emerging church must engage in what Smith calls “racial penance,” a situation in which there is true justice between people of different ethnicities, allowing the church to “get rid of Western, white captivity.” Smith said that “friendship is important for repentance” and that “isolation is dangerous.”

The way these concepts are communicated—especially to younger people—is very important, according to Alise Barrymore, pastor of a self-identified emerging church called the Emmaus Community. Specifically, said Barrymore, the emerging church needs to offer “new language and tools to help the next generations understand church.” This, combined with the drive for racial reconciliation and justice, will be crucial for ethnic churches such as the African-American church, which places high value on “negotiating the [role] of race.” Failure to effectively engage individual cultures on their own terms will result in “not translating ideas into language that is accessible and understandable to others,” said Clawson, creating a barrier to the spiritual and social progress the emerging church seeks.

An Emerging Future?
Members of the Emergent movement are optimistic that a more ethnically diverse and inclusive future is possible. Has there been a shift in Emergent? One of the major developments in recent years is that the more visible faces and names from the early years have moved on from leadership in the emerging church, and Emergent Village is now in the process of building an identity that doesn’t rely on these well-known people.

If the white male locus of Emergent is truly passé, then Emergent has the opportunity to become a part of the larger stream of the real emerging church. If the label of the emerging church is to have a future, then the term needs to be reclaimed and disassociated from the specific brand of Emergent, and applied much more broadly to the church around the world.

The burgeoning church is not just a small sliver of American Christianity; rather, it must be seen in the context of a larger movement of God on a global scale. The real emerging church is global and multi-ethnic—and a truly international, truly diverse emerging church has great potential to bring about authentic, deep revival to the world.

Soong-Chan Rah is Milton B. Engebretson associate professor of church growth and evangelism at North Park Theological Seminary in Chicago and the author of The Next Evangelicalism: Freeing the Church from Western Cultural Captivity. Jason Mach is a student at North Park Theological Seminary.

What is the Emerging Church?
On its face, the emerging church is a decentralized Christian movement exploring what it means to follow Jesus in our postmodern age.

Since it is cross-denominational and cross-cultural, however, expressions of emergence vary widely, encompassing everything from evangelical conversations about being culturally relevant to mainline liturgical renewals, from a rediscovery of social justice among suburban Christians to new monastic communities among the urban poor, from provocative theological discussions to postcolonial reconciliation movements (to name just a few). These culturally and theologically diverse streams are discovering together how to move the faith forward into the 21st century.

Transparently open-sourced, the emerging conversation includes anyone who desires to lend her voice to it. Emergent Village serves as one facilitator of this conversation, resourcing and connecting people to the diversity of emerging voices worldwide.

Theological discussions sparked by leaders in Emergent are often met with controversy, especially when they challenge traditional Western assumptions about the gospel and encourage the voices of women and other cultural minorities. Nevertheless, both Emergent and the broader emerging movement are navigating what it means to practice sustainable faith in a globalized and postmodern/postcolonial world, and hopefully helping the church universal better understand and celebrate the beautiful plurality of Christian expressions worldwide.

Julie Clawson is author of Everyday Justice and a member of the Emergent Village Council.

Overcoming Resistance
I’m glad that Soong-Chan Rah and Jason Mach have addressed some important questions about this wide-ranging phenomenon known as emerging church. I might address a few small details differently. For example, while I’m very happy to see that many new churches are being planted, for a lot of reasons I don’t think it’s particularly helpful to brand and count them as “emerging” or “emergent” or whatever. What’s far more significant to me are wide-ranging changes in outlook among a wide range of leaders in both new and existing churches—Catholic, mainline Protestant, Pentecostal, evangelical, etc.

But small quibbles aside, I am in full agreement that we need to understand the real story in terms of a shift away from white, Western, male hegemony and homogeneity. For many years I’ve believed that “the postmodern conversation” in the West was one side of the coin, and the more interesting side was the postcolonial conversation arising in the global South.

To me, deep, theological conversations about the shape and purpose of the gospel, along with issues of justice—racial, environmental, and economic—are far more urgent and important than arguments about what goes on in church services, as valuable as church services are. The way forward must involve—and not just in a token way—exactly the kind of diversity Soong-Chan and Jason call for. The systemic resistance to this diversity is subtle but strong, and its consequences are sad. Many of us have been working quietly behind the scenes in hopes that this resistance can, by God’s grace, be overcome.

Brian McLaren’s most recent book is A New Kind of Christianity: Ten Questions That Are Transforming the Faith.

A Broken Church, Renewed
The church at its best is a messed-up, broken witness to the grace of God, and at its worst a suffocating, power-seeking, patriarchal, and divisive body. If the emerging church reflects some of the values of the “capitalist entertainment empire,” it also has generated an enormous amount of creativity and freedom to question structures and texts and power. Certainly other communities all over the world are generating similar freedoms.

The church I serve is diverse. The congregants are old and young, from Catholic, mainline, fundamentalist, and atheist backgrounds, gay, straight, working class, intellectual, Buddhist, Quaker, drunks, in recovery, artists, and musicians. They are square, circular, zigzag, hyphenated, and occasionally Republican.

Despite these differences, there is a commonality to the people who end up at our church as well. They are usually not wealthy. They tend to question a lot about mainstream society. They are often of European descent. I would not hold us up as the face of the future of American Christianity. That would be silly, scary, and boring. Every manifestation of the church reflects some of the aberrations and illusions of the culture it lives in. Hopefully it also reflects the entirely life-giving love of God.

Debbie Blue is pastor of House of Mercy in St. Paul, Minnesota and author of Sensual Orthodoxy.

Is the Emerging Church for Whites Only? By Soong-Chan Rah and Jason Mach, with responses by Julie Clawson, Brian McLaren, and Debbie Blue. Sojourners Magazine, May 2010 (Vol. 39, No. 5, pp. 16). Cover.