Setting *all* the captives free
Romans 7: 15-25a
New Ark United Church of Christ, Newark, DE
July 9, 2023
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| Photo of a gray cement wall with overlapping graffiti on it. In red paint over everything else are the words "Unity in Diversity". |
This past week, at the 34th General Synod of the United Church of Christ held in Indianapolis, once again the church received a resolution to study and develop reparations proposals for African Americans. I say once again because we have been here many times before. In 1991 the UCC issued The Pastoral Letter on Racism and the Role of the Church that called the Church to advance issues of racial justice. Ten years later in 2001 the 23rd General Synod adopted the resolution, “A Call for Study on Reparations for Slavery”. In 2003 at the 24th General Synod, the Rev. Bernice Powell Jackson presented the discussion and study guide, Reparations: A Process for Repairing the Breach. In 2008, recognizing that not enough engagement had taken root, the officers of the UCC issued The Pastoral Letter on Racism that gave rise to the practice of Sacred Conversations on Race, especially in local churches.
In the U.S. Congress, The Commission to Study Reparation Proposals for African Americans Act was introduced, first by the late Rep. John Conyers Jr. in 1989 and every session through in 2017, and then by Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee in 2021. In April 2021 United Church of Christ leaders supported this act by publishing an article lauding this historic legislation. Then in 2022 the UCC initiated the Join the Movement campaign, an invitation to expand racial justice by engaging in practices of antiracism, promoting equity and interdependence, and enacting systemic change and transformation.
Even as the 34th General Synod was also considering a resolution put forward by our own conference to actively construct within our churches a White supremacy free zone, we were confronted with not only our racist past but also our racist present. During a plenary session, the Rev. John Dorhauer acknowledged our sin of racism and apologized for our church’s failure to recognize the Afro-Christian Convention as the fifth stream, the fifth antecedent to the United Church of Christ. The Rev. Yvonne Delk, the first Black woman ordained in the UCC and was the first woman nominated to lead the UCC in 1989, is the editor of a book on the Afro-Christian Convention and its essential role in the formation of the United Church of Christ, and I hope we will read it together.
As for our racist present, another denomination shared space with us at the Indiana Convention Center, the Church of God in Christ, which is a predominantly African American church. A few UCC members, who were Black, approached UCC volunteers, who were White, working at Synod, and asked for directions. The White UCC volunteers assumed because they were Black they were part of the Church of God in Christ and directed them to their space.
I don’t know the sin that Paul was wrestling with in his letter to the church in Rome, but I do find it curious that he wrote about that particular struggle to a congregation situated in the heart of empire. And just for this moment, let us say for the sake of argument that Paul is White. He was a Hellenist Jew and a Roman citizen, which meant that he could move about more freely in the Roman Empire. He writes of the good he wants to do but instead he does the evil he does not wish to do. He can will what is right but he cannot do it, and he says that the problem resides in his flesh, that his flesh is enslaved to sin.
Now usually I would call out such a harmful attitude toward the body, as though having a body is what makes us sinful. And yet what I hear from Paul who for the sake of this argument is White, who benefits from his privilege, is that he is enslaved to Whiteness, that it has become idolatry, and he needs to be liberated from this captivity, this sin. One of the biggest spiritual conflicts of our time for those of us working for justice is that we want things to change but we also want to keep what we have. We can will what is right but there are times we cannot do it.
In 2019 the average per capita wealth of White Americans was $338,093 but only $60,126 for Black Americans. According to the Pew Research Center, 75% of White Americans are against reparations, as are a majority of Latino and Asian Americans, despite this obvious racial wealth gap. The reasoning generally goes like this: “Of course slavery was wrong and racism is a sin, but how can people be responsible for something that happened over 150 years ago? Besides, no one in my family owned slaves. By this point everyone is responsible for their own lives and through hard work they can achieve anything they want.”
That is the same reasoning behind the Supreme Court’s decision to rule against affirmative action, a belief that we have achieved racial equality, that race is no longer a factor in education but also no longer a factor in the acquisition of wealth or in healthcare outcomes or in voting accessibility or in housing.
Reparations isn’t about responsibility and blame; it’s about repairing what is wrong. If you are walking on the beach or in the woods or on a city street and see a piece of trash, even though you were not the one who littered, would you not pick it up and dispose of it properly? Or if you saw an injured person who needed help, even though you were not the one who injured them, would you not stop and see if there is anything you could do to help them?
Reparations is about who is my neighbor. Reparations is about interdependence. Reparations is about the death sentence for humanity that is White supremacy. Reparations is about the generational trauma of ancestors who were enslaved and about healing what the poet Wendell Berry called “the hidden wound of racism” in all of us. Reparations is about Jim Crow laws and mass incarceration and redlining and voter suppression, the effects of which continue in communities we all live in. Reparations is about the moral arc of justice, restoration, and wholeness, about systemic change as much as money that could literally save lives and families.
And so we can imagine it is this White man Paul who writes that it is Black Jesus who liberates him from Whiteness, a Jesus that he used to persecute, a Jesus who was executed by the state, a Jesus raised from the dead and yet still wounded. Paul had his own wounds and found a source of strength in Jesus crucified and raised to life. Is that not also who we are called to be as Church, as embodied Christ? Have we not also been called to confront and to heal woundedness from racism but also homophobia, transphobia, religious trauma, misogyny, trauma from our own lives and in our life together?
Benediction
I don’t know the sin that Paul was wrestling with in his letter to the church in Rome, but I do find it curious that he wrote about that particular struggle to a congregation situated in the heart of empire. And just for this moment, let us say for the sake of argument that Paul is White. He was a Hellenist Jew and a Roman citizen, which meant that he could move about more freely in the Roman Empire. He writes of the good he wants to do but instead he does the evil he does not wish to do. He can will what is right but he cannot do it, and he says that the problem resides in his flesh, that his flesh is enslaved to sin.
Now usually I would call out such a harmful attitude toward the body, as though having a body is what makes us sinful. And yet what I hear from Paul who for the sake of this argument is White, who benefits from his privilege, is that he is enslaved to Whiteness, that it has become idolatry, and he needs to be liberated from this captivity, this sin. One of the biggest spiritual conflicts of our time for those of us working for justice is that we want things to change but we also want to keep what we have. We can will what is right but there are times we cannot do it.
In 2019 the average per capita wealth of White Americans was $338,093 but only $60,126 for Black Americans. According to the Pew Research Center, 75% of White Americans are against reparations, as are a majority of Latino and Asian Americans, despite this obvious racial wealth gap. The reasoning generally goes like this: “Of course slavery was wrong and racism is a sin, but how can people be responsible for something that happened over 150 years ago? Besides, no one in my family owned slaves. By this point everyone is responsible for their own lives and through hard work they can achieve anything they want.”
That is the same reasoning behind the Supreme Court’s decision to rule against affirmative action, a belief that we have achieved racial equality, that race is no longer a factor in education but also no longer a factor in the acquisition of wealth or in healthcare outcomes or in voting accessibility or in housing.
Reparations isn’t about responsibility and blame; it’s about repairing what is wrong. If you are walking on the beach or in the woods or on a city street and see a piece of trash, even though you were not the one who littered, would you not pick it up and dispose of it properly? Or if you saw an injured person who needed help, even though you were not the one who injured them, would you not stop and see if there is anything you could do to help them?
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| Photo of a field and a church with dark gray storm clouds and these words superimposed over the photo: "Trauma is perhaps the most avoided, ignored, belittled, denied, misunderstood, and untreated cause of human suffering." - Peter Levine |
Reparations is about who is my neighbor. Reparations is about interdependence. Reparations is about the death sentence for humanity that is White supremacy. Reparations is about the generational trauma of ancestors who were enslaved and about healing what the poet Wendell Berry called “the hidden wound of racism” in all of us. Reparations is about Jim Crow laws and mass incarceration and redlining and voter suppression, the effects of which continue in communities we all live in. Reparations is about the moral arc of justice, restoration, and wholeness, about systemic change as much as money that could literally save lives and families.
And so we can imagine it is this White man Paul who writes that it is Black Jesus who liberates him from Whiteness, a Jesus that he used to persecute, a Jesus who was executed by the state, a Jesus raised from the dead and yet still wounded. Paul had his own wounds and found a source of strength in Jesus crucified and raised to life. Is that not also who we are called to be as Church, as embodied Christ? Have we not also been called to confront and to heal woundedness from racism but also homophobia, transphobia, religious trauma, misogyny, trauma from our own lives and in our life together?
This, my beloved friends, is an important part of what it means to be community, to be Church (because if not us then who, if not now, then when?): to acknowledge trauma and grief, whether it be ours or someone else’s, to accompany one another through it and eventually move beyond it to something new, something whole, something like the kin-dom of God. Setting all the captives free.
Love is flowing like a river
Flowing out from you and me
Flowing out into the desert
Setting all the captives free.
Amen.
Love is flowing like a river
Flowing out from you and me
Flowing out into the desert
Setting all the captives free.
Amen.
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| "The target is not Christians, it's Christian Nationalism. The target is not White people, it's White supremacy. The target is not heterosexuals, it's homophobia. The target is not men, it's sexism and patriarchy. Don't take it personal, join the work and dismantle oppressive systems." thehappygivers.com |
Benediction
(hear/read in the spirit of reparations)
Go forth into the world in peace.
Be of good courage.
Hold fast to that which is good
and render to no one evil for evil.
Strengthen the faint-hearted;
support the weak; help the afflicted.
Honor all people.
Love and serve God,
rejoicing in the power of the Holy Spirit.
The grace of our Savior Jesus Christ be with us all. Amen.
Go forth into the world in peace.
Be of good courage.
Hold fast to that which is good
and render to no one evil for evil.
Strengthen the faint-hearted;
support the weak; help the afflicted.
Honor all people.
Love and serve God,
rejoicing in the power of the Holy Spirit.
The grace of our Savior Jesus Christ be with us all. Amen.
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