A FRESH BEGINNING
I think one of the paralyzing features of modern Christianity in addressing racism is its inability to deal with shame. Most members don’t know the exact details, but whether it is in the early days of this country or just the history of many local churches, they know that Christianity compromised its own beliefs in support of slavery and, later, the systemic racism of our society.
When Africans were brought to this country beginning in 1619, they were sold as cheap labor to raise cotton and tobacco. There was significant debate as to whether one should proclaim the Gospel to Africans because they might get the idea that they were equally created in the image of God and demand to be respected as God’s children. Major theologians wrestled with the Scripture and Christian beliefs and developed a defense of slavery.
Today, there aren’t many active Christians that would fail to see that the Gospel challenges racism and bigotry. At the same time, they recognize that if you emphasized those Christian values too much, it would demand a costly lifestyle and division within society.
The result is that many Christians prefer to just keep quiet and keep the peace (among White Christians.) While, in a parallel fashion, African-Americans heard a different message that enabled them to stay strong during the horror of the moment.
Scape-Goat Sunday
When the Israelites were making their way across the wilderness, they developed some worship practices that might help us cross our own wilderness. One of those practices was what we might call the festival of the scapegoat.
We tend to romanticize these people in the wilderness as if their only problem was finding food and water and coping with poisonous snakes. Like most human communities, another significant challenge was how to live with each other. The Ten Commandments are part of their response to this challenge.
One of the almost forgotten festivals was the once-yearly festival of the scapegoat. Once a year, they chose a goat and symbolically placed upon it the sins of the people. They then drove the goat out into the wilderness. Think about what this meant. Once every year, the Israelites took all of their misbehaviors, placed them on the goat, and drove the goat away. They could have a fresh start.
God’s Scapegoat Invitation
It is true that in Christ, we are offered the opportunity to confess and be forgiven more often, but as a people, we need public rituals to remind us of some basic truths. Let me apply that to the issue of racism and the church. We know and are embarrassed by the way that the church and its theologians have compromised the Gospel and its relation to racism. But what if we could be liberated from that guilt?
Imagine the effect of a church, at least once a year, being liberated from any racism in their past, by both members and institutions. They would be free to both learn about and respond to the Good News of the Gospel as it offered healing and hope in our fractured society.
Picture a liturgical process by which we confessed our sins and received forgiveness that sets us free to be God’s ambassadors of reconciliation. That begins with confession that we are no better than others, but it continues in a grace that heals. “Create in me a clean heart, o God, and put a new and right spirit within me.” (Psalm 51:10.)
MOVING BEYOND DENIAL
For Christians to respond to the reality of racism in our lives and in our congregations, we must first move beyond denial. In classic Christian terminology, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[JQ9] But such confession is done in hope. “If we confess our sins, he who is faithful and just will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” [JQ10]
This is often a hard truth for congregations to hear.
A congregation that desires to overcome the sin of racism, which bogs down and distorts its experience of the faith, must begin with confession. Such a confession, however, must be seen as a positive step. It is a significant step towards healing a major division among humanity.
Can we be liberated from that guilt without changing the structures that continue to reflect that legacy of racism? I wonder if you want to at least acknowledge that it is not ENOUGH to confess our sins and be liberated if our neighbors are not yet liberated in the current society.
