Perspective:
Responding to racial injustice
By Jeremy Rehwaldt R Illustrations by Fred Willingham
ace still matters in the U.S. Month aſter month news reports tell us about unarmed
African-American people killed by the police, leading to protests in cit- ies across the country. Tese events aren’t anomalies. A ProPublica anal- ysis revealed that African-American teenagers are 21 times more likely to be killed by the police than white teenagers. Te median white family has a net worth 13 times that of the median African-American fam- ily and 10 times that of the median Latino family, according to the Pew Research Center. Te disparities could go on
and on. Te numbers overwhelm us
and the stories break our hearts. Observing that “our nation and our church have been and remain deeply besieged by racism,” Presid- ing Bishop Elizabeth A. Eaton has called us to respond: “Resting in the conviction that we are redeemed, we can begin the hard work of confronting the reality of systemic racism in our country.” As people of faith, how do we
respond? First, we need to acknowledge
that racism is sin, “a violation of God’s intention for humanity,” as “Freed in Christ,” the ELCA’s social statement on race, ethnicity and culture, explains. We live in a sinful and racist society. But because we are, as Augustine noted, curvatus in se (curved in on ourselves), those of us who are white sometimes don’t
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notice and don’t want to believe this. Much of the dif-
ficulty in believing this is rooted in a deep gap between people’s experiences. As “Freed in Christ” explains: “A wall of hostility stands intact. Captive on one side of the wall, people with access to opportunities and insti- tutions are largely unaware either of their own cultural biases or the worth of other cultures. On the other side of the wall, people scarred by slavery and other forms of degra- dation and suffering have seen their cultures ridiculed and reviled, or destroyed.” In the midst of that, among
mainline Protestant congregations the claim that 11 a.m. on Sunday is the “most segregated hour of the week” remains true today. Despite the commitment proclaimed in “Freed in Christ” to “be in mission and ministry in a multicultural society,” the ELCA’s membership is 93 percent white, according to a 2013 report from the churchwide organization.
Differing experiences I know conversations about racial injustice are difficult. Aſter studying three intentionally multiracial con- gregations in the South (each with white
and African-American members), I discovered that even congrega- tions that intentionally cultivated a multiracial membership permit inequalities and misunderstanding to remain in place. For instance, Jonathan (names
changed to maintain confidential- ity), a white person I interviewed in one congregation, said, “I think we, my wife and I, have helped the cause within our church body because we don’t see color.” In contrast, several African-
Americans in the same congrega- tion had contrasting perspectives.
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