RACE AND FIRST CHURCH

Kendrick Norris
April, 2008 

     Senator Obama, a United Church of Christ member, said that his former pastor, Jeremiah Wright used “incendiary language to express views that have the potential to not only widen the racial divide, but views that denigrate both the greatness and the goodness of our nation.”

      In response to the Jeremiah Wright controversy, John Thomas, the President of the United Church of Christ, has asked the ministers of our denomination to begin a Sacred Conversation on Race in America on Sunday, May 18th.  

     We will be celebrating Children’s Day that morning, and the preceding Sundays are also already scheduled with special themes, so I am going to begin the Sacred Conversation on Race today.

     It’s not without some warranted trepidation that I do this.  It could be legitimately asked whether any white person has the eyes to see the situation correctly. But then there could be no conversation. Secondly, race in America is a super-charged, highly complex subject and its analysis is not amenable to a sermon-length discussion. But then this is just a beginning. I will be interested in hearing from you how you think we ought to proceed in having a Sacred Conversation of Race in America.

5 “And you shall make response before the LORD your God, ‘A wandering Aramean was my father; and he went down into Egypt and sojourned there, few in number; and there he became a nation, great, mighty, and populous. 6 And the Egyptians treated us harshly, and afflicted us, and laid upon us hard bondage. 7 Then we cried to the LORD the God of our fathers, and the LORD heard our voice, and saw our affliction, our toil, and our oppression; 8 and the LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with great terror, with signs and wonders; 9 and he brought us into this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey. 10 And behold, now I bring the first of the fruit of the ground, which thou, O LORD, hast given me.’ And you shall set it down before the LORD your God, and worship before the LORD your God; 11 and you shall rejoice in all the good which the LORD your God has given to you and to your house, you, and the Levite, and the sojourner who is among you.

     Here is a translation of this passage from the Black experience:

A transported African was my father who came across the waters into America and sojourned here. And the Americans treated us harshly and afflicted us, and laid upon us hard bondage. Thus we cried to the Lord the God of all, and the Lord began to bring us out of slavery with a mighty hand and outstretched arm, with great strife, with undergrounds and insurrection, with signs and wonders with demonstrations and burnings; and God brought us to this day leading us on to the day of justice and shalom!  Praise the Lord!

     These are hard words to hear: “And the Americans treated us harshly and afflicted us, and laid upon us hard bondage.” The terrorism and brutality of Slavery, as many have said, is America’s original sin. The comprehensiveness of that physical and psychological violence has created wounds that still exist today. We all, black and white, will have to cry many tears, alone and together.

    While Lincoln ended slavery in 1863, hate-inspired segregationalist Jim Crow laws were widely practiced until only forty years ago. Barely one generation of Black Americans have experienced an America without racist laws afflicting them, without equal opportunity afforded them.

     So, Black rage should not be a surprise. Yes, much admirable progress has been made, but there is still a long way to go before our African American brothers and sisters finally find that day of justice and shalom. Is there any one here who does not want and hope that day will come?

     The Apostle Paul said to the Athenians: “God has made of one blood all the nations of the earth.” As Christians we know this to be true, but how do we make it real?

II.

     The title of this sermon is First Church and Race.  From our own timeline in history and our own experience we all have many stories to share. Now let me tell you some things about your Senior Minister. First of all, my two grandchildren are bi-racial.  But that is just the surface of my longstanding concern about race relations.

     In the 1970’s, I was a counselor and then director of a remarkable Christian summer camp. There were twelve campsites each holding twelve campers who lived in covered wagons and tipis, had to cut their own wood, make their own fires and cook their own food. They had to get along to make do.

     What made it special was that the campers were male and female, privileged and poor, black and white, Latino and Asian. Each group had a male and female counselor who facilitated a group process where very different individuals began to understand each other, work together and often appreciate each other.

     Actually this was to be my calling, of creating places where there really would be neither Greek nor Jew, slave nor free, male nor female, for all are one in Christ Jesus.

     That’s one of the reasons we are an Open and Affirming Church in the most inclusive sense possible: No matter who you are or where you are on life’s journey, you are welcome here.

     At the beginning of my working at this camp, I became a member of a new group on my college Campus.  It was called Black Concern—a group of white and African Americans students concerned about racism. With a common goal we worked together well, until one day all of the whites were expelled; we were no longer wanted or needed.   

     Adam Clayton Powell once said: “Beware of Greeks bearing gifts and white people who understand black people.” It was uncomfortable for concerned whites but understandable that there needed to be a time when African Americans could be by themselves, for themselves. But during this time of Black Power there was no room for those conversations that had previously been taking place.

III.

      When I became the Senior Minister of our church in 1987, one of my hopes was to get back to some of the work I had done at that camp. I had a keen sense that Black/White issues were burning underground, just not being talked about. I thought it essential for the well-being of all that they be addressed.  I tried to find a sister church in New Haven where we could start these sacred conversations.

     We had good beginnings with a racially mixed church in Fair Haven whose pastor was Latino.  That relationship developed exceedingly well, intimacy and trust were building, but after about two years, due to financial pressures, this sister church had to close their doors forever.  

     We then struck up a relationship with an all-African American Church in New Haven.  This worked for only about half a year when, after an honest dialogue led by the Consultation Center of New Haven, this church began a pattern of cancelling our planned meetings at the very last minute. That relationship ended on a sour note.

     Still believing in the great importance of this work, I talked with several other African American Churches in New Haven. They were not interested. The strong message I received was that this sort of dialogue was something more meaningful to white suburban churches than black city churches.  

     It was at that time that I looked for another avenue to widen our understanding and outreach. I pushed to begin a Refugee Resettlement ministry which, thanks be to God, led into our hugely successful Melita House Ministry.

     I bring this history to you, so that you know that it has never been our church’s intention to not have sacred conversations about Race in America.  Circumstances beyond our control have made them impossible.

IV.

     Now that Senator Obama is making a strong run for the White House, with intense support from both whites and blacks, now that race is being brought to the forefront again, maybe there will be openness, even an eagerness, to begin inter-racial dialogues again. Let’s hope so.

     If it is indeed a new day and these conversations can happen, what then do we need to know? Let me offer you the wisdom of Cornell West, a professor of religion at Princeton and a major African American intellectual. Interestingly enough, West makes the same point that I have been making, that we must move beyond the great sport of liberals and conservatives slashing and burning each other.

     In his book Race Matters, West writes:

Our truncated public discussion of race suppresses the best of who and what we are as a people because they fail to confront the complexity of the issue in a candid and critical manner. The predictable pitting of liberals against conservatives, Great Society Democrats against self-help Republicans, reinforces intellectual parochialism and political paralysis.
     
The liberal notion that more government programs can solve racial problems is simplistic—precisely because it focuses solely on the economic dimension, and the conservative idea that what is needed is a change in the moral behavior of poor black urban dwellers (especially poor black men, who, they say, should stay married, support their children, and stop committing so much crime) highlight immoral actions while ignoring public responsibility for the immoral circumstances that haunt our fellow citizens. (1)

Surely, there is truth in both the conservative and liberal answers. Can each be included in our sacred conversation on Race in America?

    Cornell West brings up another issue that needs to be well considered. He says, “No other people have been taught so systematically to hate themselves.” “There is a sense of worthlessness and self-loathing in black America.  It resembles a kind of collective clinical depression in significant pockets of black America.”     

     The fact is that not only did White America use physical violence against African Americans but they very purposefully and effectively used psychological warfare as well. Slave making entailed the systematic dismantling of language, culture, religion and family. Imagine this. William Lynch on the banks of the James River in 1712 gave a power lecture to other slave owners:

Don’t forget you must pitch the Old Black male vs. the Young Black and the young black male against the old black male.  
You must set the dark skin slaves vs. the light skin slaves, and the light skin slaves vs. the dark skin slaves.
You must use the female vs. the male and male vs. the female.  
You must also have your white servants and overseers distrust all blacks, but it is necessary that your slaves trust and depend on us.  They must love, respect and trust only us.

He begins these remarks with this promise: “The black slave after receiving this indoctrination shall carry on and will become self refueling and self generating for hundreds of years, maybe thousands. (2)

     Sadly Lynch’s prediction was accurate. Na’im Akbar, Ph.D. an Afro centric psychologist agrees, saying “these inhumane conditions persist as a kind of post-traumatic stress syndrome in the collective mind of Africans in America.” (3)

     So as we enter this Sacred Conversation of Race in America we will need to remember all this and much more.  Perhaps the most important is that we are all in this together:

     An elderly rabbi once asked his students how one could recognize the time when night ends and day begins. “Is it when, from a great distance, you can tell a dog from a sheep?” one student asked. “No,” said the rabbi. “Is it when, from a great distanced one can tell a date palm from a fig tree?” asked another student.  “No,” said the rabbi. “It is when you look into the face of any other human and see your brother or sister there.  Until then, night is with us.”

Amen.

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1  Cornell West, Race Matters: With a New Preface (2001). Beacon Press, Boston,
2  The Willie Lynch Letter and the Making of a Slave (2007). Lushena Books, Bensenville.
3  Na’im Akbar, Ph.D., Breaking the Chains of Psychological Slavery (2006). Mind Production, Tallahassee.