With Liberty and Justice for All???

One nation under God with liberty and justice for all or one nation under WASPs with liberty and superiority for WASPs?

Back to back book reviews in the May 11, 2016, Christian Century, reveal that the white American church, from the Puritans on down to 2016, has failed, and the American WASP nation have failed in their supposed quest for liberty and justice for all.

The two books: Trouble I've Seen: changing the Way the Church Views Racism by Drew Hart, and A Just and Generous Nation: Abraham Lincoln and the Fight for American Opportunity by Harold Holzer and Norton Garfinkel.

The review of Trouble I've Seen, which is about racial injustice by black pastor, activist and scholar. Drew Hart,  begins:

          The opening line of Ken Follett's Pillars of the Earth might be one of the most chilling ever written:  "The boys came early for the hanging."

      The current political context is forcing Americans to discuss race and church people have some serious reckoning to do.  Not only did the church turn a blind eye to racism, but congregations would often let out early on days there was to be a lynching in the town square so parishioners could get a good seat for the festivities.  The church came early to the hanging. . . .  throughout American history and today, the church not only condones but also contributes to antiblack racism and white supremacy. Why does the church participate in modern-day lynching, or at most turn a blind eye, rather than protesting as our [biblical] faith would dictate?

The review of A Just andGenerous Nation, which is about economic injustice, states:

     that Lincoln's fundamental cause was for 'free labor.' . . .  Lincoln meant by 'free labor' that every American should be free to advance to the middle class and to enjoy the fruit of his own labor. . . .  Lincoln declared : "Labor is prior to, and independent of capital.  Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed.  Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration."

Of course, under slavery, slave labor was anything but free; labor was exploited.  To whites, this labor was free, and along with 'free land' stolen from Native Americans, capitalism exploded.  With the 'free gifts' of both labor and land, any idiot should make a generous profit.

The authors discuss at length which presidents stood for the American Dream and which stood for the Gospel of Wealth.  The reviewer states:  "This compelling and persuasive book shows how the 'old house' divided persists in contested claims about the American Dream and who has access to it.  Ta-Nehisi Coates parses the dream as a white notion of a life of privilege that depends upon the cheap labor of others."

Our nation may have been conceived in liberty---life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness---but it was never conceived in justice.  Our founding fathers never believed in justice---especially a biblical Jubilee type justice; neither did Lincoln; neither do white Americans today.  Biblically, there is no liberty without justice.

In 2016, our nation is experiencing unparalleled economic inequality/injustice; and unending racial inequality/oppression   Our tragic historical past continues to haunt our current sociological present.  And most of the American church stands idly by.