Schizoid America posts two signs on the Mexican border: Help Wanted and Go Home.
On the one hand, we want cheap, hardworking laborers to harvest our crops and construct our roads and process our beef, pork and chickens. On the other hand, we don't want inferior, dangerous foreigners corrupting our superior culture, so deportation is the order of the day.
We had the same love/hate relationship with African slaves in this country. We desperately wanted their free labor to grow tobacco and cotton, but once black slaves were freed, we had a dilemma on our hands. Inferior blacks were too beastly and dangerous, too inferior to be safely integrated into white society, so America began to send them back to Africa. Even President Lincoln, the Great Emancipator, agreed with the deportation plan. Strangely, Lincoln never volunteered to go back to Europe.
Enter political scientist, Peter Beinart, with his analysis "The Democrats Immigration Mistake."
Beinart quotes Paul Krugman: "immigration is an intensely painful topic . . . because it places basic principles in conflict."
How do we balance unity/assimilation with diversity/ethnicity? Obama put unity of America first and won twice. Clinton put diversity first and lost.
"Promoting assimilation need not mean expecting immigrants to abandon their culture. But it does mean breaking down the barriers that segregate them from the native-born. And it means celebrating America's diversity less, and its unity more."
Obama: "there is not a liberal America and a conservative America . . . There is not a black America and white America and Latino America and Asian America; there's the United States of America."
Friday, June 30, 2017
Thursday, June 29, 2017
More on the Rape of Black Women
This blog is a continuation of my previous blog about the book At The Dark End of the Street: Black Women, Rape, and Resistance. The following quotations come from the Epilogue by Danielle L. McGuire.
According to historian McGuire, Recy Taylor who was gang raped in 1944 was a key but largely unknown figure in the civil rights movement.
"Recy Taylor turned eighty-nine on December 31, 2008. I met her and her youngest brother [Robert Corbitt] at his tidy ranch house just down the street from the Rock Hill Holiness Church in Abbeville, Alabama. We came together on the same day that one million Americans gathered in Washington, D.C., to witness the inauguration of the country's first black president. I talked with the slight, spry woman whose courage and testimony in 1994 helped inspire the modern civil rights movement. . . . as William Faulkner put it, that 'the past is never dead, it isn't even past.'"
"This seems especially true in Abbeville, where Taylor's family and the families of her assailants have lived side by side for decades. . . . Corbitt, a lean man with a warm smile, said, 'You'd be surprised at how close they lived. We were very segregated---but we were neighbors. It's just that we were in the gray houses and they were in the nicer houses.'"
"For the Corbitt family, those county roads and old homes surrounding Abbeville will always be crime scenes---there has been no resolution or reconciliation, no justice. The violence resonates through generations. . . . Not surprisingly, most whites denied it ever happened [the gang rape], while blacks remembered it well."
"Recy had a hard life," Robert said. "When our mother died, everyone fell in her hands. She had to take care of all the children. . . . She is still 'very hurt', [PTSD]. I didn't realize the effect rape took on people until it happened to my sister."
"I never had nothin,' Taylor recalled, 'I still don't have nothin.'"
From Diane McWhorter, author of Carry Me Home: Birmingham, Alabama, and the Climatic Battle of the Civil Rights Revolution:
"Just when we thought there couldn't be anything left to uncover about the civil rights movement, Danielle L. McGuire finds a new facet of that endlessly prismatic struggle at the core of our national identity. By reinterpreting black liberation through the lens of organized resistance of white male sexual aggression against African-American women, McGuire ingeniously upends the white race's ultimate rationale for its violent subjugation of blacks---imputed [supposed] black male sexual aggression against white women. It is an original premise, and At the Dark End of the Street delivers on it with scholarly authority and narrative polish."
From Nell Irvin Painter, author of of The History of White People:
"This book is as essential as its history is infuriating."
According to historian McGuire, Recy Taylor who was gang raped in 1944 was a key but largely unknown figure in the civil rights movement.
"Recy Taylor turned eighty-nine on December 31, 2008. I met her and her youngest brother [Robert Corbitt] at his tidy ranch house just down the street from the Rock Hill Holiness Church in Abbeville, Alabama. We came together on the same day that one million Americans gathered in Washington, D.C., to witness the inauguration of the country's first black president. I talked with the slight, spry woman whose courage and testimony in 1994 helped inspire the modern civil rights movement. . . . as William Faulkner put it, that 'the past is never dead, it isn't even past.'"
"This seems especially true in Abbeville, where Taylor's family and the families of her assailants have lived side by side for decades. . . . Corbitt, a lean man with a warm smile, said, 'You'd be surprised at how close they lived. We were very segregated---but we were neighbors. It's just that we were in the gray houses and they were in the nicer houses.'"
"For the Corbitt family, those county roads and old homes surrounding Abbeville will always be crime scenes---there has been no resolution or reconciliation, no justice. The violence resonates through generations. . . . Not surprisingly, most whites denied it ever happened [the gang rape], while blacks remembered it well."
"Recy had a hard life," Robert said. "When our mother died, everyone fell in her hands. She had to take care of all the children. . . . She is still 'very hurt', [PTSD]. I didn't realize the effect rape took on people until it happened to my sister."
"I never had nothin,' Taylor recalled, 'I still don't have nothin.'"
From Diane McWhorter, author of Carry Me Home: Birmingham, Alabama, and the Climatic Battle of the Civil Rights Revolution:
"Just when we thought there couldn't be anything left to uncover about the civil rights movement, Danielle L. McGuire finds a new facet of that endlessly prismatic struggle at the core of our national identity. By reinterpreting black liberation through the lens of organized resistance of white male sexual aggression against African-American women, McGuire ingeniously upends the white race's ultimate rationale for its violent subjugation of blacks---imputed [supposed] black male sexual aggression against white women. It is an original premise, and At the Dark End of the Street delivers on it with scholarly authority and narrative polish."
From Nell Irvin Painter, author of of The History of White People:
"This book is as essential as its history is infuriating."
Wednesday, June 28, 2017
Much More Rape Under Oppression
Rape is one of many negative consequences of systems of oppression such as slavery and near slavery/segregation. Lifelong or generations of oppression touch every area of life. Oppression creates individual, family, community and cultural dysfunction. It creates poverty, illiteracy, etc.
There are no specific statistics on how many white male oppressors raped black slave women during slavery times. But judging by the color of skin, it is quite obvious that lots of white genes were implanted in the black gene pool. This racial mixing was due primarily to rape, not consensual sex.
I would guesstimate that for every black male rape of white women, there were 10 white male rapes of black women. But the propaganda war has been won by whites as they have successfully portrayed black males as the dangerous, criminal ones. In reality, throughout history white male oppressors have been the dangerous, criminal sex fiends.
A 2010 book by historian Danielle L. McGuire titled "At The Dark End Of The Street: Black Women, Rape, and Resistance---a New History of the Civil Rights Movement from Rosa Parks to the Rise of Black Power." This fine book tells the story of "how it was, in part, started in protest against the ritualistic rape of black women by white males who used economic intimidation, sexual violence, and terror to derail the freedom movement."
In 1994, Gunnar Myrdal wrote: "Sex is the principle around which the whole structure of segregation . . . is organized."
"The 1955 Montgomery bus boycott, often heralded as the opening scene of the civil rights movement, was in many ways the last act of a decade long struggle to protect women, like Taylor, from sexualized violence and rape."
"The sexual exploitation of black women by white men had its roots in slavery and continued throughout the better part of the twentieth century."
"Fannie Lou Hamer, a forty-three-year-old sharecropper and freedom fighter from the Mississippi Delta, knew that sexual terror was common in the history of the South. Hamer's grandmother, Liza Bramlett, spoke often of the 'horrors of slavery.' including stories about 'how the white folks would do her.' .. . . Twenty of the twenty-three children Bramlett gave birth to were the products of rape. At some point, Hamer's mother must have decided death---hers or someone else's---was preferable to her own mother's experience. Fannie Lou Hamer remembered her mother packing a nine-millimeter Luger into their covered lunch bucket, just in case a white man decided to attack her or her children in the cotton fields."
For more on women's perspectives on the Civil Rights Movement, I recommend the following books: My Life, My Legacy, My Love by Coretta Scott King; Freedom Song by Mary King; Ella Baker and the Black Freedom Movement.
There are no specific statistics on how many white male oppressors raped black slave women during slavery times. But judging by the color of skin, it is quite obvious that lots of white genes were implanted in the black gene pool. This racial mixing was due primarily to rape, not consensual sex.
I would guesstimate that for every black male rape of white women, there were 10 white male rapes of black women. But the propaganda war has been won by whites as they have successfully portrayed black males as the dangerous, criminal ones. In reality, throughout history white male oppressors have been the dangerous, criminal sex fiends.
A 2010 book by historian Danielle L. McGuire titled "At The Dark End Of The Street: Black Women, Rape, and Resistance---a New History of the Civil Rights Movement from Rosa Parks to the Rise of Black Power." This fine book tells the story of "how it was, in part, started in protest against the ritualistic rape of black women by white males who used economic intimidation, sexual violence, and terror to derail the freedom movement."
In 1994, Gunnar Myrdal wrote: "Sex is the principle around which the whole structure of segregation . . . is organized."
"The 1955 Montgomery bus boycott, often heralded as the opening scene of the civil rights movement, was in many ways the last act of a decade long struggle to protect women, like Taylor, from sexualized violence and rape."
"The sexual exploitation of black women by white men had its roots in slavery and continued throughout the better part of the twentieth century."
"Fannie Lou Hamer, a forty-three-year-old sharecropper and freedom fighter from the Mississippi Delta, knew that sexual terror was common in the history of the South. Hamer's grandmother, Liza Bramlett, spoke often of the 'horrors of slavery.' including stories about 'how the white folks would do her.' .. . . Twenty of the twenty-three children Bramlett gave birth to were the products of rape. At some point, Hamer's mother must have decided death---hers or someone else's---was preferable to her own mother's experience. Fannie Lou Hamer remembered her mother packing a nine-millimeter Luger into their covered lunch bucket, just in case a white man decided to attack her or her children in the cotton fields."
For more on women's perspectives on the Civil Rights Movement, I recommend the following books: My Life, My Legacy, My Love by Coretta Scott King; Freedom Song by Mary King; Ella Baker and the Black Freedom Movement.
Tuesday, June 27, 2017
Health Care Crisis
America's current health care crisis and what to do about it.
Background perspective:
All other western democracies have universal health care/single payer systems. All health care systems will have their flaws, but all these government, non-market systems deliver as good a quality of health care, as long a life expectancy, and ALL citizens are covered at roughly half the cost as the U.S. health care hodgepodge. The market system may not be the best way to deliver health care; the market system can be and often is rigged by the rich.
After listening to experts on Iowa Public Radio and Iowa Public TV, I have concluded the following:
1. Over the last 50 years, health care costs have risen from about 5 percent of the GNP to 17 percent and they will likely continue to rise under the current fee-for-service, market-driven system. The current system is too much for the federal government to finance; nor can the states and cities finance it, nor can employers and employees, nor can hospitals finance it.
2. The present fee-for service system is broken, irreparable by reforms---Democratic or Republican. We need a new model that rewards prevention and wellness. Obamacare encouraged some of this model but it did not go far enough.
3. We need a Medicare for All system. Even Warren Buffet, the ultimate capitalist, says so. And Matthew Dowd, a Republican strategist agrees. Medicare for All needs the power to negotiate drug prices.
4. The transition from a market driven system to Medicare for All would be difficult, but now, at this time of crisis, may be the best time to do it.
Background perspective:
All other western democracies have universal health care/single payer systems. All health care systems will have their flaws, but all these government, non-market systems deliver as good a quality of health care, as long a life expectancy, and ALL citizens are covered at roughly half the cost as the U.S. health care hodgepodge. The market system may not be the best way to deliver health care; the market system can be and often is rigged by the rich.
After listening to experts on Iowa Public Radio and Iowa Public TV, I have concluded the following:
1. Over the last 50 years, health care costs have risen from about 5 percent of the GNP to 17 percent and they will likely continue to rise under the current fee-for-service, market-driven system. The current system is too much for the federal government to finance; nor can the states and cities finance it, nor can employers and employees, nor can hospitals finance it.
2. The present fee-for service system is broken, irreparable by reforms---Democratic or Republican. We need a new model that rewards prevention and wellness. Obamacare encouraged some of this model but it did not go far enough.
3. We need a Medicare for All system. Even Warren Buffet, the ultimate capitalist, says so. And Matthew Dowd, a Republican strategist agrees. Medicare for All needs the power to negotiate drug prices.
4. The transition from a market driven system to Medicare for All would be difficult, but now, at this time of crisis, may be the best time to do it.
Monday, June 26, 2017
North Korea and the United States
In the July/August issue of The Atlantic, in an article by Mark Bowden titled "The Worst Problem on Earth: Here's How to Deal with North Korea, It's Not Going to be Pretty," Bowden cites four options:
1) Prevention: A Crushing Military Strike, 2) Turning the Screws: Limited Military Strikes, 3) Decapitation: Assassination of Kim, 4) Acceptance of Status Quo
"All options are bad."
Some summary observations by Bowden:
"Kim may be a madman, a tyrant but he is neither suicidal nor crazy. . . . as a young man with a lifetime of wealth and power before him, how likely is he to wake up one morning and set fire to his world?"
After reflecting on Bowden's fine essay, these are my thoughts:
1. Both nations have a strong sense of Manifest Destiny.
2. Both nations are highly militarized and both would not hesitate to use them.
3. Both nations have a racist, nationalistic mythology.
4. Both nations are self-righteously arrogant.
5. Both nations are nuclear powers.
Only the U.S. has already used nuclear weapons on civilians. MAD or Mutually Assured Destruction might save the day; it did during the Cold War.
1) Prevention: A Crushing Military Strike, 2) Turning the Screws: Limited Military Strikes, 3) Decapitation: Assassination of Kim, 4) Acceptance of Status Quo
"All options are bad."
Some summary observations by Bowden:
"Kim may be a madman, a tyrant but he is neither suicidal nor crazy. . . . as a young man with a lifetime of wealth and power before him, how likely is he to wake up one morning and set fire to his world?"
After reflecting on Bowden's fine essay, these are my thoughts:
1. Both nations have a strong sense of Manifest Destiny.
2. Both nations are highly militarized and both would not hesitate to use them.
3. Both nations have a racist, nationalistic mythology.
4. Both nations are self-righteously arrogant.
5. Both nations are nuclear powers.
Only the U.S. has already used nuclear weapons on civilians. MAD or Mutually Assured Destruction might save the day; it did during the Cold War.
Friday, June 23, 2017
Repeal and Replace or Reward and Punish?
Repeal and replace Obamacare or reward the rich and punish the poor?
A little history on Obamacare. Back in the 1990s, Hillary Clinton tried to introduce a new health care plan. It failed to pass. A Republican think tank came up with alternative plan. Romney introduced it in Mass. Repubcare worked quite well in Mass. So Obama adapted Romneycare as the heart of his health care plan. In mass, Republicans abandoned Repubcare. Such are the strange twists and turns of politics. Repubcare became Obamacare; Republicans won the political propaganda war.
Now the Republicans are about to pass a health care bill that will reward the rich and punish the poor.
Rewarding the rich and punishing the poor is 100 percent American. It goes way back to our founding fathers.
A little history on Obamacare. Back in the 1990s, Hillary Clinton tried to introduce a new health care plan. It failed to pass. A Republican think tank came up with alternative plan. Romney introduced it in Mass. Repubcare worked quite well in Mass. So Obama adapted Romneycare as the heart of his health care plan. In mass, Republicans abandoned Repubcare. Such are the strange twists and turns of politics. Repubcare became Obamacare; Republicans won the political propaganda war.
Now the Republicans are about to pass a health care bill that will reward the rich and punish the poor.
Rewarding the rich and punishing the poor is 100 percent American. It goes way back to our founding fathers.
Thursday, June 22, 2017
The Spiritual Giant Practiced a Weak Gospel
A.W. Tozer was considered a spiritual giant of the past century; he could lay prostrate for hours praying and praising his majestic God. But as poor blacks moved into his neighborhood, he and his church people became alarmed. One one one, the members moved out into the 'spiritual suburbs.' Finally, his church decided to move as well. The neighborhood had declined so badly that it was 'irreparably damaged.' Tozer did not believe that his gospel could repair/rebuild a poor and dysfunctional community. He ignored Jesus' orders to "release the oppressed."
Tozer's white church is not the only white church that left our inner cities. Arthur Simon, a Lutheran pastor/community developer, reported that over a 40 year period 40 out of 44 Lutheran churches left Detroit. In the spiritual suburbs, I imagine they gossiped about how bad Detroit was, not realizing their contribution to the problem. What if instead of fleeing the oppressed, they had focused on releasing the oppressed.
Most American Christians focus on the damage/dysfunction of the reservation/ghetto, and largely ignore the centuries of oppression that created the damage/dysfunction. For centuries they have ignored the biblical call to repent, restitute and repair---to relocate in the community of need, to do Christian Community Development
Biblical spiritual giants restitute and rebuild; spiritual cowards flee.
In the OT, 10 spiritual cowards returned from the Promised Land with a fearful report; only two spiritual giants said, "Let's go in." I would estimate that the American church is producing 10 spiritual cowards for every 2 biblical giants with a keen commitment to doing justice.
Tozer's white church is not the only white church that left our inner cities. Arthur Simon, a Lutheran pastor/community developer, reported that over a 40 year period 40 out of 44 Lutheran churches left Detroit. In the spiritual suburbs, I imagine they gossiped about how bad Detroit was, not realizing their contribution to the problem. What if instead of fleeing the oppressed, they had focused on releasing the oppressed.
Most American Christians focus on the damage/dysfunction of the reservation/ghetto, and largely ignore the centuries of oppression that created the damage/dysfunction. For centuries they have ignored the biblical call to repent, restitute and repair---to relocate in the community of need, to do Christian Community Development
Biblical spiritual giants restitute and rebuild; spiritual cowards flee.
In the OT, 10 spiritual cowards returned from the Promised Land with a fearful report; only two spiritual giants said, "Let's go in." I would estimate that the American church is producing 10 spiritual cowards for every 2 biblical giants with a keen commitment to doing justice.
Tuesday, June 20, 2017
Are Violent Revolutions Successful or Illusions?
Are violent revolutions successful or are they illusions?
Even when violent revolutions are successful at achieving political freedom, they usually fail to achieve economic justice at the same time. In most cases, the old economic system of oppression is replaced not by justice, but by a redesigned system of economic oppression. Example: In America, we went from freedom for black slaves to economic sharecropping, legal segregation, prison gangs and lynching. As a result, even political freedom is limited or soon lost. Even the white abolitionists who sincerely fought to end slavery and with the help of a war won that battle, did not want the freed slaves to move North in large numbers and live next to them.
A really successful revolution needs both political freedom and economic justice. Without both, one elite group replaces another elite group; supposed change is illusory.
Because of the limited success of violent revolutions, every American church, every Haitian church needs to create a biblical theology and a specific applied program of kingdom of God economic justice. Begin by thinking cooperatives, not traditional capitalism or socialism. Study the HCDF model and the Mondragon model. Study Jubilee justice. Study Nehemiah 5.
Even when violent revolutions are successful at achieving political freedom, they usually fail to achieve economic justice at the same time. In most cases, the old economic system of oppression is replaced not by justice, but by a redesigned system of economic oppression. Example: In America, we went from freedom for black slaves to economic sharecropping, legal segregation, prison gangs and lynching. As a result, even political freedom is limited or soon lost. Even the white abolitionists who sincerely fought to end slavery and with the help of a war won that battle, did not want the freed slaves to move North in large numbers and live next to them.
A really successful revolution needs both political freedom and economic justice. Without both, one elite group replaces another elite group; supposed change is illusory.
Because of the limited success of violent revolutions, every American church, every Haitian church needs to create a biblical theology and a specific applied program of kingdom of God economic justice. Begin by thinking cooperatives, not traditional capitalism or socialism. Study the HCDF model and the Mondragon model. Study Jubilee justice. Study Nehemiah 5.
Monday, June 19, 2017
Good News and Bad News, June 2017
Good News and Bad News items from Christian Century, June 21, 2017.
1. Preexisting Condition:
"Mark Meadows, a [conservative] Republican congressman from North Carolina, reportedly broke down in tears when told that the health insurance law passed by Congress would make coverage impossible for multitudes of people with preexisting conditions. Meadows, who chairs the Freedom Caucus, said to a reporter, 'Listen, I lost my sister to breast cancer. I lost my dad to lung cancer. If anybody is sensitive to preexisting conditions, it's me. I'm not going to make a political decision that affects somebody's sister or father because I wouldn't do it to myself."
2. "When norms lose power"
"Trump is the spendthrift of our public character," observes columnist Michael Gerson. He is "squandering an inheritance he does not understand or value."
"The fact that so many people, including members of Congress, are willing to shrug off Trump's actions or seek to explain them away suggest that the moral power of these norms was waning well before Trump took office. He is the symptom as well as the cause of a moral crisis. We seem to be losing a shared sense of what it means to be a responsible citizen, of how to engage in the public square with integrity, and of how to pursue the common good---and of whether any of that even matters."
I saw this happening in the 1980s so I coined a phrase to express it---"the American Trinity" . The American Trinity of individualism, materialism, and racism/ethnocentrism. I called Reagan the high priest of American civil religion. In 2017, I would call Trump the high priest of the American Trinity of hyperindividualism, hypermaterialism, and hyperethnocentrism. But all of this was already deeply ingrained in America at the time of our founding fathers, many of whom were filthy rich slave holders, especially Washington and Jefferson.
3. Kyle Childress is pastor of the Austin Heights Baptist Church located in ultra-conservative Nacogdoches, Texas. Childress reports:
"Since the election and inauguration of Donald Trump, it's as if we switched the old record player from 33 to 45 rpm. Our sense of high purpose has intensified. Genuine concern and compassion are mixed with fear and anger. Immigration issues and ministry have moved front and center. We're in high gear.
"Our associate pastor and her husband are in the foster-to-adopt system. They already had a three-year-old foster child when they received a panicky phone call from Child Protective Service. The parents of two little girls had been deported that morning and a four-year-old and a still-nursing ten-month-old needed a Spanish-speaking home. Within two hours the two little sisters were delivered to our pastor and her husband. The congregation has rallied around the family, but every day we receive news of someone else being deported. Some church members are scrambling, meeting with friends and their immigration attorneys, drafting power of attorney and parental guardianship papers so if the friends are deported, their children will be protected."
4. Brian Doyle, recently deceased, was a noted Catholic journalist who saw the divisions between Protestant and Catholics as terrible. Doyle wrote:
"I am older now than they were then and the walls among the Christian traditions have still not crumbled, for any number of silly reasons---mostly having to do with lethargy and money and paranoia. But sometimes I still wonder what it would be like if they did crumble suddenly somehow, and the two billion Christians on earth stood hand in hand, for the first time ever, insisting on mercy and justice and humility and generosity as the real way in the world. You would think that two billion insisting on something might actually make that thing happen, wouldn't you?
5. From a book review of On Inequality by Gary Dorrien:
"Yale historian Timothy Snyder has been writing books for 25 years on how democracies perished in Eastern and Central Europe in the 1930s. He does not believe that history repeats itself or that the current American president is an outright fascist. On the other hand, he believes the nation has never been an exception to history and thinks believing in American exceptionalism at this moment is dangerous. The parallels between Europe then and the United States today are alarming to Snyder, so shortly after the 2016 election he posted a Facebook entry about how to defend liberal democracies from tyrants. He offered 20 lessons, the post went viral, and soon there was a book version: On Tyranny."
Another quotation from Dorrien:
"But no democracy can perpetually survive gross disparities in economic and social conditions. The United States is hurtling faster toward authoritarian nationalism than its European counterparts because it has never established more than a minimum of social democracy. [It has always been governed by a rich, white male elite]. In every nation with a social democratic tradition, everyone's health care is covered, the power of private money in the political system is curtailed, and nearly everyone recognizes that there is such a thing as an intolerable level of economic inequality. In the United States, millions have no health coverage, private money dominates the political system, and nothing is done to stem staggering inequalities of income and wealth."
6. "Red state, purple church" by Brian D. McLaren:
"Letting people go graciously, holding to essentials tightly and nonessentials lightly, and telling people directly and repeatedly that they are loved---these practices constitute the staring point for these congregations. A fourth trait takes them beyond the starting line: they don't walk on eggshells when it comes to political and social disagreements. Instead, they identify the tensions and confront the disagreements. They name the elephant in the room.
"Over and over again, we have reminded our more progressive people that all the people who voted for Trump can't be racists, bigoted, uncaring people, because they have friends at Vintage who voted for Trump and they know them to be more complex, interesting, and profound than that. And we tell our more conservative people that everyone who is angry and afraid in the face of a Trump presidency can't be whiny losers, because they have served with their liberal friends and know them to be deeply compassionate people of character."
7. From Mordechai Beck, a journalist in Jerusalem:
"Looking back at biblical history, Melchior sees a 'very clear battle between the power of the kings and that of truth and justice as voiced by the prophets. The prophets' words inspire us till today, while most of the king's names have been forgotten. The prophets, who confronted those in power, spoke the truth. Their words have lasted, not only among Jews but also Christians and Muslims. Is this a model for today, when political power is more prevalent than ethical, human values?"
"Stern has no doubt about how the Jewish state will be judged by future historians. "I think we will be judged on how we dealt with the Other, mainly the Arabs. . . . We should grant everyone equal rights, which we are not doing. As a religious Jew, I have an obligation to change this situation."
8. Karl Barth:
"The Gospel says, 'Give everything away in order to hold wholly to God.' In response we European people said, 'We want the good life.' The Gospel says, 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' We loved money in place of our neighbor."
1. Preexisting Condition:
"Mark Meadows, a [conservative] Republican congressman from North Carolina, reportedly broke down in tears when told that the health insurance law passed by Congress would make coverage impossible for multitudes of people with preexisting conditions. Meadows, who chairs the Freedom Caucus, said to a reporter, 'Listen, I lost my sister to breast cancer. I lost my dad to lung cancer. If anybody is sensitive to preexisting conditions, it's me. I'm not going to make a political decision that affects somebody's sister or father because I wouldn't do it to myself."
2. "When norms lose power"
"Trump is the spendthrift of our public character," observes columnist Michael Gerson. He is "squandering an inheritance he does not understand or value."
"The fact that so many people, including members of Congress, are willing to shrug off Trump's actions or seek to explain them away suggest that the moral power of these norms was waning well before Trump took office. He is the symptom as well as the cause of a moral crisis. We seem to be losing a shared sense of what it means to be a responsible citizen, of how to engage in the public square with integrity, and of how to pursue the common good---and of whether any of that even matters."
I saw this happening in the 1980s so I coined a phrase to express it---"the American Trinity" . The American Trinity of individualism, materialism, and racism/ethnocentrism. I called Reagan the high priest of American civil religion. In 2017, I would call Trump the high priest of the American Trinity of hyperindividualism, hypermaterialism, and hyperethnocentrism. But all of this was already deeply ingrained in America at the time of our founding fathers, many of whom were filthy rich slave holders, especially Washington and Jefferson.
3. Kyle Childress is pastor of the Austin Heights Baptist Church located in ultra-conservative Nacogdoches, Texas. Childress reports:
"Since the election and inauguration of Donald Trump, it's as if we switched the old record player from 33 to 45 rpm. Our sense of high purpose has intensified. Genuine concern and compassion are mixed with fear and anger. Immigration issues and ministry have moved front and center. We're in high gear.
"Our associate pastor and her husband are in the foster-to-adopt system. They already had a three-year-old foster child when they received a panicky phone call from Child Protective Service. The parents of two little girls had been deported that morning and a four-year-old and a still-nursing ten-month-old needed a Spanish-speaking home. Within two hours the two little sisters were delivered to our pastor and her husband. The congregation has rallied around the family, but every day we receive news of someone else being deported. Some church members are scrambling, meeting with friends and their immigration attorneys, drafting power of attorney and parental guardianship papers so if the friends are deported, their children will be protected."
4. Brian Doyle, recently deceased, was a noted Catholic journalist who saw the divisions between Protestant and Catholics as terrible. Doyle wrote:
"I am older now than they were then and the walls among the Christian traditions have still not crumbled, for any number of silly reasons---mostly having to do with lethargy and money and paranoia. But sometimes I still wonder what it would be like if they did crumble suddenly somehow, and the two billion Christians on earth stood hand in hand, for the first time ever, insisting on mercy and justice and humility and generosity as the real way in the world. You would think that two billion insisting on something might actually make that thing happen, wouldn't you?
5. From a book review of On Inequality by Gary Dorrien:
"Yale historian Timothy Snyder has been writing books for 25 years on how democracies perished in Eastern and Central Europe in the 1930s. He does not believe that history repeats itself or that the current American president is an outright fascist. On the other hand, he believes the nation has never been an exception to history and thinks believing in American exceptionalism at this moment is dangerous. The parallels between Europe then and the United States today are alarming to Snyder, so shortly after the 2016 election he posted a Facebook entry about how to defend liberal democracies from tyrants. He offered 20 lessons, the post went viral, and soon there was a book version: On Tyranny."
Another quotation from Dorrien:
"But no democracy can perpetually survive gross disparities in economic and social conditions. The United States is hurtling faster toward authoritarian nationalism than its European counterparts because it has never established more than a minimum of social democracy. [It has always been governed by a rich, white male elite]. In every nation with a social democratic tradition, everyone's health care is covered, the power of private money in the political system is curtailed, and nearly everyone recognizes that there is such a thing as an intolerable level of economic inequality. In the United States, millions have no health coverage, private money dominates the political system, and nothing is done to stem staggering inequalities of income and wealth."
6. "Red state, purple church" by Brian D. McLaren:
"Letting people go graciously, holding to essentials tightly and nonessentials lightly, and telling people directly and repeatedly that they are loved---these practices constitute the staring point for these congregations. A fourth trait takes them beyond the starting line: they don't walk on eggshells when it comes to political and social disagreements. Instead, they identify the tensions and confront the disagreements. They name the elephant in the room.
"Over and over again, we have reminded our more progressive people that all the people who voted for Trump can't be racists, bigoted, uncaring people, because they have friends at Vintage who voted for Trump and they know them to be more complex, interesting, and profound than that. And we tell our more conservative people that everyone who is angry and afraid in the face of a Trump presidency can't be whiny losers, because they have served with their liberal friends and know them to be deeply compassionate people of character."
7. From Mordechai Beck, a journalist in Jerusalem:
"Looking back at biblical history, Melchior sees a 'very clear battle between the power of the kings and that of truth and justice as voiced by the prophets. The prophets' words inspire us till today, while most of the king's names have been forgotten. The prophets, who confronted those in power, spoke the truth. Their words have lasted, not only among Jews but also Christians and Muslims. Is this a model for today, when political power is more prevalent than ethical, human values?"
"Stern has no doubt about how the Jewish state will be judged by future historians. "I think we will be judged on how we dealt with the Other, mainly the Arabs. . . . We should grant everyone equal rights, which we are not doing. As a religious Jew, I have an obligation to change this situation."
8. Karl Barth:
"The Gospel says, 'Give everything away in order to hold wholly to God.' In response we European people said, 'We want the good life.' The Gospel says, 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' We loved money in place of our neighbor."
Thursday, June 15, 2017
Is This Also A Description of Haiti, Past and Present???
The following quotations are from an article in the January 2016 Sojourners Magazine by OT scholar Walter Brueggemann titled "The Earth Awakens." To me, this concise description of OT economics is disturbingly similar to Haiti's economy over the last 500 years:
"The economy of ancient Israel, a small economy, was controlled and administered by the socio-political elites in the capital cities of Samaria in the north and Jerusalem in the south. Those elites clustered around the king and included the priests, the scribes, the tax collectors, and no doubt other powerful people. Those urban elites extracted wealth from the small, at-risk peasant-farmers who at best lived a precarious subsistence life. The process of extraction included taxation [Haiti, including customs fees/taxes] and high interest rates on loans.
"The 'normative' economy of the period had assumed that the economy consisted of only two participants: 1) the productive peasants, and 2) the urban elites, who did not work or produce anything but who lived well off of peasant produce."
God sent prophet after prophet to expose and condemn this economic system of oppression, called for repentance and required that justice be done.
"The economy of ancient Israel, a small economy, was controlled and administered by the socio-political elites in the capital cities of Samaria in the north and Jerusalem in the south. Those elites clustered around the king and included the priests, the scribes, the tax collectors, and no doubt other powerful people. Those urban elites extracted wealth from the small, at-risk peasant-farmers who at best lived a precarious subsistence life. The process of extraction included taxation [Haiti, including customs fees/taxes] and high interest rates on loans.
"The 'normative' economy of the period had assumed that the economy consisted of only two participants: 1) the productive peasants, and 2) the urban elites, who did not work or produce anything but who lived well off of peasant produce."
God sent prophet after prophet to expose and condemn this economic system of oppression, called for repentance and required that justice be done.
Tuesday, June 13, 2017
Confession, Apology, but no Restitution. Why?
Canadian pastor Mark Buchanan's article in the 2010 Leadership Journal titled "The People and the Black Book," is a must read. When it is good, it is very good; when it is bad, it is very bad. The author, of course, does not recognize the bad so you will have to be a social detective to discover the bad.
I will pose a few questions which might help you discover the bad parts.
The First Nation [Indian] people were the oppressed, the sinned-against, so why were they wailing and the white Christian Canadians from the oppressor group not wailing over their sins of ethnocentrism and oppression---the slaughter of First Nation peoples and the stealing of their land? Why do most whites, even most Christian whites, refuse to give up their economic privilege? Why authentic confession of historical sins and a genuine apology for those terrible sins, but no required biblical restitution regarding those social evils?
Buchanan engaged in a magnificent but ultimately failed attempt to do justice, in my opinion. Much better than most white Christians, but still fundamentally flawed.
Pastor B. confesses quite specifically and in considerable detail the sins of his nation, the white ethnocentrism and oppression. Also the current desperate condition of the nearby Tswassen people who were suffering from "a high incidence of suicide, alcoholism and drug abuse, teenage pregnancy and incest, domestic violence and health issues of every kind." Sounds like individual, family, community and cultural PTSD to me.
Buchanan writes:
"I spoke on Zechariah 8. I confessed that I was part of a people who have done that which God hates. I said I was prayerfully struggling to know what to do next, how to undue what had been done. I said I was committed to finding out. Then I used the story of Zacchaeus."
He referred to Zacchaeus' repentance accurately, but apparently missed the significance of the restitution part. Genuine apologies alone are not enough: "Right after I spoke, a woman from the Cowichan tribe told her story of being physically and sexually abused in a nearby Residential School. She spoke without bitterness or accusation."
"But the room was heavy when she finished. The white pastor got up, overcome with emotion, and said she was sorry. 'I'm not apologizing because I was involved in what happened to you. I'm apologizing because I wasn't involved. Because, even when I knew terrible things were happening in those schools, I still did nothing.
"Then the pastor said, 'If you are white and you want to join me in apologizing, I simply ask that you stand.' I stood. All the white people stood.
"We were completely unprepared for what happened next. The First Nations people began to weep. Then their weeping turned to sobbing. And then their sobbing turned to wailing. It was piercing. I felt the shame of all the wrongs my forebears had committed. I felt the shame of all the ways I, though not involved personally, had been personally uninvolved. Apathetic. Not wanting to know and, once knowing, wishing they'd just 'get over it'.
"The wailing continued, got deeper, got louder. When I could bear it no longer, an older First Nations woman---a chief of her tribe---came to the front, took the microphone, and said, "I do not want those of you who are standing to carry the weight of this. I forgive you. On behalf of my people, we forgive you.'
"Peace like a river swept over me, and I wept."
Pastor Buchanan unfortunately did not add the following: "With deep gratitude for undeserved forgiveness from First Nation peoples, and following the biblical example of Zacchaeus, I pledge to give 50 percent of my yearly income for the rest of my life to doing Christian Community Development in Indian communities that are still devastated because of white ethnocentrism and oppression. I will urge my church to do the same. And all Canadian Christians to do likewise. Our restitution is long overdue. Restitution is a required part of the biblical paradigm of justice, kingdom of God justice that releases the oppressed."
From Apologies to Partnerships Creating Justice
Genuine apologies are an important and necessary first step on a mile-long journey toward justice in a traumatized First Nations community. And apologies should be accompanied by wailing, wailing by the white oppressor, a sign of deeper remorse and repentance. An apology alone will not heal the damage done by generations of oppression.
So apologies are only a first step. Christians must quickly move on to repair and rebuild lives, families and communities. Think life-long partnerships. Think a generation in one location/community. Think implementing Nehemiah 5.
Steps/Stages Required of Spirit-filled Churches
1. Confession of national sins and apologies for those sins---see Daniel 9 prayer.
2. Repentance and restitution---Nehemiah 5; also Zacchaeus
3. Release of the oppressed which includes identifying systems of oppression and ending systems of oppression---see Isaiah 58:6 and Luke 4:18.
4. Repair/rebuild oppressed communities; do Christian Community Development---Isaiah 58:6ff.
5. Replace systems of oppression with systems of justice---Leviticus 25 and Deut. 15. Free slaves every 7 years; cancel debts every 7 years; return land every 50 years.
6. Shalom/kingdom of God incarnated---Isaiah 9:7; 11:1-4; 16:5; 28:16-17; 42:1-4; 61:1-4. My paraphrase of Romans 14:17 "The kingdom of God is justice, shalom, and joy in the Holy Spirit."
I will pose a few questions which might help you discover the bad parts.
The First Nation [Indian] people were the oppressed, the sinned-against, so why were they wailing and the white Christian Canadians from the oppressor group not wailing over their sins of ethnocentrism and oppression---the slaughter of First Nation peoples and the stealing of their land? Why do most whites, even most Christian whites, refuse to give up their economic privilege? Why authentic confession of historical sins and a genuine apology for those terrible sins, but no required biblical restitution regarding those social evils?
Buchanan engaged in a magnificent but ultimately failed attempt to do justice, in my opinion. Much better than most white Christians, but still fundamentally flawed.
Pastor B. confesses quite specifically and in considerable detail the sins of his nation, the white ethnocentrism and oppression. Also the current desperate condition of the nearby Tswassen people who were suffering from "a high incidence of suicide, alcoholism and drug abuse, teenage pregnancy and incest, domestic violence and health issues of every kind." Sounds like individual, family, community and cultural PTSD to me.
Buchanan writes:
"I spoke on Zechariah 8. I confessed that I was part of a people who have done that which God hates. I said I was prayerfully struggling to know what to do next, how to undue what had been done. I said I was committed to finding out. Then I used the story of Zacchaeus."
He referred to Zacchaeus' repentance accurately, but apparently missed the significance of the restitution part. Genuine apologies alone are not enough: "Right after I spoke, a woman from the Cowichan tribe told her story of being physically and sexually abused in a nearby Residential School. She spoke without bitterness or accusation."
"But the room was heavy when she finished. The white pastor got up, overcome with emotion, and said she was sorry. 'I'm not apologizing because I was involved in what happened to you. I'm apologizing because I wasn't involved. Because, even when I knew terrible things were happening in those schools, I still did nothing.
"Then the pastor said, 'If you are white and you want to join me in apologizing, I simply ask that you stand.' I stood. All the white people stood.
"We were completely unprepared for what happened next. The First Nations people began to weep. Then their weeping turned to sobbing. And then their sobbing turned to wailing. It was piercing. I felt the shame of all the wrongs my forebears had committed. I felt the shame of all the ways I, though not involved personally, had been personally uninvolved. Apathetic. Not wanting to know and, once knowing, wishing they'd just 'get over it'.
"The wailing continued, got deeper, got louder. When I could bear it no longer, an older First Nations woman---a chief of her tribe---came to the front, took the microphone, and said, "I do not want those of you who are standing to carry the weight of this. I forgive you. On behalf of my people, we forgive you.'
"Peace like a river swept over me, and I wept."
Pastor Buchanan unfortunately did not add the following: "With deep gratitude for undeserved forgiveness from First Nation peoples, and following the biblical example of Zacchaeus, I pledge to give 50 percent of my yearly income for the rest of my life to doing Christian Community Development in Indian communities that are still devastated because of white ethnocentrism and oppression. I will urge my church to do the same. And all Canadian Christians to do likewise. Our restitution is long overdue. Restitution is a required part of the biblical paradigm of justice, kingdom of God justice that releases the oppressed."
From Apologies to Partnerships Creating Justice
Genuine apologies are an important and necessary first step on a mile-long journey toward justice in a traumatized First Nations community. And apologies should be accompanied by wailing, wailing by the white oppressor, a sign of deeper remorse and repentance. An apology alone will not heal the damage done by generations of oppression.
So apologies are only a first step. Christians must quickly move on to repair and rebuild lives, families and communities. Think life-long partnerships. Think a generation in one location/community. Think implementing Nehemiah 5.
Steps/Stages Required of Spirit-filled Churches
1. Confession of national sins and apologies for those sins---see Daniel 9 prayer.
2. Repentance and restitution---Nehemiah 5; also Zacchaeus
3. Release of the oppressed which includes identifying systems of oppression and ending systems of oppression---see Isaiah 58:6 and Luke 4:18.
4. Repair/rebuild oppressed communities; do Christian Community Development---Isaiah 58:6ff.
5. Replace systems of oppression with systems of justice---Leviticus 25 and Deut. 15. Free slaves every 7 years; cancel debts every 7 years; return land every 50 years.
6. Shalom/kingdom of God incarnated---Isaiah 9:7; 11:1-4; 16:5; 28:16-17; 42:1-4; 61:1-4. My paraphrase of Romans 14:17 "The kingdom of God is justice, shalom, and joy in the Holy Spirit."
Monday, June 12, 2017
Dreams or Nightmares?
Nightmares and Dreams
About 25 years ago I wrote the following.
I am haunted by a continuing nightmare, but I am inspired by a beautiful dream. At this point in American history, my mind and spirit are dominated by the crushing impact of oppression. I see multiplied millions of people being crushed, humiliated, animalized, enslaved, and killed by white ethnocentrism, racism and oppression, by political and economic oppression in the United States, South Africa and in much of the Third World. There seems to be no end in sight to this crushing of persons creating in the image of the Almighty God. The oppressed cry out, "Who will deliver us from this massive and pervasive social evil?" The answer that echoes back is thundering silence.
By faith, I see the answer in my dream. The kingdom of God is hovering on the horizon waiting for the people of God to see it and to bring it nigh to the oppressed. The incarnated kingdom of God could/would lift up the crushed, give dignity to the humiliated, humanize the animalized, liberate the enslaved, and stop the killing of the innocent.
The answer is at hand. Why is it delayed? The people of God need the power of the Holy Spirit to incarnate the kingdom of God among the poor and oppressed. Through a combination of love and justice, this answer can be activated through works of grace. The Spirit has anointed the church to preach good news to the poor and release the oppressed (Luke 4:18). The kingdom of God is justice, shalom and joy on the Holy Spirit. (Rom. 14:17).
Recently I created a diagram to clarify oppression damage and cultural dysfunction.
At the top of the diagram are "System and Generations of Oppression." Next, I list five consequences of oppression: "illiteracy, poverty, unbelief, trauma and rape." Then I note how these five factors create "individual, family, community, and cultural dysfunction." Out of oppression damage and cultural dysfunction, flow "high use of legal and illegal drugs and high incarceration rates."
Next some notes and elaboration of the diagram.
* Isaiah called for the release of the oppressed---Isaiah 58:6.
* Quoting Isaiah 58:6, Jesus said that he came to release the oppressed---Luke 4:18.
* Therefore, the church must give high priority to ministries that release the oppressed.
* The church must intervene at all levels of the diagram; for example, Christian Community Development at the level of family and community dysfunction.
* Sabbatical and Jubilee laws: release slaves every 7 years; cancel debts every 7 years. This prevents lifelong or generational oppression. Return land every 50 years; this provides every family a free and fresh start.
* Nehemiah practiced the Sabbatical/Jubilee laws; he ended oppression and restored justice in just a few days/weeks; see chapter 5.
* There are 555 references to oppression and it synonyms in the OT. Hebrew roots often translated as oppression have the following meanings: crush, humiliate, animalize, impoverish, enslave and kill. How should American white Christians respond? Repentance, restitution, Jubilee justice, kingdom justice are required to release the oppressed.
* After the oppression cycle is started and has created massive poverty, systems of oppression can end and the poverty can continue on its own.
* Michelle Alexander: In America we really don't end systems of oppression, though most historians teach that we do; we merely redesign them. The abolitionist movement ended legal slavery, but it was quickly replaced with segregation, sharecropping, prison gangs and lynching. The civil rights ended legal racial segregation, but it was replaced by informal segregation, class segregation, mass incarceration, and a massive racial wealth gap.
* Recommended reading: God So Loved the Third World: The Biblical Vocabulary of Oppression; Google "Lowell Noble's Writings"; The New Jim Crow; The Very Good Gospel; America's Original Sin; Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome; Tally's Corner; Hillbilly Elegy.
* Compared to other democracies, America's drug use, trauma rates and incarceration rates are astronomically high. Why? Values crisis? Has the American trinity of individualism, materialism and ethnocentrism replaced the Christian Trinity?
About 25 years ago I wrote the following.
I am haunted by a continuing nightmare, but I am inspired by a beautiful dream. At this point in American history, my mind and spirit are dominated by the crushing impact of oppression. I see multiplied millions of people being crushed, humiliated, animalized, enslaved, and killed by white ethnocentrism, racism and oppression, by political and economic oppression in the United States, South Africa and in much of the Third World. There seems to be no end in sight to this crushing of persons creating in the image of the Almighty God. The oppressed cry out, "Who will deliver us from this massive and pervasive social evil?" The answer that echoes back is thundering silence.
By faith, I see the answer in my dream. The kingdom of God is hovering on the horizon waiting for the people of God to see it and to bring it nigh to the oppressed. The incarnated kingdom of God could/would lift up the crushed, give dignity to the humiliated, humanize the animalized, liberate the enslaved, and stop the killing of the innocent.
The answer is at hand. Why is it delayed? The people of God need the power of the Holy Spirit to incarnate the kingdom of God among the poor and oppressed. Through a combination of love and justice, this answer can be activated through works of grace. The Spirit has anointed the church to preach good news to the poor and release the oppressed (Luke 4:18). The kingdom of God is justice, shalom and joy on the Holy Spirit. (Rom. 14:17).
Recently I created a diagram to clarify oppression damage and cultural dysfunction.
At the top of the diagram are "System and Generations of Oppression." Next, I list five consequences of oppression: "illiteracy, poverty, unbelief, trauma and rape." Then I note how these five factors create "individual, family, community, and cultural dysfunction." Out of oppression damage and cultural dysfunction, flow "high use of legal and illegal drugs and high incarceration rates."
Next some notes and elaboration of the diagram.
* Isaiah called for the release of the oppressed---Isaiah 58:6.
* Quoting Isaiah 58:6, Jesus said that he came to release the oppressed---Luke 4:18.
* Therefore, the church must give high priority to ministries that release the oppressed.
* The church must intervene at all levels of the diagram; for example, Christian Community Development at the level of family and community dysfunction.
* Sabbatical and Jubilee laws: release slaves every 7 years; cancel debts every 7 years. This prevents lifelong or generational oppression. Return land every 50 years; this provides every family a free and fresh start.
* Nehemiah practiced the Sabbatical/Jubilee laws; he ended oppression and restored justice in just a few days/weeks; see chapter 5.
* There are 555 references to oppression and it synonyms in the OT. Hebrew roots often translated as oppression have the following meanings: crush, humiliate, animalize, impoverish, enslave and kill. How should American white Christians respond? Repentance, restitution, Jubilee justice, kingdom justice are required to release the oppressed.
* After the oppression cycle is started and has created massive poverty, systems of oppression can end and the poverty can continue on its own.
* Michelle Alexander: In America we really don't end systems of oppression, though most historians teach that we do; we merely redesign them. The abolitionist movement ended legal slavery, but it was quickly replaced with segregation, sharecropping, prison gangs and lynching. The civil rights ended legal racial segregation, but it was replaced by informal segregation, class segregation, mass incarceration, and a massive racial wealth gap.
* Recommended reading: God So Loved the Third World: The Biblical Vocabulary of Oppression; Google "Lowell Noble's Writings"; The New Jim Crow; The Very Good Gospel; America's Original Sin; Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome; Tally's Corner; Hillbilly Elegy.
* Compared to other democracies, America's drug use, trauma rates and incarceration rates are astronomically high. Why? Values crisis? Has the American trinity of individualism, materialism and ethnocentrism replaced the Christian Trinity?
Saturday, June 10, 2017
Russians and Terrorism
The news is full of information about the hacking Russians and the murderous terrorists. Forminable foes indeed.
But in terms of danger and damage to the United States, Trump is doing 10 times more evil than Putin. And the American trinity of individualism, materialism, and ethnocentrism is doing 10 times more evil from within, than the radical Islamic terrorist are doing from without our borders.
But in terms of danger and damage to the United States, Trump is doing 10 times more evil than Putin. And the American trinity of individualism, materialism, and ethnocentrism is doing 10 times more evil from within, than the radical Islamic terrorist are doing from without our borders.
Tuesday, June 6, 2017
More on the Whys of Mass Incarceration
According to Harvard professor of history, race, and public policy, Khalil Gibran Muhammad, two new books on the complex issues of oppression, race, crime and punishment have entered the scholarly debate. Muhammad reviews Locking Up Our Own: Crime and Punishment in Black America by James Forman Jr. and A Colony in a Nation by Chris Hayes.
In his review Muhammad mentions attorney Jeff Sessions desire to "return to Reagan-era zero tolerance approaches to drug use." Will Sessions target white opiod users as aggressively as Reagan targeted black drugs users?
Muhammad writes:
"The other is that the punitive style of American racial politics has been a constant feature of our history; unless something foundational changes, The United States will remain an exceptionally punitive country, and the question is only one of degree. According to this line of thinking, there will always be hell to pay for somebody, especially poor people of color."
He summarizes Chris Hayes' book with this statement: "Chris Hayes show that throughout American history, freedom---despite all the high-minded ideals---has often entailed the subjugation of [an ethnic] another." In other words, instead of freedom and justice, it has far too often been freedom and oppression.
In talking about Forman's book, Muhammad comments:
"First, black officials did not see mass incarceration coming. No one did, he argues. It was the result of a series of small decisions, made over time, by a disparate group of actors." Not even black attorney Eric Holder, got it.
Even the brilliant black civil rights lawyer, Michelle Alexander, admits that for many years she did not understand that the American criminal justice system had fathered a new system of oppression, a new racial caste system, called mass incarceration. Most Americans think too individualistically, not sociologically, not historically so even if they are surrounded by a new system of oppression it is invisible to them. Only after careful historical and sociological study, did black lawyer Michelle Alexander understand that in America we really don't end systems of oppression, we merely redesign them.
So without comprehensive white repentance and restitution, no black can ever trust a white criminal justice system to actually do justice for its people.
See the April 18, 2017, New York Times Book Review for the review article "Power and Punishment."
In his review Muhammad mentions attorney Jeff Sessions desire to "return to Reagan-era zero tolerance approaches to drug use." Will Sessions target white opiod users as aggressively as Reagan targeted black drugs users?
Muhammad writes:
"The other is that the punitive style of American racial politics has been a constant feature of our history; unless something foundational changes, The United States will remain an exceptionally punitive country, and the question is only one of degree. According to this line of thinking, there will always be hell to pay for somebody, especially poor people of color."
He summarizes Chris Hayes' book with this statement: "Chris Hayes show that throughout American history, freedom---despite all the high-minded ideals---has often entailed the subjugation of [an ethnic] another." In other words, instead of freedom and justice, it has far too often been freedom and oppression.
In talking about Forman's book, Muhammad comments:
"First, black officials did not see mass incarceration coming. No one did, he argues. It was the result of a series of small decisions, made over time, by a disparate group of actors." Not even black attorney Eric Holder, got it.
Even the brilliant black civil rights lawyer, Michelle Alexander, admits that for many years she did not understand that the American criminal justice system had fathered a new system of oppression, a new racial caste system, called mass incarceration. Most Americans think too individualistically, not sociologically, not historically so even if they are surrounded by a new system of oppression it is invisible to them. Only after careful historical and sociological study, did black lawyer Michelle Alexander understand that in America we really don't end systems of oppression, we merely redesign them.
So without comprehensive white repentance and restitution, no black can ever trust a white criminal justice system to actually do justice for its people.
See the April 18, 2017, New York Times Book Review for the review article "Power and Punishment."
Monday, June 5, 2017
"I Believe in the Holy Spirit." Really?
My pastor preached on this phrase from the Apostle's Creed, "I Believe in the Holy Spirit." The sermon prompted the following thoughts.
Which Holy Spirit? The Americanized Spirit or the Biblical Spirit? The Americanized Spirit: A cheap, water downed, superspiritual, no justice, version or the biblical combination of Spirit, kingdom and Jubilee justice, tightly integrated as a unit that targets the poor and oppressed.
In Acts chapter two, there was an emphasis on the dramatic, visible signs as evidence of the arrival and presence of the Spirit---rushing wind, flames of fire, and tongues. Fine, but if one puts chapter two in its broader context, chapters 1-4, there is a challenge for the church, using the power and wisdom of the Spirit, to tackle the toughest social problems in society---ethnic and economic divisions.
Jesus' definition of the kingdom of God can be found in Matthew 6:33 (NEB)---"God's kingdom and his justice." Carry this definition with you as you read Acts 1:3. Acts 1:1-8 combines two themes together---the Holy Spirit and the kingdom of God. Verse eight ends with the huge challenge to end the religion-ethnic gulf that divided Jew and Samaritan, Jew and Gentile. Much of this division came from Jews who falsely believed they must remain separate and pure.
The Spirit-filled Jerusalem procrastinated on this divine assignment; not until years later, not until a severe persecution broke out, did the Jewish Jerusalem church take the gospel to the Samaritans. Even later came a strong outreach to the Gentiles led by Paul and Peter.
In chapter four, we find the first social justice miracle recorded. The rich gave generously, extremely generously,
to the poor; not just a few extra dollars lying in their pockets. They literally sold surplus houses and lands and brought the total proceeds to the church. Wow! THIS IS A MIRACLE!!!
John Perkins tied the Spirit and the kingdom together to do CCD---rebuilding poor communities.
Which Holy Spirit? The Americanized Spirit or the Biblical Spirit? The Americanized Spirit: A cheap, water downed, superspiritual, no justice, version or the biblical combination of Spirit, kingdom and Jubilee justice, tightly integrated as a unit that targets the poor and oppressed.
In Acts chapter two, there was an emphasis on the dramatic, visible signs as evidence of the arrival and presence of the Spirit---rushing wind, flames of fire, and tongues. Fine, but if one puts chapter two in its broader context, chapters 1-4, there is a challenge for the church, using the power and wisdom of the Spirit, to tackle the toughest social problems in society---ethnic and economic divisions.
Jesus' definition of the kingdom of God can be found in Matthew 6:33 (NEB)---"God's kingdom and his justice." Carry this definition with you as you read Acts 1:3. Acts 1:1-8 combines two themes together---the Holy Spirit and the kingdom of God. Verse eight ends with the huge challenge to end the religion-ethnic gulf that divided Jew and Samaritan, Jew and Gentile. Much of this division came from Jews who falsely believed they must remain separate and pure.
The Spirit-filled Jerusalem procrastinated on this divine assignment; not until years later, not until a severe persecution broke out, did the Jewish Jerusalem church take the gospel to the Samaritans. Even later came a strong outreach to the Gentiles led by Paul and Peter.
In chapter four, we find the first social justice miracle recorded. The rich gave generously, extremely generously,
to the poor; not just a few extra dollars lying in their pockets. They literally sold surplus houses and lands and brought the total proceeds to the church. Wow! THIS IS A MIRACLE!!!
John Perkins tied the Spirit and the kingdom together to do CCD---rebuilding poor communities.
Friday, June 2, 2017
Eliminate Symbols of Slavery?
Eliminate American symbols of slavery?
It is a good thing that the National Cathedral, the state of South Carolina, and the city of New Orleans are getting rid of some symbols of slavery such as the Confederate flag and statues of Confederate leaders. Now the $64,000 question is: How far should we go with this effort to get rid of one of America's worst social evils---generations of ruthless slavery? Should we eliminate Northern symbols of slavery/oppression as well?
Ten U.S. presidents owned slaves. Should all their symbols and statues be eliminated? Should northerners who were slave traders be included?
The primary cause of the Civil War was the evil institution of slavery. The South---the Confederacy---desperately wanted to preserve slavery which had generated enormous wealth for the South. Cotton was to the southern economy what oil was to the American economy in the next century. The elimination of slavery would have generated an economic depression.
Since slavery was THE issue, should ALL symbols related to slaveowners be removed including General Grant's who was a slaveholder? George and Martha Washington were filthy rich people who owned together around 300 slaves. Should the Washington Memorial be sold to the Russians? Thomas Jefferson owned hundreds of slaves. Should America give the Jefferson Memorial China?
What should we do with the White House and the Capitol Building? Both were built using some slave labor.
Most of the slave trade was conducted by northerners, New Englanders. And it was done under the Stars and Stripes, not the Confederate flag. Should the Stars and Stripes be removed? Suggestion: before you answer, read Inheriting the [Slave] Trade.
This American marriage of the demonic and the divine is beautifully and gracefully symbolized by both the Washington Monument and the St. Louis Arch.
It is a good thing that the National Cathedral, the state of South Carolina, and the city of New Orleans are getting rid of some symbols of slavery such as the Confederate flag and statues of Confederate leaders. Now the $64,000 question is: How far should we go with this effort to get rid of one of America's worst social evils---generations of ruthless slavery? Should we eliminate Northern symbols of slavery/oppression as well?
Ten U.S. presidents owned slaves. Should all their symbols and statues be eliminated? Should northerners who were slave traders be included?
The primary cause of the Civil War was the evil institution of slavery. The South---the Confederacy---desperately wanted to preserve slavery which had generated enormous wealth for the South. Cotton was to the southern economy what oil was to the American economy in the next century. The elimination of slavery would have generated an economic depression.
Since slavery was THE issue, should ALL symbols related to slaveowners be removed including General Grant's who was a slaveholder? George and Martha Washington were filthy rich people who owned together around 300 slaves. Should the Washington Memorial be sold to the Russians? Thomas Jefferson owned hundreds of slaves. Should America give the Jefferson Memorial China?
What should we do with the White House and the Capitol Building? Both were built using some slave labor.
Most of the slave trade was conducted by northerners, New Englanders. And it was done under the Stars and Stripes, not the Confederate flag. Should the Stars and Stripes be removed? Suggestion: before you answer, read Inheriting the [Slave] Trade.
This American marriage of the demonic and the divine is beautifully and gracefully symbolized by both the Washington Monument and the St. Louis Arch.
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