Recently, I penned a post, Some Questions I’m Asking While Off to my White Evangelical Church that drew a bit of attention. To be honest, it was a post that had been stewing for several weeks and one in which I reasoned I did not have the courage to write. The reason is quite simple: by doing so I knew I would lose something, an affiliation with those who deem race dialogue to be of utmost importance. I’ve been working on a follow up with a focus on the issue of social justice though it’s been slow going. I hope to parse out some issues that I think are getting conflated with a gospel centered response of the church’s relationship to the world. Hopefully, I will get to that.
It occurs to me there are there are two kinds of people who positively reacted to that post. One group really does not want to face any kinds of infractions and easily dismisses those who would raise any issues. These are folks that don’t want any discussion of racial issues or take any opportunity to examine where in fact there still might be discrepancies. On the other hand, and where I hope these questions resonated, concerned people like myself, who are deeply cognizant of historical infractions and want to, at a minimum, bring awareness to how racial prejudices have had a long standing impact. But they also don’t want to lose sight of what it means to be united in Christ and keep our union and identity in Christ as the overarching priority. Like, me they having growing concerns that this priority is getting lost.
If you’ve known me personally, or followed me on Facebook or Twitter for any length of time, you’d know that I have been squarely on the side of this second group. I have tried to provoke an honest examination racism, racial bias, white privilege and yes, even white supremacy.
To this end, I’ve had some intense on-line interactions with those I have at least perceived to be in the first group. I’m finding something really interesting happens when that perception is present. When you are on the bandwagon to show how these issues still prevail, it doesn’t take much for that agenda to take on a life of its own. I was reminded the other day of an interaction I had a couple of years ago on the topic of white privilege. A white sister tried to assert how her mother experienced extreme poverty and that the idea of white privilege does not account for white people who have suffered. Aside from the fact that this sorely misunderstands what is meant by privilege in that it’s not contingent upon economic circumstances, the reality is I really didn’t care to hear it. I was only interested in showing how black people have suffered under the hands of white people because of what society deems as acceptable. But it also made me reflect on other such conversations I’ve had where the overarching agenda is to prove how subjugated black people have been. Continue reading
I’ve been pecking away little by little on a follow up to my last post, 
Yes, you heard that right, my white church. Why not just the church? In fact, I bet the title alone will set up some keen anticipation for me to address everything that’s wrong with the white church and how it’s whiteness is harming people of color, how silent the white church is on issues of social justice and generally are wielding it’s power of white supremacy against the health of the church. Sure, there will be some that will roll their eyes, shake their heads and wonder why people keep being divisive with race labels and such. But I’ll get to you later.
I recently came across 
Recently, a friend from church was sharing about her episode with anaphylaxis shock. She was home alone with her infant when suddenly and without warning, her body started reacting to what, is unknown. She couldn’t make it to the phone to call her husband or mother-in-law and barely made it to the computer to type a message out. She was going in and out of consciousness and wondered if this was it, was she going to die. But instead of the cheery easiness with which we Christians tend to treat death, there was an easiness about it. Almost a fear, more like dread.