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My church body, the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, has throughout its history been predominantly made up of white people—not surprising, given its roots in communities of confessional German immigrants.
My church body, the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, has throughout its history been predominantly made up of white people—not surprising, given its roots in communities of confessional German immigrants.
I love and am so grateful for my church, but I think a lot of us grew up with a blind spot on racism—not in actively harboring ill will toward minorities, but in a sort of built-in skepticism about concepts like implicit bias and systemic prejudice.
This was owing at least in part to what I still think is a praiseworthy thing in conservative thought—a dose of caution toward modes of thinking seen as novel, particularly those that touch the theological.
But in recent years I’ve become all too aware that in many cases that conservative tendency can harden into stubborn refusal to permit any new information whatsoever into one’s viewpoint, accompanied by sneering contempt for anyone who *does* allow for change.
So in recent days I’ve been very happy to see prominent voices in our church body pressing for us to broaden our thinking about race-related issues. I was convicted in particular by a statement put out by the LCMS’s Black Clergy Caucus. https://www.theunbrokencord.com/writings/black-clergy-caucus-statement-on-george-floyd
It reads in part:
“Now is the time. As a Christian, if you do not help end a system of injustice that takes the lives of brothers and sisters in Christ like George Floyd but “use the excuse that you did not assist their deaths by word or deed,” then “you have killed him.”
“Now is the time. As a Christian, if you do not help end a system of injustice that takes the lives of brothers and sisters in Christ like George Floyd but “use the excuse that you did not assist their deaths by word or deed,” then “you have killed him.”
“For although you have not actually committed all these crimes, as far as you are concerned, you have nevertheless permitted your neighbors to languish and perish in their misfortune.”
“This is not ‘black radical thought’. This is the Lutheran Catechism from your time in Confirmation, when you affirmed your baptismal vows, marking you as one claimed by God—and not the world.”
This piece too was very powerful: https://blogs.lcms.org/2020/racism-and-the-church-a-time-to-listen/?fbclid=IwAR19bS0gRiy_0faR1tf_GpNu7xXUAz1lmYcO1mMK6OU3ak3lycPFV6wkm1E
My church is a church of sinners and I'm very grateful for it. That's all.
