AN INVITATION TO PARTICIPATE IN #SOLIDARITYSUNDAY, JUNE 21.
Rev. Gregory Bentley June 8, 2020
Expediency asks the question, is it politic? Vanity asks the question, is it popular? But conscience asks the question, is it right? And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular but he must take it because conscience tells him it is right.” – Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
The gruesome footage of the murder of George Floyd has ignited a reckoning in American society. White Americans, in many instances for the first time, are encountering the lived reality of what it is like to be Black in America. Many watched the footage of George Floyd’s murder and saw, not only a bad cop savagely choking George Floyd for almost nine minutes, but also a complicit cop who did nothing to intervene. And since that time, many have become aware of stories like Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery and are concluding that this issue is bigger than bad apples. It is, in a word, systemic.
Systemic racism includes the practices, policies, laws, and assumptions that are entrenched in the institutions and culture of society. As a result, understanding systemic racism is vital to understanding why Black people in America encounter over-policing of their neighborhoods, face disproportionately negative interactions with law enforcement, and see increased use of force and brutality.
But systemic racism also encompasses much more. Systemic racism also informs education, housing, health care outcomes, accumulation of wealth, and economic opportunities. Solidarity Sunday is first and foremost a call to white church leaders and predominantly white churches to explicitly name systemic racism as a problem in American society and commit to steps to dismantle and eradicate it.
Below are guiding principles to keep in mind as you prepare for Solidarity Sunday:
1. Racism is not simply an issue of an individual’s negative thoughts and feelings towards Black people and other people of color. Racism is a systemic problem found in institutions and assumptions that influence things irrespective of an individual’s thoughts and feelings.
2. Well intentioned theological approaches can sometimes complicate and even unintentionally reinforce systemic racism. Theological understandings of sin that emphasize personal transgression and fail to talk about oppressive systems can lead people to individualize the problem of racism as something only bad individuals do.
3. Prayer isn’t the only answer. We acknowledge and affirm the importance and prioritization of prayer in faith communities. We also believe that the tangible manifestation of God’s answers to prayer come through the body—the Church. We affirm your desire to pray, but we implore you to take action as if you are the answer to your own prayer.
4. Listening to Black voices and loving through individual acts of solidarity are vital during this time, but addressing systemic racism requires more. Individual actions cannot solve systemic problems. We need institutions, like churches, to address systemic racism at the institutional level, and we need institutions to participate in direct action in their communities that call for reform.
5. The fight to end systemic racism has existed for a long time and has been led by Black voices. As you join this fight, take a posture of meekness and humility. Prioritize Black leadership. Solicit Black perspectives inside and outside your faith tradition. And don’t try to lead this fight. Join those who are already fighting.