A few years ago, I was watching a special on HBO featuring a story about the African country Uganda. Some of you may already know about Uganda’s deplorable attitude towards the LGBT community and some of the atrocities they’ve committed against these people.
One thing that surprised me — but after thinking about it didn’t really surprise me — was the implication that Uganda was directly influenced by right-wing conservative Christians who could not spread the same anti-homosexual message in the United States. Basically, conservative Christian white men whispered into the right ears and influenced genocide against gays in Africa, especially in Uganda.
They used the bible as their weapon of choice as they have done for centuries.
Over the years I’ve grown more distant from Christianity. Part of it is my own love of freedom and personal selfishness. But another part is the fact that I always questioned it; I’ve always been the inconvenient student who would ask the Bible study teacher uncomfortable questions. I would get the same answer when they did not know it: “you should pray on it.”
The Remarkable Circular Reasoning of Christianity
A man I still admire, and my favorite pastor, Reverend Hurst told me of how he attained his strong faith in Jesus. Reverend Hurst was a very progressive pastor who loved his congregation. He was charismatic and strong-spirited, as many Southern Baptist preachers are. He was also a very intelligent man. Back when I was about 18, I struggled with my sexuality. I was a late bloomer sexually and did not start experimenting with self-love until I was 18. I was also very religious, and I felt tremendous guilt over practicing such an activity. I always thought I just had bad faith.
One Sunday I spoke to the pastor after church. I told him about my struggles and was expecting him to tell me to keep fighting the sin. I was surprised when he laughed and said words to the effect of “Son that’s nothing to be ashamed of, that’s a perfectly natural thing for men to do, I even do that.”
I was floored and relieved; a great stone had been lifted from my chest. He went on to explain how he became “saved.”
He told me that he used to go to church and not feel the Lord. But he prayed and prayed for the Lord to touch his spirit, and sure enough, he felt him.
His story has always haunted me. He basically had to have faith to pray for the Lord to touch him with the “holy ghost.” And he eventually became more committed through a greater emotional connection. As much as I still love and respect Pastor Hurst, I’ve always found that reasoning to be bad faith.
The Complicated History of African American Christianity.
For a long time, I believed the common sorry of how Blacks became Christians in America. It involved a much darker and more brutal transition than just praying for salvation. It involved pillars of wood with round steel loops embedded. This allowed chains to pass through them. A black slave would be chained to this post and flogged if he or she did not accept Jesus as their “Lord And Savior.” This was how blacks in America became Christians, and to this day most blacks remain so.
These forms of torture among many others did take place. However, initially, slave masters were reluctant to allow their slaves to become Christians, out of fear that the religion would one day lead to their freedom or make them more disobedient.
Certain white church leaders actively campaigned slave masters to allow their slaves to become Christians, arguing that while the skin of the Africans was black, their souls could be washed “pure white.”
This attitude was the precursor to what would later be known as “upliftsuasion,” the belief that through hard work and leading an exemplary lifestyle, Black people could earn white social acceptance. And even today, there are many assimilationists who subscribe to this racist idea.
Your God Is White
Blacks were used as free labor for hundreds of years; they were beaten, tortured, raped (men and women), mutilated, hung, castrated, burned, tarred and feathered, and many more acts too vile and inhumane to begin to imagine. But the most nefarious thing that was done to Blacks in America and back in Africa was breaking them into believing their God was a white man.
Once whites were able to convince blacks their god was White, this made them more powerful than any whip or brutal punishment could ever make them. To this day black people still defer?to whites over their own people; they do it even on a subconscious level. When your god is a different color than you are, it’s natural to view the people who more closely resemble him in a positive light. For black Americans, Christianity has become part of our traditions, our culture, and our heritage. It’s in our communities and it’s almost indistinguishable from our identity as a people.
Christianity and Chitlins
During slavery, not all slave masters gave their slaves decent food. Many chose to engage in the practice of throwing out trash leftover from pigs that they would not consume themselves. Over time, Black people had to learn how to make the best of this barely edible garbage by turning it into delicious cuisines such as chitlins, pig’s feet, pig’s snout, and pig’s lips. Today, there are many people of all races who enjoy eating what was once thought to be trash, thanks to the ingenuity of Black slaves.
But, the slaves did not stop at pig parts, they found ways to retain a semblance of their African traditions by transforming the Christianity they were forced to convert to into something more African. They also used Christianity as a form of rebellion, creating songs that contained coded messages for people seeking to escape plantations. Some songs had specific directions for slaves to follow when running away, such as landmarks. Meanwhile, slave masters listened on with arrogant amusement, not knowing their slaves were openly singing about escaping!
Christianity also gave birth to the American Black church which for generations had been a refuge for Blacks seeking shelter from discrimination. Church services on Sunday were the only time during the week that many Black folks could get together, dressed in their “Sunday Best.” While in church, every Black person could feel like a full human being for a few hours, free from White persecution.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
The Civil Rights movement, which gave birth to the Black Power movement, was started in the Black church. And the most impactful Black Civil Rights leader of all time was Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Dr. King was an incredibly articulate speaker with a Ph. D from Boston University, who preached the gospel but also went against the more accommodating attitude of many church leaders when he urged Black people to engage in direct action to bring about social justice. However, because of his faith, Dr. King told his followers to only use non-violent tactics, such as sit-ins and marches to protest the racist policies of Jim Crow.
While other Black leaders in the emerging Black Power movement found King’s methods too tame, such as former Nation of Islam spokesman Malcolm X, there’s no question now that the path of non-violence was instrumental in destroying Jim Crow.
Using Scripture as a Weapon
In truth, Dr. King’s strategy of non-violence was more of a lure used to bait violent police officers and other racists to show the world their true colors with television cameras rolling. His strategy did not work in Albany, New York as the city’s police chief, Laurie Pritchett, instructed his officers to restrain from using violence while making arrests. However, the strategy found the perfect partner in Theophilus Eugene “Bull” Connor, a local Birmingham administrator who used his influence with the police and fire departments to brutalize Black protesters.
Once again, Black people used what racists considered a position of weakness to their advantage, taking an interpretation of a biblical passage to change the course of human history. Matthew 45:38-40 states:
You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’[a] 39 But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also. 40 And if anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, hand over your coat as well.
The Chains of Christian Slavery
Over the years, American Evangelicals infected poor nations in Africa with their brand of twisted Christianity. However, the generational impact of white supremacist idealogy in American Black churches is harder to quantify.
On June 17, 2015, a 27-year-old white supremacist named Dylann Roof walked into the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina, and murdered nine Black worshipers.
Later the teen was arrested without incident and police treated him to a meal at Burger King, before taking him to jail.
In response, local Black church members took to the streets to march and pray. However, beyond that not much else took place.
In Fort Worth, Texas on December 29, 2019, Keith Thomas Kinnunen, a church shooter who killed two worshipers during a church service at the West Freeway Church of Christ, was shot and killed by a volunteer security church member named Jack Wilson, who worked as a firearms instructor.
I’m not advocating that Black church members carry firearms in church. However, it’s interesting comparing these responses. This difference represents more than just the issue of self-defense, it touches on the expectations people have concerning their earthly existence.
Waiting for Jesus
One of the biggest problems with Christianity is that the religion promotes the idea of a reward and punishment in the afterlife. For those who don’t wish to change the world they live in, this ideology can be a very convenient crutch. Far too many Christians believe that nothing matters in this world, therefore there’s no point in fighting for justice. After all, God will supposedly mead out justice in Heaven anyway.
One of the things about the Black church that disturbed me even as a child was the notion of “waiting for Jesus.” There are so many Black church songs about waiting for the lord to fix all your problems. I’ve even heard older women sing about how they may not have an education, but they’ve “got Jesus.”
For me, this is one of the greatest travesties Christianity has wrought upon my people. The ancient Egyptians (who were Africans) are renowned for the pursuit of knowledge and science. However, since that time, many if not most of our people have turned to superstition and wishful thinking while sleepwalking through life. They think the afterlife holds all the answers to their problems, allowing them to tolerate the racist systems and institutions that impose hardships on their people.
While I have the greatest respect and admiration for those who live righteously, I also believe there must be a time when Black people worldwide set the ideology of Christianity aside to fully pursue justice and equality in this world.
