Megan Basham Needs to Learn More Black Church History
Her new book names me as an "activist" and "political", as if that's bad.
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In her newly released (and controversial) book, Shepherds for Sale, author Meg\an Basham quotes some of my writing.
Basham’s book has received cascades of criticism since its recent release because of factual errors and mischaracterizations rife throughout the book.
HT: Warren Throckmorton, formerly a professor at Grove City College
The quote from me that appears in her book originates from a New York Times review that an editor asked me to write on Robert P. Jones’ 2020 book, White Too Long: The Legacy of White Supremacy in American Christianity.
In a section about my saga with Grove City College and their determination that it was a “mistake” to invite me to speak at a chapel service, Basham portrays me as a danger to the school’s “reputation for high academic and intellectual standards.”
She quotes the following:
A chapel series on racial justice included antiracist scholar and Kendi protégé Jemar Tisby, who contended in the New York Times that “white Christians have to face the possibility that everything they have learned about [their] faith has been designed to explicitly or implicitly reinforce a racist structure.”
Basham references Ibram X. Kendi who wrote the national book award winning Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas and the mega-bestseller, How to Be an Antiracist.
I did briefly work at Kendi’s Center for Antiracist Research at Boston University several years ago, but I am not and have never been a protegé of his.
People such as Basham have labeled Kendi a critical race theorist (CRT) and positioned him as the figurehead of all that is wrong in modern approaches to addressing racism.
Mentioning us both in the same sentence is meant to label as “one of those CRT people.”
The second part about the white Christian church deserves more attention.
My words are provocative, of course. But they are not merely provocative.
That statement comes from reading Jones’ book, an extensively researched work of history, theology, sociology and memoir. He uses verifiable data back his thesis.
“American Christianity’s theological core has been thoroughly structured by an interest in protecting white supremacy.”
Basham goes on in her book to reference the actual sermon I preached at Grove City College.
Tisby’s sermon under the stained glass of Grove City’s vaulted chapel followed much the same theme and was not just activist but political in nature. “Freedom, justice, and democracy, especially for black people and other people of color, are in imminent danger,” he thundered from behind the hand- carved pulpit, his words reverberating off the stone walls with ecclesiastical solemnity. He finished by exhorting the students not to “refuse to get involved in the struggle,” not to be “white moderates.” “What if God brought you to this college at this time and this place in an election year to demonstrate courage to fight against racism?” he asked.
If Meghan Basham thinks my encouragement to Christian college students to get involved in the struggle for racial justice today is too “activist” or “political” then she’s really not going to like the historic Black Christian tradition.
Three examples from Black Christian history suffice to demonstrate that what I said at Grove City College, and in many other contexts, is firmly in line with the people of faith who have fought for freedom, equality, and racial justice for centuries.
David Walker’s Appeal
If Basham thinks what I preached was too forceful, then she should would not have appereciated the abolitionists.
In 1829, a Black Christian and abolitionist named David Walker, published Walker's Appeal in Four Articles; Together with a Preamble, to the Coloured Citizens of the World, but in Particular and Very Expressly to Those of the United States of America.
In his fiery essay, he called on Black people to unite and break the chains of slavery by force.
He roused Black people to remember their humanity and power. His words made white people cower at the potential judgment for their practice and acceptance of race-based chattel slavery.
He addressed most of his words to Black people, but he had plenty to say to white Christians.
“Have not the Americans the Bible in their hands? Do they believe it? Surely they do not.”
In the spirit of the Old Testament prophets, Walker white people of dire consquences if they did not change their ways.
“O Americans! Americans!! I call God—I call angels—I call men, to witness, that your DESTRUCTION is at hand, and will be speedily consummated unless you REPENT.”
He went on to predict a mighty civic conflagration if slavery persisted.
“I am awfully afraid that pride, prejudice, avarice and blood, will, before long prove the final ruin of this happy republic, or land of liberty!!!!”
About 30 years after Walker shared these words, the Civil War broke out.
Frederick Douglass Calls Out Slaveholder Christianity
The abolitionist, Frederick Douglass, has perhaps the most well-known critique of white Christianity because it is so poignantly and eloquently stated.
In an appendix to his autobiography he wrote,
I love the pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ: I therefore hate the corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land. Indeed, I can see no reason, but the most deceitful one, for calling the religion of this land Christianity. I look upon it as the climax of all misnomers, the boldest of all frauds, and the grossest of all libels.
Douglass would surely have agreed with the any modern indictments, such as my own, of a religion that calls itself Christianity and promotes, maintains, drags its feet, or turns a blind eye toward racial injustice.
Prathia Halls’ “Freedom Faith”
If Meghan Basham believes my preaching was too political, Prathia Hall has words for her.
Born in Philadelphia in 1940, Hall’s father was the pastor of a church he planted. She grew up under his preaching and sensed a call to ministry herself.
During her college years, she felt a pull to be actively involved in the Civil Rights movement.
She got involved in the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in the South, and developed what she called “freedom faith”—“the belief that God wants people to be free and equips and empowers those who work for freedom.”
Hall became an excellent preacher, theologian, and pastoral leader. She is credited with giving Martin Luther King, Jr. the phrase “I have a dream” when she used it in a public prayer where he was in the attendance.
Hall summarized her approach to faith and activism as follows:
I was raised by my parents in what I believe to be the central dynamic in the African- American religious tradition. That is, an integration of the religious and the political. It is a belief that God intends us to be free, and assists us, and empowers us in the struggle for freedom. So the stories of our history helped me to understand that we were called to be activists in this struggle for justice.
Bahsam and others believe that to be political in preaching is the same as being partisan. It is not.
As Prathia Hall explained, in the Black Christian tradition to be “political” means that “God intends us to be free”, and our preaching and teaching should reflect that.
It is no deficit for people who follow Christ to be “activists in the struggle for justice.”
What I preached at Grove City College stands solidly in the Black Christian tradition. It is not political in a negative way to assert that being an image bearer of God requires that we work to change systems and policies that degrade the dignity of God’s creations.
So much of the criticism of racial justice today displays an ignorance of or an antipathy toward the historic Black Christian tradition—a religious legacy that led to the abolition of slavery, the dismantling of Jim Crow, and the preservation of dignity for an entire people.
Before you use the terms “activist” or “political” in a pejorative way, check the history books and study the words and actions of Black Christians in ages past who paved the way for freedom today.
What do you think of Megan Basham’s new book or her characterization of me? Comment below.
Many of the above words came from my new book The Spirit of Justice. Pre-order today!
Never heard of Basham or read anything she's ever written. But as a white pastor who tries to elevate racial justice concerns from the pulpit with my mostly white, suburban congregation, I have appreciated your insights and historical references for many years. Prophetic preaching about the call for justice is central to the biblical tradition. Doing anything less is nothing short of malpractice on the part of the church in our society.
Never heard of Megan Bashan until you mentioned her, so I did about five minutes of Googling. So.... a radical right-wing flinger of unsubstantiated accusations, whose greatest accomplishment is landing a job at the Daily Wire, thinks you're a radical? Someone whose only book recommendation on Amazon comes from John MacArthur? Someone who is STILL raising the spectre of "conspiracist" George Soros after all these years?
I have a feeling - I hope - we've finally reached a point in American society where this right-wing unsubstantiated trolling rudeness has finally gone out of fashion.
Besides, I can't imagine you "thundering" at anyone. :-)
Best wishes on the book launch, I'm looking forward to reading it!