[Module 9] Race, Ethnicity, Citizenship.pptx

THE CHURCH AS MORAL
COMMUNITY
RACE, ETHNICITY,
AND CITIZENSHIP

This module asks the question:
How do citizenship, ethnicity,
race, nationality, religion, and
church interact?

SOME GUIDING QUESTIONS
• How does God’s kingdom transcend all other “races,”
“ethnicities,” and “nationalities”?
• How does being a citizen of the kingdom of God affect our national
citizenship?
• How is it affected by our national citizenship?
• How does our race affect our experience of national citizenship?
• Does (or should) our national citizenship ensure equal
treatment across racial lines? How does our faith serve to
undergird or reinforce this equality and/or this inequality?
• Let’s begin with some definitions…

THE CATEGORIES
• Race is “each of the major divisions of humankind, having
distinct physical characteristics.”
• It tends to be associated quite strongly with these physical
characteristics, especially skin “color”.
• Ethnicity is “a social group that shares a common and
distinctive culture, language, religion, heritage, nationality
(although this is not a requirement) or the like.
• It is also understood as ethnic traits, background, allegiance or
some form of natural association, perhaps primarily through
family lineage.

THE CATEGORIES
While race and ethnicity share an ideology of common ancestry, they
differ in several ways.
• Race is primarily unitary. You can only have one race, while you can
claim multiple ethnic affiliations. You can identify ethnically as Irish
and Polish, but you are usually considered to be, essentially, either
“black” or “white”.
• Race is generally biological, while ethnicity is largely cultural.
• However, some sociologists believe that racial divisions are based more on
sociological concepts than biological principles.

THE CATEGORIES
• Ethnicity can be displayed or hidden, while race generally
cannot be. Ethnicity can be adopted, ignored, or broadened,
while racial characteristics cannot.
• The connection between ethnicity and race is often socially
constructed. For instance, during the early 20th century,
immigrants of Irish, Italian, and East European descent were
not considered to be “white.”
• Question: When, how, and why did this change?
• Both have been used to subjugate or persecute people.

• Active racism
• Institutional racism
• Passive racism
• (examples from a non-racial setting?)

• Bias
• Prejudice
• Racism
• Individual
• Systemic
• Institutional
• Structural

CATEGORIES
TO
CONSIDER
• Bias is the inclination to place a disproportionate
weight in favor of or against a person, thing, or
idea
• Prejudice is forming an opinion (usually
negative) about a person or group based solely
upon their membership in a particular group
• literally means to “pre-judge”
• Racism is the systemic application of prejudice
leading to the oppression of a racial group
• Like sexism, classism, and ageism, racism involves
the ability to enact one’s prejudice in political,
social, and/or legal ways.

A BRIEF HISTORY OF RACE
IN THE UNITED STATES
A brief history of the institution of slavery:
• Aristotle/Athenian Greece
• “Slavery” as a category was much different; it was not always tied to race or
ethnicity
• All people groups were eligible to be slaves; however, all slaves could possibly
move into freedom, through financial gain or when a treaty released an entire
nation or people group from slavery.
• However, Aristotle also believed that some people were “slaves by nature” as
well as “slaves by law”, which was later used to justify slavery systems

• This relates to Aristotle’s belief that only free males have true rationality,
or “soul”. In his Politics he wrote, "The slave is wholly lacking
the deliberative element; the female has it but it lacks authority; the child
has it but it is incomplete” (1.12). Thus, slaves did not deserve the same
considerations as “free” men.
• Interestingly, he also believed that only fair-skinned women were capable of
true sexual release, (Generation of Animals I, 728a), thus showing early ties to
discrimination based on skin color.

• This has been scripturally supported (for lack of a better word) by
referencing the “curse of Ham” and Old Testament admonitions against
intermarriage, etc.
• These lead quickly into the concerns over “pure blood” that underlay the
Nazi atrocities, among others. Inevitably, it results in the stripping of the
basic humanity of the other (e.g. calling slaves “beasts”, calling Jews
“vermin”, calling Africans “apes”, etc).
• How does this overlap with the racial language and rhetoric that has to the
Black Lives Matter movement? Why has this assertion become necessary?

Part of the founding narrative of the United States is that we are a society that
has shaken off the confines of the “class system” that characterized the United
Kingdom for so long.
• Where the UK had its “class” system (fairly similar to India’s “caste” system), the
United States views itself as a nation of equals, with all welcome at the same
table.
• However, not all distinctions were released. “All” meant “all white landowning
males”. We were able to dispose of the class system of Mother England because
we maintained the distinctions of race and gender. We could dismiss “class” as a
social construct because we maintained other distinctions.

• In the United States, race functions both as a category and as a social
construct (an idea that has been created and accepted by people within a
society).
• From slavery on through the present day, concepts of race are employed for
a variety of reasons:
• To further economic self-interest
• To protect one’s social position
• To maintain positions of power and /or sociopolitical influence

• The institution of slavery was undergirded by racial narratives that
legitimized it. John Wesley addresses some of these in “Thoughts Upon
Slavery”:
• “Upon the whole, therefore, the Negroes who inhabit the coast of Africa, from
the river Senegal to the southern bounds of Angola, are so far from being the
stupid, senseless, brutish, lazy barbarians, the fierce, cruel, perfidious savages
they have been described…”
• [Quoting the slaveowners] “It is necessary to use them with severity,
considering their stupidity, stubbornness, and wickedness.’

• While slavery was abolished in
1865, racial inequality and
oppression was upheld through
legislation (the Jim Crow laws),
resulting in school and workplace
segregation, housing and
employment discrimination, and
voter suppression.

• Without a serious, scriptural, Spirit-led
consideration of the history and
progression of racial oppression in the
United States,

• One of the issues is that the categories are themselves shifting over time.
• Whereas southern/eastern Europeans used to be considered “foreigners”,
now they reside comfortably within the tent of “white” people.
• This raises the question: What is “white”, actually?
• Skin color?
• Ethnic background?
• Cultural power?
• Not kingdom, any more than Jew or Israelite is kingdom

MIROSLAV VOLF: “A VISION OF EMBRACE”
• Volf speaks of the cultural conflict in Rwanda and Bosnia
(note his own location as Croatian amidst the Balkan
conflict)
• How does the church handle the kingdom of darkness?
• Cultural identity
• Ecclesiological identity
• Eschatological identity

MIROSLAV VOLF: “A VISION OF EMBRACE”
• In both church and culture (two primary arenas of belonging),
what are our schisms?
• We are “strangers” to our own culture, yet God welcomes us
• We are distant, yet embedded; we experience an “internal difference”
• This creates space within us to receive the “other”, a posture
that Volf calls a “deep catholicity”
• “It entails judgment against the monochrome character of our own
culture and the evil in all cultures”

CONFRONTING RACISM IN
“OUR KIND OF PEOPLE”
• McConnell asks the question: “Why are churches so
painfully silent on the subject of racism and prejudice? It
is certainly not for lack of opportunity or issues to
address.”
• One of the major contributing factors is the nature of
choice in forming and maintaining relationships exercised
by Christians.

• Like everyone else, Christians choose to associate with others
who are similar to themselves. This is not a new realization for
missiologists.”
• McConnell explores the nature of choice in the formation of
churches and the resultant negative side effects.
• The observations are taken from research projects in which
the author studied churches and clergy in two cities.

• “People "like to become Christians without crossing racial,
linguistic, or class barriers,” which leads to the Homogeneous
Unit Principle (the Homogeneous Unit Principle), which he
calls “one of the most controversial church growth principles.”
• Do you have any firsthand experience of this principle, either positive
or negative?
• How could we critique (or recommend) this principle using some of the
moral language we have learned this semester?

• Contrary to the initial claims, homogeneous churches do not appear
to be moving toward racial reconciliation as they mature.
• The central problem is the lack of intentionality in confronting
prejudice as part of the formational process, which arises,
McConnell believes, out of the foundations of the homogeneous unit
principle.
• This perpetuates the racism and prejudice that is characteristic of
all human societies.

• “The formation of homogeneous units is a self-perpetuating process. That
is, the exercise of choice acts as both cause and effect. People become more
alike over time, not only by choosing others like themselves, but also by
increasingly restricting their interaction with people who are different.”
• McConnell declares: “The natural tendencies of the subcultural
phenomenon must not be the basis for the structure and culture of our
churches. Yet without the intentionality of intergroup contact and
meaningful personal relationships, the tendency remains unchallenged
even in older, presumably mature Christians.”

• Coupled with this is a strong defense of the nature of
personal choice (which is embedded into our national
character, both as individual autonomy and as
consumer choice).
• Question: What are the implications of continuing to
value choice so highly?

• “The rationale behind the Homogeneous Unit Principle
has been from the beginning primarily pragmatic, in
essence saying it works and God is using it.”
• Question: What form of moral reasoning is this? Is it a sufficient
argument? Can you think of some points that might balance it?
• Another question: What are we valuing when we say the HOP
“works”? What does it accomplish, and why do we give so much
value to this one aspect of the Christian life?

• This is especially true of the issues of racism and prejudice.
Whether it is Hutus and Tutsis, African-Americans and Euro-
Americans, or Western Province and Southern Highlanders,
ethnic conflicts are a reality that demands our attention.
• Christians and churches must, therefore, make an intentional
commitment to racial reconciliation. Such a biblical display of
unity will symbolize the transformational nature of the gospel
and be a powerful witness to a world caught in racial divisions
and ethnic strife.”

JAMES CONE
A BLACK THEOLOGY OF LIBERATION
• Cone works to incorporate the two categories of faith and race
(the civil rights movement and the black power movement),
unlike Martin Luther King and Malcolm X who tended to work
with these as separate categories.
• “I wanted to bring the blackness of my identity with the faith I
had learned in the church.”
• Why did they keep these categories separate? What possible
challenges do you see here?

JAMES CONE
• The cross was the “lynching” of the ancient Near East; yet
the white church says almost nothing about this.
• “When you see a lynched black body, that’s who God is.
God is present in that body, just like God is present in
Jesus’s cross…Crucifixion in Jesus’s time is analogous to
lynching in our time.”
• How might this lens shape our reading of scripture, our
theological reflections?

JAMES CONE
• “The cross is God making ultimate identification with the powerless.
If the powerful in our society – the white people – if they want to
become Christians, they have to give up that power and become
identified with the powerless. You can’t be identified with the
powerful and also a Christian at the same time – that’s a
contradiction of terms.”
• "God takes upon himself the suffering of the victim.“
• How do you totally give up power? How did Paul divest (or not) his
power? How did Jesus divest his power?

JAMES CONE
• “I read the scriptures from the bottom, from the vantage point of
the weak, the poor, the helpless …through the eyes of those who are
marginalized in this society.”
• “I’m making the claim which I think is inherent in the scriptures
itself. Now there are many voices in the scripture, and you have to
choose; what the scripture doesn’t do is self-interpret …you have to
make a choice. I choose by looking at the scriptures from the
vantage point of the cross – a violent event, an event in which the
helpless Christ Lord is hanging there...

JAMES CONE
• “I think that is closer to a lynched black victim than to someone
sitting up in some mansion somewhere. I have no way of proving
that; I can only bear witness. And this witness must be a witness
of proclamation for the kingdom that doesn’t point to me, but
points to the One who was on the cross.”
• What is the difference between proving something and bearing witness?
• Christians are to bear witness to the truth of what has happened
to people of color.

JAMES CONE
• Consider this: Does "victory in Christ" mask other
victimizations? Do we place so much emphasis upon the new
equalities of Galatians 3:28 that we fail to recognize how far
we still are from its eschatological fulfillment?
• “If hope can come out of the crucifixion, out of the cross, then
hope can come out of the little crosses, that I see people having
to bear, and people bearing witness against.”
• How is hope eschatological? How is it embedded in the present?

JAMES CONE
Cone’s central project is this:
How are we set free from this
mountain of racial/national animus to
get to the lived reality of Galatians
3:28?

THE GREAT AMERICAN “MELTING
POT”?
What is this video saying about the USA?
What is the video saying about the
people who immigrate to the USA?

THE GREAT AMERICAN “MELTING
POT”?
• The metaphor of America as a “melting pot”
• Depends on the concept of assimilation, where a
heterogeneous society becomes more homogeneous
• In recent years, the concept of multiculturalism has
been promoted as a preferable alternative, which
suggests such metaphors as “mosaic”, “salad bowl”,
“symphony”, and “kaleidoscope”

UN-AMERICAN, OR ALL-
AMERICAN?
• In the 1940s, to combat the rise of anti-
Semitism and xenophobia in the United
States, the Institute for American
Democracy invited Superman comic book
artist Wayne Boring to design an image
that would be made into posters and book
covers for schools across the country.
• Members of the anti-communist House
Un-American Activities Committee
denounced the image as “anti-American
propaganda”.

GALATIANS 3:28 – ALREADY BUT NOT
YET
Regarding Paul’s words in Galatians 3, one commentator states, “For Paul, all
worldly relationships, social positions and ordinary human ambitions amount to
nothing in the presence of one coming in judgment and redemption. In other words,
from the eschatological perspective, our status in this world—rich or poor, man or
woman, American or Iranian, slave or free, married or single—is no longer important.
We should not live for it, get too passionate about it, spend too much time on it. It's
indifferent. The individual's relationship to God in faith and obedience overshadows
and conditions every other relationship and circumstance. Paul's ethical reasoning
here is neither socially conservative nor socially liberal. It is radically eschatological.
From Paul's eschatological perspective, investing your life energy in social
conservatism or social liberalism, nationalism or internationalism, political pacifism
or just war theory, egalitarianism or patriarchy is to become worldly.”

YET
• This commentator claims that these categories are “indifferent”, and that
they should be “overshadowed” by “the individual’s relationship to God in
faith and obedience.”
• The question, then, is this: Do we, as Americans, view and
experience these categories as “indifferent”? Not just in the church,
or in our biblical theology, but in actual, daily life? How is that
related to our own skin color or social location?
• How does retrenching ourselves, within these conversations, within
this verse serve to hide, minimize, or excuse the racial and ethnic
injustice amidst which we live?

YET
• Our identity markers go with us into eternity: “After this I looked, and
behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation,
from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and
before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their
hands, and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who
sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” (Revelation 7:9-10)
• Our differences are gifts, charisms from God. They exist and are recognized
in order for us to be shaped by them, for us to learn from the “other”, for us
to embrace in the “other”, much as God embraces us who are, at the most
basic level, wholly “other” to Him.

THE CATEGORIES (CON’T)
“Citizen”
• a person recognized under the custom or law as being a legal
member of a sovereign state or belonging to a nation.
• a native or naturalized member of a state or nation who owes
allegiance to its government and is entitled to its protection
(distinguished from alien).
• Another possible definition -- to participate fully in human
flourishing of God’s salvation

• Patriotism: love for, or devotion to, one’s country
• Nationalism: loyalty and devotion to a nation,
particularly a sense of national consciousness exalting
one’s nation above all others and placing primary
emphasis on promotion of its culture and interests as
opposed to those of other nations
• Similar to patriotism in that as it also emphasizes strong
feelings for one’s country, but it usually contains an attitude of
superiority
• Jingoism is nationalism in the form of aggressive and proactive foreign policy, such
as a country's advocacy for the use of threats or actual force, as opposed to peaceful
relations, in efforts to safeguard what it perceives as its national
interests. Colloquially, jingoism is “an extreme type of nationalism.”

“allegiance”
• loyalty or commitment of a subordinate to a superior, or of an individual to a group
or cause
• the obligation of a feudal vassal to his liege lord
• the fidelity owed by a subject or citizen to a sovereign or government
“pledge”
• to enter into a binding promise or agreement
• to commit oneself, to bind oneself, to promise

PLEDGING ALLEGIANCE
What are we doing when we pledge
allegiance to the flag?
Do we have an adequate understanding
of the words we are using?

HOW RADICAL IS OUR MONOTHEISM?
In Radical Monotheism and Western Culture, H Richard Niebuhr (who also
did the Christ and Culture models) discusses a “conflict of faiths” that has
arisen “between radical monotheism and those other forms of human faith,
namely polytheism and henotheism in their modern, nonmythological guise.”
(11)
• “The chief rival to monotheism, I shall contend, is henotheism or that social
faith which makes a finite society, whether cultural or religious, the object
of trust as well as of loyalty and which tends to subvert even officially
monotheistic institutions, such as the churches.” (11)
• Do we ever consider that our “monotheism” – our confession of the one
true and Triune God – may not be as radically monotheistic as we’d
always assumed?

• So, henotheism – a faith that is primarily social, created and adopted by a
particular society of people – tends to locate trust, hope, value, and loyalty
in such categories as national citizenship, racial groupings, and ethnic
distinctions.
• Faith is “the attitude and action of confidence in, and fidelity to, certain
realities as the sources of value and the objects of loyalty. This personal
attitude or action is ambivalent; it involves reference to the value that
attaches to the self and to the value toward which the self is directed. On
the one hand it is trust in that which gives value to the self; on the other
hand it is loyalty to what the self values.” (16)

“A better example [of henotheism] may be found in nationalism. When the
patriotic nationalist says, “I was born to die for my country,” he is exhibiting
the double relation that we now call faith. The national life is for him the
reality whence his own life derives its worth. He relies on the nation as
source of his own value. He trusts it; first, perhaps, in the sense of looking
constantly to it as the enduring reality out of which he has issued, into whose
ongoing cultural life his own actions and being will merge. His life has
meaning because it is part of that context, like a word in a sentence. It has
value because it fits into a valuable whole. His trust may also be directed
towards the nation as a power which will supply his needs, care for his
children, and protect his life.” (17)

“But faith in the nation is primarily reliance upon it as an enduring value-
center. Insofar as the nation is the last value-center to which the nationalist
refers, he does not raise the question about its goodness to him or about its
rightness or wrongness. Insofar as it is one’s value-center, rightness and
wrongness depend on it. This does not mean in any Hobbesian sense that for
such faith the national government determines what is right and what is
wrong, but rather that the rightness of all actions depends on their
consonance with the inner constitution of the nation and on their tendency to
enhance or diminish national life, power, and glory.” (17, emphasis mine)

“The counterpoint of trust in the value-center is loyalty or fidelity. Trust is, as it
were, the passive aspect of the faith relation. It is expressed in praise or
confessed in a creed that states the self-evident principle. Loyalty or
faithfulness is the active side. It values the center and seeks to enhance its
power and glory. It makes that center its cause for which to live and labor. In
this active faith the loyal self organizes its activities and seeks to organize its
world. Faithfully, though it used the same words as faith-trust, expresses itself
in a sacramentum, an oath of fealty, a vow of commitment.” (18)
How does our faith in the nation seek to secure our loyalty and fidelity as
well?
What kind of fealty or commitment do we owe the nation-state?

• “Thus the creedal expressions of patriotism, uttered or heard in one way,
seem to state with simple assurance and as matters of fact, that Britain
rules the waves, or that Germany is overall, or that Columbia is the home
of the brave and the free. Yet these phrases are also used to pledge
devotion; they are spoken and sung by voices ringing with resolution; they
may signalize decision to give everything to the country’s cause. Also the
Christian statement, “I believe in God, the Father, Almighty Maker of
heaven and earth,” is on the one hand an expression of confidence, on the
other, an oath of allegiance. In the one sense it means, “I trust in God”; in
the other, “I will keep faith with him.” (18)

How does our faith in the nation seek to secure our loyalty
and fidelity as well?
What kind of fealty or commitment do we owe the nation-
state?
Are there dangers in using the same language of devotion,
allegiance, and trust for both God and country?
What are some possible consequences
of this kind of “social religion”?

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[Module 9] Race, Ethnicity, Citizenship.pptx