Attention Fellow White People

There is a God and It is Not Me or You

Once or twice a year in the context of a sermon warning against pride or idolatry, a former pastor at my home church would pause his sermon and ask the congregation to repeat after him, “There is a god, and it is not me.” Then he would ask us to turn to the person sitting next to us and tell them, “there is a god, and it is not you.” This second part of the exercise always elicited some chuckling, as the pastor acknowledged it is satisfying every now and then to be given permission from the pastor to say that to a loved one, as all of us can be difficult to live with at times given our fallen state.

In my previous post, I linked to the second episode of White People Work, a podcast I heard about through Shake the Dust, a podcast hosted by a black man and a blind white man that I listen to religiously, as their tagline “leaving colonized faith for the kingdom of God” is awesome, and so in line with my mission here. The host of White People Work, Scott Hall, is a white person who like me grew up as the privileged majority in an affluent neighborhood. He was aware of the reality that people of color lived in a different world from him, but this was something no one talked about. In college, he was originally on track for medical school, taking pre-med classes, but an elective course in African American studies altered the course of his life. Inspired by a speaker at a Christian conference, he launched this podcast to help white people understand themselves and “take responsibility for their presence in the world.” I highly recommend listening to every episode as they are all fantastic. I appreciate the way he, being a white person himself, approaches this touchy subject with compassion, humility—openly admitting when he has made mistakes—and empathy, and yet at the same time pulls no punches. But my favorite episode is episode 3. In this episode, he draws a distinction between being white—our skin complexion—which we cannot control, and the ideology of whiteness, which we can choose to oppose. As for the ideology of whiteness, he proposes a definition that stopped me in my tracks. At its root, the ideology of whiteness is “a social power construct that puts European descended people in the role of God on earth.” You heard that right. We as white people have a god complex.

There is so much I could write about this, as this ideology has implications beyond racial superiority. But for the purpose of this blog, I will focus on the first harmful implication Scott Hall discusses related to this ideology, the tendency to put ourselves and our culture at the center of everything and everyone. This ideology is the driver behind our dark history. It explains our celebration of Christopher Columbus as a hero who “discovered” America even though native Americans had thriving civilizations in this land for thousands of years, our belief that our culture is superior to indigenous cultures, our rationalization for enslaving black people, and our continued unwillingness to acknowledge our unearned privilege compared to people of color. Not only that, but because our culture has been centered for so many centuries, we don’t think of it as a culture at all. White food, white music, white hair styles, the white way of speaking, and even sadly, white interpretations of theology and white worship preferences, are just normal. But most sobering of all, this god complex explains my own racism detailed in my previous post, especially my discomfort with white film makers and writers potentially being displaced by people of color. Even though in principal I find the ideology of white superiority abhorrent, the ideology of whiteness is so entrenched, like toxic water that is unavoidable, that it is uncomfortable to imagine a world in which white people forfeit their power and influence. But it struck me while reading Austin Channing Brown’s book I’m Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness, that being uncomfortable is what being a follower of Christ requires. And this discomfort is completely at odds with Christian Nationalism, which sadly explains why white evangelicals are especially uncomfortable discussing our dark history or acknowledging the unearned privilege they continue to enjoy today.

The first of the ten commandments God gives the Israelites in Exodus 20:3 is “You shall have no other gods before me” and in Mark 8:34, Jesus teaches that “if anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.” In other words, we must imitate Christ through our own lives, and if you had to define Christ’s ministry in one word, I think that word would be reconciliation. But because of our god complex—our idolatry of ourselves—we are unable or unwilling to take this concept seriously. We commend ourselves for having a conference about racism, inviting a black pastor to preach once or twice a year, having a few people of color in the worship band or on the staff, (even if they are not in senior leadership positions that shape the direction of the church), so that we can feel good about ourselves without really changing the status quo. But in the words of Austin Channing Brown, “when white people stop short of reconciliation, it’s often because they are motivated by a deep need to believe in their own goodness, and for that goodness to be affirmed over and over and over again. These folks want a pat on the back simply for arriving at the conclusion that having people of color around is good. But reconciliation is not about white feelings. It’s about diverting power and attention to the oppressed, toward the powerless” (Page 171). She is not the first author of color from whom I have read similar sentiments, but now given my growing awareness of Christian Nationalism, which has motivated me to expose myself to other perspectives, she is the first author from whom I have read such sentiments without getting defensive. “It’s not as if I could control being born white” I used to think, “why does it seem as though these writers hate me, desire to penalize me, for the sins of past generations which are also beyond my control?” Now I am coming to realize that it’s not out of bitterness or resentment that these writers of color say things that make us as white people uncomfortable. In fact, this willingness to call us out is an act of love, that, similar to a parent’s discipline, makes us mad short-term, but is for our long-term, perhaps even eternal good. Essentially, these people of color are trying to say the same thing as my former pastor, “Hey white people, there is a god, and it’s not you!” If we want to live a truly Christian life now that isn’t content with cheap grace, and if we want a foretaste of God’s eternal kingdom, we would do well to listen.