The recent shooting deaths of nine people in a South Carolina church during Bible study was indeed horrific. What really caught my attention [ besides the fact the shooter was a white youth spewing hatred about blacks ] is how black Christians forgave the murderer so quickly. When the murderer appeared in court shortly after being captured, relatives of those killed in church said "we forgive you" to someone that showed no remorse for those killings. It is true that the religious faith of those people who forgave the killer motivated them; but why was it necessary to look into television cameras and say "we forgive him for the killings." The media loved the forgiveness angle and proclaimed it on all their outlets for days. In communities all across America black Christians were smiling like damn fools saying "hate never wins" and "love conquers all."
I have a question that is addressed to those reading this story -has acceptance of Christianity robbed blacks of their will to fight oppression ? Author and historian E. Franklin Frazier wrote in his book The Negro Church in America : " the uprooting of Negroes [ from Africa ] and the transportation of them to an alien land undoubtedly had a shattering effect upon their lives. In destroying their traditional culture and in breaking up their social organization, slavery deprived them of their accustomed orientation toward the world..... The vast majority of the slaves submitted to their fate and in their confusion and bewilderment sought a new meaning for their existence in the new white man's world. The new orientation to the world was provided by Christianity as communicated to the slaves by their white masters." In the 500 years of blacks living in America the onslaughts of racism, oppression, lynching, denigration etc. has been continuous. During all of these years blacks have [ with only brief periods of self defense or armed resistance ] forgiven the oppressor at every chance.
Justification for blacks forgiveness of their oppressors has roots in the religion of Christianity accepted shortly after arrival in America. However it is this same religion that has somehow seemed to rob blacks of any determination in their fight against oppression. For according to the forgiveness model, a benevolent and merciful God will correct all injustices [ if not on earth, then in heaven ] all the faithful believers need to do is wait on divine unction from some being in the clouds. It reads in biblical literature how God answered prayers of His chosen people and delivered them out of the hands of many enemies. In America the so called Negro has cried out for hundreds of years for deliverance but what is the response ? A young white male walks into a black church and kills nine people during Bible study. What has been the response to this latest indignity to the black nation? It is found in the language of forgiveness of the shooter-days after he appeared in court.
Black people rely on some being in the clouds to save them from oppression. Gone is the fighting spirit that motivated our ancestors to rise up at various times in history and take visible stands against monolithic oppression embraced by the majority population. If an honest critique is presented about this issue of forgiveness, the present black Christian position shown to the killer of nine people in that black church, came out of a Christian religion that Frazier states "was communicated to the slaves by their white masters." In contemporary times the theme of forgiveness is still being communicated by power brokers in society who feel more comfortable with blacks mouthing forgiveness of oppression than those blacks seeking freedom "by any means necessary."
In the final analysis history is clear that no group of people ever won their freedom from oppression by waiting on someone or something in the sky to save them.
...never in history have groups nations, classes, races-voluntarily relinquished a favored position.
- Reinhold Niebuhr
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