The Tyranny of Greed

Tyranny is a word that has, unfortunately, been heard often in recent years. The term usually refers to “the usurpation of power by a single individual or group, or the circumvention of law by rulers for their own benefit.”*¹ But it can also describe any power, such as greed, that dominates and dehumanizes. 

Greed is the inordinate desire to possess wealth, goods, or objects of abstract value with the intention of keeping it for oneself, far beyond the dictates of basic survival and comfort. It is not merely a personal flaw; it is also a power that enslaves both individuals and societies.

The biblical phrase “the love of money” is clearly a reference to greed (“the inordinate desire to possess wealth”)—and also a clear reference to its tyrannical nature, as it is “the root of all kinds of evil” (1 Timothy 6:10, CEB).

According to my AI “buddy” Claude, “greed was absolutely central to Jamestown's founding in 1607.” The Virginia Company was a corporation “created explicitly to generate profits for its investors.” It became profitable after 1614, when it began shipping tobacco to Great Britain.

The greed of the Virginia Company led to enslaved Africans being brought to Virginia in 1619 to work in the tobacco fields. Human beings were reduced to property so that plantation owners could increase their wealth.

A century later, cotton became king, and greed increasingly drove the engines of slavery. So, citing Claude again, “the desire for wealth [=greed] from cotton drove the expansion and entrenchment of one of history's most brutal systems of human exploitation.”

“The more profitable cotton became, the more deeply the South invested in slavery, making it nearly impossible to imagine their economy without it—which ultimately helped precipitate the Civil War.”

But as far back as 1607, greed also wreaked havoc on Native Americans. The founding of Jamestown inadvertently initiated the genocide of the Native nations. Much later, the desire for more land to grow cotton was a major factor behind the Indian Removal Act of 1830. 

For much of the nineteenth century, greed fueled the seizure of Native American lands under the banner of progress, or “Manifest Destiny,” as settlers and governments justified the displacement/removal of the Indian nations for the sake of acquiring land to use for their own economic gain.

Whenever and wherever greed is rampant, people are exploited, lands are stolen, and justice is distorted. Sadly, though, even today, tyrannical greed continues to shape economies, politics, and daily habits of consumption—and that greed is epitomized in the current POTUS. His “business” activity is just one indication of his greed.

According to an Oct. 9 post (here), Trump has launched ads “to sell his new collection of watches.” This will add to the wealth he has greedily accumulated as President. He reportedly made $10 million in the last year selling watches, sneakers, Bibles, and guitars.

His most profitable business, though, is cryptocurrency. Last year, he made over $57 million from his stake in World Liberty Financial, the cryptocurrency platform. His $TRUMP meme coin launched in January 2025 is estimated to have earned $320 million in fees.

Since the tyranny of greed is so prevalent, attention needs to be given to Malcolm Foley’s book, The Anti-Greed Gospel (2025).*² (Here is a picture of author Foley and his “million dollar smile” along with the subtitle of his book.)

In his book, Foley cites John Chrysostom (d. 407), who asserted that “great is the tyranny of Mammon.” That tyranny exacerbated the idolatrous worship of Mammon rather than the true God. It also led to the construction of racism.

Plantation owners needed a moral and legal justification for treating human beings as property, so they constructed an ideology of racial inferiority. This allowed them to justify the brutal exploitation and to prevent solidarity between poor White and enslaved Black people.

While he does not cite them, Foley’s basic explanation of racism is similar to that of contemporary scholars Inram X. Kendi and Starlette Thomas.*³ They all argue that racist ideas were created to justify slavery. The latter was based on greed, which led to exploitation and then used racist ideology to justify it.

In the last part of his book, Foley challenges churches to confront greed as both a personal and systemic sin, and to replace it with practices of justice, solidarity, and truth.

Since greed is personal as well as societal, all of us need to remember the oft-quoted admonition of Thomas Merton: 

*¹ These words are from Timothy Snyder’s instructive book, On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century (2017).

*² Foley (Ph.D., Baylor University) is a pastor, historian, and speaker who serves as special adviser to the president for equity and campus engagement at Baylor. Foley also co-pastors Mosaic Waco, a multicultural church in Waco, Texas

*³ Kendi is an author, professor, and anti-racist activist. He is the author of three books, the most influential being How to Be an Antiracist (2019). Thomas is an author, preacher, activist, and race abolitionist who serves as the director of The Raceless Gospel Initiative at Good Faith Media. She is the author of Take Me to the Water: The Raceless Gospel as Baptismal Pedagogy for a Desegregated Church (2023).

In This New Year, Let’s Respect the Humanity of Everyone

In December, I finished (slightly) revising and updating the 2020 book I wrote primarily for my children and grandchildren, the subtitle of which now is The Story of My Life from My Birth to My 85^th Birthday (1938~2023). My daughter Kathy (who lives nearby) helped in several ways, including doing some proofreading. 

A few times in my book, I used the word Black(s) to refer to African American people. Kathy, who is a teacher of gifted students in the local public school system, said that that terminology should be changed, and referred to the current recommendations of the APA in that regard.

In their style guide for writing, the American Psychological Association (APA) lists some “general principles for reducing bias,” one of which is “be sensitive to labels.” In that regard is this directive: “Acknowledge people’s humanity.” They went on to say,

Choose labels with sensitivity, ensuring that the individuality and humanity of people are respected. Avoid using adjectives as nouns to label people…or labels that equate people with their condition.

Although there are some descendants of enslaved people in this country who reportedly prefer to term Black to African American, I soon agreed with the APA’s guidelines, and with my insightful daughter.

This insight is something I heard more than 60 years ago from Wayne Oates, the professor of my seminary course in Pastoral Counseling.* I have not, though, sufficiently or consistently put that perspective into practice.

I still remember Dr. Oates telling us “preacher boys” (and I don’t remember even one female student in that course I took in 1961 or ’62) that in our work as pastors, we shouldn’t say things like we’re going to visit the sick or the elderly. Rather, we should always refer to them as sick or elderly people.

Oates, who had a Ph.D. in religious psychology, was emphasizing then what the APA is still stressing now: adjectives should not be used as nouns to label people. The humanity of all people should always be recognized.

Even the humanity of our enemies must be affirmed. That is one thing that impressed me when I read the Sojourners article that introduced and included an interview with Ali Abu Awwad, the Palestinian pacifist I wrote about in my previous blog post.** That article begins with these words:

A core principle of nonviolence is recognizing the humanity of your opponent.

Considerable progress has been made in this regard in recent years. In the public media, “slaves” are now usually referred to as enslaved people. Such language choice separates people's identity from their circumstance.

And just the other day, I was surprised to hear a newscaster on the radio refer to “people experiencing homelessness” rather than “the homeless.” That was another example of people’s humanity being emphasized over their current condition.

But what about Awwad’s emphasis on recognizing the humanity of one’s opponents or enemies? It is certainly commendable that as a Palestinian man he can see the humanity of the Israelis who incarcerated him.

Can Israelis or even us in this in country, though, recognize the humanity of Palestinians affiliated with Hamas? It is certainly easier to demonize such people—and the enemy in every war is demonized. That makes it much easier to kill them.

As an advocate of nonviolence, I agree with Awwad’s recognition of the humanity of all people, including enemies. After all, Jesus said to his followers, “…love your enemies and pray for those who harass you” (Matt. 5:44, CEB).

The Hamas fighters are usually called terrorists, and not without reason. But if we follow the guidelines given above, perhaps they should be called “desperate people engaging in terrorism [=the use of intentional violence and fear to achieve political or ideological aims].”

I do not in any way condone the 10/7 violent attacks on Israel. But I do want to affirm their humanity, and that affirmation comes partly from recognizing their legitimate grievances at the way Palestinians have been treated since 1948.  

There is no telling what may happen, in the Levant or the world as a whole, in this new year of 2024. But among other things, let us always endeavor to respect the humanity of all people.

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  * In my 10/20/14 blog post I wrote that Wayne Oates was “probably the wisest teacher I ever sat under.”

** Only after making my previous blog post did I learn that Awwad was one of two men awarded this year’s Indira Gandhi Prize for Peace, Disarmament and Development in December. That award was bestowed on Awwad for his “efforts towards a non-violent resolution of the Israel-Palestine conflict.” That prestigious Peace Prize has been awarded annually since its establishment in 1986. Jimmy Carter was the recipient of it in 1997.

The Supreme Court Then and Now: Reflecting on the Dred Scott Case

In recent years there have been a couple of bad U.S. Supreme Court decisions, namely, “Citizens United” in 2010 and the decision to gut the Voting Right Act in 2013. But it is widely agreed that the Court’s decision on the Dred Scott case 165 years ago, on March 6, 1857, was the worst ever. 

Dred Scott’s Suit for Freedom

Although it is an embarrassment to me, Missouri, the state where I was born and where I have lived again since 2004, was a slave state from its beginning in 1821, and the Dred Scott case was closely linked to Missouri.

Dred Scott was an enslaved man who was born in Virginia between 1795 and 1799. Peter Blow, his enslaver, brought Scott and his other slaves to St. Louis in 1830 and soon sold him to John Emerson, a surgeon serving in the U.S. Army.

Emerson took Scott with him to Illinois and then to Wisconsin Territory, both areas where slavery was illegal. But then the doctor moved back to Missouri in 1840. Scott, though, claimed that since he had lived in free territories, he should no longer be considered enslaved—and he sued for his freedom.

He won his case, but after it was reversed by the Mo. Supreme Court, Scott and his wife took their case to the U.S. Supreme Court—and to their dismay and the dismay of many, the SCOTUS ruled against them by a vote of 7-2.

However, in May 1857, Dred and Harriet Scott appeared in the St. Louis Circuit Court and were formally freed— but he did not live to enjoy his free status very long as he died of tuberculosis in September of the next year.**

The Supreme Court in 1857

Of the nine members on the Supreme Court in 1857—all White men, of course—five were from the South and were slave owners. Two of the Northerners sided with the Southerners in voting against Scott’s freedom.

Roger B. Taney was the Chief Justice and wrote the infamous majority opinion of the Dred Scott decision. Taney (1777~1864) was born into a wealthy, slave-owning family in Maryland. He was confirmed as a Supreme Court Justice in 1836 and remained the Chief Justice until his death.

(In an interesting but unrelated Missouri connection, a new county in south Missouri was officially organized in 1837 and named in honor of the new Chief Justice. Many years later the now widely-known resort town of Branson was incorporated in Taney County.)

In his infamous opinion, Taney wrote that the majority held that “a negro, whose ancestors were imported into [the U.S.], and sold as slaves,” whether enslaved or free, could not be an American citizen and therefore did not have the standing to sue in federal court.

Ironically, as Chief Justice, Taney was forced to issue the presidential oath to Lincoln in March 1861, and to listen to Lincoln’s inaugural address, where he criticized Taney and the Dred Scott decision, but not directly by name.

After the Civil War, in 1868 the Fourteenth Amendment overturned the Dred Scott decision by granting citizenship to all those born in the United States, regardless of color or former enslavement.

The Supreme Court Now

From the beginning to the present, there have been 115 Supreme Court Justices—and all but seven of those have been White men.

It was of the greatest significance when Thurgood Marshall was confirmed as the first African American Justice in 1967, a full 110 years after the Dred Scott decision.

And now Ketanji Brown Jackson will likely soon be confirmed as the first Black woman to be seated on the Supreme Court.

Both Marshall and Jackson, as well as Justice Clarence Thomas, are descendants of enslaved people who were not and could not be U.S. citizens according to the Dred Scott decision of 1857.

But now the Supreme Court needs to act again to ensure that African Americans, whose full citizenship was acknowledged in the 1860s, can exercise their right to vote despite new Jim Crow laws currently encroaching on the voting rights of Black citizens.

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** Here is the link to a lengthy and informative talk about the Dred Scott case that was given by (now) retiring Justice Stephen Breyer in 2009.

The Christmas Rebellion (aka Baptist War) of 1831

“The Battle for Christmas” was the title of my Dec. 20 blog post. This article is about the battle that began on Christmas 1831 in the British Crown Colony of Jamaica. It is known as the Christmas Rebellion or as the Baptist War. 

Slavery in Jamaica

My initial impetus for writing this blog post came a year ago when I read Baylor University Professor Philip Jenkins’s article “Jamaica’s Baptist War” in the Dec. 16, 2020, issue of Christian Century.

According to Jenkins, from the 1520s through the 1870s, some 400,000 slaves were imported into what became and then was the United States. During that same period, Jamaica brought in almost a million enslaved Africans.

Slavery in Jamaica was largely due to Englishmen seeking to make a fortune from growing sugar cane in that island colony. England gained control of Jamaica in 1655, and soon some enterprising men were lured into creating sugar plantations there—and slaves were needed to work in the cane fields.

In 1662, Englishman Peter Beckford emigrated to the island, taking with him two or three enslaved Africans. By the time of his death in 1710, Beckford’s wealth included 20 Jamaican estates, 1,500 slaves, and a huge amount of bank stock.

“The Beckfords, Slavery In Jamaica” is an hour-long documentary produced by BBC and available to see here on YouTube. It graphically depicts the opulence of the Beckford family and the cruel treatment of the slaves who were forced to toil on their sugar plantations.

Baptist Slaves in Jamaica

The first Black missionary to Jamaica was George Lisle (sometimes spelled Liele), a Georgia slave who was freed by his “owner,” Henry Sharp, in 1778. While still a slave, he was the first African American to be ordained, and in 1783 he became the first Baptist to go to another land as a missionary.

By 1814, there were around 8,000 Jamaican slaves who had become Baptist Christians. Missionary Lisle, who died in Jamaica in 1828, didn’t openly challenge the system of slavery, but he prepared the way for those who did.

Samuel Sharpe was born into slavery in 1801. While he was still a young man, his fellow Baptists nicknamed him “Daddy” because he was literate, intelligent, and exhibited leadership qualities.

According to this 2020 article in The Gazette, UK’s “official public record” since 1665,

Sharpe led a plan for a peaceful general strike to start on Christmas Day in 1831, with the slaves demanding more freedom and a working wage and refusing to work unless their demands were met by the state owners and managers.

However, the peaceful strike morphed into the largest slave rebellion in the West Indies with as many as 60,000 of Jamaica’s 300,000 slaves arming themselves and seizing property across the island. But in just a few days the British forces and the Jamaican government quelled the rebellion.

Fourteen planters and 2-300 slaves were killed during the battles, and later over 300 more were executed. Just before Sharpe was hanged in May 1832, he declared, 

That slave rebellion, though, pushed Great Britain to pass the Slavery Abolition Act in 1833. Full emancipation throughout all Britain’s colonies was implemented in 1838. Quite an accomplishment for the Baptist (and other) slaves in Jamaica!

Baptist Deacons in Jamaica

Sam Sharpe, who led that Christmas Rebellion of 1831 was a Baptist deacon (and lay preacher)—and because so many of those who participated in the battles were Baptists, it is often called the Baptist War.

Another Baptist deacon, Paul Bogle, led a significant antipoverty uprising in 1865. According to Wikipedia, Bogle (b. 1822–24) “was a Jamaican Baptist deacon and activist” who led a march “for justice and fair treatment for all the people in Jamaica.” He was hanged by the government in Oct. 1865.

In 1968, though, the Jamaican government established The Order of National Hero, and seven Jamaicans have been inducted into that Order. Two of those seven are Deacon Sharpe and Deacon Bogle.

Also, Deacon Sharpe’s image is on the Jamaican $50 bill even now. 

Thank God for Sam Sharpe and Paul Bogle, Baptist deacons who led in the struggle for freedom and justice!

Misusing the Bible: The Tragedy of Nat Turner’s Rebellion

Earlier this month I watched the 2016 movie The Birth of a Nation for the third time. It graphically depicts the rebellion of enslaved men in Virginia that began 190 years ago on August 21, 1831. 

Historical marker erected in 1991

The Making of a Black Preacher

Much of what is portrayed in The Birth of a Nation is fictional—or a composite of the historical people of the time rather than specifically about the one boy/man Nat Turner, who was, in fact, born in October 1800 in Virginia’s Southampton County.

It also is historically true that Nat was a precocious boy who learned to read at a young age—although not necessarily in the way it was portrayed in the movie. And he learned to read by using the Bible as his “reader.”

Further, it is factually true that Nat continued to read the Bible regularly and had a deep, even mystical, spiritual life. Both because of his knowledge of the Bible and his mystical experiences, he apparently became a preacher at an early age.

However, Nat was not used by his “owner,” Tom Turner, as portrayed in the movie, for in fact, Tom Turner died in 1822.

But even if Nat was not “used” to pacify the enslaved people to whom he preached in Southampton Co., it is historically accurate that “slaveowners” expected Black preachers to use Ephesians 6:5, Colossians 3:22, and 1 Peter 2:18 often in their sermons.

Also, similar to what is portrayed in the movie, those preachers did so when “slave owners” were present, as they often were. Selective use of the Bible became a tool for the control of enslaved people in the American South.

That is just one of numerous examples of the historical—and current!—misuse of the Bible.

The Re-making of a Black Preacher

Nat Turner, however, seems to have begun to read the Old Testament more and more, especially passages about the “warrior” God depicted in Deuteronomy, Joshua, and some of the Minor Prophets.

Spurred by visions that he considered of divine origin, Nat began to preach more and more, when he could, about the use of force against evil—and he began to plot a violent rebellion against the Whites in Southampton. And, as indicated, the actual uprising began on the night of August 21, 1831.

The actions of Nat Turner and his fellow rebels were brutal. White children were killed along with their slave-owning parents. That was consistent with what the Old Testament includes as God’s instructions to the Israelites in their battles against the Canaanites and others.

The insurrection was quelled in just a couple of days, but it took the lives of some 60 Whites and about four times that number of Blacks. After successfully hiding out for more than two months, Nat was captured and then hanged on November 11.

Critiquing Black Preacher Turner

The main problem I have with Nat Turner’s use of the Bible—as well as with the pro-slavery people of the South—is his/their paucity of references to Jesus Christ and his teachings in the Sermon on the Mount and elsewhere.

Still, it is not hard to have considerable sympathy for Nat Turner. As Judith Edwards writes near the end of Nat Turner’s Slave Rebellion in American History (2000), her helpful book written for high school students,

Nat Turner, whose rebellion was so very bloody, seems not to have been a violent man by choice. The excesses of slavery caused the excesses of his rebellion (p. 99).

So, perhaps the (mis)use of the Bible by Nat Turner wasn’t any worse than, and maybe not as bad as, the (mis)use of the Bible by the Whites of the South in the 19^th century—and now.

But when, oh when, will Christians ever learn how to believe/preach the word of truth correctly (see 2 Tim. 2:15)?

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** My blog post for Oct. 10, 2016, was titled “The Birth of the Nation” and is about the 2016 movie with that name and Nat Turner’s rebellion. While the content overlaps this present post, there is much that is different, and I commend it for your consideration (again). (Surprisingly, there have been over 850 “pageviews” of that post.)

Congratulations, Missouri!

Recently, Missouri was often in the news, but for embarrassing reasons for us Missourians: Missouri, especially the southwest part of the state, was a hotspot for new covid-19 cases. But today (8/10) is a celebratory day for all Missourians; it is the state’s bicentennial. 

Missouri History

The name Missouri came from the Native Americans, and it is usually pronounced mĭ-zo͝or′ē, although in the west/northwest part of the state, mĭ-zo͝or′ə is more common.

The land that became the state of Missouri was part of the Louisiana Purchase of 1803 and was called Louisiana Territory until 1812 when Louisiana became a state. From then until 1821, most of that area was called Missouri Territory.

Then on August 10, 1821, Missouri became the 24^th state of the United States. That was following and in accordance with the Missouri Compromise of March 1820.

That Compromise was federal legislation that stopped northern attempts to forever prohibit slavery’s expansion by admitting Missouri as a slave state and Maine as a free state in exchange for legislation that prohibited slavery in the remaining Louisiana Purchase lands except for Missouri.

Missouri Fame

Missouri was the first state completely west of the Mississippi River to be admitted to the Union, and long ago St. Louis was dubbed “Gateway to the West.” In 1965, construction of the Gateway Arch in St. Louis was completed, and it is the world’s tallest arch.

Missouri was the birthplace of many who became nationally, and internationally, famous. Foremost of those is Harry S. Truman, who always had a home in Missouri. Earlier this year, historians again ranked Truman the sixth best President in U.S. history.

Other famous Missourians include (in alphabetical order), the painter Thomas Hart Benton, author Dale Carnegie, George Washington Carver, theologian Reinhold Niebuhr, and Mark Twain. Also, author Laura Ingalls Wilder lived in Missouri for over 60 years before her death in 1957.

The geographical center of the contiguous United States is actually in Kansas, about 250 miles west of the Missouri-Kansas border. But because of its diversity, Missouri seems more like the center of the nation.

Missouri is not East or West, North or South, but right in the middle, adjacent to all four geographical areas of the 48 states, so I have sometimes claimed that it is the most typical part of the U.S.

Missouri Roots

Even though my pride in Missouri has waned some in recent years, mainly because of the state’s political position, my Missouri roots run deep, and most of my life I have been justly proud of my home state.

My Grandpa George’s grandfather, Franklin Wadsworth Seat, was born in Cooper County in 1818, three years before Missouri became a state.

Not long before Franklin’s birth, his parents, Littleton and Elizabeth, migrated with two of Littleton’s brothers from Tennessee to Cooper Co.—and then in 1844 moved to what is now Worth County.

The area that became Worth Co. in 1861 was the very northwest corner of the state—and of the United States—when Missouri was admitted to the Union and remained so until the Platte Purchase was added in 1837.

I regret that the Seat family in Tennessee, and previously in Virginia, “owned” enslaved people, but as far as I have been able to ascertain, the Seats in Missouri never had “slaves” and a couple of Littleton’s nephews in Cooper Co. were Union soldiers in the Civil War.

Today, I am happy to join with fellow Missourians all over the state in celebration of Missouri’s bicentennial—and to take pride in the fact that some of my branch of the Seat family have lived in the state for all of these 200 years, and even longer.

After my death, some of my ashes will be buried not far from the grave of Franklin Seat, who, as mentioned, was born in Missouri before it became a state and who was buried in Worth County’s New Hope Cemetery in 1905.

So, as a deeply rooted Missourian, I join the chorus of those who, today and this month, exclaim, Congratulations, Missouri! 

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** For those who would like to learn more, here is the link to the Missouri Statehood Day website, which has a schedule of activities, some of which will be live-streamed.

** Many Missouri communities will be having ice cream socials today, including here in Liberty. There will be free ice cream on the square between 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. (More information here.)

The Problem of (Teaching) History: “1619” or “1776”?

This post is closely related to my June 19 article regarding critical race theory (CRT). Most of the legislation seeking to curtail the teaching of CRT has included criticism of The 1619 Project as well. CRT and “1619” both raise the question of how history is understood and taught.  

The Problem of Microhistory

Each one of us has our own personal history, which should, one would think, be rather straightforward and non-problematic. But in writing my life story, now available in print, some historical “facts” came under question. June did not remember some of our family history the same way I did.

The two siblings in Ann Patchett’s intriguing book The Dutch House (2019) discuss their family’s microhistory. One asks, “Do you think it’s possible to ever see the past as it actually was?” The other reflects on how we humans

overlay the present onto the past. We look back through the lens of what we know now, so we’re not seeing it as the people we were, we’re seeing it as the people we are, and that means the past has been radically altered (p. 45).

The Problem of Macrohistory

Recently I also read The Sense of an Ending (2011) by British author Julian Barnes. In that novel, one “high school” student remarks, “History is the lies of the victors.” The teacher retorts that “it is also the self-delusions of the defeated.”

At that point, the most brilliant student in the class says, rather cynically, “History is that certainty produced at the point where the imperfections of memory meet the inadequacies of documentation” (pp. 16-17).

If that is true in personal or family history; it is especially true in writing macrohistory. But the problem is more than just the imperfections of memory and the inadequacies of documentation.

The most serious problem is the biases of the historians and the conscious or unconscious interpretation of past events for the benefit of a particular segment of society.

Thus, the squabble over The 1619 Project continues.

U.S. History: “1619” or “1776”?

In 2019, The New York Times Magazine published The 1619 Project, developed by journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones and others.

The year 1619 was when the first African slaves set foot in North America. The 1619 Project, then, “aims to reframe the country's history by placing the consequences of slavery and the contributions of Black Americans at the very center of the United States’ national narrative" (from this link).

The 1619 Project was strongly criticized by politicians such as former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich (see here) and Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), who proposed the Saving of American History Act of 2020 (see here), and especially by former Pres. Trump.

On the day before the 2020 presidential election, by executive order DJT established the 1776 Commission. Republican politicians continue to praise the flawed 1776 Commission report and to castigate The 1619 Project.

The “1776 Pledge to Save Our Schools” is being signed by numerous politicians, such as the two current Republican gubernatorial candidates in Kansas, who were rebuked by an editorial in the June 28 issue of the Kansas City Star.

There are some obvious problems with The 1619 Project, including some historical inaccuracies (as noted in this 3/6/20 Politico article). It also fails to link the beginning of U.S. history to the mistreatment of Native Americans (as this 9/26/20 opinion piece explains).

But most who oppose teaching CRT and “1619” want to shield students from much of the “ugly” history of the past. They need to consider, though, the truth of the following meme. (The painting depicts some dreadful history of Canada’s First Nations children, similar to what happened in the U.S.) 

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**Of the many articles I have read related to this post, I am linking here to only one, Eugene Robinson’s 6/28 opinion piece in The Washington Post, which is accessible here without a paywall. The sixth paragraph on is directly about The 1619 Project.

Remembering Great-Grandmother

This blog post is about two great-grandmothers: Rachel Seat, my great-grandmother who was scarcely known beyond the county where she lived most of her life, and writer Michelle Duster’s great-grandmother, the world-famous Ida B. Wells. 

Ida B. Wells (c.1917)

My Great-Grandmother: Rachel Clark Seat

Although I have claimed to faintly remember Great-grandmother Rachel, I may remember mainly the picture of me sitting on her lap in 1941 (see picture on right) and what my parents told me about her.

Rachel Clark was born in Perry County, Illinois, in 1852 and in her tenth year migrated with her birth family to Worth County, Missouri, where I was born 76 years later. 

Great-grandmother Rachel married William Littleton Seat in November 1870, the month after her 18^th birthday. Sadly, he died before they had been married ten years—and before Rachel’s 28^th birthday. At the time of his death, they had four children and one on the way.

Rachel was a widow for over sixty years, dying in the summer of 1941. In addition to five children, she was the grandmother of at least eleven, and I don’t know how many great-grandchildren there were/are—but I am happy to be one of them.

Michelle Duster’s Great-Grandmother: Ida B. Wells

Michelle Duster was born 101 years after her great-grandmother, Ida B. Wells, whose birth was ten years after my great-grandmother Rachel, in 1862, the year the Clark family migrated from Illinois to Worth County, Missouri.

Ida died 90 years ago today, on March 25, 1931, ten years before my great-grandmother. But even though Ida’s lifespan was twenty years shorter than Rachel Seat’s, her accomplishments far exceeded what my great-grandmother could ever have imagined.

Early this year, Ms. Duster’s book about her illustrious great-grandmother was published under the title Ida B. the Queen: The Extraordinary Life and Legacy of Ida B. Wells. It is an informative book that is quite visually appealing because of its extensive artwork and other images. 

No one would have the slightest reason to write a book about my great-grandmother, although my Aunt Mary Seat did write a six-page, unillustrated story about her (and available for viewing/reading here).

The Life and Legacy of Ida B. Wells

In July 1862, James and Elizabeth Wells, who were both enslaved on a farm in Holly Springs, Mississippi, became the parents of their first child, whom they named Ida. She was a precocious child, and she learned to read at an early age—and read the newspaper to her father and his friends.

When she was 16, Ida’s parents and her youngest sibling died of yellow fever. Ida was determined to keep her surviving five siblings together. She studied hard and passed the test to become a teacher in a rural Black school. For two years she provided for her siblings in that way.

That was in 1878, just two years before Grandma Rachel became a widow and had five of her own children to take care of from January 1881. So, Ida was providing for her siblings by teaching school in the same year my great-grandmother was working in her neighbors’ fields for 50 cents a week.

And at the same age Grandma Rachel became a widow, Ida became the one-third owner of a newspaper and a journalist in 1889. Five years later she published her first book, Southern Horrors: Lynch Laws in All Its Phases.

For forty years before her death on March 25, 1931, Ida worked as a writer and activist, combatting the evils of lynching and other forms of racism as well as sexism. She was a tireless, and effective, advocate for the social equality of Blacks and of women.

Had she known about Ida B. Wells at the time of her death, Grandma Rachel probably couldn’t have fathomed the outstanding social impact of a little Black slave girl born in Mississippi, whose entire life was within her (Rachel’s) lifespan.    

Ida’s courageous fight for social justice has been recognized in various ways, including the USPS issuing a Black heritage postage stamp in her honor in 1990, Chicago changing a street name to Ida B. Wells Drive in 2019, and her being awarded a Pulitzer Prize Special Citation in 2020.

Thank God for the extraordinary life and legacy of Ida B. Wells!

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Here are some notable books by and about Ida B. Wells (in addition to Duster’s 2021 book):

* Crusade for Justice: The Autobiography of Ida B. Wells (1972, edited by Ida’s daughter Alfreda Duster; 2020, with Afterword by Michelle Duster)

* Ida in Her Own Words (2008, edited by Michelle Duster)

* The Light of Truth: Writings of an Anti-Lynching Crusader (2014, by Ida B. Wells)

Pondering the Birth/Death of Jesus, the Slave

During the Christmas season, we sing/hear many hymns/carols. In the New Testament, though, there are few hymns. Philippians 2:6~11 is most likely one of those hymns, and there Jesus is referred to as a doulos, the Greek word for slave.

“The Christ Hymn”

The words of Philippians 2:6~11 are often called “the Christ Hymn,” and they are a significant summary of the nature of Jesus Christ’s existence. Verses 6~8 emphasize Jesus’ humiliation and verses 9~11 highlight his exultation.

Even though most English versions of the Bible translate the word doulos (in v. 7) as servant, its primary meaning is slave. And Jesus, the slave, ends up being crucified, which according to Black theologian James Cone is the equivalent of slaves and, later, their descendants during the Jim Crow years being lynched.

Those of us who grew up in evangelical churches, and those who are evangelicals today, see the first three verses mainly as linked to Jesus’ death on the cross as the means of providing atonement for sinful human beings.

Be that as it may, Jesus was crucified as a common criminal by the usual Roman means of capital punishment. Moreover, the Jews of Jesus’ day knew that the Hebrew Bible states that “anyone hung on a tree is under God’s curse” (Deuteronomy 21:23).

The last half of “the Christ hymn” emphasizes the inexplicable exaltation of the crucified Jesus. Certainly, both Jesus’ humiliation and his exaltation must be recognized and affirmed. Most of us, though, perhaps fail to grasp the full impact of the ignominy of Jesus’ being “lynched” as a dissident slave.

“The Gospel according to Mary Brown”

In July, a youngish blogger in California posted a long and thought-provoking blog article titled “The Cross and The Lynching Tree by Dr. James Cone.”

On pages 6-7 of his post, the blogger introduces W.E.B. Du Bois’s “The Gospel According to Mary Brown” and provides this link to the “Xmas 1919” issue of The Crisis magazine with, scrolling down, to Du Bois’s brief three-page story.  

Du Bois co-founded the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People in 1909 and long served as the founding editor of The Crisis, the official publication of the NAACP.**

In that 101-years-ago issue of The Crisis, Du Bois took the conventional Jesus story and brought it to his Black readers living in the Jim Crow South. He replaced Jesus with Joshua, a black baby born to a single mother (Mary Brown) sharecropping in the rural South.

That re-telling of the narrative about Jesus was consistent with a central point Du Bois had made in his The Souls of Black Folk (1903) and other essays. He condemned “white religion” as an “utter failure.”

As Cone points out in his book mentioned above, for Du Bois, true Christianity is defined by “the life and teaching of Jesus of Nazareth and the Golden Rule.” But, Du Bois emphasized, “the white church’s treatment of blacks was “sadly at variance with this doctrine” (Cone, pp. 103-4).

As we celebrate Christmas this year—in ways far different from usual because of the covid-19 pandemic—let’s celebrate not only the birth of Jesus as the Savior but also the one who came “to liberate the oppressed” (Luke 4:18, CEB).

In Du Bois’s story of Joshua, “the White Folk” were offended by what he said. They complained, “What do you mean by this talk about all being brothers—do you mean social equality?”

And they also said to Joshua, in Du Bois’s words, “What do you mean by saying God is you-all’s father—is God a nigger?"

These White Folk finally brought Joshua before a judge from the North—but he “washed his hands of the whole matter.” The White crowd then seized Joshua and lynched him.

Since in our land today 100 years later there are still problems of discrimination and oppression because of race and/or class, perhaps this is the “Christmas story” we need to hear and to ponder this week. What do you think?

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** My 9/15/18 blog post was written in honor of Du Bois (1868~1963).

Needed: Justice, Not (Just) Friendship or Even Money

Just as in 1968, racial tension in the U.S. has been rampant these last few months in 2020, and, again, just like back then, one presidential candidate is calling for LAW AND ORDER. But what is the most pressing need for People of Color, and how can the current unrest best be addressed?  

Are Reparations the Answer?

There have been strong calls by some for the U.S. government to provide reparations to the descendants of Black people who were formerly enslaved. In his long, oft-cited June 2014 piece in The Atlantic, Ta-Nehisi Coates makes a strong appeal for reparations.

If it could have been arranged, this month would have been a fitting time for reparations to be paid, for it was 170 years ago on September 18, 1850, that the Fugitive Slave Act was passed by the U.S. Congress, making the enslavement of Blacks in the South even more secure—and more odious.

Harriet Tubman escaped slavery in 1849, but then her daring work freeing other slaves by means of the Underground Railroad was made even more dangerous and challenging after the Fugitive Slave Act took effect the next year.

But there are many problems with reparations: how could it be satisfactorily determined who is eligible for reparations after all these years, and how could adequate funding be provided? With the massive expenditures on covid-19 relief this year, there is no possibility of funding being provided now, even if there were the will to do so.

Reparations are most likely not the answer to the problem of racial unrest in this country for the foreseeable future—or ever.

Is Friendship the Answer?

There has been much talk over the last sixty years about the need for racial reconciliation and for eliminating the segregation of Blacks and whites.

Near the beginning of “A Segregated Church or a Beloved Community,” the sixth chapter in his 2016 book America’s Original Sin, Jim Wallis recounts how in the 1950s Martin Luther King, Jr., sadly said, “I am [ashamed] and appalled that eleven o’clock on Sunday morning is the most segregated hour in Christian America.”

Then Wallis went on to lament that still now “the racial segregation of US churches is nothing short of scandalous and sinful” (Kindle ed., pp. 97, 98).

While I strongly believe that churches should never be segregated because of unwillingness to accept people of different races/ethnicities and have long regretted not being a part of a church here in the U.S. with a significant number of People of Color, I now think that integration is not the primary goal we whites should seek.

Last month, Jennifer Harvey, a religion professor at Drake University in Iowa, wrote a powerful opinion piece for CNN. While her piece was largely in support of reparations, I was struck by her disparagement of all the work that has been done for “racial reconciliation” and the emphasis in recent years on “diversity and inclusion.”

Harvey insists that “we need to be clear that friendships are never a substitute for justice.”

Thus, while definitely important, friendship/reconciliation is not the primary answer to the problem of racial unrest abroad in the land.

The Need for Justice/Equity

In her highly acclaimed book Caste (2020), Isabel Wilkerson writes, “We are not personally responsible for what people who look like us did centuries ago. But we are responsible for what good or ill we do to people alive with us today” (p. 387).

Accordingly, rather than focusing on reparations for the past, what is needed most now is the creation of a more just, equitable society.

If we whites want to help People of Color (PoC) have better lives in this still-racist society, we need to focus most on legislation and law enforcement that, among other things, combats police brutality against PoC; corrects the inequities in the prison justice system; and eliminates discrimination in housing and discriminatory finance charges for both houses and cars.

To do this we can support various nationwide organizations, such as the ACLU, for example, which urges us to Demand Justice Now.

Celebrating Juneteenth

June 19 is a special day that, unfortunately, is overlooked and/or disregarded widely by the dominant culture in the U.S. But Juneteenth, celebrated on June 19 each year, is the oldest nationally celebrated commemoration of the ending of slavery in the U.S.  

The Beginning of Juneteenth

The Civil War officially ended on June 2, 1865. But, much earlier, the Emancipation Proclamation became official on January 1, 1863, so the slaves in Texas were technically freed on that date.

It was not until June 19, 1865, however, that Major General Gordon Granger and his Union soldiers landed at Galveston, Texas, and announced that the Civil War had ended and that all enslaved persons were free.

Granger read “General Order Number 3” to his audience in Galveston. It began,

The people of Texas are informed that, in accordance with a proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all slaves are free. This involves an absolute equality of personal rights and rights of property between former masters and slaves, and the connection heretofore existing between them becomes that between employer and hired labor.

That was the beginning of Juneteenth.

Large celebrations on June 19 began in 1866 and continued regularly into the early 20^th century. Throughout much of the 20^th century, though, there was a decline in the celebration of Juneteenth.

But then in 1980, Juneteenth became a legal state holiday in Texas. By 2000, only three other states had followed Texas’ example. But now Juneteenth is recognized as a state holiday or special day of observance in 47 of the 50 states and in D.C.

The Celebration of Juneteenth

One of the most meaningful events I attended last year was the local Juneteenth banquet, which I mentioned in this blog post. Unfortunately, because of the covid-19 pandemic, there will not be a local in-person gathering this year and few nationwide.

But I am wondering if the strong opposition to, and removal of, Confederate statues and other memorials cannot be seen as this year’s Juneteenth celebration.

Juneteenth is sometimes called Black Independence Day. Certainly, for the enslaved people in the U.S. before 1865, July 4 had little significance, for as Frederick Douglass asked in his famous July 5, 1852, speech, "What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?"

It goes without saying that after the Revolutionary War there were no monuments or statues to King George III of the UK or any British monarch or military man in the U.S. There was no honoring of the opponents of freedom.

Since Juneteenth is the celebration of freedom for the formerly enslaved people of the U.S. and their descendants, why should statues and monuments honoring the military men who fought in opposition to their freedom be allowed on public property?

Ideally, those monuments should be removed in a legal and orderly manner, not by “lynching.” But they should be removed—and, yes, that is a way that Juneteenth can be meaningfully celebrated this year.

The Antithetical Celebration of Juneteenth

As the mainstream news media widely reported last week, DJT was scheduled to go to Tulsa, Oklahoma, for a political rally on June 19.

Plans for a racist President, who a WaPo columnist recently said “might go down in history as the last president of the Confederacy,” to hold a rally on Juneteenth in a city marking the 99^th anniversary of terrible white-on-black violence raised the hackles of many.

Consequently, late last Friday night DJT tweeted that the MAGA rally would be postponed a day and be held on June 20. Yet, that also happens to be the day of many Juneteenth celebrations since it is a Saturday—and even downtown Tulsa (see here) is planning its Juneteenth celebration from 11 a.m. on the 19^th to midnight on the 20^th.

No, holding a political rally in Tulsa on June 19 or 20 is NOT a proper way to celebrate Juneteenth.

But, seeking/supporting the removal of statues and/or monuments that honor those who fought against the freedom, equality, and dignity of enslaved people—or the removal of names of blatant racists on public facilities—is one excellent way to celebrate Juneteenth this year.