My Faith Journey: The work of preventing White Supremacy from stealing my trust in God

I have been out of the United States for almost 18 months. During that time I have realized that a large part of my acclimation process has involved detoxing, decolonizing, and managing the PTSD of being Black in America. So many times I have been triggered when watching US news, even though I knew that I was no longer personally affected by it. I couldn't watch Ketanji Brown Jackson's confirmation hearings without experiencing my own physiologic response to the misogynoir experienced by all professional Black women seeking positions of power.

When school shootings happened, I mourned and worried as though I was still dropping off my children to schools with active shooter drills.

I question why I still follow certain podcasts that keep me up to date on all of the rights the Supreme Court is systematically stripping away.

Before I left the US, the more advocacy work I did, the more I became disgusted with the state of Christianity in America, and I became angry at God. I remember all of the intimate and tangible ways that my relationship with Him helped me to get to who and where I am today, but I couldn't understand why every time I turned around, I was finding more and more examples of ways that He allowed people of the African diaspora to be literally shit on and abused for centuries.

In my quest to understand and separate God from the White evangelical nationalism corrupting America, and to hear from any faith leaders who acknowledge the evil role that the church has played, I have done a lot of reading.

My very dear friend had given me the book One Blood: Parting Words to the Church on Race and Love by John M. Perkins before I moved, and I took it with me to NZ. I found it on my bookshelf one day and read most of it. I realize that she must have sensed my frustration and angst because the book addressed so much of what I was struggling with. He was an American Christian Minister and civil rights activist, bible teacher and best-selling author, philosopher and community developer. His book was an open invitation for the body of Christ to take inventory of our progress and do as ourselves if we are living by Christ's standards, or have we succumbed to those of the world? I could have filled a whole blog post with quotes from his book.

"That we [The Church] have given up our control of the issue is evident in the fact that the Black Lives Matter movement began outside of the church. We should have sounded the alarm when Michael Brown...Eric Garner.. and so many others were killed. We should have been leading the marches and speaking truth to power. But instead, too much of our energy and drive has been misdirected toward materialism, comfort, and convenience.....We have become inwardly focused and are not the healing agents we once were. This is part of our confession, and we must be broken about it."

"Oh, how beautiful it would be if we could wash one another's wounds from the evil of racism in the church!"

I have read books and listened to interviews by Father Richard Rohr. He expressed what I also observed about Christianity that makes it more of a recruiter for atheism than new souls for Christ.

In his book Breathing Underwater, he discusses the "Close minded, dead heart, body denying thing that much religion has allowed faith to become. Religion is lived by people afraid of hell. Spirituality is lived by people who have been through hell".

"The innocuous mental belief systems of much religion is probably the major cause of atheism in the world today because people see that it has not generally created people who are more strong, caring or creative than other groups and often were a lot worse. I wish I did not have to say that but religion either produces the very best people or the very worst"

Father Richard Rohr

I came across the book below when I saw an interview on Al Jazeera in which Ms. Anthea Butler was on the panel. To hear of the integral role white supremacy, segregation and racism played in the American White Evangelical entity in the US from the very beginning, made me understand why I felt certain things going to church in the US that I never felt while gathering to worship in Trinidad.

How was I able to find God amidst all of the judgement, racism, intolerance and hypocrisy of the Christian church (all denominations included)? That is His miracle I am certain.

"Between the Christianity of this land and the Christianity of Christ, I recognize the widest possible difference"

Frederick Douglas

Below is something I posted on social media recently, after I came across an article about what Rev. William Barber thinks of Christian Nationalism. This was before reading the book by Anthea Butler, which provided me so many more receipts to support my statement below:

"Christian nationalism attempts to sanctify oppression and not liberation. It attempts to sanctify lies and not truth. At best it’s a form of theological malpractice. At worst, it’s a form of heresy."

Rev. William J. Barber II

If you want to know the kind of Christian that I am, listen to Rev. Barber.

There are so many days when I question why God would allow whole races of people to be oppressed and I wonder whose side He was and is really on- surely the God of the oppressor cannot be the God of the oppressed.

Watching the rise of Evangelical Christian Nationalism has brought many of us non-radicalized Christians distress and confusion.

The antithesis of Christ's examples and teachings are paraded around as the true religion and the Bible is bastardized and turned into an excuse for hate and injustice, instead of the Justice, Love and Mercy that is preached within its pages (Micah 6:8 for example). Watching that makes us have to dig even deeper to not lose sight of what being a Christian is supposed to be about.

Black Christian churches have their faults. There is still some misogyny and homophobia that needs to be worked out, but I will tell you that there is where you will more likely see the true essence of God. The fact that we even have white and Black churches in the US should tell you how deeply racism and thus segregation is imbedded in the religion of Christianity. All denominations of Christianity are guilty. Mormons, that includes you.

I will continue to work on not losing sight of the God of love and mercy. The God who will always choose inclusion over estrangement. The God who demands acceptance of His people instead of the weak substitute called tolerance.

While I still cry out many times asking God to get back into the old testament type miracle business, I will stay focused and avoid the distractions of wolves in religious clothing.

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To anyone reading this post who identify as any denomination of Christian, I recommend reading the book White Evangelical Racism: The politics of morality in America.

God still has some answering to do, in my opinion, but, as disturbing as it is to face, separating faith and spirituality from religion and the humans who corrupt it has helped me to hopefully feel less alienated from the God that I used to fiercely trust.