VEMPHaHa reviewed White Too Long by Robert P. Jones
Review of 'White Too Long' on 'Goodreads'
5 stars
If you are a white American Christian, DO NOT READ THIS BOOK...unless you want to be convicted of the racism that wraps itself around the heart of our christianity like a thorny, choking vine. I've read and read and read about the history and reality of slavery and convict leasing and lynching and racism in America. Yet, this book made me gasp. As Jones surveys the racist positions of churches during the Civil Rights era, I smugly wait for him to say, "But, thankfully, the Episcopal Church was a shining beacon of hope in this nightmare." Instead, he leads me to the NATIONAL CATHEDRAL's stained glass windows installed in 1953 during the racist reaction to burgeoning African American rights. After the killings at Mother Emmanuel, the church "studied" taking down these windows depicting Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson but didn't actually do it until 2 years later after Charlottesville. …
If you are a white American Christian, DO NOT READ THIS BOOK...unless you want to be convicted of the racism that wraps itself around the heart of our christianity like a thorny, choking vine. I've read and read and read about the history and reality of slavery and convict leasing and lynching and racism in America. Yet, this book made me gasp. As Jones surveys the racist positions of churches during the Civil Rights era, I smugly wait for him to say, "But, thankfully, the Episcopal Church was a shining beacon of hope in this nightmare." Instead, he leads me to the NATIONAL CATHEDRAL's stained glass windows installed in 1953 during the racist reaction to burgeoning African American rights. After the killings at Mother Emmanuel, the church "studied" taking down these windows depicting Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson but didn't actually do it until 2 years later after Charlottesville. On the other hand, St. Paul's Episcopal in Richmond (which wants to change its motto from "Cathedral of the Confederacy" to one touting itself as a church of reconciliation) simply cannot bring itself to take down its windows depicting Jefferson Davis as St. Paul and Lee as Moses (!). The book made me focus on our deep desire to clutch at the slender reeds of doing the right thing in our family and faith histories and blot out the drowning waves of complicity. Dear God, I pray I not hereafter succumb. And, dear Jesus, can I figure out my next step here?
