Hope and Despair for Black Lives Matter

Last updated on: February 16, 2016 at 8:22 am by Anne Kennedy

Hope and Despair for Black Lives Matter 2016-02-16T08:22:17-04:00 Anne Kennedy

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

I’m trying to get the audio on my talk from Friday loaded, which means, sadly, me learning how to do something new with a computer. Also, I was going back through it trying to see if what was on the page is what I really said, and I was distracting myself at the same time, and so found this tragic piece over at the Washington Post.

I didn’t say anything about it in the talk, but the whole time I was writing and trying to think about the cross cultural nature of the gospel itself–which is what my talk is basically about–I was circling quietly in my own mind about Black Lives Matter.

America is a peculiar place that I am still trying to understand, and the race and class issues seem to shift and change not only by region of the country, but also by time period. Indeed, ethnicity and cross cultural trouble might be said to be at the heart of this election season in a new and different way with immigration being the roiling issue that it is.

Now, as I’ve said here and there, I’m a political conservative, and so I understand that that makes me a hater who needs to creep quietly into a corner to repent of my sins of bigotry, that many loud and shouting people think that I’m the problem and the only way to be part of the solution is to disappear or vote democrat. But, while that’s going on, in my corner of the fading, crumbling rust belt, I do actually fret a great deal about the poor in my community, the school system, the growing heroine scene, and more than all that, about a couple of women who I know personally, who are caught in an impossibly ridiculous system from which, by their own choice in many cases, they cannot escape, no matter what I do practically to help them.

So depression and suicide is a thing in the black activist community? I’m not surprised at all. Sad and heartbroken? Yes, but not surprised. Because the very basic futility of the task that they are undertaking, and the very wrong foundation upon which it is built, means that depression and mental illness are always going to be stalking round the perimeter, ready to devour.

Black Lives Matter, whose motivations I am not particularly interested in questioning, who I am sure are trying to do good and not evil, I believe suffer from the same particularly American error that the Prosperity movement propagates. Only, in the prosperity movement, the people at the top don’t suffer much, what with all the money rolling in, it’s the people at the bottom, so desperate for healing and happiness. But in Black Lives Matter, the suffering is everywhere, rank, file and celebrity. Why is that?

The error in both is theological and it’s as old as humanity, and as simple. And that is, that the task of “salvation” rests on you. It’s all on you to change whatever it is that needs changed. But for the prosperity follower, that task is confined to the troubles of your own individual life. That is a big enough burden as it is, but at least it is a well defined one. For Black Lives Matter, on the other hand, it is the whole world. And, worse off, whereas the prosperity preacher doesn’t have to convince anyone that something is wrong, the Black Lives Matter activist has to convince everyone.

Furthermore, for the Black Lives Matter person, everything has to be changed, now. Injustice, sin (however it is defined), racism, death–all of it, it needs an immediate, worldly end, now. And that is quite a heavy and impossible task, as well as a futile and discouraging one. I cannot imagine how anyone could carry that responsibility for more than a short while without coming undone at the psychic seams.

It’s why the gospel really does need to be preached to America once more, and why the substance of that gospel really matters. An entire arm of the American family is being hacked off in painful increments, and the only real solution is believed to be too hateful to even be spoken of in the public square. I know it is beating an old tired drum, but you can’t have abortion, that is death, at the center of your cultural landscape, and have one segment of the population participating in it more than all the others, and come away with anything but the shadow of death looming over the living. Abortion is to the black community like the prosperity gospel is to the white. The willing dupe. No one forces you into that clinic with a gun, no one compels you to write that check and send it in–in both cases, you do it yourself, “willingly”.

But the center of the gospel is that your will is broken, that you Cannot do what is right, and that God came to save both you and the world, when you failed. We cannot do other than sin. We cannot do other than embrace the terrible lie that we are what we have been waiting for, that if we just remove circumstances and other people’s bad behavior, everything will be restored to a heavenly state. The fact, however hateful it may sound, is that on earth there is not a single sinless person, black nor white nor Hispanic, no not one. All have turned aside and together we have become worthless. And the sign of our worthlessness is our corporate death grip on death itself.

We have to have the gospel come to these young people who are burdened by a task they have set out for themselves, a task too big and too difficult to bear. They need to put their trust and hope in Jesus. Jesus bore in himself the due penalty of our worthlessness and failure. His resurrection is the only chance at life that any person has, whatever their color and culture. The black life does matter, each and every single one. But it matters because God himself was willing to come and die and bear the eternal weight of sin instead of that life bearing it. He is the solution, both temporally and eternally. It is the depth of tragedy that that message isn’t on the table as a solution to any of these problems.

culture watch

The Prayer of Jonah

Work and the Christian

Binghamton

Culture Watch

Politics

Previous Post

February 15, 2016

A Life Giving Luncheon

Next Post

February 17, 2016 Exiled for the Gospel

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category books Catechesis of the Good Shepherd Children in Conversation culture watch Daily Devotions Demotivations with Anne faith alone for the grandparents GAFCON In conversation with children In the News Kitchen Notes Lambeth Learning Notes Life Going On Men are Human Notes from Home Pictures Reading the Bible Saturday Links Sermons Signs of the Apocalypse The Bad Word Association The Prayer of Jonah Travel Notes Uncategorized Witless Wednesdays Work and the Christian

Select a Month June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 July 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 April 2011 March 2011 February 2011 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010 September 2010 August 2010 July 2010 June 2010 May 2010 April 2010 March 2010 February 2010 January 2010 December 2009 November 2009 October 2009 September 2009 August 2009 July 2009 June 2009 May 2009 April 2009 March 2009 February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November 2008 October 2008 September 2008 August 2008 July 2008 June 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 September 2007 August 2007 July 2007 June 2007 May 2007 April 2007 March 2007 February 2007 January 2007 December 2006 November 2006 October 2006

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

We celebrate a feast with feasting and joy, remembering deliverance from destruction in Persia. What feast are we?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Pentecost Passover Purim Hanukkah

Books by This Author Books by Anne Kennedy

See All Titles »