From the Worldwide Faith News archives www.wfn.org


Forum addresses racism, need to recognize 'those who stayed'


From "NewsDesk" <NewsDesk@UMCOM.ORG>
Date Thu, 15 May 2003 15:09:23 -0500

May 15, 2003 News media contact: Tim Tanton7(615)742-54707Nashville, Tenn. 
10-31-71BP{283}

NOTE: Photographs of several of the speakers in this story are available.

By Denise Johnson Stovall*

DALLAS (UMNS) - Racism has "clogged the arteries" of the United Methodist
Church, and like a heart-attack victim, the denomination must make changes in
order to survive, according to an African-American church leader.

"We look good, but we're not well," said Marilyn Magee, a staff executive of
the United Methodist Board of Discipleship and former officer of the church's
Black Methodists for Church Renewal caucus.

Magee likened the denomination to a person who has a long-term illness. Black
church members thought the body was healthy enough to overcome its ailment,
but "they were wrong."

"They were not aware (that the) disease of racism clogged the arteries of the
body called the church," she said. "A steady diet of bigotry, discrimination,
and legalized segregation and racism is harmful and has not been good for the
body." Heart attack victims learn that their survival depends on their
willingness to change their lifestyle, and the United Methodist Church must
do the same, she said.

Church leaders wrestled with the problems of racism and reconciliation during
a May 2-4 dialogue sponsored by the United Methodist Commission on Christian
Unity and Interreligious Concerns. The ecumenical agency of the church held
the event, "Acknowledging the Past, Shaping the Future," as a follow-up
dialogue to the denomination's official act of repentance for racism in 2000.

Speakers at the forum emphasized the need for recognizing "those who stayed"
- the African Americans who stayed in the denomination despite a history of
racism.

After the Act of Repentance for Reconciliation, performed by the
denomination's 2000 General Conference in Cleveland, black United Methodists
voiced concern that they had been overlooked. They noted that the apology had
been directed largely at the black Methodist denominations that had formed
over the years in response to racism in the predominantly white church: the
African Methodist Episcopal Church, the African Methodist Episcopal Zion
Church and the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church.
	
Those concerns were addressed during the Dallas forum.

"We all have a commitment to move forward to be the church that God calls us
to be," said the Rev. Bruce Robbins, top staff executive of the Commission on
Christian Unity. "We know that we are part of a broken church, and racism is
a central part of that brokenness.

"We have taken some steps and stumbled some and have taken some steps forward
as the whole 'Act of Repentance' process has gone on since 1996," he said.
His agency "wants to do the best it can to enable and assist this healing, in
envisioning a church that is reconciled and addresses the sin of racism."

The commission needs help as it prepares its report to the 2004 General
Conference, Robbins said, asking for suggestions for additional steps that
should be taken for the United Methodist Church to become whole.

Most of the denomination's 64 annual (regional) conferences have performed
acts of repentance services since 2000, at the direction of the General
Conference.

The National Black Methodists for Church Renewal, a United Methodist caucus
group, had taken the lead in expressing concern following the Act of
Repentance service in 2000. In a letter to the Commission on Christian Unity,
the caucus noted that "most of the General Conference worship and the related
study material say relatively little about those African Americans who
remained members of the former Methodist Episcopal Church, in spite of the
racist indignities we suffered under the yoke of a racially segregated church
structure. We, the members of National Black Methodists for Church Renewal,
are troubled by this omission."

In a letter to BMCR this year, Jerry Ruth Williams of Chesterfield, Mo., an
elected director of the Commission on Christian Unity, said the agency
admitted that the Act of Repentance event "reopened old wounds and revisited
unresolved issues."

"We failed to acknowledge adequately and to apologize to the African
Americans who remained within the denominational bounds from the 18th century
through the creation and eventual dissolution of the (segregated) Central
Jurisdiction of the Methodist Church, and acquired the designation of 'those
who stayed,'" Williams said.

The agency  "is acutely aware" of the need for the denomination to follow up
its Act of Repentance with a similar act of repentance and appreciation for
the African Americans who remained within the United Methodist Church, she
wrote. "It is of paramount importance that the church express appreciation
for the gifts of 'those who stayed.'"

'No debate' about penance

Retired Bishop James S. Thomas of Atlanta noted that following the 2000
General Conference's Act of Repentance, many young African Americans asked
him about "the need for reconciliation."

"Biblically, there is no debate about repentance and reconciliation - none,"
he said. "At the heart of the biblical story is the enduring paradox of human
beings who are forever seeking peace, while at the same time creating
conditions that produce alienation, separation and even subjugation." 

Thomas contends that the service held at General Conference was timely, "no
matter how one feels about the process of repentance and reconciliation." In
fact, the bishop said, "it was indeed long behind times," since services have
been held by other denominations, such as the Southern Baptists, the Roman
Catholics, the Presbyterians.

The United States and the international Methodist family have a long history
of racial dominance, said Thomas, a Methodist historian. "Do not forget, we
are encased in a racially oppressive society in the United States. Slavery
entered these shores in 1619. In the year 2003, the United States is 227
years old, and the UMC is 219 years old. Black slavery was the evil
institution first of state and then supported by church." 

However, Methodism also has a redemptive history, he noted, citing movement
founder John Wesley's fight against slavery; early American leader Francis
Asbury's campaign against slavery in the Southern annual conferences; the
long history of abolitionists in Methodism; and the founding and support of
black colleges by Methodists - the largest number of black colleges by any
denomination or faith group.

"So-called racism is idolatry," he said. "God made us different! Did God make
a mistake? No."

Said Magee: "There are many illusions of inclusiveness in our church. Racism
is a reality, even in the church. We must be wise as serpents and gentle as
doves. We cannot afford nor do we have time for hate or pity."

Bishop Ernest S. Lyght, who leads the church's New York Area, assessed the
challenges facing African-American United Methodists in setting goals for the
future. 

"Quite frankly, I had mixed emotions about the service of repentance," said
Lyght, who was a member of the Pan-Methodist Commission on Cooperation before
the 2000 General Conference. "I was not sure how I felt about the matter of
repentance. Who was repenting? Why? What was to be gained? What did I, as an
African American, have to repent about and-or for?"

Lyght said African American United Methodists must never forget to do "what
we do best."

Quoting Bishop Noah Moore, a leader of the Central Jurisdiction, Lyght said,
"'We were at our best when we helped the denomination to pray into the
future, see into the future and live into the future.'

"We are not at our best when we dwell too long looking to the past and
helplessly staring at our present situation in exasperation and
helplessness."

Lyght challenged the United Methodist Church to open its heart to feel the
pain of African Americans and other disadvantaged groups. The denomination
must also be "receptive to the ideas and teachings of African Americans."

Celebrate contributions

Other participants in the consultation also offered observations. Dallas
layman Joe Nash said the bishops from the historically black Methodist
churches "may never come back to have their powers watered down." He feels
that United Methodists should not only repent but should "celebrate" the
contributions of the blacks that stayed.

"Perhaps the celebration has not been done the way it should," Nash said. "As
black United Methodists, we are now in great leadership roles and are part of
the influence of the church. So we need to be about empowering people -
particularly the young people."

Anne Fleming Williams of Philadelphia, who was the national BMCR chairperson
when the letter of concern was sent to Christian Unity, said African-American
United Methodists have "whined long enough and had enough pity parties."

"We have to continue to 'Acknowledge the Past,'" she said, referring to the
conference theme, "but we don't have to dwell there."
# # #
*Stovall is a freelance writer in Dallas.

 
 

*************************************
United Methodist News Service
Photos and stories also available at:
http://umns.umc.org


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