Credit: Dan Kitwood/Getty
“I’m ashamed of our history and I’m ashamed of our failure. There is no doubt when we look at our own Church that we are still deeply institutionally racist.” This was Archbishop Justin Welby’s shocking confession last year at the General Synod. He swore to eradicate racism and set up a task force to investigate further.
The Archbishop’s distress was echoed on Panorama this week, as real experiences of racism were aired by members of the clergy, some of whom wept as they told their stories. But as the Anti-racism Taskforce prepares to publish its first report into these assertions of bigotry and prejudice, and set the parameters for a new Racial Justice Commission, cool heads must prevail. The existence of racism in the Church of England does not validate every diagnosis of its cause, and thus, even more so, every prescription for its eradication.
Amid the heightened emotion of our current moment, however, this very important distinction is in danger of being overlooked. The task force has made its diagnoses and is offering prescriptions based upon them. And the most troubling part of the report’s diagnosis, which was leaked a few weeks ago, comes in its section on “theology”. Theology is the heart of the church its body of belief. It provides the reference point for all doctrine and action. On this, the report is bold: the objective must be “transforming the theological landscape”.
It is a damning analysis.
According to the report that I saw, the church’s “existing foundations and principle theological frameworks entrench racial prejudice and white normativity across the church’s traditions and its doctrinal teachings”. Its “systemic and structural racism … derives its legitimation from certain theological foundations” which must be “redressed”. These foundations are “Eurocentrism, Christendom (sic) and White normativity”. They form “underlying theological assumptions” and “a prejudicial theological value system” that shapes “racial prejudice” in the “official teachings of the church”, perpetuated by “predominantly white male theological perspectives and forms of knowledge”. Its theology must be “decolonized”.
The shocking set of accusations provokes two questions: where have these ideas come from? And where, more ominously, will they lead?
In fact, they all reflect the key concepts that are part of a little-known branch of teaching called Black theology, or more accurately, Black liberation theology — a radical, revolutionary doctrine which analyses power structures in the church in order to liberate black people — and its better known (though equally little understood) secular cousin, Critical Race Theory. Unnoticed by many, the two have been making substantial inroads in the Anglican Church and their proponents already dominate the church’s conversation on race.
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SubscribeIf the Church of England has too few people within it who understand its doctrines, and the significance of them, if it lacks even enough intellectual heft and backbone to fight on the one subject it really ought to know and care about, namely what it (and by extension its flock) believes, it really is in deep trouble.
It’s understandable (though desperately disappointing) if Social Studies departments at universities disappear up their intellectual arses, and twenty-somethings in PR departments feel the need to virtue-signal on behalf of their companies, and your man-in-the-street figures he’ll sit this one out since it’ll harm his career to swim against the tide.
But for the church not to know what it believes in, to lack the moral confidence to even argue, ‘No, we are not what you claim, you are wrong, what we are and believe is fair and just and good’ , is just pitiful.
And they think falling attendances are because they’re not hip enough, not ‘appealing’ or relevant or whatever.
Jesus wept.
It struck me as absolutely correct what I read somewhere recently, maybe here in Unheard, namely that the C of E and the BBC have an almost identical fundamental problem, namely that they both strongly dislike nearly all of their congregation/audience and what they assume are their attitudes and values.
They are also both full of the same people who have the same agenda as America-by linking our history with slavery. They can then bring forward policies to atone for our collective guilt and the more people resist , the more they are told they are at fault. It is obviously fact free as most people have nothing to do with slavery and those that did fairly quickly abolished it. I would have thought the clergy were familiar with the Joseph and his colourful coat bible story where he is sold into slavery by his brothers, which happened many years before western society appeared.
Precisely as George Orwell said some years ago now.
Hi Seb; I see this quite differently. To me, this is an example of the church actually trying to live what it professes to believe: that everyone is of equal, inherent and infinite value; that we all sin, whether we are aware of that or not (i.e. there is an unconscious component to sin); and that self-reflection, repentance and atonement are essential aspects of Christian life.
Can overdo it though-a story has emerged today that as well as returning genuine Benin bronzes ,Lambeth Palace has decided to return two bronzes that were made and gifted to the then Archbishop of Canterbury in 1980;s ie nothing to do with colonialism ,conquest , empire and all the rest , just a couple of thoughtful presents.
If people are of equal value, then why choose to treat one set differently on the basis of their skin colour? The article seems to imply that access to ordination will be dependent upon perceived adherence to a doctrine (anti-racism, as defined by CRT theorists in this case) that basically says you are racist unless you agree that everything is racist, and if you happen to be white, it’s your fault. Personally I think that dividing the world into victims and aggressors, the right, the wronged, and the irredeemable sinners, based upon skin colour, is simplistic and, yes, just plain wrong. It would confer upon a particular group of people the right to judge others based upon the degree to which they profess belief in a highly contentious fringe ideology, which includes claims that the principles of the Church enshrine systemic and structural racism.
Really? Do they?
Tell that the priesthood in Uganda, to North Korean Christians maintaining their faith even in labour camps, tell that to to Yazidis. And tell it to all the righteous men and women who have through no fault of their own been born white and still striven to do good in the world.
There is nothing in your post I disagree with. I simply believe that the church, and other pillars of our great civilisation, the one that produced the scientific method, that freed slaves because it was the right thing to do, that was democratic earlier than anywhere else, that said a man is innocent until proven guilty, has a right to a fair trial, that all men are equal before the law, that this church need not mutely accept the claims being made about it, but should stand up and refute them.
The church should be judging CRT not the other way round. And it is CRT and its ideological mutations like intersectionality that should be found wanting, since they seek to divide people, not unite them, to base judgment upon what someone is and not who.
Well put
If only it were that simple I’d go back to church.
After 2,000 years of faithful prayer, scholarship, persecution the Christian church finally sees the light, its eyes opened by atheists of the most self-indulgent, materialist, self-righteous generation the world has seen? Really?
You put it rather better than I did. Thank you.
There is the Bible which is the authority for whatever theology men construct from it. There is the Holy Spirit of God who guides men in the understanding of the Word of God.
God doesn’t look at skin colour, but the heart of a man.
It seems to me that the people in the C of E who accept any theology based on skin colour have not gained this “insight” from either the Bible or Holy Spirit.
I have to conclude that Black Theology, Liberation Theology and Critical Race Theory as described in this article are all human rather than Godly ideas which come from the prince of this world to confuse and attack the church. Anyone gullible enough to believe those who espouse these matters is not hearing from Holy Spirit.
If skin colour has determined roles in the C of E, anyone who claims to be a “victim” and a Christian will have to accept humbly that we all receive from God what He has planned for us, and not to struggle for power, position, revenge or apologies as we must forgive others in order to be forgiven ourselves. Every complainant/victim seems to me to lack forgiveness and lack humility. Seeking redress is not the way of the Lord, for He says, Mine is the judgment. Wrongdoers in the C of E have to bear their own guilt, but they too can be forgiven, and need to be forgiven, rather than vilified. We are all sinners, so pointing fingers at others is not the way forward.
Thank you, I entirely agree.
Wasn’t it Martin Luther King who hoped to see the day when his children would be judged by the content of their character, not the colour of their skin?
Yes but nobody believes that now. Racism has been redefined to account for the inherent evil of white people, which transcends their character. The Western world is eating itself.
Beautifully put thank you.
We all know that Archbishop Wellness (sic) is an utter fool, as evidenced by the fact that he has fallen for the sinister CRT nonsense that is designed to destroy our societies.
Welby certainly is a fool, aiding and abetting all those who are intent on destroying what remains of the church of which he is leader and of which he is apparently so ashamed. How is it that people like him always seem to rise to the top of organisations such as the BBC and the National Trust? What have we all, very largely tolerant and easy-going, done to deserve these Marxist jobsworths? Perhaps it is a punishment for original sin.
There are enough theological differences liable to split the church at the moment without adding yet another. The average age of churchgoers is over 70: predominantly white women who are not going to embrace these invented notions. It remains a fact that the CofE is dying out and this political pandering will do nothing to stop that trend. I’m beginning to find Justin Welby embarrassing!
The Church is already dying. CRT will just accelerate things. Obviously, the Church leaders are just missing the point – their old congregations just won’t care.
New religions are taking over – The United Church of Cancel Culture is one of them. This teaches how to destroy the past so that the future will be pure again.
The Church of the Environment preaches that we need to go back to poverty to discover what real life means.
i am one of those “old congregants” who is not going to be a member of the United church of Cancel Culture. What I find interesting, is that it seems younger people in the USA are joining very conservative Protestant churches in droves – you will never find them in the more progressive ones. I also read – but can’t provide links – that even the most conservative branch of the Catholic church is growing in numbers. The traditional church is dying and doing all it can to entice younger members but it seems to be going about it in the wrong way.
This is Satan’s work. Welby is his servant. He will rot in Hell.
Ah, memories of Ian Paisley. You’re not wrong though.
The Reverend Ian Paisley, please.
If I am correct, it would be the Very Rev and Right Honorable Dr Ian Paisley, as a Moderator Emeritus of the Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster.
Thank you, I must admit I had forgotten the rest of his splendid title.
The gods conceal from men the happiness of death, that they may endure life.*
*Marcus Annaeus Lucanus (39 AD – 65 AD)
I tried to reply with a barb from Lucan but the Censor won’t have it !
Moral, never translate!
Cite it in Latin! It will keep readers on their toes anyway!
‘uicturosque dei celant, ut uiuere durent,
felix esse mori.’
(Pharsalia, IV, 519-20.)
Wow! I see the English has appeared above too.
The end game is clear…the ‘oppresser’ can’t ever become the ‘oppressed.’ The ‘final solution’ is their elimination…
That he shall, but by that time it will be of little consolation for the culture and civilisation he is sh¡tt¡ng all over with great impunity. I dearly hope he and his fellow travellers will be made accountable while still in the mortal coil.
Any chance of a translation please?
“And all the others here whom you can see / were, when alive, the sowers of dissension / and scandal, and for this they now are split.”
The fate of the Schismatics: Inferno, Canto 28, lines 34-36. In hell they are sundered perpetually with swords, as they sundered the body of the Church. Dante called this technique – the punishment fitting the crime, essentially – a “contrapasso”.
A religion that bends to fashion is no more than a fashion
How did the writer fail to mention the creators of ‘Critical Theory’, a very dark, Intellectual group of Nihilist, Marxist, Existentialist, Utilitarian, Freudian, thinkers in the Wiemar Republic – that time and place where most of the world’s chaos still resonates from.
They are called the Frankfurt School’ and a needed google if you do not know them. Their mission was to destroy Capitalism and the middle classes so Marxism could take the world.
Google the 11 points, the school of hought they began moved to Columbia University in the 50s and so took American intellectualism, and so captured the education and MSM industries.
it’s ironic that what passes for todays Middle classes are the ones most enamoured of it.
Heteronormative?
It is my experience that the black Churches are the most heteronormative.
Thank God
It you want to find a gay vicar the CofE is full of them. All of them that I have come across, white.
I have written a piece along these lines for Unherd which they have not published (for reasons which are not clear to me). I’d be happy to share it with interested readers.
That sounds interesting.
Yes please
sounds excellent
Yes; it sounds interesting.
yes anything that sheds light on the institution.
Is there nothing these curs won’t touch? The Church of England is the national church, it will
Reflect the 39 articles of its founding and the Anglo catholic doctrine to which it originates.
If they want their own church set one up. Don’t destroy one of the few actual
Cultural and social institutions left.
This will not end well
But that’s the aim – destroy existing institutions and replace them with their own. Since Critical Theory is almost a religion in itself (relying on the belief that racism, for example is ‘structural’ and white people have the ‘original sin’ of prejudice and must atone) it’s only logical for it’s proponents to go for the dominant religion.
Then I hope the authorities that be destroy them, or that they step aside and allows us to destroy them. We cannot allow Critical Race Theory to win.
This is very true and apart from a few individuals and one group such as Counter Weight, I don’t unfortunately.
If Mr Trump was to take up the case of the brutal murder of Ms Alisha Babbitt, it would be a start.
Such a flagrant denial of justice besmirches the name of the United States, and reduces it to the level of the proverbial Banana Republic it is rapidly turning into.
in the long run I don’t think they will if history is anything to go by (see 17th century for details)
Welby is a perfect example of the old adage that if you stand for nothing you’ll fall for anything. Entirely spineless, with no principles beyond appearing ‘progressive’, he is the living embodiment of the cultural drift in our country. When the Archbishop of Canterbury can’t even bring himself to defend simple Christian precepts like the atonement, its a sign of a society completely unmoored from any kind of principle.
At some point we collectively decided that to be racist was the worst thing a person could possibly be, and consequently to be anti-racist was to be the most righteous of all. Therefore, we can vandalise our institutions, smear our history, topple our heroes, even force our public figures to kneel in public and beg for forgiveness, with no compunction. Just as long as it is done in the name of ‘anti-racism’.
And if you object to the players STILL kneeling before the Motherwell v Hibs match because of some violent cop several thousand miles away in Minnesota killed a suspect a year ago, then you are by definition racist and will be dealt with accordingly.
I don’t think the idea that race is a construct is particular to CRT. In fact I’m not sure I agree that it is – I think CT tends to support race essentialism.
But the findings described in the article by the CofE are interesting. I wonder what they make of the fact that the predominantly white, western churches, with their wishy-washy theology, are dying, while the Anglican churches in Africa are thriving, even with all of that old-fashioned colonialist theology. Even here, increasingly the most vital churches are full on immigrants and more traditional in character.
Kimberley Crenshaw made race essentialism central to CRT. A postmodern slight of hand.
Race is no more a construct than dog breeds are.
The problem with Western Christianity is that unlike Liberation Theology or Black Liberation Theology or African Christianity, Western Christianity is not a moral support for the lives of its believers. Western Christianity decided it was for everyone — universal — rather than the spiritual framework for whites of European descent.
Well, it got what it wanted. Have a nice day.
Oxford Regent’s College hosted a ‘Dismantling Whiteness’ conference this weekend which was essentially this for five hours.
The tone was set ten minutes in when the first speaker declared, ‘Jesus is racist’.
The panel later agreed this was fair enough as CRT confirms that we are all racist after all despite our good intentions.
How does that benefit anyone? These are supposed to be intelligent people, yet their conclusion is everything is racist, which also means nothing is racist since the term of diluted by overuse.
Perhaps supposedly intelligent people parrot these ideas because (they perceive) the cost of not doing so as high, namely excommunication from the progressive church.
Think again. I’ve been hearing that “diluted” line for 40 years.
Yet the potency of the accusation of racism or racist has never been stronger.
This is so unbelievably depressing.
I meant to add, Jesus also committed ‘violence’ towards Mary at the wedding when she pointed out the wine had gone. This was all in the opening talk. It didn’t get any better.
Yes, I attended that conference too, for a few minutes. A depressing uniformity of self-flagellation by delegates who were nearly all white, over 50, Corbynites.
As Hannah Arendt observed, every ideology requires an enemy. Despite the reality of racism, the enemy as characterised by BT and CRT is largely imaginary. The only racism to be confronted is that which its proponents deem convenient to confront. Chinese racism as expressed in that country’s appalling treatment of its minorities, for example, doesn’t get a look in.
Moreover, for those proponents to remain relevant, and thus important in their own eyes and the eyes of others, it is crucial that the Enemy should never be defeated. If it were defeated, there would be no reason to listen to these people any more – if there were ever a reason to listen to them in the first place. Il faut que la lutte doit continue, always, without end.
“Il faut que la lutte doit continue”
You’re a state school French teacher, right?
There is one exception, England. Although I must breach the old adage that “self praise is no recommendation “, England, thanks to effortless superiority has no ‘enemy’, not now not ever really.
Critical race theory is pure unadulterated racism it just happens to be anti white.
The church of England is dying and crap like this is another nail in its coffin.
You are no longer relevant in out lives and this won’t make people come flocking back.
“you are no longer relevant in our lives” If only. The CofE has countless schools in which this poison is going to be insinuated into the minds of our young. It is also the custodian of most of our most beautiful and historic buildings and of a glorious choral tradition. And as we were reminded just last Saturday it is also the celebrant at all our great religious occasions.
So it is an essential part of the fabric of our country and our national identity – no wonder that it has been targeted by this wickedness.
This sounds just like Positive Christianity, which was popular in Germany circa 1933 – 1945, but for novelty these neo-racists have inverted which race is ubermensch and which race is untermensch.
Did the SS maintain a Chaplaincy at Auschwitz or the other Extermination Camps?
Oh dear – forgive me Welby but who, pray, is going to pay for all this? Your congregations are collapsing along with your income. Drive good old Mr and Mrs Whitey out and guess what. Their money goes with them.
A future government will be happy to support such churches and churchmen. They provide a sturdy moral prop for the coming Woke regime.
Look at how much money the US government gives to church groups who sponsor and support Third World immigration into the country.
All this bile seeped out of american campuses. Unfortunately the UK is downstream of american culture since the sixties, and any pop fad floats over here. And then much of the rest of Europe feels compelled to opt into it.
I didn’t think, that in the 2nd half of my life, I’d see a significant financial crash, or a global pandemic, and certainly not a mainstream religion redefining itself (which I hope leads to a schism because I didn’t think I’d see one of those either). Only a world war eludes us…
Expect multiple religious schisms. The doctrinal tensions within several churches are too much for them to remain “united”. No matter how 200% tolerant, non-judgemental and inclusive their leaders attempt to be.
… or the return of marxist doctrine, this time in the “Free West”.
It’s not that we Roman Catholics are any better off, with this Argentinian “weeping pope” – a liberation-theologist sh¡tstain on the Church’s fabric. Ratzinger is my pope, and i’m a heretic these days.
So very sad. Ichabod. RJ Neuhaus once quipped that what drives progressive denominations is their need to be liked, which is a modern way, I suppose, of saying ‘the fear of man.’’ Having lost the respect and cultural clout it once enjoyed in the Christian west, the church has decided to baptize whatever is popular in its attempts to ‘be cool too’ and thereby regain its lost prestige. As the Bible teaches, repeatedly, thats a sure fire recipe for becoming pathetic, not respectable. The irony being, as with any idol, progressive churches run after people only to have people yawn and respond to their hipster theology with, ‘why should I come to your church, I get plenty of this stuff at school and on TV.’ No thanks. Having worshipped the idol, the idol not only doesn’t save, the idol damns in the time of greatest need. I remember speaking with a friend who attends a dead and dying progressive Presby church and they were hand wringing about how to re-vitalize their church. They’d used consultants, plans, town halls, etc. After he finished, I said, ‘How about if you simply begin to gather for prayer and ask Jesus to guide you forward?’ He was silent….and then changed the subject.
It’s being pushed by a combination of shockingly naive bishops and equally shocking disingenuous ones with a political agenda who arrogate to themselves the right to trump every fact, truth, piece of data, empirical evidence with their chosen suit. If anything it is reverse racism; but it is also a form of totalitarianism. The House of Bishops have yet again shown themselves to be wolves in sheep’s clothing.
Jesus and His Apostles were neither black nor white. It might have been a providential quirk of geography, but they were neither Europeans nor Asians. They were neither Americans nor Africans. They were definitely not part of the Imperial elite. But I guess that makes them all purpose symbols to be hijacked for anything
They were neither black nor white because ‘race’, the social construct, had not been constructed at the time.
Perhaps the fact that the Church of England has agreed to essentially ignore the last two Easters without a whimper says sufficient for where the priorities of its leadership are, and about it’s sense of purpose. While these may make sense for a social club, even a well-intentioned do-good social club, they probably don’t sit well with an organization who’s core reason for existence is the Resurrection.
I’m not sure celebration of the resurrection would have been best served by defying the law and risking more deaths from Covid.
So why doesn’t Welby resign his position, and retreat to a hut somewhere in Africa and bewail his sin of being born a privileged Old Etonian who seems to have progressed up the ladder of Church preferment with suspicious rapidity? If he did that, I’d be more inclined to at least respect his views.
I suppose it’s just rather nice having a couple of palaces, and a seat in Government, and a considerable stipend, and the opportunity to address the nation , all without much evidence of merit.
Don’t let’s forget that Welby tried to subvert the result of the Referendum, with an alternative ‘Parliament’. Is it really surprising that he is now trying to subvert and overthrow the Church?
Presumably the people making the award have some meaning for the phrase Black Theology. So does White Theology exist too? (Or even white Theology?) If so, what is it?
Maybe paintings with Jesus and God as bearded white men are examples? Or the KKK with their fiery cross?
We know God does not judge us on the basis of our skin colour. Theology is colour blind as it’s about God who no man has ever seen, but who made man in His image. Allocating a skin colour to Jesus other than what it was… same as most people in first century Israel… is seeking to alter or twist truth. We know who the truth twister is…. he seeks to confuse and turn people away from Jesus.
“We know God does not judge us on the basis of our skin colour.”
No. You THINK God does not judge us on our skin colour.
A word of explanation (because the “We know” statement hit a particular nerve).
At my local C of E church, thirty-odd years ago, there was a vicar who was a really good guy, and, I would like to think, a friend. I liked him and his family enormously.
He did, however, have one irritating habit. If he had not had time to produce a fresh sermon, he would fall back on a sermon the theme of which was how he disliked it when people said to him on religious topics “I think….” to which he would reply “You think, but I KNOW.” (which greatly impressed his congregation.)
Given that he was a very intelligent, well-educated man, I found it extremely irritating that he would not accept that he might BELIEVE, or have FAITH, or even THINK HE KNEW, but he was pronouncing on matters he could not possibly KNOW.
I am happy if people state their beliefs, but the arrogance of saying that they KNOW (for example the mind of God) is anathema to me.
And he used to get quite cross when I would say to him “We have to agree to disagree about this – but I know God wants you to make me a cup of tea now.”
He exhibited considerable Christian tolerance if he put up with you continually questioning his Faith.
I didn’t question his faith : merely his failure to accept that his faith did not amount to knowledge.
I fall back on the scribes and teachers of the law who trawled through Scripture to find if anything good came out of Nazareth. There is no reference in the Bible of God judging men on the basis of skin colour… plenty on the basis of commandments broken, wrong doing and wickedness, but never skin colour. As we are created in God’s image, this applies to all of us, whatever skin colour. In the absence of any evidence to the contrary, God’s Word says that He loves all mankind regardless of skin colour. Hence one must conclude He doesn’t judge us on the basis of our skin colour as that part of us isn’t sinful or unholy.
Wonderful. You say what “God’s word” is, because you can’t find a statement to the contrary in a book of uncertain provenance.
I asked God about this : He says you’re deluded. And I know He’s right..
You say you asked God, and that He answered you. How do you know it was God? How do you know that the answer received is right? You say above how could anyone possibly know what God thinks. Mocking me or trying to be sarcastic is not rational argument to justify your assertion, but rhetorical frippery which adds nothing of value to a debate.
You have contradicted yourself by claiming to know that God told you something – i.e. you know what God knows, while accusing others of arrogance or presumption to know what God knows. Theology is knowledge of God… knowing what God knows. The Word of God, the “logos” of God is knowledge of God. Knowing how Jesus spoke to people, knowing the Word of God revealed in the Bible would indicate that God does not prefer or ignore anyone on the basis of skin colour. Martin Luther King was right: a man should be judged on his character and not the colour of his skin.
What astounding circular logic : you know the Bible is the word of God because the Bible says so.
Perhaps you should consider conversion to Islam because it too has a book containing the word of God and it must be correct because its book says so – only more explicitly.
Please explain why your book is right, and the other one wrong.
Jesus who is the Son of God says so. Holy Spirit says so. The apostle Paul says all Scripture is God breathed. Is your argument that a historical figure whose life story is accurately recorded is somehow not proper evidence of truth?
Those who follow Jesus also have experience of the Holy Spirit, and recognise that their experience confirms the truth of God’s Word.
God is love. We all know love exists, but none of us can prove our personal experience of it is real other than comparing the experience of others with similar experiences. Do you think love is real – or hate for that matter? When it comes to the supernatural, the scientists/rationalists/atheists who rely on the natural (or that which they claim they can explain) are blind (preferring to ignore the unexplainable in their terms) if they seek to deny its existence. When they fall in love, they don’t deny its existence. Many have tried to explain love as a set of chemical reactions in our brains, but so far none stands up to scrutiny as fact.
There is in the Bible the story of God’s interaction with mankind. You either believe without seeing miracles (which are inexplicable, but happen) or know when you see the supernatural power of God that He exists.
Perhaps God is a woman, and as such, beyond such tosh?
I fail to see what benefit arises from the blatant racism of something like CRT. In the US, kids are being taught to hate themselves and each other. How does that end well? We have a holiday for a man who talked about “character over color,” yet that man would be labeled a sell-out today by people who claim their lives are more challenging than his was.
At some point, you have to stop playing the victim, take advantage of the opportunities that others fought to secure, and grow up. This means embracing freedom, which is far scarier than the cocoon of victimhood. Freedom means being responsible for one’s decisions and the results. But instead of noting the massive leaps in societal progress, it is more advantageous for people like the archbishop to pick at the scab, to relitigate old grievances, and to perpetuate division.
The report referred to in this article was produced by the Anti-Racism Unit set up by the Church last year. I find the theology section to which Mr Udy refers to be intellectually dishonest and has an obvious political agenda. It is preposterous to think that it will become the basis of any change in the doctrine of the Church. There are often theological debates in the Church but they cannot change the bedrock of Christian belief to which the Church of England bears witness. At every Ordination and Institution of a Vicar or Rector of a parish a priest has to affirm and declare their belief “in the faith which is revealed in Holy Scripture and set forth in the catholic creeds to which the historic formularies of the Church of England bear witness”.
Furthermore any major change in the Church of England has to go through a process of discussion and prayerful discernment at local and national level. The theology of this report is so polemical, political and erroneous that it would not stand the test.
As far as institutional racism is concerned the Church seems to have lost sight of a very simple fact. The previous Archbishop of York was John Sentamu, a black Ugandan. I think this should show any fair-minded person that the Church is not institutionally racist. If a black person can reach one of the top jobs the way is open for others who are called of God to follow. Any glass ceiling has been shattered.
Once again there are some commenters who are purveying “fake news” about the Church’s near demise. The Church is not dying! Many churches are vibrant and growing including the one I have the blessing to belong. Yes there is decline also but that can be and often is turned round by visionary and prayerful leadership.
Your argument concerning the former Archbishop of York is as futile as the same argument being made about US racism and the election of Barack Obama.
Race resentment and revenge do not respond to instruments of so-called white domination such as “evidence.” Please accept that, as well as the actual position you are in during these times.
You imported your problem into England even though you had plenty of evidence of what it would lead to. You did so because of your utopian universalist ideas. You were concerned with what, not Whom.
Change your thinking if you want to live.
Sorry William, apart from your first sentence I don’t understand what you’re saying, but I want to, so could you try again please?
Ah, the old ‘I can’t be racist. Some of my best vicars are black’ argument.
No. It’s an argument based on observation of the Church of England over a lifetime
+
The phrase “famous last words” springs to mind.
People refuse to contemplate absurdity to happen, until it happens. The Holocaust happened, communism happened, and these days absurdity is raining from the sky like cats & dogs.
Time will tell, and the Church has got plenty of that
The Church perhaps, but us laypeople maybe not so much.
“Cui bono – follow the money.” The United Church of Canada went down a similar path in the last decades. People did not use the name of the founder of the church (I mean Jesus Christ) or read the Bible or pray outside of services. Much of the church’s vast wealth in real estate – churches and campsites, etc – is being sold off or rented out. This gives a great deal of money to pay salaries since much formerly volunteer work is now well-paid. “Bums in the pews” – as congregation are called – who donate money are not needed. Attendance has crashed. But ironically, the renters and purchaser of church property are very often ‘ethnic minority’ churches who hold to the authority of scripture. So a United Church congregation of under 30 elderly folk with a well-paid minister and assorted assistant staff is financed by a large noisy congregation of Jesus-loving folks from China, Latin America, Africa, Russia.
the high priest of Amun just called and said hi
Jim Jones just called and wanted to know if Welby needed his famous Jonestown koolaid recipe.
Time for some one to do for the C of E what Henry did for the catholic church
Thomas Cromwell really, and like that other great Englishman Clement Attlee, born in Putney.
What did Henry do for the catholic church (as opposed to the Roman Catholic church)?
You might ask God to tell you… it’s probably easier for you (as you got an answer from him in less than a day last time you responded to my post) than reading up history.
I don’t need to ask Him, because He and I both know the difference between the catholic church and the Roman Catholic church, and you appear not to.
Liberation Theology, Critical Theory and-so-on, is from Frankfurt School Marxism. No where does the Church of England admit that all this stuff is Marxist – but then, come to think of it, neither does this article.
To write an entire article opposing Marxist “theology” without once mentioning that it is Marxist, is rather odd.
When attending Regent College’s ‘Dismantling Whiteness’ conference at the weekend I was quite tempted to ask if they had a favourite era of Christianity under communism.
If it wasn’t the decapitation of Priests during the Russian Civil War could it have been Romania’s Piteski Torture Camp where clergy enjoyed communion via human excrement?
Or maybe when Kim Jong literally steamrollered Christians?
Inequality will always be with us. Christianity uniquely gives a way of coping with it, as we are all children of God. We should be spreading the light of the gospel to a shallow, lost world obsessed with materialism and status. The C of E decides instead to learn from hate-filled zealots and bring darkness into the church.
Equality has been promoted to god by the atheists, in their search for meaning, morality and purpose. Time for the church to choose between our loving, wise creator God and the false created gods.
I don’t think “the poor are always with you” is a commandment, or an excuse to ignore injustice and suffering. Yes, the Christian message can bring comfort to those who are suffering – but Christianity is not the opium of the people, and the commanded “love for ‘our neighbours'” demands more than just comforting them.
You are spot on about the christian demand that followers share the light of the Gospel to a shallow and materialistic world. But part of that is to challenge not just individual acts, but patterns of behavior and systems of injustice.
I believe you go too far when you label as hate-filled darkness the C of E’s imperfect attempts to deal with this injustice (which the article does not deny exists).
If you’re debating substance, you’ve already lost.
“That is to say, if you are trying to convince a skeptic or win a debate, including debates over what policies and views will prevail in a church or other institution, by using factual, logical, rational arguments, you are very likely to lose and in fact, have probably lost already and just don’t know it yet.”
“In our modern, mass media saturated society, most winning arguments are only nominally based on logic. Instead, emotional based appeals are much more key. But above all the position or status of the person making the arguments trumps all. It determines to a great extent, for example, which arguments or emotional appeals are considered valid. The battle for social or cultural status ends up being definitive today in all too many cases.”
The fact is that this debate is so far removed from what Christ came to address that it is a monumental distraction from what really matters. Matthew 13:28
As I am not a Marxist (in spite of my name) associating with a Church committed to Marxist “theology”, Critical Theory, Liberation “Theology” and the rest of the Frankfurt School doctrines, would be dishonest. Perhaps I should no longer describe myself as Church of England – Anglican.
Sadly, I find myself in that position as well, and not even tempted to “go over to Rome”, now the good German Pope has retired, Perhaps I will style myself — in the manner of the apocryphal calling card “(name) A.B. University of Bombay (Failed)” — as E. Walsh, Anglican (Ronin)… I remain entirely atheist to the notion of “racism”, other than the .07% of the human genome responsible for morphological differences.
Yes, I’m afraid as a recently lapsed RC the bad news is Pope Frankie is as Woke as any
Although I am a church member of a denomination which has ignored parts of the Word of God that it doesn’t like and are out of step with the secular world, and seems more interested in ecology than following Jesus, the fellowship I am part of does not accept or have to comply with any of the non-Christian stuff the majority of the leadership think overrides what the Bible says.
There are many Anglicans in the same position: what is said by bishops and clergy that is not Biblical usually does not affect a local church with lets call it a believing team and congregation. Churches led by those who espouse humanist claptrap and omit teaching on all of the Bible usually wither and the leaders are accountable for the sheep misled by them.
However what church leaders say affects the reputation of every Christian who worships in one of their denominations. We are on the back foot if ever asked to defend what church leaders say allegedly in our name, because to be honest, we simply cannot agree with them.
The problem with the Church is division caused by heresy, pride and indifference – highlighted in John’s Revelation on the seven churches of Asia. It was a problem 2,000 years ago, and remains a problem today.
Adrian Plass wrote 30 years ago that after much soul searching God had decided to leave the Church of England, and a spokesman for the C of E responded by saying “losing God is a bit of a blow, but we shall try to carry on as best we can without Him”. That was prophetic, was it not?
I’m not sure there are ANY denominations that don’t ignore some parts of the Bible they find uncomfortable.
This is what happens when the Episcopacy doesn’t actually believe in God.
The cult of shrews, no fella will do
Less comprador cucks do kneel and bow.
Confuses the masses, outraged but passive
No agency unless a clown.
Vote for me, ignorant plebian that be
Unwise to the preselected drones.
Whether left or right, you aren’t so bright
Disciples both with wokery well honed
Taxes raised, by zealots depraved
Religious bigotry the Treasury’s goal.
And atheists like thee, BBC virtue will see
Choose between the yoke or on the dole.
No religion remains, the Bible disdained
Priests, pastors the cult instead promote
Intersectionality, logic is unjust banality
Critical race theory preached to provoke.
The sect of thee, is plain to see.
Dictated! Assumed guilt of feminist foes.
White men obviously, bottom of the tree
Buy indulgences! Soothe Greta’s woes.
Fair England’s history, a civil war I see
The Protestants against the Pope.
In modernity, a Maoist insurgency
Cloaked in the language of woke.
Money overseas, don’t say missionaries
Spread the sermon of bras that burned
Confused yet? You will be, till you see
That the Dark ages have indeed returned.
Any time a racist theory is put into practice by the State a likely result is a holocaust.
The Apartheid regime in South Africa put a racist theory into practice, without a Holocaust. Plenty of evil, but no Holocaust. Interesting, the presence of concentration camps in that country dates back to a previous era with a different set of rulers.
Honestly this sounds like Lutheranism under the Nazis. Utterly terrible and unchristian.
However much you disagree with the approach being taken on racism and allegations of racism, it’s not remotely like anything under the Nazjs.
Justin Welby suffers from delusions of grandeur. His tenure as AB/C has done more damage to the structure and traditions of the CofE than any other AB/C in living memory.
I found it interesting to hear (BBC) on Saturday that the incomparable Duke of Edinburgh had personally requested that honourable Christian Dean of Windsor ‘preside’ at his funeral service.
AB/C (may he suffer long for his ego mania) was merely a courteous ‘add-on’. A last ‘warning’ perhaps of Prince Phillip’s ability as a Judge of Character? The Rev. David Conner did not disappoint in either tone or demeanour.
“O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you that you should not obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed among you as crucified? This only I want to learn from you: Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun in the Spirit, are you now being made perfect by the flesh? Have you suffered so many things in vain—if indeed it was in vain?
“There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”
Saint Paul, Galatians 3
I think the Apostle Paul was describing how things should be, not how they are in, say, 21st Century Anglicanism.
It’s not clear to me from this analysis why the new commissars cannot and therefore won’t be successful, as asserted in the heading
Woke Satanism …
Radical left-wing political ideas had been spread by the American Revolution of 1765–83 and the French Revolution of 1789–99, and the figure of Satan, who was interpreted as having rebelled against the tyranny imposed by God, was an appealing one for many of the radical leftists of the period.[97] For them, Satan was “a symbol for the struggle against tyranny, injustice, and oppression… a mythical figure of rebellion for an age of revolutions, a larger-than-life individual for an age of individualism, a free thinker in an age struggling for free thought”.[92] The French anarchist Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, who was a staunch critic of Christianity, embraced Satan as a symbol of liberty in several of his writings.[98] Another prominent 19th century anarchist, the Russian Mikhail Bakunin, similarly described the figure of Satan as “the eternal rebel, the first freethinker and the emancipator of worlds” in his book God and the State.[99] These ideas likely inspired the American feminist activist Moses Harman to name his anarchist periodical Lucifer the Lightbearer.[100] The idea of this “Leftist Satan” declined during the twentieth century,[100] although it was used on occasion by authorities within the Soviet Union, who portrayed Satan as a symbol of freedom and equality.[101]
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satanism
Competitive Race Theory actively seeks to polarise humans on skin colour.
Black Liberation Theology seeks the same.
Equality of Treatment as safeguarded by the Equality Act is not defined by a particular colour but by all colours.
The cooption of the rainbow as a progressive symbol is a logical falsehood driven by hate and malice.
The Church of England has submitted to Satan.
If the Church of England had to depend on the offerings of the faithful who attend their services, rather than government money, all these prelates would be too busy working second and third jobs. Remove their official church status and be done with it. What is more racist than having an official state church?
Why do UK citizens support so many corrupted organizations with their tax money? The BBC, the CofE, various trusts and institutions who all seem to now hate the UK, portray it as racist and are determined to destroy its history and traditions. Force them all to get real jobs. Begin by telling Welby to learn to code.
I don’t quite see the shock of a guy believing in fantasy (Welby thinking there’s a god) believing in the fantasy of institutional racism.
I don’t think Welby believes in the Christian God of the Bible, or of the Anglican Church.
.?
It “must take care”..?
It must put its hobnailed boots on more like.!
The story is about the CofE but you have Roman Catholic Priests as your picture.
How is this any different from the the Nazis did to the Lutheran Church after 1933. Instead of the sanctified Deutch Volk at the heart of the Church you have the “brown man”
Is there no heresy the CoE will not stoop to?
Using racism to fight racism…a novel approach and doomed to failure. If one lived in Kenya or Zimbabwe, South Africa would the minority white be justified in declaring a Black Supremacy, that all institutions support Black Hegemony? I’m sure not with the specter history of colonization. The wonderful thing about meritocracy in America is that anyone can succeed. Don’t kid yourself “equity” is just about the money. Perhaps power as well.
An interesting and very Anglocentric view of race and religion.
The question is what the Gospel actually says on the issue. What in the historic context of the Church as we know it having been white and at the best taken the Gospel to the black people in Africa.
That model is not longer working. It was however very strongly tied in with the whole view of Empire.
However the concept of Christendom no longer works. There is a profoundly secular Europe – with a few folk memories of rites of passage. The centre of Christianity has moved south – into Africa for the Protestant/Reformed tradition and into Latin America for the Roman Catholics.
The people there have been writing their theology which addresses their experience.
Of course it is perfectly possible to sustain Giles Udy’s position. He is perfectly entitled to continue to believe in the Bible as being the Word of God (what actually do you mean when you say that?) as opposed to the Bible being about God, and that the death of Jesus was for our sins (again which particular theory of the Atonement do you find most effective?) as opposed by Jesus having been killed by sinful humanity through the sins of Humanity.
It is perfectly acceptable for the Church of England to continue as the cultic religion of the English no matter how much support and attendance is reduced.
Alternatively the Church might just be trying to find out what the authentic Kerygma of the Gospel is for the whole community.
I suspect that Giles Udy is be informed by his own life experience, but the problem of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is that it challenges us to understand what the Good News of Christ really is about and seek not only to talk about it, but to live by it so that the Kingdom of God is found in the Communities in which we live
There’s a lot more to Christianity than being a belief system. JudeoChristianity – an amalgam of many more items than merely Christianity or Judaism – is culture. Culture and civilisation. You don’t have to be a believer of God to be a full part of that culture and civilisation – you have to be of a European mind, regardless of your private belief system. Doesn’t matter how fervent religious zeal Africa and the New World acquires, they don’t have the history, culture, civilisation Christianity is built on. And THAT culture and civilisation is endangered by the toxic woke dogma the heads of CoE and the Catholic Church signed up for, not the “Gospel” itself.
You do sound like a preacher of one of those New World culticles.
I’m actually a professionally trained Theologian and a minister of the Church of Scotland. I have however watched Theology chan ge and develop. Of course what you write has been nonsense since Barth and Church Dogmatics 1:2 Religion as unbelief, and you can trace where we are actually back to Bonhoeffer. The views which you are producing are not unlike the ideas behind teh German Christians.
The idea that Christianity is a culture simply failed to recognise just how fluid it has been down the years. It has been the genuine shape shifter as anyone who knows teh history of Christianity in Africa can tell you and teh development of liberation theology in Latin America.
Now that Christendom no longer really exists, as most people don’t have the cultural equipment – a lack of biblical knowledge, or any understanding of belief, and the majority of the community failing to go through the same rites of passage, – The minority in Scotland identify with any form of Religion and I believe that it is just as bad in England.
The question which Christianity demands is what do you think of Christ? It is not enough to like some particular culture.
Thanks for your reply, and apologies if i came across a tad harshly.
I’m not saying that Christianity is solely reduced to ‘culture’. What i was trying to say is that stripping it off of its cultural / civilisational framework will reduce it to a mere “belief system”, a private affair between the individual and the deity. Religion is a manmade construct. Theology is a manmade subject, a science studying the nature / affairs of God. Unlike the nature of God – which is constant -, religion and theology are subject to change, ephemeral, fallible, and susceptible to be hijacked by political agenda.
But that was what Bonhoffer wrote about religionless Christianity and Barth about religion as unbelief.
For Christianity to survive it has to be a faith, or a perceived relationship.
People describe the recent past of as the Bourgeoisie captivity of the Church.
The problem is that the leaders of the religions have jumped on Bandwagon, often not fully understand what is actually being pushed
I don’t disagree. It’s just that faith can be difficult to have. I had it in my late teens – it was like first love or joyful drunkenness on the best wine, then it fizzled out. Trying to chase it doesn’t work. The closest i get is trying to imagine God via algebra (mathematics, geometry & stuff. Not that i understand any of those either – just have a gut feeling that there’s where the understanding of the nature of God is hiding in plain sight, somehow.)
But my lack of faith would not stop me from fighting till the last breath for my (not very existent) Christian faith, shall it come to that.
Of course Faith is difficult, for we are always struggling between faith and doubt. In many ways it is easier to go for the certainties of Dogma, whether it is the Magisterium, or the Predications of a Conservative Reformed Faith.
The problem is that Faith isn’t something which we can chase. It is a gift of God, and is something which has to be worked on, not in terms of “Belief” whatever that is, but in the practical working out of the Faith. What it actually means to love our Neighbour (or even more difficult, our Enemy).
Proir to 313 Christianity was counter cultural. God comes to earth and challenges what the holy people of his time thought, and He continues to challenge us today. After 313, the Faith was codifies into right and wrong answers – orthodoxy and heresy, and cultural norms. it is these cultural norms which are being pushed in this article.
Having been brought up in a very much Reformed tradition, one of the big questions which has always been has been about “Good” people who are outside the community of faith. The liberal position has been to try and recruit them as honorary Christians. You hear it in both the positive thing. an act of kindness is described as a “Christian” and a comment or action which is seen as lacking charity is described as not being very Christian. I would argue that the adverb is not Christian, but humanitarian. Good people of all faiths are joined in a common humanity
The Institutionalised Church is going to have to come to terms with the charges in society and in world view. I would argue that Pope Francis is letting go of the cultural junk which has been added to the Church, while in many ways people like me, Reformed and going for Liberation Theology are in many ways reverting to the Radical Reformation, without the burden of Biblical literalism.
Udy is pushing a cultural position which has little to do within faith, but his cultural understanding. Of course there is the danger that the faith becomes personalised, but Christ’s model for his people is salt, years, light, whihc is not really reflected in teh powerful culturally conformist Church..
I am Irish and while I have not had the experience of coloured people I was once thrown out of a Black pub in Manchester for being Irish. What we get all too often is people who don’t want to admit the problems which there are as dealing with the problems would mean that they might find their own lifestyles and privileges being eroded.
I hope that this rambling helps. Doing the writing certainly has helped as I prepare Prayers of Intercession for Easter 5
Blessings
Hi Johannes; where does Christ fit into your concept of JudeoChristianity?
Being a (somewhat irreligious) Roman Catholic, i regard Christ as the Son of God, ⅓ of the Holy Trinity, Saviour of mankind.
Thank you. And what of his teaching?
That’s an exegetical matter (to paraphrase Father Jack Hackett).
That aside, your name rang a bell – and there you are indeed, right in the Grun:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/oct/03/unconscious-bias-training-fad-mps-pc-jesus-sin#comments
Which pretty much conveys to us your exegetical take on the matter, aligned to liberation theology dogmata. Particularly enjoyed this little snippet:
I gather you meant CENTRAL Europe, including my birth country Hungary.
Yes indeed, there are many pitfalls of unconditional deference to one’s own exegetical take on archive texts. ‘Fraid i don’t share your own personal sentiments at all. And it appears most of the population don’t share them either, thank God for that. Not even the Guardian’s readership.
And on the note of “ethno-nationalism” – are you aware that Hungary is one of the most ethnically diverse countries in Europe, with over 30 distinct ethnic minorities? So how exactly this “ethno-nationalism” and “xenophobia” you speak of applies to them? Are you one of those who believes that ALL foreigners are black and/or muslim? That’s a downright bizarre belief system. Hungary and Poland are eminently welcoming nations to most foreigners. But not to all, indiscriminately. That would be very foolish.
Yes, that is indeed me! I certainly don’t expect everybody to share my views; but then, being popular is not the same as being right. It seems to me that much orthodox, traditional Christian thought and practice is entirely consistent with recent currents of thought around race; I do think however that Christian concepts of forgiveness and redemption are sadly lacking from contemporary discussion on the matter.
It also seems to me that you and I mean very different things by the word ‘Christianity’. It is indeed a broad and often not especially helpful word. I may be wrong but your interpretation of the word seems to leave little room for the teachings of Christ; you see the word as referring to some idea of civilisation: specifically white, European civilisation. I cannot agree with this, theologically or historically; indeed, I find it antithetical to the faith. But obviously I cannot see into your heart and it is not my place to judge you. And thank you for your comments on Hungary; I may well have been inexact with my terminology and I apologise if so, but I stand by my general point. Thank you.
Your debate with Johannes is interesting. I am not sure why you think his beliefs relate specifically to white Europeans; could you clarify for me please> Thanks!
Thanks Judy – it’s something I’ve inferred from his previous comments, such as:
and
Whether it’s white Europeans per se or some idea of ‘white Europe’ is harder to tell. As I say, however, I may be wrong, and rather hope I am.
“Being popular is not the same as being right.” Indeed. Nor is there an obverse truth. Many wrong takes are quite deservedly unpopular. I do agree with you, if I understand aright, that Christianity is not the sole province of European civilization, but I also did not get the impression that Johannes was claiming that it was. However, our cultural expressions are bound to be, nor do they owe any apology, diverse.
True, but there is sometimes a problem in distinguishing our faith from its cultural expression.
You’d be suprised how unmoveable the church is. It’s not fundamentally changing as this article suggests. It’s not changing its fundamental principles. As someone who has asked the church for an national service on the matter, the response from the majority of church members clergy, and church media outlets has been radio silence.
Also, the conversations have been a lot wider than CRT because ordinary people have broader conversations than sticking within the remits of any specific theory. They have more grounded, less theoretical conversations. I watched a panel with Wilby a few months back that highlights older Black christians don’t feel the same way as younger Black Christians do. This article does not capture the nuances of the conversations people are having in daily church life. In my own church, what came out of our convos on race was that no one in our church explicitly experienced racism from anyone in the congregation. For many White middle class people, they were just shocked that any Black people they knew had ever experienced racism in the first place. Useful conversations.
Synod is a big deal for the church, as a result I think it is important to look at these questions at this internatonal level (synod is all Anglican churches across the world) and addressing race and the role of churches in the international context will yield interesting results.
The article’s premise I find is difficult to understand, and also (I don’t have the big picture) but it maybe potentially focusing on minutiae and sensationalising it.
Not to say that the church isn’t using CRT, but that they are primarily using Christian values to reframe their discussions on race, not in lieu of them.
As an insider, I do not feel this article is sympathetic to the wider context. There is a lot more healthy debate and respect for boundaries going on within the church than one might think.
Thanks for a more nuanced and less dogmatic take on the subject than the original article gave us.
Is there a section of these classes where the scourge is used? Seems a good self flagellation of the wicked racists may drive the sin out of them.
Wow this was an extremely informative article. It’s a sign of our times that reliable accurate information is so hard to find.
Ecclesiastes 4: 4: …then i saw all toil and all skill in work comes from a man’s envy of his nieghbour. This is also vanity and a striving after wind.
5: the fool folds his hand, then eats his own flesh.
To rip off someone else quote:
Some churches are so desperate to prove they still exist the decide to publicly commit suicide.
The reaction of thr C of E and RC Church over the last 18 months to the Covid issue, and this Woke nightmare has been the final nail in the coffin for me. No more Church attendance, no more regarding myself as a Catholic. Both churches have destroyed Christianity in this country. What follows is not going to be pretty at all
Someone tell those people that is not compulsory to be Christian.
Either you accept the principles of New Testament or create your own religion.
No one has the right to change the scriptures to his own beliefs and preferences.
Besides, the whole meaning of believing in Jesus is the scorn of secular powers and the absolute desire for internal transformation.
The theory of “whiteness” echoes revenge scenarios rather than Christian thinking.
CRT and BLT proponents are free to believe what they want but they don’t convince as Christians, their bitterness is all over the place.
The dry bones in the leadership of the church reach out for something they perceive has having life – I think the real Church will move Underground and if James Lindsay (author of Cynical Theories) is correct CRT will destroy the church institution as it has destroyed other institutions.
The only intersectionality we’ve got is between race-hustlers and a renewed puritanism – a Middle class huddle fest in the shape of Woke -if it wasn’t race it would be some other flavour of oppression, this is typical of a society on the downward slope of its history – both probably have economic motives conscious or unconsious at their root:
As Davidson and Rees-Mogg predicted in ‘The Great Reckoning’ published 1992 ’The tendency to assign rewards according to status rather than through competition is a common characteristic of closed societies. When there is a common perception that prospects for economic growth in a society have diminished the focus of energies tends to shift away from acquiring competence and productive skills; more attention is devoted to struggles for the redistribution of wealth. These inevitably become worse than a zero-sum game….they undermine future prosperity, doing more to suppress the creation of wealth than they can achieve in redistributing it. The deemphais of science and intellectual rigor for example undermines the very knowledge and skills that made the west richer and more powerful than the rest of the world..’