Bishop Tutu writes of black theology and black consciousness.
Black theology merely incarnates the Christian faith for blacks, just German, Scandinavian and other types of theology incarnate the Christian faith for their various peoples. Black theology is firmly biblical. I am ready to demonstrate this to anyone who is willing to listen.
Black consciousness is of God. Our Lord said the two major laws are "Love God and thy neighbor as thyself." A proper self-love is an indispensable ingredient to love of others. Black consciousness seeks to awake in the black person an awareness of their worth as a child of God. Apartheid, oppression, and injustice are blasphemous and evil because they have made God's children doubt that they are God's children.
It is this ending statement that is so powerful for me today. We have enough trouble accepting the outrageous and gracious love of God to have any voice...any voice - deny that there are any of God's beloved who are not children of God. One odd argument I hear about full-inclusion of glbt sisters and brother in the ELCA is that no one denies that they are children of God. The argument goes on to say that we must love them as brothers and sisters but we must stir them from their ways. Odd. How can one trust that they are God's children if they are limited as to how they can be within the household of God when the rest of us can be there under any condition. Odd. Some try to say that we must love our glbt brothers and sisters so much that we will prayerfully attempt to help them correct their "unnatural ways." Odd. In the name of the risen Christ, Jesus, our worth - the worth of all of us - is set in place and cannot be downgraded or limited. It is only through being a full child of God that the whole community begins to see the gift and marvel of each and every one of us. No limits. No controls. Freely liberated and freely loved - all. Some may call that odd. I call it the glory of God.
Connection: It is always a bit amusing to me that the those in power or those who seem to want to control how the world turns and how the Reign of God is established among us are rarely called blasphemous. And yet, the limits...the rejection...the fear...the anxiety...the half-truths - all seem to develop a world of blasphemy instead of a sacred rule of grace.
Be the God who is maker of all. We long for your presence daily and we long for you ways to become our ways. As the world turns, turn us around again and again until we are not quite sure where we are going. For then, we may just run into someone we have been trying to remove from among us and we will be handed the opportunity to see them with new eyes. Amen.
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