At the United Nations, a Baptist voice for reparations
Photograph by Charles Parker via Pexels
Rev. Dr. Michael Woolf
During Holy Week this year, I had the privilege of joining the Baptist World Alliance for a side event of the United Nations Permanent Forum on People of African Descent focused on reparations. Hearing from speakers and forming connections with an international group of Baptists dedicated to advocating for an 18th Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) based on reparatory justice showed me one thing – Baptist voices are needed to advance a vision of peace and justice for our world, but white churches have plenty of work to do before they can be effective advocates.
Whether it was the outstanding speakers at the “Missing SDG” event, or the delegates gathered from around the world, the topic of reparations was on everyone’s lips. As the world reckons with what to do with the outstanding amount of wealth obtained from plundering the African continent’s resources through colonialism or the transatlantic trade in enslaved Africans, reparations is the only solution that seems ethical. As delegates from the Jamaica Baptist Union made clear at the event, it is even the stated foreign policy of countries such as Jamaica, which is seeking redress from the United Kingdom.
The Brattle Group has estimated that the United States and Europe owe some $100 – $131 trillion in reparations for the transatlantic trade in enslaved Africans. That is undoubtedly a big number, but when one considers the fact that the vast wealth of the West was taken through the brutal cruelty of slavery, it seems right.
It can be difficult to reckon with the fact that the West’s wealth is blood money, but only a clear-eyed approach to history and the present moment can guide us through. In my work on reparations in Evanston, the site of America’s first municipal reparations program, I have seen that telling the truth can be a pathway to healing the divisions that strike at the heart of our communities. The same is true on the global scale.
In my work on reparations in Evanston, the site of America’s first municipal reparations program, I have seen that telling the truth can be a pathway to healing the divisions that strike at the heart of our communities. The same is true on the global scale.
Jesus tells us that “the truth will set you free,” but do we really trust that to be true? When the Black Manifesto was presented to churches and synagogues in 1969, the amount asked for was $500 million. That demand was ignored, and as a result that number would be several billion dollars today. I imagine the demands of the Manifesto were ignored not only because of the cost, but because it would have required acknowledging that the vast wealth of white houses of worship today stems from their complicity in slavery and later discrimination in housing, healthcare, education, and civic life.
For many of us, the truth is hard to bear. And yet, I do believe it is the only thing that can set us free to be the type of people that God imagined us to be. The parable of the house built on sinking sand comes to mind. Will we build our houses on the solid rock of truth-telling and redress, or will they instead be mired with a flimsy foundation that only pays lip service to the Gospel?
The world needs voices that have clarity about what God has called us to do. For white institutions like mine that benefited and continue to benefit from white supremacy, we have a lot of internal work to do before we can be in solidarity with the international outcry for justice in these times. The good news is there is still time to act.
One of the great benefits of a gathering like the Baptist World Alliance’s is that you can see just how diverse our global communion is. It contains prophetic voices that can lead us to a closer relationship with Jesus. That has never been a solely interior concern; rather, where we put our resources and whether we tell the truth about how we got them is just as much a question of discipleship as any other spiritual discipline.
I think Cornel West put it best: “justice is what love looks like in public.”
Rev. Dr. Michael Woolf is senior minister, Lake Street Church of Evanston, Illinois. He currently serves as the co-associate regional minister with the American Baptist Churches Metro Chicago. His book, published in 2023 by T&T Clark, is titled “Sanctuary and Subjectivity: Thinking Theologically about Whiteness and Sanctuary Movements.” He is also the co-founder of Challenging Islamophobia Together Chicagoland, an initiative that brings together people of all faiths to counter Islamophobia from a religious perspective.
The views expressed are those of the author and not necessarily those of American Baptist Home Mission Societies.
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