The opinion piece in italics below was written by Andre Henry the program manager for the Racial Justice Institute at Evangelicals for Social Action. It was published by Religion News Service on January 9th. {White evangelicals' attacks on James Cone are about power, not truth} I have not previously written about James Cone, for reasons that will become clear below, his philosophy/theology falls outside of that which I would read for my own edification/enlightenment, nor have his books ended up in my pile of non-orthodox/non-Christian books to read in order to understand the beliefs of others. That being said, I have no pre-conceived ideas either for or against James Cone (If Andre Henry is mis-representing him let me know), and am only interacting with the author's assertions about the reasoning behind the critiques of those who have studied and written in response to James Cone. My thoughts will be interspersed below {bracketed in bold}.
(RNS) — A specter has been haunting white evangelicalism. It comes in the shape of James Cone, one of the founders of black liberation theology. {What is liberation theology? The short answer: A synthesis (combining) of Christian theology with socio-economic analysis, often Marxist, that fuses the spiritual liberation of the Gospel with economic/political liberation for oppressed/poverty stricken peoples. Throughout the history of the Church, attempts have been made to fuse Christianity with various philosophies, governmental systems, and cultures. The Early Church was deeply affected by Platonic Greek philosophy, the Eastern Church with the Byzantine vision of its divinely appointed right to rule over the Church, an idea that in the West led to countless struggles (even wars) between Popes and kings and emperors. Christianity in the 18th century began to be fused with the ascendant Nationalism, with horrific results culminating in WWI and WWII. Lastly, American Christianity has often been fused with ideas such as Rugged Individualism, Manifest Destiny, Democracy, and Capitalism. Some of these combinations have been beneficial to the Church and Christian theology, some have been disastrous, most are a mixed bag of blessings and curses. Liberation theology, while emphasizing the need for care for the poor (a positive if handled correctly) is not without its drawbacks.}
As last year ended, Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary President Daniel Akin tweeted in response to a (since deleted) tweet, “James Cone was a heretic & almost certainly not a Christian based on his teachings. ... We do not legitimize him.” {A tweet by the President of a Seminary carries weight, and ought to be nuanced, perhaps with an opening phrase like, "While I don't know his heart/mind, and God alone is our judge..." However, the portion in the ellipsis should not have been left out by Andre Henry as it runs counter to his point. The full tweet's text: "James Cone was a heretic & almost certainly not a Christian based on his teachings. But, to understand him you should/must read him. Then you provide a fair, honest & balanced critique. That is a basic requirement for a good education. Hope that helps. We do not legitimize him." The full quote is far less strident when the middle is left in. It is, in part, the job of leadership in seminaries to protect against heresy, to warn of dangerous ideas, and to try to steer the Church toward the Truth. With a better preface, Akin is simply doing his job, whether or not one agrees with the conclusion.}
After significant pushback, Akin made an amendment: “Though his writings & statements give me pause & great concern for his soul, if when I get to heaven I discover that James Cone is there, I will humbly, gladly & joyfully greet him as my brother in Christ as we together worship King Jesus for His amazing salvation, grace & love.” {This is a better way of putting it. There are a number of Christian leaders, theologians, and writers, past and present, whose ideas stray from orthodoxy, who personal lives exhibited hypocrisy, and who generally leave us with questions about how they stood with God. If, in the end, our worries about them prove less than God's grace, we will rejoice to find that fellow brother/sister in Christ in heaven.}
Some other Christian thought leaders found this too generous. The Rev. Josh Buice, a Southern Baptist pastor, suggested that Akin had “normalized an enemy of the gospel.” {Here is where things get tricky as we strive to define the ideas which are the foundation of our faith, and how they can acceptably be expressed, in order to define what is/is not orthodox, and thus those who are/are not promoting heresy. The Early Church dealt with this powerfully in AD 325 during the Council of Nicaea during which they rejected a definition of Jesus' humanity (a core issue about who Jesus is) put forth by a Christian priest named Arius, which then led to the creed bearing the same name that helped teach future generations of Christian to avoid the errors that Arius had made...What then do we do in response to those who reject orthodoxy, who stray near the edges? Assuming the issue at hand is key and not a matter of conscience, a range of responses are required from Scripture, beginning with a personal appeal to the one in error, and ending with some form of shunning/excommunication, as in 2 John 7-11 or Romans 16:17-18. Christians with good intentions can, and do, disagree about which issues are core, the range of acceptable expressions of those issues, and what to do in response in particular cases of unorthodox beliefs. In this case, the Reverend Josh Buice worried that perhaps President Daniel Akin was being too soft, while the author of the article believes that Akin's response was much too harsh.}
It’s not entirely clear what had occasioned this discussion of Cone, a longtime professor at Union Theological Seminary who died in 2018. But his sins against the white evangelical establishment date back to 1969, when he published “Black Theology and Black Power,” which interpreted the faith through the lens of the black freedom struggle. {Why write/speak about a topic now? Often a good question, but the more important one is this: Were the ideas championed by James Cone acceptable expressions of Christianity, were they unorthodox heresy, or something in between?}In the book’s introduction Cone explained: “I wanted to speak on behalf of the voiceless black masses in the name of Jesus whose gospel I believed had been greatly distorted by the preaching and theology of white churches."
His major themes include the idea, summarized in the mantra “God is black,” that God always sides with oppressed people, that the black experience is a legitimate source for doing theology and that the task of theology is liberation. {This is far from a full response to the theology of James Cone, that's why books are written, not blog posts; a few thoughts: Undoubtedly the Gospel had been distorted in the white churches that had twisted the Scriptures to support slavery and racial supremacy, a fact repeatedly brought to the forefront by the Abolitionists who opposed them, in Great Britain, and then here in America...Any mantra like "God is white" "God is an American", or "God is a woman" is ridiculous, theologically unsound, and leading toward a distorted viewpoint (ironic given the stated aim of undoing a previously distorted view). God is above our categories, above our divisions, and above belonging to any of us. God is the Creator, the Sovereign, holy and immutable. When we speak about God using human categories, we are presumptuous to use any beyond those which God himself chose while revealing himself to the patriarchs, prophets, and apostles {i.e. God calling himself Father}...Lastly, the task of theology is liberation, but the important part of that thought is this: liberation from what, and liberation how? The answer is crucial.}
He raised questions about some tenets of faith that white evangelicals cherish, particularly the inerrancy of Scripture and the concept that Jesus died the death we deserved because of sin. {Here is where Andre Henry goes far astray. The inerrancy (accuracy/reliability/divine origin) of Scripture and Substitutionary Atonement are NOT 'white' ideas. They long preceded our modern issues with race, and are cherished by orthodox Christians throughout the world (of all races) and throughout Church history. To reject them is to take issue with the Apostle Paul, St. Augustine, Martin Luther, and many others. It is NOT an issue of race, but of ideas, ideas that lie at the heart of historic and apostolic Christianity. Ideas embraced (in their own ways) by Orthodox, Catholic, and Protestant Christians alike. When Joseph Smith rejected the orthodox/apostolic understanding of Jesus and Salvation and proclaimed that he had received a new revelation, it was not race that led the Christian Americans who lived near him to soundly reject his heresy, but his ideas. The Truth or error of an idea is not related to the race or gender of its proponents or opponents, nor to their nationality, age, or status. Truth exists apart from us.}
Perhaps the biggest problem white theologians have with Cone’s work is his emphasis on Jesus’ humanity over his divinity, and his conviction that salvation is as much about saving black people from the Klanner’s noose, or the officer’s chokehold, as it is about going to heaven when we die (if it has anything to do with the latter at all). {'humanity OVER his divinity'? Yeah, that's a problem, the flip-side of the one rejected by the Council of Nicaea. Whenever either portion, humanity or deity, is elevated/deflated it has massive implications for Christian theology...Salvation is not 'as much about' anything as it is about saving our souls by restoring a right relationship with God. That process requires repentance and righteous living, here and now, but in service to that larger vision of God's redemptive work within/through us. There are many important issues and causes that we face in this life because of our Christian faith, but none of them hold a candle to the transformation of our hearts/minds/souls through the working of the Holy Spirit in our lives as the result of what Christ accomplished through his life, death, and resurrection. This is THE heart of Christianity, it cannot be shared or replaced with anything else...'if it has anything to do with the latter at all' is full-blown heresy on the part of Andre Henry. Who Jesus is and what he accomplished (i.e. the Gospel, salvation) may not have anything to do with whether or not we go to heaven (or hell) when we die?? This thought is incomprehensible when reading the Scriptures, the writings of the Church Fathers, or virtually any Christian theologian remotely near orthodoxy.}
What Cone decidedly did not lack was sincere devotion to the way of Jesus as he understood it. No, the heresy Cone is guilty of is denying white Christian leaders’ authority to define what Christianity should look like for black people. {Sincere devotion is not good enough, as Jesus himself makes clear in Matthew 7:13-23, although sincere devotion is absolutely required as a manifestation of the belief of those who have been saved. Christian leaders must define what Christianity looks like for Christians. That is there God-ordained task, to examine the Scriptures, and by the Spirit lead the people of God in applying its timeless words and wisdom to our lives today. The authority does not lie in the race, nationality, or gender of the leader/theologian, but in the Word of God that he/she serves. The Gospel looks EXACTLY the same for all peoples in all times. When Christ sent his Apostles into the world to preach the Gospel he sent them to the ends of the earth, to everyone. The Apostle Paul spent a lot of time and energy trying to figure out how best to explain that Gospel message to the Greek gentiles he was sent to, but hear this, the message itself did not change, at all, only its delivery. (Galatians 3:26-28)}
What constitutes heresy in the church depends on where the boundaries for orthodoxy (meaning "right belief") are drawn. The Roman Catholic and the Eastern Orthodox churches excommunicated each other, in 1054, partly because of differing views on the nature of the Holy Spirit. Protestants were declared heretics by the Roman Catholics, and Protestants considered Catholics heretical, largely on the issue of papal authority. {This is correct, orthodoxy is staying within the defined boundaries. The Church took several generations to establish/explain/defend the boundaries of the faith they inherited from the Apostles and the Scriptures, but those definitions hold to this day. It is true that the Church split in half about 1,000 years ago, and that the Western half split again just over 500 years ago, but that does not invalidate the idea of orthodoxy, nor the need for a standard by which we can judge ideas/people to be promoting Truth or error.}
Generally, white evangelicals claim Scripture as the sole standard for measuring orthodoxy. They don’t admit, or don’t see, the white frame that informs their theology. {Martin Luther's rallying cry was Sola Scriptura (Scripture alone), and of course he didn't fully live up to that cry as evidenced by his retention of a traditional sacramental Eucharist and infant baptism, but it was a watershed idea to treat the authority of Scripture ABOVE that of tradition...Do white evangelicals have a lens/frame that clouds their view of the Scriptures? Of course they do, all people have biases and blind spots, inconsistencies and errors in judgment. That is why orthodoxy has two powerful correctives: (1) The Word of God given by inspiration, and (2) the collective wisdom of the Church throughout the generations in understanding and applying it. In addition, the same Holy Spirit works within Christians of all races to correct the errors we bring to the text, to rebuke us when we go astray, and to enable us to see the error of those who speak with a voice different from that of the Good Shepherd.}
Framing, something like a mental field of vision, determines what we don’t see and how we interpret what we do see. White people’s frame tends to ignore the systems of anti-black violence and white supremacy, both subtle and overt, that permeate American society. {It may tend to, but it doesn't have to. I am well aware of the flaws of American society, flaws that have negatively affected a wide variety of groups for a number of reasons. To say that this affects 'white people' in any unique way is incorrect. The Fallen Nature of humanity affects us all equally, as does the redemptive power of the Gospel.}
This explains how some of the founders of American evangelicalism, George Whitefield and Jonathan Edwards, could emphasize God’s wrath and the need for repentance from sin while also owning slaves. They framed their reading of Scripture in such a way that it didn’t interfere with their white supremacy. {Every movement has flawed founders, flawed people are the only ones available. No excuses, they should have seen the sin of their involvement with slavery. How does this relate to the question at hand: Why do (white) evangelicals today object to the theology of James Cone? Guilt by association? That's a pretty tenuous connection and an unbiblical methodology.}
Today that kind of framing leads Whitefield's and Edwards' heirs to miss the connection between social action and Christian faithfulness. Mistaking their frame for the whole picture, they claim that what they can't see isn't there, and they dress their biases in religious language. {Some evangelicals do miss the connection between being a faithful Christian and working for justice in our society, but not nearly as many as the author implies. What is actually happening is a difference of opinion as to which social causes Christian faith speaks to, what one should do about those causes in a pluralistic republic, and how much of our witness as a Christian, or as a Church, ought to be invested in these areas vs. the more focused expressions of Gospel witness. These are complicated issues, with serious and thoughtful answers available that have nothing to do with the race of the people trying to faithfully live as Christians.}
Cone recognized that black Christians needed to embrace a frame of their own. He said, rightfully, that black people and other persecuted groups don’t organize their faith around ruminating on theological propositions, but around encountering God in their struggle for freedom. {A false dichotomy, all Christians need 'theological propositions', i.e. Truth, and they need to put that faith into action in the time/place/culture in which they live. A Truth-less faith, or a Truth-lite faith is not the answer for any group of people, no matter what their history of privilege or oppression might be.}
This experiential emphasis for knowing God can coexist with the white church's emphasis on propositions, but Akin and Buice and similar thinkers can’t help but assert that their frame is better. {The frame isn't in question, the Apostle James made it very clear that experience (action) is the partner of faith, rather it is the content of those very propositions that James Cone called into question. This is a question of faith AND action, mind AND heart, not an either/or.}
And that is how many a theology curriculum is organized, with white male theologians — Luther, Calvin, Barth — as required reading, and everyone else listed as extra credit (if that). {If the writer in question is a Christian, speaking the Truth, why does race or gender matter? A broad curriculum is important, but one based on a thorough understanding of the ideas in question, not one that places thinkers into better/worse categories based on who they are. In the Kingdom of God, these distinctions are meaningless. I've said that already, but Andre Henry doesn't seem to believe it anymore than the racist white supremacists (whom I have repeatedly condemned).}
Cone was no more heretical than any white theologian celebrated today. White Christians simply don’t stop and frisk white theologians for doctrinal contraband as they do black thinkers. {That's a smear, and an unfair one. The list of rejected white male heretics is long, with today's leader among them being Bart Ehrman, and yesterday's being Bishop John Shelby Spong, both rejected by the Church as a whole for heresy/apostasy with no thought to racial solidarity. I don't know how to weigh more/less heretical, being a heretic is a problem, even when it is only a little bit of heresy about a core issue. 'He's only as big a heretic as other white guys you aren't complaining about' isn't much of an argument even if it was true.}
Martin Luther, for example, slips through security with his anti-Semitic writings without seminary presidents expressing "concern for his soul." Thinkers like Cone set off the alarm, on the other hand, because they dare to hold theologians like Luther accountable. {Martin Luther's anti-Semitic writings are a grave stain upon his legacy, what theologian has discounted that? It had horrific consequences when it was embraced by later generations whose own writings inspired the Nazis. Martin Luther doesn't get a free pass because he was white. Flawed Christians can still write the Truth, we as thinkers, given that power by God, can sift the wheat from the chaff.}
This racist exceptionalism is not restricted to Cone. At their recent Social Justice and The Gospel Conference, a panel of male Southern Baptist leaders who drafted a statement on social justice griped that more people didn’t raise issues about Martin Luther King Jr.’s theology, which also held that salvation had to do with social equity.
(They also raised the civil rights icon’s reported infidelities, but men in their position often manage to speak of Karl Barth without speaking of his mistress, Charlotte von Kirschbaum.) {If Barth is given a pass by some who criticize King Jr. that's on them. Moral failings are an equal opportunity flaw, affecting many of the heroes of the faith who ideas/work we would otherwise celebrate without reservation.}
Even though both Cone and King rely heavily on Scripture and center their work on the person and work of Jesus every bit as much as white theologians do, the black thinkers are threatened with hellfire for not staying within the confines of white evangelicalism's tiny gospel. {Wow. 'tiny gospel' is a brutal phrase aimed at the traditional and apostolic Church's testimony regarding the Gospel for two thousand years. 'within the confines' means within orthodoxy. Orthodoxy matters, it has always mattered.}
The difficulty men like Akin face in disposing of Cone or King is that white men no longer have ownership of hell. The days of handing heretics over to the state to be burned at the stake or drowned are long gone. Even excommunication only works if the “heretic” is accountable to a religious governing body. The threat of sanctions is the only thing that once made charges of heresy meaningful. {This is true, and that loss of 'control' isn't necessarily a bad thing, given how real or imagined heretics were treated in the past. What ought the Church to do with heretics and apostates? When Bart Ehrman walked away from the faith he kept his job and sold a lot of books, getting rich and famous in the process.}
The internet’s democratizing influence makes even social excommunication — currently known as “being canceled” — useless. Remember when conservative heavyweight John Piper famously tweeted “Farewell, Rob Bell” when Bell’s 2011 book, “Love Wins,” questioned the existence of hell? Bell went on to publish a New York Times bestseller about the Bible, and there was nothing Piper could do about it. {No, but Rob Bell did walk away from the community to which he had belonged. Whether or not somebody has a NYT bestseller is hardly a fitting evaluation of their orthodoxy and whether or not they still belong within the Church.}
This brings us back to questions of power and truth. Evangelical Christians have long expressed their deep concern about an immanent postmodern apocalypse that would annihilate the notion of “absolute truth.” {A terrifying prospect, perhaps one at times overblown in 'sky is falling' fashion, but a real concern given the developments of philosophy and religion from the Enlightenment to Post-Modernism.}
The advent of fake news in a post-truth presidential administration shows that their anxieties weren’t altogether unwarranted. But truth is not altogether gone. It’s just that we understand the difference between a landscape and someone’s field of vision — their frame.
Is the truth a landscape before us, which each of us sees only in part? Or is truth the power to force everyone to see the world through one frame? {This reminds me of Obi-Wan's 'from a certain point of view' speech. However, it has little to do with traditional/apostolic/orthodox Christianity. For Truth transcends these barriers and limitations for it is God's Truth, it does not belong to us, nor was it created by us. In that sense, Truth cannot be destroyed, even if a particular culture declares the death of Truth with a capital 'T' and seeks to replace it with 'my truth' and 'our truth'. This point works against the author's overall theme. Truth exists beyond the lens/frame/filter that both he and James Cone would view it through (and beyond that of the white theologians he appears to disdain as well). Attempts to minimize and contain that Truth are as futile as they are dangerous in the short-term.}
Whiteness has often defined “truth” as the latter — the acceptance of a white supremacist, capitalist patriarchy as orthodoxy, as normal and ideal, with the threat of violence forcing compliance from those who suffer under that narrative. {The Gospel is NOT 'Whiteness', is does not belong to any race or nationality, it never has. Orthodoxy is defined by the Scriptures and the Church (with the Spirit), any true understanding of the Gospel has no room whatsoever for racial supremacy, nationalism, politics/economics, etc. That the Church in America today struggles with these boundaries is evident, but our failure in no way diminishes the power of orthodoxy itself, for that standard comes from God and will be judged by God.}
By rejecting that one story, many marginalized people are simply stating that the white frame never fit us. It isn’t a loss of truth that’s at stake. It’s the white establishment’s loss of control over the frame, their power to define the boundaries of truth. {The 'power to define the boundaries of truth' has always belonged to God. God gave revelation and established His Church in fulfillment of that authority. When the Church began it was a small minority, soon to be persecuted, it was full of women, slaves, and the rejects of Greco-Roman society who saw the Hope that the Gospel offered to even them. Did the Church gain temporal power? Indeed it did (and its corrupting influences), but what it didn't do is change the orthodoxy that had been handed down to it from the Apostles (Bart Ehrman strenuously objects to that thought, but what he has is zeal, the evidence of history says otherwise). The Church today still follows the orthodoxy established by a traveling Jewish rabbi who taught it first to a group comprised primarily of Jewish fishermen.}
Cone is among those defiantly asserting that white people have no governing role over the religion of black Christians. He reminded us that the white evangelical frame for their gospel has nothing to do with meeting God in the black freedom struggle. He’s an example to us all. And there’s nothing white evangelicals can do about it. {One Lord, One Faith, One Baptism. Either there is One Church, comprised of all those who have been saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ, or the Gospel as it has been understood and preached for two thousand years is meaningless. There is not a church for each race, there is not a church for each gender, and there is not a church for each nationality. We, human beings, have contributed to these false barriers through our failures and our sin, but they do not in reality exist. Jesus Christ is Lord of all, his Word has authority over all who believe. To attempt to sub-divide that Church is as dangerous and foolish today as it was when white racists would not allow their black slaves to worship with them at church.}
