I read a lot of the Old Testament last year, and in the aftermath I’ve been thinking a lot about collective sin.
It seems like the only time this is ever addressed in America is when we’re talking about slavery, or Jim Crowe, or the Trail Of Tears, or Japanese internment camps, or any time white people and the American government can be villainized and a “marginalized group” can be victimized.
I’m not saying that these historical atrocities don’t matter, or that they should be downplayed.
But I don’t know why they’re all we talk about.
Because the more I think about collective sin, the clearer it becomes that in the same way we’re all guilty as individuals, we’re all guilty as races, ethnicities and peoples.
And as a black American woman, I can’t think of a more appropriate time than ⅔ of the way through Black History Month to address one of the most egregious sins of my community.
I know that rates of violent crime are higher among black Americans than any other ethnic group. I know that black Americans disproportionately depend on welfare without any real reason to, like an injury or disability. I know that black America has plenty of problems that might seem more urgent, but I think in one way or another, most of them stem from this root.
What’s weighing on my heart and tearing at my soul is forgiveness — and what happens when it’s rejected generationally.
Forgiveness has never come naturally to me.
I think it may actually be my greatest challenge as a Christian, possibly because I remember things in a way that other people seem not to.
I’ll hear my friends make a comment about something they’re eyeing but can’t bring themselves to splurge on, and buy it for them months later for their birthdays or Christmas. Seemingly insignificant interactions will become seared in my memory. If I think too long about things that happened months ago or even years ago, my body starts reacting like it happened 30 seconds ago.
But even outside of my own experiences, I’ll find myself bristling watching a movie like 27 Dresses, where we’re supposed to think Katherine Heigl is just as bad as her slutty selfish sister because she chose the least flattering avenue to tell the truth about her. Or in Raya the Last Dragon, when the conniving foreigner is clearly about to betray the protagonist years after betraying her the first time, but we’re supposed to be just as mad at the protagonist for making an assumption as we are at the scheming thief.
And when I think about the personal offenses I’ve lived through, and how minuscule my life experiences are compared to historical atrocities like slavery, I know there’s no comparison.
I was blessed to know my great grandfather, but he died before I was old enough to have any real curiosity about his life.
He wasn’t a slave, but I know he was mistreated.
I know he was belittled, dehumanized, and made to feel like the color of his skin was the most important thing about him in the worst possible way. Like no matter what he accomplished or how many stereotypes he defied, all he’d be was a nigger with high cheek bones (he was half Native).
He was born in the 1930s and extremely successful in business. But he wasn’t one for spectacle or pomp. He drove the same white pick up truck and lived in the same, modest home for decades even though he could afford something much nicer.
I remember my mother telling me once that white people respected him; they never called him “boy” or anything like that, but they still didn’t treat him like a white man. I wonder exactly what she meant.
I suspect that everyone in my family tree that came before me had experiences with racism much more severe and dramatic than anything I’ve gone through.
And I know how easy it is to inherit resentment.
You have one generation telling the next about the evil they encountered, passing trauma down like a book of family recipes, and encouraging a never-ending cycle of hatred and animosity that disguises a prison of past pain as present protection.
Whether black Americans want to admit it or not, many of us were taught at some point that white people weren’t to be trusted, that white people could somehow be held liable for any and every struggle we faced, and that we were owed indefinitely as a result.
I have a deep respect and reverence for my predecessors and what they went through, because I know what they made possible for me. But I think an insistence on treating their hardships like our own, with no room for acknowledgment of genuine improvements has hurt black America much more than it’s helped.
I don’t think most black Americans have actually forgiven white people for slavery or what ensued. On the contrary, I believe most of us have clung to it for dear life.
God knows what evil we’re capable of against one another and He tells us to forgive anyway.
Sometimes it feels like God gives us impossible tasks for His own amusement, but everything He commands of us – including forgiveness – is for our own good.
Something I’ve realized is that when you reject forgiveness, you often end up blinding yourself to your own spiritual vulnerabilities and areas for growth.
You’re completely consumed with what was done to you — and maybe for good reason. But when you don’t challenge yourself to overcome your most base human instincts, you usually end up ignoring your own.
This is not a biblical fact and I have no intentions of pretending it is. It’s just something that crossed my mind. But I think there’s a reason that Jesus seems harshest in His condemnation of Pharisees, and it’s that self righteousness has a unique ability to numb us to our own evil.
When we lust, when we lie, when we steal, on some level we can usually recognize that what we’re doing is wrong. But when we’re convinced that everyone but us needs to repent, we’re in deep spiritual danger.
And when every major societal institution reinforces that self righteousness, the threat increases exponentially.
In other words, becoming so fixated on historical offenses against us has dulled us to our own.
We’ve been encouraged — sometimes by elders, sometimes by educators, and sometimes by the culture at large — to treat slavery and Jim Crowe as a permanent get out of jail free card both literally and figuratively.
Many Black Americans — or the people that claim to speak on behalf of us, anyway — insist that “mass incarceration” and the “prison industrial complex” are just extensions of what our ancestors endured. They advocated for laws that shielded juveniles from consequences for adult offenses, let violent, repeat offenders off time after time with slaps on the wrist, and reduced felonies to misdemeanors.
So now we have gangs of rabid teenagers terrorizing the masses, innocent people being slaughtered by reprobates with no regard for human life in completely preventable tragedies, and masked thugs organizing crime sprees knowing they have a minimal chance of ever setting foot behind bars — let alone losing a meaningful period of their lives to prison.
We had affirmative action which eventually became DEI, propping up the most obnoxious imbeciles and grifters our race had to offer. We had constant, hysterical lectures treating black people as if they could do no wrong and white people like they could do nothing but wrong. We had “racism” reduced to a meaningless buzzword, because it became the default excuse when presented with any criticism or even questioning of anyone black.
We had an alarming number of black Americans cheering for OJ Simpson, knowing he was a murderer, because they thought they deserved revenge against white people. We had black Americans destroying cities across the country every time a black person was killed by the police, no matter the circumstances. And we had black people doing gold medal-worthy mental gymnastics to defend Karmelo Anthony after his indefensible violent outburst.
We had a black president that stoked the flames of racial resentment. We had a “black” vice president and presidential nominee that could barely string together a sentence without looking at a teleprompter. And we had the first black woman added to the Supreme Court, undermining the office at every turn and notorious for lenient sentencing for child predators.
Can anyone honestly say we’re better off for it?
Black America is in crisis — and in large part due to a collective grievance mentality and subsequent entitlement.
Too many of us think that because our forefathers were slaves and second class citizens, we’re allowed to skirt the rules, embrace mediocrity and avoid accountability.
I know that black Americans are capable of more than the reputation we’ve earned.
But we won’t achieve it until more of us stop relying on the good will earned on the backs of our grandparents. We won’t achieve until more of us stop treating white people like they owe us something by default. And we won’t achieve it until more of us stop treating our history like a disability as opposed to the inheritance it actually was.
Black Americans aren’t in a worse position today than we would have been without the transatlantic slave trade; we’re in a better one. Because our ancestors were slaves, we were given a birthright in the greatest country that has ever existed, and that the rest of the world risks life and limb to get to.
But for decades, we’ve taken the most valuable legacy we were given for granted and treated it like performative leverage as opposed to the blessing it is.
And what do we have to show for it?
Tribal conflict isn’t new; the Old Testament is full of it.
And the New Testament tells us how it’s resolved, when Jesus shared the parable of the Good Samaritan.
He told the Jews to prioritize their own experiences with people above their history, above their lineage, and above their prejudice.
And my sincere belief is that race relations are the worst they’ve been in 30 years because many black Americans refuse to do that.
That’s not to say that genuine racism against black people no longer exists.
But a black person whose opinion of white people has been more influenced by what others told them than their own interactions needs repentance much more than they need reparations.
what do you think?