The Road Toward Racial Justice

A Pastoral Invitation at Easter 2021

Dear Friends in Christ,

As we moved through Holy Week this year, we did so with a deep aching for the resurrection hope and promise that come at Easter. This past year, all of us have felt the toll of living with the pandemic. We are keenly aware that our world is crying out for racial justice and equity. We recognize that the very earth itself groans under the weight of threats to the global environment. Together, we join in longing for the transformation that the Risen Christ brings to our lives, our neighborhoods, and the whole created order.

The people of the Saint Paul Area Synod – all 108,000 of us – belong to 110 distinct congregations and mission starts. While we are predominantly people of European heritage, this synod includes African American, African descent, Asian American, Latinx, and Indigenous rostered ministers and laity. Our social and political perspectives span the gamut from conservative to progressive, as do our homes in urban, suburban, and rural contexts. What connects us is our faith in Jesus Christ.

A New Urgency

Over the past several years there have been a variety of programs, designed to address racism in this synod. There have been book discussion groups, learning cohorts, anti-racism training for congregational leaders, mini grants to help congregations with their initiatives, film recommendations, and experiential learning opportunities. The Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI) has been introduced to help individuals and organizations assess and develop knowledge, attitudes, and skills for engaging diversity. Even during the pandemic, Zoom conversations continued, allowing participants to learn more about the history and impact of racism in this country.

Each of these activities has been a helpful step. However, with the death of George Floyd, many of us recognized a new urgency to address our own attitudes and to help our churches be places where all people are regarded and respected as gifted children of God.

Now, with the joy of Easter before us and the promise of greater safety to gather in person in new ways, it is time to step into a time of wrestling with the consequences of racism in a bolder way. During the 50 days of the Easter season this year, I invite you personally to join me in making a commitment to an ongoing initiative to address racism in all its forms, to seek God’s help in changing our own attitudes and practices that are racist, and to examine and change those habits and actions that have estranged us from one another.

Out of a time of dedicated reflection and prayer during Advent and into 2021, I am convinced that this is soul work we need to do now to live fully as the Christian community we are called to be. While many issues clamor for our attention, we cannot authentically address the vitality of congregational life or our efforts at outreach into the wider community without also addressing the ways we have allowed racism to diminish our witness as disciples of Jesus Christ, the fundamental identity given to us at baptism.

The Road Toward Racial Justice

The specific initiative to which you are invited is called The Road Toward Racial Justice. It is not a packaged program, led by one committee or group of leaders. Instead, it is a commitment to the lifelong work of better understanding and addressing the systems of racism and white privilege that shape attitudes, perspectives, and relationships within our households and faith communities, and diminish our national and global work as a church.

In this initiative we each begin where we are, trusting that God is calling us to live in a way that reflects the power of Christ at work in our lives. Some come to this initiative out of years of deep investment in the work of being an antiracist. Others find themselves being beckoned for the first time into new awareness and learning. As we proclaim in the synod’s statement of purpose, “We are not there yet. We are on the way together.”

The image of a road is broad enough to suggest that there is room for all of us – young and old alike – to join in this soul work, beginning right where we are in our own understanding and experience. The word toward is a reminder that this will be a long process of listening, learning, and repenting in order to grow into relationships and attitudes that fully recognize and respect the diversity of all the children of God. Naming the goal as racial justice acknowledges that perceptions of race and prejudice toward those of other races have seeped into all aspects of our life at a deep and often unnoticed level.

Opportunities With Ministry Partners

The invitation to join others on The Road Toward Racial Justice comes with the understanding that there needs to be multiple opportunities to engage antiracism work in a way that leads to personal and cultural transformation. This diagram offers a glimpse of the many groups already addressing racial equity. (It is simply a draft to suggest the many activity centers and leaders in racial justice work across the Saint Paul Area Synod.)