Your image "Meeting of the KKK" shocked me. I said Oh My God! Then, I started laughing and crying at the same time. It was almost funny, the contrast of a man of God shaking hands with a Klan member. It was frightening to think that human beings could be this way. It was disgusting for the same reason, and it was painful to know that this did happen in my country and that it still does.
As you go on about white racist Christians, I want to tell you that I am a Christian who is predominantly white but, unlike the entitled, racist white people, I know that God is the God of all mankind. The God of all mankind has placed non-Christian people who know Him/Her/It in my path for a reason. I am a Christian because I know that Jesus spoke truth just as my relatives and ancestors, the North American Indians/Natives/Indigenous people (what is our name) did and do. God is the spiritual which is above all of the ridiculous worldly notions of mankind.
Yes, the Bible is not perfect. I try to explain that to adamant Christians. I know that certain books were included and certain were excluded per the dictates of the elite white people who decide what was important and what was not. I know that some of the books removed during the Reformation because they had not been canonized in the Hebrew Bible are scripture to Jews, 1 and 2 Maccabees being the most important. They are the story of Chanukah. I know that the Gospel of Thomas is a Gospel in India and possibly in other places that I have forgotten about. I know that there are different books included in the Bible in Ethiopia, the Eastern Orthodox Church and in other denominations. I know that the raving Protestant Christians are unaware of all of this. I know that it is okay for women to speak in church. I know that it was misogynistic Christian men who wrote this because Jesus was completely equal opportunity in every way. I know that the Evangelical Christians who back the Republicans who do not want asylum seekers of color to come in to the country are not doing as Jesus demonstrated and taught because I know that Jesus said to love and help your neighbor and that all people are your neighbor. What I know, above all else, is that there are many deceived people who cling to satan (lower case to disrespect) but who call themselves Christians.
Yes, the KKK is a fine example of this evil. Cross burnings were a Christian thing to do. Anyone who believed that or any of the other disgusting and painful things that they and other right-wing white people have done and continue to do are not Christians. They lie. They use the name of Jesus for evil purposes as the colonizers did.
When you speak of Constantine forcing people to convert, you bring me back to the knowledge of what was done to my people and other people around the world. We knew the God of all mankind. They did not. Yet, through their evil barbarian acts, we were forced to succumb to their selfish, greedy desires. Human beings were not human beings to them. That is not what Jesus taught. Yes, murdering people to force convert them as with the people all over the earth and including Constantine's family members is not Christian at all. God is love.
Thank you for mentioning Zimbabwe and the fact that it began over 100,000 years ago. So much of African history has been covered up. So much of all non-European histories have been covered up. Yes, I have written about this at Medium too.
When you write "White colonists created laws forbidding Black people from reading and writing in America.", I want you to know that Frederick Douglass and, of course, Harriet Tubman along with many others are some of the most amazing people who I can think of. All that they went through. Yet, they were willing to help many other people and even put their own lives at risk to do so. I keep a picture of Frederick Douglass and some of his family members on my laptop where I pull it up often. I have written about all of the people all over the world who are not taught in American history classes or are only given a line or paragraph while European history covers most of the writing in most American textbooks.
When you write "Many Black people found hope and faith in the Bible, and it offered many comforts, but it was all rooted in oppression." do you know that there was a slave Bible? The white slave owners took parts of the Bible out. They ensured that the parts where Moses led the Israelites to freedom was left out of their Bible because they did not want the slaves to seek freedom. The slave Bible was heavily redacted for their purposes.
No, black people or any other people should not be forced to be Christian but the real Jesus has not been heard. People choose to come to Jesus. He does not force them to do so. I have chosen Jesus because I know that He spoke truth but I also choose to know that the true God of all mankind knows all people no matter which religion they choose.
Thanks for being one of my favorite writers on Medium, Allison. May the God of all mankind bless you.
