Structural Racism Isn’t Wokeness, It’s Reality

Christians must not deny the full consequences of centuries of intentional, racist harm. 

By
917

One of America’s most influential pastors is facing a crisis. No, it’s not the crisis of personal scandal. It’s the crisis of church division—over race, ideology, and minutiae of church procedure. Putting aside the procedural arguments, that division is a microcosm of the racial conflicts that are dividing the larger American church and the nation itself. 

David Platt is a bestselling author, the former president of the Southern Baptist Convention’s International Mission Board, and the pastor of McLean Bible Church (MBC), a huge and influential church located outside Washington, D.C. Platt is facing a revolt from self-described “conservative” congregants, a revolt that culminated in a lawsuit filed against the church by a group of its own members, demanding that a Virginia state court intervene in the church’s elder selection process to, among other things, preserve their alleged right to vote in those elections and to mandate a secret ballot.

I’m not going to address the church’s procedural disputes. (Though I will note that it is contrary to basic principles of religious liberty to ask an arm of the state—a judge—to intervene in matters of church governance.) I am going to deal head-on with the prime underlying complaint that has triggered outrage and national media coverage of a struggle for control in one of America’s largest and most influential churches. The charge against Platt and his team can be summed up in one word: wokeness.

The congregants object to what they perceive as a pastoral embrace of critical race theory, and they assert that the Bible alone contains teaching sufficient to address America’s race problems. You can read the comprehensive complaint against Platt and his team here and the allegations of teaching or advocating CRT here. 

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  1. Avatar photo
    Norman Shatkin

    It cannot be stated more clearly that Lincoln put it in his second inaugural: "Yet, if God wills that it (the war) continue until all the wealth piled by the bondsman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword as was said three thousand years ago so still it must be said 'the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether." The rulers of the southern states were MURDEROUS THIEVES, and to punish them was a divine mission.

    Next time someone waves a Confederate flag at a demonstration, remember whose legacy he is celebrating. Hint: it ain't that of conservatives -- religious or otherwise.

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  2. M M (Lee)

    David, my impression is that you oppose equal rights for LGBT Americans. If so, it doesn't make sense to me how you would be writing about this topic.

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  3. Will

    David. Thank you so much for this. My Christian faith is literally hanging on because of you and a few other Christian leaders who are articulating on this and other issues so well and giving us a Christianity we can want to be a part of . I could not agree more with your points in this write up. Loved it. Keep up the great work. I am sure many will criticize but for many of us your direct, transparent and humble approach to racism in the history of the church and our country is a breath of fresh air in an ocean of denial and avoidance of contemplation and repentance.

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  4. Steve

    Quoting Barack Obama here speaking about he racist sermons of his pastor Jeremiah Wright.....
    How does this synch with your thoughts David?

    "They expressed a profoundly distorted view of this country — a view that sees white racism as endemic, and that elevates what is wrong with America above
    all that we know is right with America... The profound mistake of Reverend Wright’s sermons is not that he spoke about racism in our society. It’s that he spoke as if our society was static; as if no progress has been made; as if this country — a country that has made it possible for one of his own members to run for the highest office in the land and build a coalition of white and black; Latino and Asian, rich and poor, young and old — is still irrevocably bound to a tragic past."

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    Tom Wilson

    It's my hope that if those who choose government as the instrument to correct the living standard deficiencies between many blacks the the majority of the races don't do as much harm as The Great Society and other government programs. Government policies and programs intended to address the disparities have reversed the trend toward a greater equity of outcome.
    You will ask what is to be done. The same things cause prosperity regardless of race. You all know what those things are. They stem from individual determinism and commitment.

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    Jordan

    Thanks, David. I've just finished Tim Keller's extended essay on biblical justice, which echos many of the same thoughts you bring up here. These are convicting yet convincing words from you, from Keller, from Platt, even John Piper. One thing you said here gave me a thought. You talked about how offensive it can be for people who are truly not personally racist to be told they are unwittingly perpetuating racist structures. I wonder if the term “structural/systemic racism" may itself be problematic, or even a trigger. This in itself may halt dialog before it starts. After all, racism is a feeling, and structures are not sentient entities; only people are. Thus structures cannot actually be rac*ist*, but they can lock racial disparities that originated through racism into place, or at least extend them. What if we started using a different term, such as "persistent racial disparity" or "systemic racial disparity" or similar. Just an idea. This may help foster more understanding, at least among those willing to listen, but who were too put off by the current, somewhat misleading, terminology.

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  7. H.Allen.Irish

    I'm late to the game, but it's a bit shocking that David would pluck out some obscure (and horrific) piece of scripture to support some sort of racial blood guilt theory. He seems to have fully bought into the basic circular reasoning of the anti-racist cult, which is that unequal outcomes between groups are wholly explained by something called "structural racism." None of the Kendis and the other race grifters ever have to show any examples of actual racism. In their telling, it's just obviously there because more black people are jailed, more black teens have babies, black families have less wealth on average, etc. And if all these ills are not the outcome of individual agency, the only way to remedy them is to compensate the "victims."

    I don't buy any of it. There is very little overt or even subtle racism in the world today -- at least racism directed at black people. On the contrary, there is massive racism disadvantaging whites, and especially white men, in the form of a myriad of racial preferences benefitting blacks. I know David fancies himself a basketball fan...given that sport's clearly unequal outcomes in terms of racial groups, would David then concede there is structural racism harming whites, and the only solution is to change the scoring system to provide additional value to a "white" score. This is essentially what is happening with standardized college testing now. Everyone isn't the same height, so the yardstick is obviously racist. Blacks score much lower on average than other racial groups, so the SAT is obviously racist. I'm sorry to see that David has consciously or unconsciously adopted this idea that something called "structural racism" is the self-evident cause of any racial disparities. Is this one of the effects of TDS?

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  8. JAB&hook

    Uh….and so? What do you do? What’s the solution??? Is there another part to the article? So school choice..which the Left will never embrace (bc they’re not the racists) and the Bill of Rights?.

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    Ben Connelly

    First, it’s not conservative to seek out government intervention in a church. What ever happened to the First Amendment? I doubt I’d be on either side in this controversy.

    Second, David you recently asked why (or brought up) many of your friends and colleagues have been asking if you’re still conservative/with them. This is why. I have strong feelings about the middle section of this article. At the same time, I agree with many of your small government solutions to these problems that you list at the end of the article.

    Some questions:

    1. What would you say to the white descendants of immigrants whose ancestors were not around for the Civil War and did not contribute to Jim Crow or slavery? Or recent white immigrants who quite literally have zero to do with “structural racism?” You’re right about what the Bible says about sins of fathers visited upon the sons. But what about those whose fathers were not a part of the sin?

    2. Your response to anti-CRT laws (which I agree with), is that existing discrimination statutes are enough? Why is that not the case here? Why is existing law not enough to correct for injustices?

    3. I agree that racism did not end in 1965, and that by definition blacks were starting way behind whites in terms of poverty and housing etc. This was the reason for affirmative action. But what have decades of affirmative action done? What does that effort to correct historical injustices have to show for itself? Do you think reparations are the answer? I don’t.

    4. What about the argument that the main driver of black poverty today is the utter failure of Great Society and the destruction of the black family? What about Moynihan? What about the argument Thomas Sowell would likely make that this is the fallout of the progressive anti-poverty programs meant to help blacks? If that’s the main driver, how is it “structural racism?”

    5. What about existing racism? I grew up in the South and saw plenty of people still ready to discriminate against blacks. Why are the people who despise that part of the problem (ie “contributing to structural inequalities”) instead of the people actively furthering the problem?

    6. I agree with you about NIMBYism and property rights and basically would call for a libertarian approach that opposes all HOAs or attempts for governing bodies to limit what people can do with their property. But why do I have to account for NIMBYism and policies I oppose in somehow “confronting my own complicity in furthering systemic injustices?” My father spent his own money to go to court to get a restrictive covenant removed from a house after he bought it and never asked for any credit (my mother told me). Are he and I somehow still guilty in furthering structural racism when he used his own time and money to literally oppose and remove literal structural racism (ie a covenant in a deed that said the house could not be sold to a black person)?

    David, I think you see your role as holding your own side to account and educating your own people as to their error. But to be honest, given today’s climate, I actually think it’s important to close ranks to oppose some of this CRT BS - even when you admit there’s a grain of truth. Platt marches in a BLM rally. You called it a Christian BLM rally. That’s an oxymoron. I believe that black lives matter but I would stand in opposition to any BLM protest. They are a Marxist organization that wants to abolish the nuclear family (can you think of anything worse for black lives). They said so themselves a year ago. I see why people are upset at Platt.

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  10. Marla Hughes

    NO! First, how is it wrong to fight a church issue in court but not wrong to fight a church issue in the court of public opinion?
    Now, to the issue. Any blood guilt of Saul was paid by the blood of Jesus Christ, just as any other sin is. All the descendants have to do is accept the gift as presented and not repeat it (repent in word and truth). That's why people are objecting to wokeism, intersectionality, CRT and all their iterations so strongly. They deny Christ's blood sacrifice's power and relevance.
    Redlining is illegal now so irrelevant to current situations other than inherited property that might not be as valuable. OR, as in Harlem, might be even more valuable to the point of running generational residents out of the housing market in that location altogether.

    The assumption that objections to multi family housing is racial is farcical. For one thing statistically a lot more white people live in them due to populations. If you have 100 white people and 20 black people, then it's more likely more white people will live in ANY housing. Because there's simply so many more of them.
    There are a lot of explanations for current income gaps. Race is becoming less and less one of them. Also, what about the Asians? Do they owe white people some sort of reparations or something? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Household_income_in_the_United_States

    "“Sola scriptura” doesn’t tell us how we should zone our communities, district our schools, or protect civil rights."
    Actually it does. Yeah, some people don't listen but they also didn't listen when the Bible told them slavery was wrong. School choice is grounded in Biblical thought. "Raise a child up..." The Bill of Rights are grounded in Biblical theory as well and are interpreted as such. Don't need that Priest of Wokeness advising on that, either.

    David used to be able to argue that successfully. It's one of the reasons I'm such a fan of his. What he's not recognizing is that his very thought process on this issue is BECAUSE HE'S A CHRISTIAN. That's where his ideology is grounded. He's gotten lost in anti Trump and automatically opposes anything that might have any association with Trumpism.

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