ArchiveEthics

Evangelicals against Racism

This is a translation of a German news article by A. Wirth written for ProKompakt on the publication of my book „Rassismus“, see here, see the German original here: proKOMPAKT 28/2009 pp. 17–18. An English translation of the book is underway.

With his new book „Racism“, the Evangelical scholar and author Thomas Schirrmacher wants to do away with prejudices – this is something which is still important nowadays. Furthermore, Schirrmacher is convinced: Evangelicals have always vehemently fought against racism.

The core of racism, writes Schirrmacher, is “what is different in the other person” and the belief that this otherness makes people superior or inferior. Nevertheless, in reading his work it quickly becomes clear: Racism is, from a biological point of view, nonsense. The results of modern genetics have unobjectionably demonstrated that there are no different human races, and rather that there is only one species of mankind.” Schirrmacher also justifies this position biblically with the aid of the Epistle of James in the New Testament, saying that even proven differences between human races express nothing about the equal dignity everyone has.

In this passage we find the following “If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself,’ you are doing right.But if you show favoritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as lawbreakers.” In the United Nations charter the following is stated and holds to Christian tradition: “All human beings belong to a single species and are descended from a common stock. They are born equal in dignity and rights and all form an integral part of humanity.”

Evangelicals called for the Abolition of Slavery

In conversation with the Christian media magazine pro, the author empahsized the positive connection between the fight against racism and the Evangelical movement: “Evangelical revivalism was significantly involved in bringing an end to slavery. It was at this point that the designation Evangelicals came about in the first place. This applies to the legal abolishment of slavery in Great Britain as well as to the anti-slavery movement in the USA. Among Evangelicals in general, free church Quakers and Methodists, for instance, played a central role in the anti-slavery movement in the USA. Best known in this connection is the Evangelical classic, Uncle Tom’s Cabin. In my book I quote a historian who shows that racism had much better chances in France and Germany, because there are hardly any Evangelicals there. In India William Carey, a British missionary and language researcher whom many view as the father of Evangelicals, fought racism found in Christian churches in India under the caste system in the 18^th century.”

Nowadays the internationalization of the Evangelical movement means that racism does not have a chance, says Schirrmacher. “In my Evangelical environment, from the time I was small, there were Indonesians, Kenyans and Latin Americans whom I got to know as role models, so racism was obsolete before I got to know about it on the school playground. Additionally, the World Evangelical Alliance has repeatedly and clearly taken a position against all forms of racism,” says Schirrmacher. “As far as the present is concerned, I really would not know where racism could be expected to find a home in Evangelical churches. For a long time now we have been used to reading books from all over the world, taking the foremost spiritual leaders from all cultures as role models and welcoming people of all cultures and ethnic groups. Since the majority of the Evangelical movement stems from Asia, Africa, and Latin America, they set the tone in many committees.”

And what about North America, we ask the German professor of the sociology of religion? “The Evangelical movement in the USA”, he say, “is often criticized for having right-wing leanings. But at the same time a lot of people forget that there are not only ‘white’ Evangelicals. Rather, a lot of African-Americans, Latinos, and Asians are Evangelicals. Unfortunately, in the USA there is a broad right-wing spectrum that says America is white, English-speaking, and Christian. That has little to do with Christian churches.”

Schirrmacher primarily wrote his book in order to provide enlightenment about racism. This is something that is still important to do today. “First of all, racism is such a seriously mistaken position that there simply cannot be enough written against it. However, you would really be astonished at how few books in the German book market there are on racism. And most of them are very technical, very specialized, and hardly understandable for the man on the street.”

Against ‘Blacks,’ Jews and ‘Gypsies’

In his book the theologian writes about three “types of racism that are the most internationally widespread and can be tracked over the course of many centuries.” They are directed against the co-called ‘blacks’ or people with darker skin color, against Jews, and against so-called ‘gypsies,’ which is to say against Sintis and Romanies. Schirrmacher has determined that it is simply nonsense to speak of ‘racist differences.’ If anyone in Central Europe wants to speak of some sort of race that is in any way stable after all the ‘racial mixing’ that took place in the Roman Empire, subsequent migrations, campaigns of conquest from every direction, the invasion of Asian troops on horseback, and immigration from all over the world, then the only explanation is that the wish is father to the thought and the modern nation state would like to have a biological, religious, or other type of fixed anchoring for its citizens. Studies of Y-chromosomes suggest that the people of Europe have no identifiable origin, but that they all go back to repeatedly new waves of immigration from all different directions.

Thomas Schirrmacher is the head of the Martin Bucer Seminary, a Professor for the Sociology of Religion at the State University of Oradea in Romania, and the Director of the World Evangelical Alliance’s International Institute for Religious Freedom. He received his doctorate in 1985 in Ecumenical Theology in the Netherlands, in 1989 in Cultural Anthropology in Los Angeles and in 2007 in Comparative Religious Studies at the University of Bonn. He has released other works relating to the topic at hand, most recently The Multicultural Society and Hitler’s Religion of War.

The German Armed Forces are Calling again …

Recently I had the honor to speak at a “Security Policy Think Tank Roundtable” regarding the “Implementation of Ethical Training and Advanced Education,” which took place in the German Army Academy for Information and Communication in Strausberg in the state of Brandenburg. In the notice regarding the Roundtable the following was stated: “The Evangelical ethicist Thomas Schirrmacher, who lives in Bonn, has called on ethicists and social ethicists to support and accompany the German Army (Bundeswehr) in its efforts to conduct ethical training. A good tradition of the Federal Republic of Germany is that the parliamentary army is in constant dialog with civil society, and one in which Christian as well as non-Christian ethicists belong.”

I have the opportunity to continue this dialog (my presentation can be found here) before international guests on June 3, 2009 (2:30 – 4:00 pm) in the former BT Chamber, Room C in Bonn at the Deutsche Welle’s Second Global Media Forum (www.dw-gmf.de). The topic is: “The Mutual Responsibility of the Armed Forces and Civil Society.”

Upon this occasion I would like to quote from the Strausberg Report (available in complete form here):

The German Army requires Ethicists!
Protestant Ethicists call upon colleagues to support the German Army in its concept of ‘internal leadership’

(Bonn April 24, 2009) The ethicist Thomas Schirrmacher, resident in Bonn, has called upon ethicists and social ethicists to heighten their support of efforts made by the German Army with respect to ethical training. A good tradition of the Federal Republic of Germany is that the parliamentary army is in constant dialog with the civil society, and one in which Christian as well as non-Christian ethicists belong.

Schirrmacher spoke in the framework of a “Security Policy Think Tank Roundtable” on the “Implementation of ethical Training and Advanced Education,” which took place in the German Army Academy for Information and Communication in Strausberg in the state of Brandenburg.

Schirrmacher accused many of his colleagues of occupying themselves too little with ethical questions within the army and for an army in action. It is naturally correct to occupy oneself generally with ethics in peacetime. However, it is in the everyday activities of the Germany army in its foreign deployments that it is decided how much our democracy differentiates itself from countries which simply utilize the military to accomplish its political goals.

A democratic parliamentary army begins with one of the largest ethical dilemmas that there is, one with which many do not want to get their hands dirty. This applies equally to theologians as well as to politicians. The protection of life and the prohibition against killing is one of the highest values that is known in our constitution and which (almost) all citizens share instinctively. Since there are, however, people on earth – countries as well as armies for civil war and terrorists who are ready to kill or already do kill, someone has to be prepared to potentially risk his or her life or if necessary to even end the life of the attacker. Without this dilemma we would not need an army, and an army would only be employed at that point where a threat to life is real – otherwise, for instance, the Red Cross would be sufficient in Afghanistan.

The monopoly on force which is in the hands of the state, according to Schirrmacher, only allows the state to rightfully maintain an army. There have admittedly been many war mongering armies in history which were contemptuous of human life. A rightfully maintained army can only be differentiated from a war mongering army if political and internal military orientation and structures ensure human rights protection and the goal of freedom.

According to Schirrmacher’s opinion, ethicists – Christians as well as others – may not be allowed to leave the German army out in the cold, and neither may politicians, who disguise highly dangerous operations as peace missions or humanitarian operations and do so in order to present before the public the appearance of not being a participant in a war.

In theory the German Army, with its concept of ‘internal leadership,’ has again confirmed through its Central Service Regulations 10/01 that globally it has the best prerequisites. Now it is left for these ambitious goals to be thought through, communicated, and put into practice.

As a representative of the military, Dr. Edwin Micewski of the Austrian Federal Army also spoke in addition to Schirrmacher at the Security Policy Think Tank Roundtable. Micewski teaches ethics at the Austrian Military Academy as well as at universities in the USA. Although in contrast to Schirrmacher he does not refer back to Christian ethics, but rather a deontology reminiscent of the Kantian tradition, he came to the same result relative to the initial dilemma that an army faces. He also calls for not putting a positive spin on this problem, but rather to pay particular attention to offering support to soldiers and officers in overcoming these problems.

Additional information:

• >Bonner Querschnitte 12/2009 – Issue 96 (in German)
• Photo download: Prof. Schirrmacher and Dr. Micewski at the German Army Military Academy in Strausberg

Hope founded on Salvation – A Bible Study by the Pope

In his third year as Pope, Benedict XVI set forth his second encyclical “Spe Salvi.”, published 30^th of November, 2007 (www.vatican.va) Traditionally, the first two Latin words of an encyclical provide the topic of the encyclical, and in this case it means “in this hope we are saved,” which is a quote from Paul’s Letter to the Romans (8:24). In 50 numbered sections the Pope unfolds a Biblical teaching on hope.

From numerous New Testament texts the Pope demonstrates that hope is a central component of faith and that people without God are people without a sustainable hope. He expends considerable time on New Testament texts which say that hope does not rest upon an internal subjective attitude, but rather on objective facts. He just as soundly highlights that hope and salvation in the New Testament are not to be understood purely individualistically. It is rather the case that Christians in community with Christ and as God’s people have hope.

Subsequently, the Pope delineated between the Christian understanding of hope and the subjective conception of hope of the French Revolution, of industrial optimism, of Marxism, and of Humanism and calls for a long overdue ‘self-criticism of modern times.’ “It is not science that saves mankind. Mankind will be saved by love.” (12) Prayer and undergoing suffering belong to the practice of a belief in hope, to which the moralism of atheism and of progress ideologies has no answers.

The encyclical will supposedly not be counted as one of the great encyclicals that will still be quoted one hundred years from now. This is due to the fact that the encyclical neither announces a surprising change within the Catholic Church, nor does it take a stance with respect to a highly controversial topic. Calmly and matter-of-factly it refers to the large difference between Christian hope and the missing or illusory and worldly hope of Western ideas of progress. It highlights that Christian hope is only thinkable because there is salvation in Christ and because there are transcendent linchpins beyond earthly time, such as the final judgment, salvation, and eternal life.

However, in another aspect the encyclical contrasts to earlier encyclicals, namely through its strong concentration on the interpretation of New Testament texts and the practical absence of typical Catholic points of view. The encyclical has this in common with the book the Pope wrote about Jesus, although the book was published expressly as private remarks. This time, however, the encyclical is a doctrinal document.

In the first 47 paragraphs of the encyclical there is no statement that would be conspicuous were it to be heard coming from an Evangelical pulpit. In Pope Johannes Paul II’s encyclicals it was exactly the opposite. One could find almost no sentence where Mary, the salvific role of the church, or another Catholic feature was not mentioned. In paragraph 48 prayers for the dead are briefly mentioned. Maria is not appealed to until the final paragraphs 49-50. And whoever reads this long address to Maria will astonishingly determine that it consists practically of a compilation of New Testament statements about Maria and Jesus. A teaching about Maria that is particularly Catholic is not mentioned. The final paragraphs also seem to indicate that the curia required their inclusion so that the encyclical would not sound completely un-Catholic.

(The systematic theologian and religious sociologist Prof. Thomas Schirrmacher has authored numerous books regarding Catholic teaching as well as the book Hope for Europe.)

« Vorherige Seite