The Naughty Baptist

It has to stop

I was supposed to go running this morning. But we got to bed around midnight and, when my alarm went off at 5, I decided to just sleep in. I meet a friend for breakfast most Thursdays, so I figured I'd sleep until 6 or so and then get ready and go.

I couldn't get back to sleep. I kept thinking about the killing of Alton Sterling. I lay there, by turns incredibly sad and angry, and finally got up. My phone said it was 5:59. I thought I would sit down and write up my thoughts.

Then I saw the news about Philando Castile.

I'm still trying to process all this. I have no wisdom to offer here.

Here's what I know: Two men, made in the image of God, are dead. And they should not be.

As a Christian, I can't be silent. We white Christians have been silent far too long. Martin Luther King, Jr., condemned us in 1963 for our silence. Our brothers and sisters today do so, too. They are right to do so.

I don't know what this means, exactly. Right now it means listening, and weeping with those who weep (Romans 12:15).

Here's the paragraph from King's Letter from a Birmingham Jail that still rings true:

We can never forget that everything Hitler did in Germany was "legal" and everything the Hungarian freedom fighters did in Hungary was "illegal." It was "illegal" to aid and comfort a Jew in Hitler's Germany. But I am sure that if I had lived in Germany during that time I would have aided and comforted my Jewish brothers even though it was illegal. If I lived in a Communist country today where certain principles dear to the Christian faith are suppressed, I believe I would openly advocate disobeying these anti-religious laws. I must make two honest confessions to you, my Christian and Jewish brothers. First, I must confess that over the last few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I can't agree with your methods of direct action;" who paternalistically feels he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by the myth of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait until a "more convenient season." Shallow understanding from people of goodwill is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.