Despite Admitting That Our Community Is As Bad Off As Ever - The Conservative Remains The Superior Threat To The Pharisees

I want to make a point that I am not some crazed "Progressive Chaser". Listen to the entire audio report from a Black preacher who is leading the collaboration between the 9 predominately Black Christian denominations in America  Rev W. Franklin Richardson of the Grace Baptist Church in Mt Vernon NY .

First he says flat out that Black America is suffering at all fronts - DESPITE having a "Black President". (Again I look at the architecture of 'favorable people' in the institutions from local up to the White House. To look at Obama only makes it "about him" and misses the point that needs to be made).

Then further on in the discussions he indicates that Black Christian CONSERVATIVE voices have become the voice of the religious movements, having hijacked the "social justice" movement that the church needs to be leading.

The Disconnection Between The Conditions Within The Black Community And The Institutions Within The Community

"Every measure of quality of life......the Black community is at the bottom....That crisis!" - Rev Richardson

• Education
• Prison Population
• Foreclosures
• Infant Mortality

I have never criticized the Black Progressive-Fundamentalist for being fearful to articulate the problems that we have in our community.   I have only been critical of them for failing to take OWNERSHIP of the problems per their:

• Control over the institutions that are the vehicles that will change the situation
• Strong influence over the people within our community
• Constant redirection of our "community domain problems" upon the "American political domain" and their enemies
• Propensity to promote their ideology rather than establish a system of transparent appraisal of it as one of many tools to solve problems

In summary - they don't mind talking about the problems among our people - as long as they can make an INDICTMENT upon some other entity as the cause of the continuing problems.   When they stand alone, their finger prints over all of the controls - they will point to the ubiquitous, amorphous power of SLAVERY and CAPITALISM which has bested them despite these nominal powers.

The article earlier in the year that Mrs Martin points to "Is The Black Church Dead?" penned by academic theologian Eddie Glaude Jr which appeared in The Huffington Post (a sure sign of the way the wind will blow in the [hit] piece) also pointed to CONSERVATISM in the Black church as the problem.  As I look around and see 91% of Black support for a leftist president I am left to ask: "Where are there conservative Christian Negroes that the mega church Black pastors are leading off of the cliff toward 'conservativism'?"

This Ain't About Conservatism

The truth is that they are not arguing against "conservatism" per se.   

Instead they see a morass of problems among the people who they care for and in their quest to apply a sustained spirit of emotion to connect with these people who are in need - they do not wish to have ANY dogma which threatens their ability to gain access to unchecked resources and reorder the society in a way that they see fit to have a countervailing effect on their agenda.

They argue that those who see 'the least of these' and yet walk past them with haughty indignation as to their "sinful" condition are able to hide behind the CONSERVATIVE structures of America and its capitalism which does not impress upon them to give all that they have without concern for self.  This is "God's work" if you allow them to tell it.

When racism and capitalism and materialism and sexism and "hetero-normative" though are present and in control - oppression and "the least of these" are the inevitable end.   They must destroy the institutions that allow people to hide behind these points of bigotry in order to make a change for "the least of these".  (My investment in watching "Link TV" and reading your magazines is paying off in my understanding of you.   :-)  ).

A Molestation Of Christian Principle - Ideological Money Changers In The Temple

 The two axioms from the Christian faith that need to be applied to this situation at hand are:

1. Jesus came to help "the Least Of These" for justice shown to them is evidence of the proper expression of the Christian faith
2. God made all man in his image.  The Christian experience is a struggle for the disciple to grow into the full form of this model of Jesus while he is living his life here on Earth

(Note - I heard a Muslim man say #1 on the radio the other day in reference to why he is against capitalism and the evil [White] men that are taking money out of the mouths of the poor through tax cuts for the rich.  True story.)

I don't believe that these two statements are mutually exclusive.  They can indeed exist in the same space and time within a Christian's heart and mind.

I do, however, believe that #2 must be the superior intention of the Christian.   Yes engage the "Least of These" but the mission must be to allow him to find a vision of himself that will allow him to grow into the "UN-least of These" as we walks forward.

It is my belief that the Christian religion has been hijacked in this regard.   There are bodies of thought who see progress as evidenced by an increase in the length of the line outside of their soup kitchen.  As they note that their line has doubled in one year's time I imagine them going to "Jesus" and telling him about their success in helping more people.   

"MY JESUS", however will look at these same people and ask what they did to insure that they would not come back?   What has been done to build them up so that they themselves might open up a soup kitchen for those who are THE LEAST OF THESE in comparison to their own state of being as "the least of these".  (Example - are America's poor able to go of to Haiti or Romania and help the desperately poor that reside in these places based on the increase that they have received in the clutches of American Christian progressives?).

The Primary Agent Of Your Own Salvation

The admission of failure from the mouth of Rev Richardson as he gathers together the 9 large Black denominations should not be evidence of a plan to change course in the ideological tenants and hijacked Christian dogma that has been implemented.   Though no doubt from the mouths of many of the Black preachers in the convention has echoed the damnation that God has released upon AMERICA for failing to follow the spirit of his words - there is a strong unlikelihood that these same preachers are able to project this same notion against the Black community culture that reigns as a subset inside of the larger container called "America".   Indeed as they were focusing on fixing America they allowed the more localized forces of consciousness to fester.

In any given Black community there exists a Black church edifice.  While those who enter inside receive air conditioning and spiritual guidance - the real problem that exists in the community is found in the more numerous people who don't receive the "air conditioning".  

In the long fight against "societal oppression" certain organizations have been created for both mobility and coping skills.  The Black church is one such entity.

As the outright and systematic changes in the forces of oppression from the greater society have changed - the organizations in the Black Community have failed to adapt, becoming the agents of change in INNER-SPACE!!

The Black Church organization and the Civil Rights Pharisees who today stream from it, both of whom reside in the American Political Domain appear clueless about "human resource management" and the key "institutional management that is required to accomplish these ends.  

All the while they are fighting against "Euro-centric notions" that have been imprinted upon us from "Slavery", our "Mystical Magical African Culture" having been stolen - they can't see that:

Anti-Conservative/Anti-Republican/Anti-Capitalism IS NOT Pro-Black Community Development

They are expert at forging "unity" but are failures at erecting a broad based cultural and spiritual dogma that sets up boundaries among our people so that we have little choice but to focus upon the remaining domain of choices that will produce the higher standard of living that is desired.  Instead to them freedom from what they term as "cultural oppression" IS their end. As long as there is an operator of the framework against which they struggle in close proximity to the - they are able to retain the illusions of their forward struggle.

IF they are allowed to stand on their own, their body of thought being judged independently - just as every individual will be "Judged By Jesus" as they stand naked - these Progressive Pharisees will have to stand in judgement of what their dogma has done to lift their people and not their success in keeping our people unified behind an ideology. 

The Black Church Is Dead Part I
(Notice how the hollow beer can holding the pebble of "Progressivism" is rattled so frequently by Mr Glaude.  He calls out Bishop Jackson of Maryland who has been vocal in the defense of traditional marriage but appears to not have a problem with the tens of thousands of other Black pastors who have not spoken so dogmatically against the quasi-anarchistic progressive mothership.).

The Black Church Is Dead Part II
Prof Butler is far more sober and on point with her assessment of the Black church than was Prof Glaude.