​Our Dear Colleagues in Christ,
 
During this Coronavirus crisis we are once again witnessing the devastating racial disparities in our nation’s public health. Being born Black is a preexisting condition that continues to be criminalized and deemed worthy of a mortal neglect. This nation has caused us to conclude with the rapper Ice Cube that our skin is our sin. We have ministered to grief-stricken congregants and communities as COVID-19 has spotlighted the pervasive systems of racism and the disproportionate advent of Black death. Black people have been tested least while dying the most. We are three times more likely to die from COVID-19 than our white counterparts. The racial sickness beneath the surface of the virus’ deadly spread in our communities has made international headlines, but there have been no healing words from you denouncing the disparities; no show of Christian force to confront the fissures that allow these medical and racial viruses to thrive, especially in neglected and impoverished communities. We are horrified. We are heartbroken. Self-appointed vigilantes hunted down and killed Ahmaud Arbery in Georgia; it took months for them even to be arrested. 
 
Breonna Taylor was murdered in her sleep when plain-clothed police used a no-knock warrant to enter her home and in discriminately end her life. They shot her eight times in her sleep. Maybe you have watched the excruciating 8 minute and 46 second video of the Minneapolis police choking the last breaths from George Floyd as the officer kneed on his neck and callously almost smiled as he did so. We are sure that you understand that many in our community are emotionally drained and in pain because of the never-ending nightmare that has unfolded during this pandemic. Our sorrow has been magnified by your appalling silence and your glaring absence from the scenes of the crimes calling for justice. 
 
We are writing this missive wondering if your love for our Lord and belief in the Bible does not inspire and empower you to stand up for justice and speak up for the voiceless? Ralph Waldo Emerson attended a Bible Society Convention in a southern state. The convention was held in a room where the window opened on a slave market where Blacks were being auctioned off as property. Emerson describes the scene: “One, therefore heard the glad tidings of great joy whilst the other regaled with ‘Going gentlemen, going...’” The experience of Emerson illustrates the hideous hypocrisy and original sin of white Christianity in America. Those who were studying the Bible during a conference in a slave state had edited out of their biblical hermeneutic a gospel that “sets the captives free.” Worse, their belief in the God of creation did not open their eyes to the humanity of Black people. Do you not wonder why at least one of the pious conference attendees was so convicted by the liberating good news in the Bible that they didn’t run out of the symposium of saints and protest the sin and shame of slavery? No one attending the conference was motivated by the ministry of Moses to leave the comfort of the confab and tell the auctioneer and upholders of the system of slavery to “Let God’s people go.” Sadly, there was no Amos who stood up and challenged the conventioneers to “Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness as an ever-flowing stream.” Heaven and history now judge them guilty of the sin of silence in the face of inhumanity, iniquity and injustice.
 
Is the sin of silence in the face of the suffering of and enslavement of Black people being passed on through the generations? Has it been passed down through the spiritual genes of white evangelical Christianity to ignore injustice while being complicit with systems of racism? Honestly, it feels that way to us. It is unfathomable and inexplicable to us that the white evangelical pulpit, so visibly and vociferously present for right-wing, pro-life politicians and President Donald Trump, remains invisible and blind to the realities of racism and mute about brutal police violence that kills Black people. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. lambasted Christian ministers from the Birmingham Jail. “We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the vitriolic words and actions of the bad people, but for the appalling silence of the good people.” Your appalling silence is deafening and disappointing.
 
We know that you have a powerful platform and we have seen you wield great influence on politicians to advance your moral agenda. We don’t understand why your moral imagination does not include using your influence to dismantle systems of oppression and rid this nation of her original sin? We don’t understand why you have not signed up to be our allies in our battles against bigotry and brutality in policing? We are baffled because you have not used your considerable clout to stand for social change that would end racial injustice in this country. You’ve been a headlight of the vehicle of society on issues of abortion but a taillight on issues of racial injustice. Your “pro-life” agenda causes you to passionately fight for our rights before we are born but you don’t fight the death dealing culture that aborts the life expectancy of Black people in this country after we are born; when we are here, living and breathing and not breathing and dying.
 
The death dealing culture we speak of has exploded in uprisings across the country. As Fanny Lou Hamer said decades ago, Black people are “sick and tired of being sick and tired.” Dr. King instructed that “a riot is the language of the unheard.” You are a part of the power structure and system that has refused to hear our hearts and to acknowledge our pain. Can you hear us now? The policing system that serves and protects your white communities occupies and oppresses our Black communities. Can you hear us now? 
 
The murder of George Floyd was caught on video but we know so many others in our communities have been brutally, if not fatally victimized by police violence but didn’t have the benefit of video. Can you hear us now? White militias show up at state capitols armed with weapons of mass destruction to demand the opening of the economy so they can be served and get haircuts and they are treated with dignity. But when Black protestors express their anger and frustration the response is militarized. The Commander-in-Chief quotes this nation’s racist past when he tweets “when the looting starts the shooting starts.” Can you hear us now? We have had to console our traumatized children who have had sudden breakdowns of weeping as they reflected on the killing of Black people in “real time.” Can you hear us now?
 
We have heard, but we hope it is not true, that white evangelical Christians don’t stand for justice for Black people because they are “more white than they are evangelical.” Dr. Renita Weems says “Make no mistake about it: evangelicalism is white supremacy disguised as religion.” You will have to interrogate your faith walk to determine if this is true. We will just say that from our perspective it appears to be true. We do know that the original sin of the White Church in America is racism. White evangelical Christianity was complicit in the slave trade and the enslavement of our ancestors. White evangelical Christianity modeled and supported Jim and Jane Crow segregation. The track record of white evangelical Christians on issues of race and racism has been abysmal, but the relationships and Christian fellowship that many of us have with you has given us the hope that this generation can be the generation that has the moral imagination and Christian love to overcome the sins of the past. We have faith that we can create a new Church in America that will in turn (and in time) create a new America.
 
It is our prayer that the white evangelical church will rise to the occasion and meet the challenge of this decisive hour. We are praying that your Christology will reunite Jesus and Justice in holy wedlock. We are praying that you will catch a fresh vision of God’s will for the family of humanity. We know that you are familiar with the story of Peter and Cornelius in the Book of Acts. Cornelius was a Roman soldier, a representative of the occupying and oppressive Roman Empire. These soldiers were known for enforcing Roman repression through terror and crucifixions. However, Cornelius was one who used the power of his privilege for the underprivileged. Cornelius, a Roman soldier, had privileges he possessed because of the benefits that came with his birth as a citizen of the powerful Roman Empire. How are you using your privilege in this crucial hour? Cornelius was conscious of the privileges that opened doors for him because of his inherent affiliation with empire. Cornelius had an encounter with God in a vision. God was up to something because simultaneously, Peter had an eye-opening vision that set him free from the restrictions of his race. The vision that Peter had was an alternative to his divisive and repressive reality. The vision from God called Peter out of his comfort zone. It is worth noting that this vision was given in Joppa. It was in Joppa that God instructed the prophet Jonah to get over his prejudices and preach to non-Israelites in Nineveh. Peter engaged in doctrinal disobedience when he associated and fellowshipped with an Italian representative of the oppressive status quo. In the process, he destroyed the walls between Jews and Gentiles in the Christian family and built a bridge. Peter and Cornelius had a revolutionary vision of restructuring. Will you join us and have the moral courage to reimagine a redemptive restructuring of our nation that is characterized by justice for all. Can we reimagine an America where ALL Black lives matter?
 
We pray that since white people created racism and white Christianity has given cover to racism that you will take the lead to “cancel” systemic racism. Cancel culture is a modern internet phenomenon where one is ejected from influence and condemned to shame because of their questionable, if not unacceptable behavior. Cancel culture is caused by a critical mass of people who are done with a particular person; it is a final and collective judgement of the people. Just as Jesus cancelled the culture of sickness when He saw suffering, and cancelled the culture of sexism when He intentionally included and ministered to women, and cancelled the culture of hunger when He fed the multitude, we are calling on you to form a Christian critical mass and cancel the culture of racism. 
 
You can begin to cancel the culture of racism by having the humility to listen to and learn from Black people about racism. Your whiteness does not make you an expert in racism and racial injustice. It is vital that you finally hear us. We are done with “kumbaya moments” where we join hands and sing “We Shall Overcome.”  We are done with preaching in each other’s pulpits and temporarily feeling good because we have briefly escaped our respective comfort zones. You will not be able to cancel racism if you don’t know how racism operates in systems and structures. Racism is not simply about you being mean to us or calling us the “N” word. Racism is structural. It’s like going to a restaurant and realizing a “closed” sign facing those who are on the street, but you notice there are patrons inside the restaurant enjoying the food and the atmosphere. Our community has been locked out of the restaurant of privilege and justice, while you enjoy the privileges of being inside and partaking of the meal of prosperity and opportunity. Please don’t believe that just because a few of us make it in that the culture of systemic racism doesn’t exist.. 
 
After listening and learning what racism is and how it operates, we want you to use your considerable influence and preach and teach about racism as much as you preach and teach about evangelism and discipleship and prayer. Use your connections to influence politicians to pass policies characterized by racial justice. You do know that this nation has an ugly history of passing policies that specifically disadvantage Black people. The Black Codes, The Dred Scott Decision, Plessy versus Ferguson, convict leasing system, voting poll taxes, redlining, blockbusting, and exclusion from FHA loans up until the 1950s are just some of the targeted policies that hurt and hindered our communities. Now we must repair the legacy of damages by passing policies that specifically restore the spiritual, social, political and economic lives of Black people who have suffered from such racist policies throughout this nation’s history.
 
Finally, we need you to show up and speak up as allies at the scene of the crime of racism. Speak up and denounce racism in policing. Speak up and castigate medical apartheid, environmental racism and food, job and opportunity deserts. Speak up and end voter suppression. Speak up when the president, you adore, uses his bully pulpit to bully us with his racist tirades and tweets. We are not asking for charity, but we are demanding justice.
 
We pray this letter finds you strong in the faith. We submit it to you with love and hope. Please know that we pray for you. We are praying for our sick country. We are praying for our wounded world. Let us pray and work together to end this long night of pain and division and usher in a scintillating new day of love and liberty, joy and justice.
 
Peace and Power
 
Frederick Douglass Haynes, III Senior Pastor, Friendship West
Co-Founder, Samuel DeWitt Proctor Conference
 
Jeremiah A. Wright, Jr.
Co-Founder, Samuel DeWitt Proctor Conference
 
Iva Elaine Carruthers
General Secretary/CEO, Samuel DeWitt Proctor Conference

Dear Pastor Jeffress,
 
Grace and peace.
 
I greet you in the Name of our Lord and Liberator, Jesus Christ. I have been moved to write you this letter because our country – which Maya Angelou aptly called “these yet to be United States” – has accelerated her descent into destructive division. A spiritual eclipse of decency, honesty and integrity has left this country in the frightening darkness of emboldened racism. Hate and greed have grown bolder.
 
Recently, you used your significant platform as a guest contributor on Fox News to throw gasoline on the fires of racial conflict. You drew a dangerous connection between the NFL controversy and North Korea – whose leaders have engaged in a war of words with our president.
 
“These players ought to be thanking God that they live in a country where they’re not only free to earn millions of dollars every year, but they're also free from the worry of being shot in the head for taking the knee like they would be in North Korea,” you said to Fox & Friends host Ainsley Earhardt. Of course, “earn” is the operative word, since they haven’t been given any money, and clearly you think these players aren’t free to think for themselves and to protest.
 
“And I think tens of millions of Americans agree with President Trump when he says they ought to be called out for this,” you continued, arguing there is "a better way to protest social injustice without disrespecting our country.” Unfortunately, like most who make that claim, you didn’t tell us how. That suggests there are no preferred methods of protest from your privileged perspective. Protests for justice and equity are always disruptive because, as Martin Luther King, Jr., reminded us, social change does not “roll in on the wheels of inevitability.” Change takes place through discomfort. Protests, even peaceful ones, are uncomfortable.
 
Sadder still, you didn’t cite the reason for the protests you denounced: the slaughtering of unarmed Black folk by cops. You didn’t call these actions evil or disrespectful. The courageous athletes who take a knee don’t disrespect the flag or the national anthem. The flag is disrespected when we fail to honor our pledge of allegiance to “liberty and justice for all.” The flag is disrespected whenever Black bodies are unjustly haunted and harassed by officers in blue.
 
Your words hurt. They are morally irresponsible. They border on blasphemy. You fail to see the fundamental contradiction in your argument. You would be shot in the head in North Korea for taking a knee to pray and preach your version of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I would not want that for you. Don’t you see that Black people don’t have to go to North Korea to be victims of state sanctioned murder? Unarmed teen Jordan Edwards will never earn millions of dollars in the NFL. He wasn’t in North Korea when he was shot and killed by a cop in Balch Springs, Texas. Neither was Clinton Allen there when an officer of the law in Dallas shot him. Twelve-year-old Tamir Rice was nowhere near North Korea when he was shot and killed less than three seconds after an officer of the law exited his vehicle and executed him in a park. Walter Scott was running from a police officer who shot him in the back and manipulated the scene to cover his crime. Yet another brokenhearted Black mother lost her son; still more devastated Black children lost their father. Scott wasn’t shot in North Korea, but in North America. I could go on and on. I hope you get the picture by now. Killing black people in the name of the law has aborted – a word I know you appreciate as a pro-life advocate – Black lives at an epidemic rate.
 
The policing system serves as the frontlines of a criminal justice system that is often criminal, racist and unjust. This unjust system has made America – not North Korea – the most incarcerated nation on the planet. The NFL players you viciously attacked are protesting racism and social injustice, particularly in the police use of the outlawed Chokehold, a powerful new book by Paul Butler you should pick up. They are speaking out against the spread of The New Jim Crow – an instant classic you should read – of mass incarceration that keeps America from becoming a “more perfect union.” No wonder Dr. Michael Eric Dyson articulated our heartbreak in his great book Tears We Cannot Stop: A Sermon to White America. Please read it.
 
Our nation is now reaping the whirlwind of social turmoil that it has sown in the wind of unrepentant racism, systemic injustice and white supremacy. Too often white churches have been complicit in this tragedy with their appalling silence. Modern day prophet Jim Wallis says that’s “because they’re more white than Christian.”
 
Several years ago you graciously accepted an invitation to be interviewed on my radio show, Freddy Haynes Unscripted. I was sincerely shocked when you affirmed the rightness of the civil rights movement at the end of our conversation and declared that had you been around you “would have marched with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.”
 
Now I’m wondering which Dr. King you were referring to? It must have been the sanitized myth of the “apostle of nonviolence” that America created in order to fit her narrative of exceptionalism. Were you speaking of marching with the Dr. King who thundered “I Have A Dream” at the great March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom? That’s usually the convenient Dr. King that Americans are comfortable with. I would remind you that before he eloquently articulated his dream, he
 narrated our nightmare as a “drum major for justice.”
 
Do you recall this section of his prophetic poetic proclamation? “There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, ‘When will you be satisfied?’ We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality.” If you would have marched with Dr. King then, you should be standing with our courageous athletes now against the “unspeakable horrors of police brutality.”
 
Since it is impossible for you to march with Dr. King, you should take a knee with former San Francisco 49er star Colin Kaepernick, and Seattle Seahawks star Michael Bennett, who are taking a stand against the “unspeakable horrors of police brutality.” Sadly, and sinfully, these unspeakable horrors have terrorized our communities since the birth of this nation. The slave patrols, Black Codes, the Convict leasing system, Birmingham Public Safety Commissioner Bull Connor and Selma Sheriff Jim Clark reflect the use of policing as a weapon of oppression.
 
I will share something with you that I never talk about. My best friend, the late Rev. Dr. Marvis P. May, and I, both graduated from the now defunct, but never dead, Bishop College in Dallas, TX. We decided one year, while attending summer school at Bishop, to visit your prestigious First Baptist Church, then considered the largest church in the United States. First Baptist’s pastor, Dr. W.A. Criswell, had pastored and preached to presidents. He had also at one point been a staunch defender of segregation. Fortunately, he changed his theological stance. This was the summer of 1981. Marvis and I were warmly welcomed and received by the greeters and ushers. We enjoyed the experience and were happy to say that during our college matriculation we had visited the historic First Baptist Church of Dallas.
 
After the benediction, members of First Baptist continued to bless us with their kindness and engaging fellowship. After exchanging courtesies, Marvis and I went to retrieve the car we had borrowed from a fraternity brother. When we exited the parking lot we mistakenly turned the wrong way down a one-way street. We immediately corrected our course and drove in the direction of the impressive gothic structure. That's when a police siren from behind us arrested our attention. Through the rear view mirror I could see the police officer pointing, telling us to pull over. I intentionally parked in front of First Baptist hoping that this would be a pleasant and not deadly stop.
 
The officers got out of their vehicle and aggressively approached us. Both of us were nervous. We were told, in rather vulgar terms, to get out of the car. No, they didn't ask for my license and registration. Immediately, we were handcuffed and bent over our car. The officers weren’t satisfied. We were moved and told to get on the sidewalk face down. Honestly, we were pushed to the ground. I still recall the pain I felt from the knee of the officer in my back. All of this was taking place in front of the church where we had just worshipped. Marvis asked, “Why are we being held?” The
cops ignored our question, and instead barked at us, “Shut up until I tell you to speak nigger.”
 
I was hurt and humiliated. Embarrassment and anxiety clouded my emotional skies. Surely they wouldn't do anything to us in front of this church. I grew angrier by the second. There were still worshippers filing out of First Baptist. They didn't allow our predicament to interrupt their walk to their cars. People we had just worshipped with simply glanced at us as they continued on their way. Marvis and I were both dressed in suits, but, contrary to the advocates of respectability politics, our fine clothing didn't stop the police from making us "eat the sidewalk.” Our sharp dress didn’t cause our fellow worshippers at First Baptist to stop and intervene in the sweltering sun of a Dallas July summer afternoon. Like the priest and the Levite in the parable of the Heroic Samaritan – I refuse to say “good” Samaritan as if all the rest were bad, similar to how we have more recently pitted “good” Negroes against the masses of bad Black people – folk just passed us by “on the other side” without helping.
 
In hindsight, I wonder what conclusions were drawn by those we had worshipped with, those who had warmly received us, as they passed by on the other side? What did they see when they saw us, dressed in suits, fresh from worshipping in their sanctuary, but handcuffed with our faces to the hot sidewalk? Did they see our humanity stamped with the image of God? Did they see the Imago Dei, or the Imago Negro?
 
And what do they, and you, see now? What do you see as Terrence Crutcher is killed by an officer even though his hands are up? As angry as I was at the cops for stopping us because we “looked like we were up to no good” – yes that is the “scientific” rationale offered to us by our violent pursuers – I was most angry at those I had just worshipped with who passed by on the other side.
 
Thankfully, a courageous and kind gentleman emerged from the worship facility of First Baptist and decided to ask what was wrong. He proceeded to tell the police officers that we had just worshipped with them. The officers were shocked. They asked, “Are you sure it was these people?” The man firmly said “yes!” The officers, attempting to justify what they did, responded, “Well, maybe they just look like someone we were looking for?” They helped us up from the sidewalk. Our suits weren’t nearly as dirty as our worship experience had become; our spirits were now stained by this embarrassing experience. The man who was kind enough to put his privilege on the line for us went back into the sanctuary. We got in our borrowed car and silently drove back to campus.
 
I am sharing this humiliating and heartbreaking episode from my life because it offers you a metaphorical choice with real ramifications. Will you choose to pass by on the other side and pontificate from your perch of privilege about athletes disrespecting the flag or national anthem? Will you choose to use your privilege as the pastor of one of the largest and most historic churches in the country and do like the church member who intervened on our behalf? He didn’t rush to judgment about us. He used his privileged whiteness to empathetically enter into our predicament and, as a result, our predicament was transformed.
 
Pastor Jeffress, if you would do as the anonymous member did we would begin to transform a justice and policing system that is destroying lives, breaking up families and hurting communities. Will you make that “pro life” move?
 
You have boldly declared that racism is a sin. I agree with you. God hurts when God’s children are mistreated because of how God created them. Black people in our country live with this mistreatment everyday. We experience racism from individuals and institutions, through micro-aggressions and systems. The policing and criminal justice system is most vicious because police officers have the power of the state behind them. I’ve done more than one funeral in this country where I’ve tried to comfort a family whose unarmed child or father was killed by a police officer who was not held accountable.
 
Please understand why the football players are protesting before you attack them. You’ve never had to give your children “the talk.” You don’t know the feeling of wondering, when the police stop you, if this is a life or death stop. Your privileged skin has insured that your life always matters.
 
In light of your unequivocal statement that “racism is a sin,” I’m inviting you to move from declaration to demonstration.
 
You and I should invite Colin Kaepernick and Michael Bennett to Dallas and listen to them. Let’s have a constructive conversation about what we can do to insure that America is truly a place of “liberty and justice for all.” It would be a powerful statement for you and I to invite both of them and come up with solutions to the problems of the policing and justice systems that oppress people of color in our country.
 
Dr. King, who you would have marched with, lovingly chastised the Christian church of his day for being thermometers and not thermostats. I invite you to use your prestigious and privileged platform to fight against racial injustice. You said racism is a sin. You’re right, now I invite you to not just “talk about it, be about it.”
 
In the Name of Jesus and Justice,
 
Frederick Douglass Haynes, III
Senior Pastor
Friendship West Baptist Church

Steve Harvey, 
From the time I first met you, I admired you. I always enjoyed every movie you were in, watching you on Family Feud while away at college, looking up YouTube videos of you and all of that. You seemed so big in my eyes! It was so cool to know that my dad knew you and you knew my dad. Now, I am extremely disappointed in you and wondering what you're thinking. Was meeting with Trump a personal victory or were you really there fighting for our people? I can't help but to think you were there for the latter because there is no way you could walk away from that meeting and report back to us that you found him "congenial and sincere" and that you would "sit with him anytime." I don't understand. You would sit with a man who has spewed racist and hate filled language to everyone who is considered "different" or not white? You would sit with someone who has some of the most divisive an adversarial language in the 21st century? You would sit with a man who brags about grabbing women by their private parts? You have daughters and you have a wife, who just the other day posted Meryl Streep on her IG and remarked on how inspired she was by her speech at the Golden Globes (which had a lot to do with Trump). I am not mad that you met with the man. I am just mad that in your IG report back to us you stated "Trump wants to help with the situations in the inner cities so he immediately got Dr. Ben Carson." PAUSE. Trump picked a man whose only relation to the inner city is that he once lived there and like a lot of people in the inner city he is Black. He isn't qualified. If Trump were really concerned about the inner city he would've gotten someone who is capable and well versed in Urban Housing issues to really address and rectify the situation. Dr. Ben Carson has showed that he has no interest in really helping his people with the moves he has made and with every ignorant thing that comes out of his mouth. Come on Steve you fell for the okie doke? I thought you were better than that. Why not come out of that meeting and tell us you challenged him on his selection for Housing and Urban Development Director? Why not come out of that meeting telling us you challenged him about his reprehensible comments about women because you are a father, a husband and a man that has a fan base of millions of women? Why not come out of that meeting telling us you challenged him about his comments on Stop and Frisk? Why not come out of that meeting saying you challenged him on his pick for Attorney General? Why not come out of that meeting telling us you challenged him on saying Black people have nothing to lose? Why not come out of that meeting telling us all of that before you mention he is "congenial and sincere?" I am not falling for it Steve. And for the TRUMP TEAM who thinks that they can pick every Black Entertainer that we love so much to go meet with Trump and come back saying its okay, you're showing your "conservative racism." Black people aren't a monolith. We don't all believe the same things and even more so, we aren't STUPID. Just because we love their art doesn't always mean we will love their heart. Oh and Steve, I know this man isn't sincere. He just attacked one of our foremost leaders in the Civil Rights movement today. Also Steve, I have a strong feeling that you know you punked out because you turned off your IG comments under the post you made about Trump. I know you know that you disappointed your people and your fan base. So you can stop with the BS.
Sincerely,
Abeni Haynes