White Supremacy and Attacks Against the Faith of Dr. Reverend Raphael Warnock
In his autobiography, Frederick Douglass spoke about the various slave owners he endured before escaping and eventually winning his freedom. Though most were religious to some degree, he knew he was in for the most brutal punishment by those who were the most devout.
Throughout some of the darkest moments in American history, many white Christians have used the Bible and interpretations of its text to inflict brutal and unjust treatment upon Black Americans and society’s most marginalized. But that hypocrisy is not a relic of the past. As the eyes of the nation look to Georgia and the contentious runoff Senate elections, we are again witnessing white Christians use the name of God to disparage a man seeking to become Georgia’s first Black Senator.
Dr. Reverend Raphael Warnock pastors one of the most storied churches in our nation. Ebenezer Baptist Church is not just the former church of Nobel Peace Prize winner Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., it has also been a center of Black progress and Black activism since the late 19th century. So significant is this church that many presidents of the United States and global leaders from around the world have paid their respects and worshipped in its sacred sanctuary. Kelly Loeffler, who is currently running against Rev. Warnock for a seat in the U.S. Senate, has sat in its pews herself, honoring Dr. King and worshipping alongside its primarily African American congregants.
It is therefore disheartening that Loeffler and her allies have focused many of their attacks on the very faith that Rev. Warnock embodies and has lived out his entire life. These accusations don’t merely land upon Rev. Warnock, but are blows to millions of Black Americans and their places of worship. Feed the hungry. Serve the poor. Turn the other cheek. Love thy enemies. The lived faith of Dr. King and the man who now fills his shoes at Ebenezer Baptist Church have become fodder for attack ads and debate stage disrespect.
Rev. Warnock, in addition to leading one of the most respected faith communities in our country, earned his Doctor of Philosophy from Union Theological Seminary, a prestigious school of religious higher education. When sharing a debate stage, Loeffler deliberately chose not to address her opponent as “Dr.” or “Reverend” Warnock, but referred to him as “my opponent radical liberal Raphael Warnock.” She also went out of her way to disparage his faith, claiming that he could not be a real Christian due to his belief in a woman’s right to make decisions about her own body. This sentiment has also been echoed by Georgia Congressman Doug Collins, who claimed Warnock’s faith was “a lie from the bed of hell, and should be sent back to Ebenezer Baptist Church.”
What Collins considers a bed of hell is actually an institution that has served as a beacon of hope for the disenfranchised since 1886. Anchored in the historic Sweet Auburn neighborhood east of downtown Atlanta, Ebenezer Baptist Church has been a pillar of strength for the Black community and the faith home to many of our most revered civil rights leaders. This church has always strived to manifest what Dr. King called the “Beloved Community” — a global vision of economic and social justice, and a world free of racism, bigotry, and prejudice.
Throughout history, majority Black churches like Ebenezer Baptist Church became institutions led by and for Black people, and were the epicenter from which the Black community levied political and social power. Collective actions organized by the Black Church, like the Montgomery Bus Boycott and Operation Breadbasket, accelerated racial progress by leveraging Black spending power to apply economic pressure on white-controlled institutions. These men and women of deep faith saw the teachings of Jesus as a promise for and a pathway to freedom and justice.
As Rev. Warnock continues to endure constant flogging by white Christians who criticize his faith, one can’t help but wonder: What are these gospel teachings that white Christians are holding up? Are they the same teachings once used to justify slavery? Or the ones employed to condemn interracial marriage and enforce the crushing social order of segregation?
Whatever these seemingly malleable teachings are, it is undeniable that they have consistently disfavored Black people — and the Black Church — throughout the history of our country. From slave-worked plantation fields to clergy-endorsed segregation, into the very pulpit that Dr. King occupied, white Christianity has perpetuated judgement and the gross mistreatment of our Black brothers and sisters.
In 2008, when the Democratic Party nominated a Black man to run for president for the first time in the party’s history, white opposition did everything it could to discredit his faith. From claiming he was a Muslim born of a foreign land to digging through decades of his pastor’s sermons, they looked for any opportunity to take him down. Eventually, Barack Obama was forced to sever his decades-long relationship with his pastor Jeremiah Wright over a few out of context soundbites that crossed a line white Christian America felt was too radical. These same clips are being used misleadingly in attack ads against Warnock today.
In 2016, a white man who lived in gold buildings, was a noted adulterer, thrice married, and who embodies what Christians traditionally consider the seven deadly sins (greed, lust, gluttony, sloth, wrath, envy, pride) found himself against all odds carrying the banner of the Republican nomination for President. Instead of facing the scrutiny of his predecessor, white evangelical leaders flocked to his aid to provide defense and cover for his obvious flaws of character and lack of faith. “He is a baby Christian,” said James Dobson, head of Focus on the Family, a Christian organization that preaches morality. “We aren’t electing a Sunday school teacher” said Jerry Falwell Jr., the now disgraced former president of the largest Christian university in the country. Not only was he given a pass for his moral failings and obvious shortcomings of the Christian teachings, he was provided explicit support and was granted their unwavering endorsement. The faith based double standard applied against Democratic leaders of color vs their white Republican counterparts is impossible to ignore.
Like Douglass’s most barbaric slave owners, almost all white slave owners professed an allegiance to Gospel Christianity. After the Civil War, when Black Americans finally earned their freedom, the majority of white Christians opposed their progress at every step, imposing Jim Crow laws and enforcing segregation, instilling the terror of lynching, creating mass incarceration, and trapping Black people into generational poverty. Dr. King, who is one of the most adored figures we have in our society today was arrested and jailed 29 times, and had a disapproval rating of 75% among his fellow Americans at the time of his assassination.
If we hope to shape a future where Christianity brings us closer to racial harmony, us white people must see these attacks on Rev. Warnock for what they are and strongly condemn them. If we wish to one day experience Dr. King’s Beloved Community, we must join together under a faith banner that is wide enough to deliver on our nation’s promise of liberty and justice for all.
