March 2, 2020
Sociologist Jones (The End of White Christian America), founder and CEO of the Public Religion Research Institute, offers in this vociferous work a refreshing blend of historical accounting, soul-searching reflection, and analysis of white supremacy within the American Christian identity. “White Christian churches have not just been complacent; they have not only been complicit... as the dominant cultural power in America, they have been responsible for constructing and sustaining a project to protect white supremacy at the expense of black equality.” He challenges white Christians to see how white supremacy operates in their religious lives; learn its history, theology, and physical presence; to understand how racism has become “constitutive of white Christian identity”; and to take antiracist action. Woven throughout is the author’s personal story of growing up white in a Southern Baptist community in Jackson, Miss., his journey toward a fuller understanding of his family and faith history in relation to racism, and his efforts to chart a more just path forward. Only with honest assessment, followed by deliberate individual and collective reparative justice work, Jones argues, can white Christian Americans do the necessary work of addressing structural racism within their faith and nation. Jones’s introspective, measured study is a revelatory unpacking of influence and history of white Christian nationalism.
April 1, 2020
Is there a connection between America's churches and white supremacy? Jones (CEO, Public Religion Research Inst.; End of White Christian America) considers this question in this examination of white Christian America. In this wide-ranging work, Jones covers several time periods: from "Redemption" in the South following the end of Reconstruction through Jim Crow apartheid to the current issue of Confederate statues in public spaces. Jones finds examples of white Christians legitimizing and enforcing white supremacy, from lynchings in the South to housing restrictions in the North. Jones documents the disconnection between the official progressive denominational stances on race to the racism perpetuated by individuals. While much time is spent on white supremacy among Southern Baptists, Jones also has examples from Methodist, Catholic, and other churches. Though the scope of the book is far-reaching, survey data are presented throughout, showing differences on racial issues between white and black Christians. Especially illustrative is a chart tabulating the number of Confederate statutes erected in each decade. VERDICT Jones provides hard figures and historical examples illustrating racial relations in the United States, and how people can work toward reconciliation. An ideal complement to Sarah Posner's Unholy.--Jeffrey Meyer, Mt. Pleasant P.L., IA
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Starred review from April 1, 2020
A scholar and commentator raised in the Southern Baptist Church clearly demonstrates "how intractably white supremacy has become embedded in the DNA of American Christianity." Growing up amid a religious tradition that believed "chattel slavery could flourish alongside the gospel of Jesus Christ," Jones approaches his subject matter from both a personal and historical perspective. His book--a concise yet comprehensive combination of deeply documented religious history, social science research about contemporary religion, and heartfelt memoir--traces a path that began in the narrow world of Macon, Georgia, and other Jim Crow-infested Southern towns. He received a master of divinity degree from the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, but it wasn't until he entered the doctorate program at Emory University that he understood "the brutal violence that white Christians deployed to resist black enfranchisement after the Civil War." As Jones points out, those Christians were not limited to the Baptist faith. The author located race hatred embedded in the doctrines of other Christian churches, including Methodist, Episcopalian, Catholic, and countless other heavily white congregations. Even though he was shocked and disgusted by his discoveries, Jones held back from sharing those disturbing realizations widely, first conducting studies through his work at the organization he founded, the Public Religion Research Institute. Those consistently illuminating studies, mentioned throughout the book, paint a damning portrait. One example: "For all white Christian subgroups," writes the author, "there is a positive relationship between holding racist attitudes and white Christian identity among both frequent (weekly or more) and infrequent church attenders." The most hopeful case study focuses on his hometown of Macon, where there are efforts between white and black Baptist churches to pull together. As Jones has sought various paths out of the morass, he has often turned to the writings of James Baldwin about "the white problem" in U.S. society. An indispensable study of Christianity in America. (b/w images)
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Starred review from June 1, 2020
In this important book, Jones (The End of White Christian America, 2016) methodically lays out the source of American racism's origins and its continued flourishing: white evangelical churches. Drawing on his own southern background, he explores the culture that inculcated white social dominance and control, but his personal story is only a framing device for the extensive historical and sociological research that comprises the bulk of the book. Beginning with the schism over slavery in the Baptist denomination, Jones details how other white Protestant denominations and, eventually, Catholicism also came into the fold. Although scientists were also culpable in advancing notions of white supremacy, religion's role is the primary focus of this book. Jones holds a mirror to white religious culture, cautioning those who "read their worldview back into the Bible." Leaders must own up to their history, confess the deep hurt they have caused African Americans, and make reparations. This book is a marvel. It manages to quietly excoriate the insidious, entrenched attitudes that continue to sow racial hatred and division and to show the large and small ways that they continue. Devoid of moralizing, this powerful, heavily researched and annotated book is a must-read for religious leaders and academics.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2020, American Library Association.)