White Jesus: The Architexture of Racism in Religion and Education

The four authors of White Jesus: The Architecture of Racism in Religion and Education, all scholars in higher education, seek to differentiate between the White Jesus of American civil religion and the real Jesus of Nazareth. They point educators and administrators to evidence that reveals two rivaling notions of Christian faith in colleges and universities. The former is often oppressive and distinctly aligned with White American culture, and the latter predates and supersedes that narrow definition with a historical, transcultural, and self-sacrificial faith. The book calls educators and administrators in higher education out of silence to examine and reckon with historical and systemic racism within their Christian institutions. White Jesus describes American civil religion, in which Christianity became enmeshed with the ethos of the nation. The marriage of Christianity and state has had historical precedents, such as Constantine’s Roman Empire, and this marriage becomes dangerous when adherents justify the country’s practices through misinterpreted Christian texts. The myths of Manifest Destiny or Americans as God’s chosen people, for example, are problematic both because they misinterpret Scripture and because they overlook the experiences of marginalized groups in America, such as Native Americans and African Americans. Also, in this American-Christian syncretism, White cultural values become as weighty as biblical values. The book provides a brief history of Christian culpability in systemic racism in America. For example, after Reconstruction, White Christians thought that African Americans threatened their culture because they weren’t sufficiently educated or evangelized. Also, for nearly a hundred years after Reconstruction, many Christians taught that God created distinct races; therefore, those races should be maintained and not mixed or unified. Additionally, even in today’s discourse, White Christians usually deny the existence of systemic racism because Protestant individualism (emphasizing individual accountability and salvation) International Journal of Christianity & Education