Hope Greater than Hell

In addition to other sources, this post owes a great debt to a fantastic article by Orthodox Bishop Kallistos Ware.

*******************

“There is no doctrine which I would more willingly remove from Christianity than the doctrine of hell, if it lay in my power,” wrote C.S. Lewis. There are few if any beliefs held by Christians as difficult to swallow as that of human beings suffering for all eternity in hell.  The seeming hopelessness and injustice of hell has caused many to walk away from the Christian faith and torments many others who stay.   

If that sounds familiar, if you left or if you are still struggling, if the destiny of those in hell is a gut-wrenching obstacle to your faith, this post is for you.

At this point, some Christian readers are probably rolling their eyes, grumbling, and already sure they know and strongly disagree with what I’m about to say. They might be right.

The following is a suggestion that hell may not have the last word.  

It is an argument for the real possibility of a universal reconciliation between God and all of humanity, one in which salvation through Christ is extended to all people and hell is left empty in the end.   

Let me be clear, however: I am not talking about a universalism where all religions are the same and Jesus doesn’t matter.  The possibility of universal salvation is only through the person and work of Jesus and the acceptance of his loving gift of life.  When he said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:8), he meant it, and so do I.

The Christian message has historically been referred to as “the gospel”. The English word “gospel” comes from the Old English translation of the Greek wordevangelion, meaning “good news”.  In other words, the Christian message is meant to be a joyous proclamation.

As the prophet Isaiah (52:7) wrote, 

How lovely on the mountains
   Are the feet of him who brings good news,
Who announces peace
   And brings good news of happiness,
Who announces salvation,
   And says to Zion, “Your God reigns!”

The gospel is often presented as something like this: “All people have done bad things.  To be just, God has to sentence them to an eternity suffering in hell, but he sent Jesus to die in our place and take our punishment.  If we accept his sacrifice, we are saved and can have eternal life with God.”  While the language of this formulation and some of its theological details belong to modern American Evangelicalism, the rough outline of punishment and salvation through Jesus are and have been held in common by most Christians around the world and throughout history. 

But the other side of the coin, “The vast majority of the people who have ever lived will suffer in hell for all eternity,” doesn’t sound like good news at all. It sounds like devastatingly terrible news, even if we’re being offered an escape.

Ware quotes Fr Sophrony, who wrote the following in his biography of St Silouan the Athonite:

It was particularly characteristic of Staretz Silouan to pray for the dead suffering in the hell of separation from God... He could not bear to think that anyone would languish in “outer darkness.” I remember a conversation between him and a certain hermit, who declared with evident satisfaction, “God will punish all atheists. They will burn in everlasting fire.” 

Obviously upset, the Staretz said, “Tell me, supposing you went to paradise, and there looked down and saw somebody burning in hell-fire—would you feel happy?” 

“It can’t be helped. It would be their own fault,” said the hermit.

The Staretz answered him with a sorrowful countenance. “Love could not bear that,” he said. “We must pray for all.”

“Love could not bear that.”

If “God is love” (1 John 4:8) and loves infinitely more powerfully than any other being, can that greatest of love bear to see the eternal torment of those in hell?  1 Timothy 2:4 says that God “desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth,” and the sacrifice of his only Son suggests he is willing to go to the greatest of lengths to do so.  And yet our God-given free will allows us to reject him.

There are two sets of passages regarding the matter in the New Testament, some that talk about judgement and hell and others that speak to the salvation of all people.  We have a tendency to give precedence to the former and qualify the latter.  

In the Gospel of Luke (16:26), Jesus tells a parable in which Abraham says to a man in hell begging for mercy, 

“Between us and you a great chasm has been fixed, in order that those who would pass from here to you may not be able, and none may cross from there to us.”

In Mark 9:43-48, he says,

If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than with two hands to go to hell, to the unquenchable fire. And if your foot causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life lame than with two feet to be thrown into hell.  And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into hell, where the worm does not die and the fire is not quenched.

The word translated here as “hell” is Gehenna, a valley outside Jerusalem where the city’s trash was dumped and burned, hence the imagery of fire and the “worm [that] does not die.” This is the word most commonly translated as “hell” in English bibles.  Other imagery used in the New Testament includes “outer darkness” and a “lake of fire.” 

These pictures are most likely meant to be evocative rather than literally descriptive of what one might experience in the afterlife.  Indeed, theologians have variously theorized that the true suffering in hell comes from things such as complete separation from God, the confrontation of one’s true self, or even the experience of God’s love itself.  For example, the seventh-century ascetic and theologian, St Isaac the Syrian, writes:

I also maintain that those who are punished in Gehenna are scourged by the scourge of love.  Nay, what is so bitter and vehement as the torment of love?  I mean that those who have become conscious that they have sinned against love suffer greater torment from this than from any fear of punishment. For the sorrow caused in the heart by sin against love is more poignant than any torment.  It would be improper for a man to think that sinners in Gehenna are deprived of the love of God.  Love is the offspring of knowledge of the truth which, as is commonly confessed, is given to all.  The power of love works in two ways. It torments sinners, even as happens here when a friend suffers from a friend.  But it becomes a source of joy for those who have observed its duties.  Thus I say that this is the torment of Gehenna: bitter regret.  But love inebriates the souls of the sons of Heaven by its delectability.

In Matthew 25:31-46, Jesus describes humanity’s final judgement based on how they treated others, which he describes as their treatment of God himself. The first half describes the actions of the righteous and their consequences, the second (41-46) describes those of the wicked and their consequences:

Then he will say to those on his left, “Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.  For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink, I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.”  Then they also will answer, saying, “Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to you?”  Then he will answer them, saying, “Truly, I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.”  And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.

It should be noted that the Greek word translated as “eternal” in this passage and elsewhere, aionios, does not necessarily mean forever, but rather “lasting for an aion” (where we get the English word “eon”) or “age”, potentially a finite rather than infinite period.  Indeed, New Testament writers use aionto refer to both the present world as “this age” and what comes afterword as “the age to come”.  In the final verse of this passage, however, both life as well as punishment are described as “age-long”.  This would seem to suggest that, at least in this case, both are of equal eternal duration, and this may be the case, although theologian Thomas Talbott argues that aionioshere carries a connotation of quality rather than duration, pointing instead to their source in the eternal nature of God.  In any case, aionios, can be used in ambiguous ways, and we should be open to the idea that the eternity of hell may not be as certain as we think.

A second set of texts speaks of the extension of salvation to all people.

Perhaps the simplest of these is 1 Corinthians 15:22:

For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.

“In Adam all die,” while understood somewhat differently by Eastern and Western Christians, is a statement of an original sin whose effects are decidedly universal.  It is generally argued that “all [being] made alive” is merely a potentiality, not a fact that will certainly be accomplished, but Paul does not say “all maybe made alive,” but “all shallbe made alive.”  And why should “all” in the second part of the sentence be any different than it is in the first?  However one balances it with other passages, the verse is decidedly universalistic in tone.

We read similar statements in Paul’s letter to the Romans.  For instance, Romans 5:18-19 says, 

Therefore, as one trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousnessleads to justification and life for all men. For as by the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man's obedience the many will be made righteous.  

And Romans 11:32 says, 

For God has consigned all to disobedience, that he may have mercy on all.

This last verse comes at the end of a series of difficult chapters (9-11) that describe God “hardening the hearts” of certain people and groups of people so that they will not accept him.  These chapters have been frequently used by Calvinists to argue against the idea of free will in salvation and that God will irresistibly choose some people for salvation and others for damnation apart from any volition on their part.  

Seen in the context of Romans 11:23 through a universalistic lens, however, chapters 9-11 take on a significantly different character.  If God must temporarily harden the hearts if certain individuals, how much greater will their reward and forgiveness be at the end of all things?  They are not consigned to eternal punishment against their will, but only temporarily held back for a greater purpose.  Who knows if even a temporary hell is their destination at all?

Other verses speak of universalistic ideas in the language of reconciliation and union.  For example, Colossians 1:19-20 says,

For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.

Likewise, 1 Corinthians 15:28, a key text for patristic theologians like Origen and St Gregory of Nyssa, says,

When all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to him who put all things in subjection under him, that God may be all in all.

If these passages are to be taken at face value, then what of hell?  

The doctrine that God punishes wrongdoers is firm, but to what end?  The standard answer is justice: a person who has done wrong must pay for what they have done.  (Though we might here ask what justice it is for a finite crime to receive infinite punishment?)  But what has been gained?  Does a loving and merciful God derive satisfaction from taking vengeance upon those he loves?  Would he not rather be reconciled with his wayward loves?

We often see justice this way, merely as recompense, but the Bible speaks of God as a sort of cosmic parent, so let’s consider a parent punishing their child: A good parent doesn’t punish to give a child “what they deserve” but to correct them and make them a better person. Change is the object.  Beyond recompense, justice is also a state in which all things have been made right.  George MacDonald suggests that, “Punishment…is not the thing required of God, but the absolute destruction of sin.”  Like Origen, Isaac, Gregory, and others, MacDonald sees God as a kind of ultimate physician, allowing a punishment that at its core is corrective rather that retributive.

The Bible says again and again that God passionately loves the whole world. If there was a way to rescue all, even the dead, would an infinitely loving God not do so?  If we agree with St Isaac the Syrian and others like him that the torment of hell is one of self-reflection and the overwhelming guilt of rejecting the very source of love or even the experience of rejected love itself (this is a common view amongst Eastern Orthodox Christians), why might God not allow those individuals the chance to change their minds?   

C.S. Lewis, though not a universalist himself, imagines such a scenario in his book, The Great Divorce, in which those in hell are allowed to visit heaven where they are constantly bid to stay, even though many refuse.  Nevertheless the offer remains, and the bidding never ceases.

The Bible itself suggests that death may not be the end of God’s eternally loving invitation through Jesus, with 1 Peter 3:18-20:

For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, in order to bring you to God. He was put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit, in which also he went and made a proclamation to the spirits in prison, who in former times did not obey, when God waited patiently in the days of Noah…

This is otherwise described in Ephesians 4:8-10:

Therefore it is said,

“When he ascended on high he made captivity itself a captive;
          he gave gifts to his people.”

When it says, “He ascended,” what does it mean but that he had also descended into the lower parts of the earth?  He who descended is the same one who ascended far above all the heavens, so that he might fill all things.

While Christ’s descent and ministry to the “spirits in prison”, traditionally referred to as the “Harrowing of Hell”, is generally seen as the rescue of the faithful who died before Jesus’s ministry and death, those who were disobedient in the time of Noah hardly represent God’s faithful before Christ. It’s possible that this preaching was not meant to be salvific in nature, but I see no reason to prefer such an interpretation.  As Psalm 139:8 says, even “if I make my bed [amongst the dead], you are there!”

Nonetheless, free will allows us to say, “No.”

This is what kept C.S. Lewis from adopting the universalism of George MacDonald, whom he greatly admired and was greatly influenced by.  It is certainly possible that free will shall prevent an eventual emptying of hell, but perhaps love wins.  In his book, In the End God, J.A.T. Robinson suggests that perhaps love itself may win over even the hardest hearts:

Everyone may point to instances in which he has been constrained to thankful response by the overmastering power of love. And yet, under this strange compulsion, has anyone ever felt his freedom infringed or his personality violated? Is it not precisely at these moments that he becomes conscious, perhaps only for a fleeting space, of being himself in a way he never knew before, of attaining a fullness and integration of life which is inextricably bound up with the decision drawn from him by another’s love? Moreover, this is true however strong be the constraint laid upon him: or, rather, it is truer the stronger it is. Under the constraint of the love of God in Christ this sense of self-fulfillment is at its maximum. The testimony of generations is that here, as nowhere else, service is perfect freedom.

Perhaps this is not so.  It may be that the universal reconciliation between God and humanity is only a hope, but we must hope for it.

In the end, we must ask ourselves, “Does God win?”  If so, what does that mean?  If his will is that “all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4), is the eternal presence of persons in hell not a defeat?  Can God’s purposes be frustrated forever?

A Christ-centered universalism seems to me to be the only way in which God truly wins and his purposes are fulfilled.  In my mind, it is the purest triumph of love.

But can I say any of this with absolute certainty?  No, I cannot.  But do I believe it and hope for it?  Yes, I do, and it fills me with such joy and hope as no other Christian idea does.  This is truly good news.

I have great hope to affirm with Julian of Norwich that, in the end,

All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.

                                                      

For ease of both reading and writing, I have not given the detailed citations that I would in an academic publication.  If you want more information on the sources for anything I have written, leave a comment below or message me directly, and I will get back to you as soon as I can.

The Gospel is Bigger than You Think

Preach the gospel always, when necessary use words.

This quote is generally attributed to St Francis of Assisi, although he almost certainly didn’t say it.  It gets panned a lot, and St Francis himself was a prolific preacher, but maybe it’s worth a second look because of how it encourages us to see the gospel as something much bigger than a spoken message.

So what is the gospel, and how do we preach it?

The English word “gospel” comes from the Old English translation of the Greek word evangelion, meaning “good news”.

At its root, it goes something like this:  People have done bad things and come under the power of sin and death. Jesus died to erase all that and rose from the dead to offer us eternal life and relationship with God if we are willing to accept it.  There are a lot of different ways of understanding how that works, but that’s for another post.

Evangelicalism follows a theological tradition that emphasizes the gospel as a story of personal redemption and the Christian life as one of personal relationship with God.  This is an important aspect of the gospel, but ultimately it’s incomplete on its own.

When Jesus wandered through first-century Palestine, he framed the good news like this: “The kingdom of God is at hand.”  This kingdom is not a physical one with borders but rather a way of living with God and one another that transforms ourselves, our priorities, and our relationships with other people.

The kingdom of God flips the values of our world upside down, so much that the “first will be last and the last will be first” (Matthew 19:30, 20:16; Mark 10:31; Luke 13:30) and prostitutes and those who collaborated with the Roman occupation enter in before the religious elites (Matthew 21:31). To enter the kingdom of God requires one to become like a child and is exceedingly hard for the rich.  Jesus said,

Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.

Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.

Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.

Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.

Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.

Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. (Matthew 5:3-10)

and,

Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.

Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied.

Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh.

Blessed are you when people hate you and when they exclude you and revile you and spurn your name as evil, on account of the Son of Man! Rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven; for so their fathers did to the prophets.

But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation.

Woe to you who are full now, for you shall be hungry.

Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep.

Woe to you, when all people speak well of you, for so their fathers did to the false prophets. (Luke 6:20-26)

The kingdom of God is a place where you love your enemies, turn the other cheek, and pray for those who persecute you.  And it has massive social implications.  

In Matthew 22:39, Jesus says commands us to love one another just like we love ourselves and likens it to loving God Himself.  Love here is more than a warm fuzzy feeling, it’s a prioritization of needs and wellbeing, sacrificially if necessary.  So how do I express my self-love?  When I’m hungry, I feed myself; when I’m thirsty, I drink clean water; I keep a roof over my head; I give myself an education and many other things; and when I’m sick I go to the doctor.  If this is what I do for myself, this is what I should also seek for others who need it. The kingdom of God requires us to reorient our social, economic, and political, as well as spiritual priorities in ways that may be uncomfortable and challenge our existing ideologies.

Make no mistake, Jesus calls for personal salvation.  In John 3:16, he famously said “For God so loved the world that he sent his Son, so that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” Later he says, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:8). 

But accepting that and entering the kingdom of God demands a whole new way of living.

At the end of Matthew’s gospel, Jesus says to his disciples,

All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.  Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey all that I have commanded you.

“Go and make disciples of all nations…teaching them to obey all that I have commanded you.”  It is a charge for Christians to make disciples, not just converts, people who truly seek to Jesus fully.

The college ministry I attended for much of my undergrad years took the first part of that very seriously.  In addition to evangelism, they focused on memorizing scripture and mentoring others to help them live a holy life and make more disciples in their image.  They were and are wonderful people, but there was a lot they left out.  On a spring break retreat breakout session, I asked about addressing poverty and social justice as Christians.  The results were…underwhelming: “Um…try reading Amos.”  Profoundly unsatisfied, I found plenty enough to put together a bible study on the subject that spanned both Old and New Testaments and required multiple sessions for a group to work through.  Earlier, I had also started a small charity in college dedicated to dealing with global poverty, social justice, and HIV/AIDS.  Trying to get people at that student ministry to care or even donate their pocket change was…difficult.  A few people (including my amazing future wife) were interested and joined up, but the most I generally got was something along the lines of “Oh, it’s so great that you’re doing that” and that was it.  Most people we more concerned with “sharing the gospel” and “making disciples”, as if these things could be separated.  Exploring the social ramifications of Jesus’s teaching like Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7; Luke 6:17-49) or the command to “love your neighbor as yourself” didn’t really seem to be on their radar when it came making disciples and teaching them to follow what Jesus commanded.

Personal salvation is important, but a gospel that is not also social falls short of the gospel of Jesus Christ. (The reverse is also true.)

Preaching is the proclamation of the gospel, but it must be more than words (and those words must be about more than just how to be “saved”): it is showing God’s kingdom to the world by living it.  It is showing the world transformed relationships, politics, economics, communities based on love for one another.

Feeding the hungry proclaims the gospel.  Prison reform proclaims the gospel.  Fighting racism proclaims the gospel.  Standing with the poor and oppressed proclaims the gospel. Sacrificially giving your time, money, attention for the sake of others proclaims the gospel.  These things proclaim the kingdom of God loud and clear, sometimes more so than the words we speak, as necessary as those are.

     Perhaps more than anything else, we preach the gospel when we live a transformed life, and how we live out God’s kingdom may well speak far louder to the world around us than our words about personal salvation do.

Grace, Humility, and the Fourth of July

     The Fourth of July is coming up soon.  That means I’m supposed to be excited and patriotic and revel in how amazing the United States is and in the genius of the men who created it.

Instead, I feel ambivalent.  I feel ambivalent every year.  

It’s not just that I’m not all that into crowds and fireworks.  The American brand of patriotism itself makes me uneasy.  It’s not just a thankfulness for our country or a love for home, it’s also an arrogance and hubris that says we’re better than everyone else in practically every way.  Fox News personality Sean Hannity once summed up many of our attitudes by saying that “America is the greatest, best country God has ever given man on the face of the earth.”

That’s a pretty strong statement.

It’s also a prime example of the unbridled pride and self-righteousness that are hallmarks of American patriotism.

As we questioned why terrorists would attack us on 9/11, many Americans said, “They hate us for our freedom.”  Conservatives were enraged at the thought that Barack Obama might “apologize for America,” as if we have nothing to seek forgiveness for.  Democrats and Republicans alike proclaim that “America is the greatest nation on Earth” with dizzying frequency.  Anyone too critical is accused of hating America and being ungrateful for its blessings.

At this point, some of you are sorely tempted to stop reading.  “Oh great, here goes another liberal, dumping on America again!”  That’s really not my point.  I like America – our ideals of freedom, equality, and democratic government enshrined in the Constitution are inspiring – but we also have to own up to our faults if we want to live up to our highest ideals.  

In Matthew 7:3-5, Jesus tells his disciples,

Why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?  Or how can you say to your brother, “Let me take the speck out of your eye,” when there is the log in your own eye?  You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye.

I write this with plenty a log in my own eye, and we celebrate our country’s founding on Wednesday with our own national logs clouding our collective vision. My point is not to dump on America, it’s to plead for humility, grace, and self-reflection as a nation.

What is greatness, anyway?  Is it political or economic domination?  Wealth? Freedom?  Equality?  The strongest military?

At several points, Jesus’s disciples argued amongst themselves which of them were the greatest or would be when Jesus inaugurated his kingdom.

But Jesus called them to him and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them.  It shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant,  and whoever would be first among you must be your slave, even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (Matthew 20:25-28)

I’m not sure to what extent to apply this idea to the nation-state, but it’s clear that God’s standards of greatness are different from those of the world we live in.  Perhaps a better measure of our greatness than military power or GDP is how we care for one another.

In Matthew 25:40, Jesus says “Whatever you do to the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you do to me.”

So how do the least among us fare? 

While the United States is one of the wealthiest countries in the world, that wealth is distributed highly unequally.  According to Oxfam, “The three richest people in the US own the same wealth as the bottom half of the US population (roughly 160 million people).” Drawing on numbers from the U.S. Census Bureau, a recent United Nations report found that “about 40 million [Americans] live in poverty, 18.5 million in extreme poverty, and 5.3 million live in Third World conditions of absolute poverty.“  A whole 21% of American children live below the federal poverty line and another 22% live in low-income households, affecting not only their health and development, but also their ability to learn and succeed in school.  As of 2015, almost 1.5 million households in the United States subsist on less than two dollars per day.

Meanwhile, our politicians enact huge tax cuts that mainly benefit the wealthy and then try to balance the national budget on the backs of the poor, the sick, and the elderly by making cuts to our social safety net.  Huge corporations reap billions of dollars in profit while their employees struggle on food stamps, because they aren’t paid a living wage for their labor.  

American poverty is not a foregone conclusion.  We have enough for everyone, but we hold it back.  We have the resources to address the systemic problems that allow poverty to thrive, but we still hold them back.  Our neighbors need help, and whether you ultimately prefer a social safety net in the form of government programs or private charity, we are holding back.  

St Basil the Great preached:

Is not the person who strips another of clothing called a thief?  And those who do not clothe the naked when they have the power to do so, should they not be called the same?  The bread you are holding back is for the hungry, the clothes you keep put away are for the naked, the shoes that are rotting away with disuse are for those who have none, the silver you keep buried in the earth is for the needy.  You are thus guilty of injustice toward as many as you might have aided, and did not.

As for the sick, the American healthcare system can be precarious.

My son and I both have a congenital heart condition called Tetralogy of Fallot.  In 2015, the year I had my most recent open-heart surgery (I’ve had four now), I racked up over $400,000 in medical bills.  My son Elliot is only nine months old and his care has already cost at least three quarters of a million dollars.  Thankfully, my family has good insurance through my wife’s employer, but many of us are not so lucky.  Tens of millions of Americans lack any health insurance at all and others remain underinsured and still at risk of financial disaster from medical costs.  Unlike the United States, our peers in the developed world provide comprehensive universal coverage.  Here the Trump administration is even taking aim at regulations in the Affordable Care Act that mean that people like my son and I can’t be denied health insurance or charged higher premiums due to preexisting conditions.

And while many white Americans like to believe that we now live in a post-racial society, the reality is that equality is far from having been achieved.

In 1852 former slave Frederick Douglass was asked to speak at a Fourth of July event.  His speech was an indictment of the gross injustice of antebellum America:

I am not included within the pale of this glorious anniversary! Your high independence only reveals the immeasurable distance between us. The blessings in which you this day rejoice are not enjoyed in common. The rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity, and independence bequeathed by your fathers is shared by you, not by me. The sunlight that brought life and healing to you has brought stripes and death to me. This Fourth of July is yours, not mine. You may rejoice, I must mourn. To drag a man in fetters into the grand illuminated temple of liberty, and call upon him to join you in joyous anthems, were inhuman mockery and sacrilegious irony. Do you mean, citizens, to mock me, by asking me to speak today? What, to the American slave, is your Fourth of July?

Many African Americans still feel this way, that the Fourth, the flag, and the anthem are not theirs, that America’s promise is not for them.  Slavery is over, but are racial minorities even now equal participants in America’s freedom and prosperity?  The old Jim Crow is illegal, but segregation still reigns in cities like mine, where redlining, racially restrictive housing covenants, and white flight left blacks clustered in well-defined and economically depressed areas that remain fifty years after the passage of the Fair Housing Act, so much so that one can move between drastically different neighborhoods almost just by crossing the street.

Despite only accounting for 5% of the global population, the United States incarcerates 25% of the world’s prisoners, and a hugely disproportionate number of these prisoners are African Americans, who are incarcerated at five times the rate of whites overall and up to ten times as often in states like Oklahoma and New Jersey.  Our criminal justice system shows a disturbing racial bias against African Americans at every level, from police interactions and arrests to charges, convictions, and sentencing, and our society at large operates with an assumption of black criminality.

Furthermore, researchers have found that job applicants with whiter-sounding names and experiences on their resumes were twice as likely to be called back as those whose resumes suggested the candidate was a member of a racial minority.  And Valerie Wilson of the Economic Policy Institute gives the following statistics about racial disparities in income and wealth in America:

In 2016, the most recent year for which all of these data are available, the median black worker earned 75 percent of what the median white worker earned in an hour; the median black household earned 61 percent of the income the median white household earned in a year; and the value of net worth for the median black family was just 10 percent of the value for the median white family. Related to these relative proportionate differences is also a wide range of absolute differences. While median hourly wages vary by a few dollars ($14.92 for black workers, $19.79 for white workers), the difference in median household income is tens of thousands of dollars ($39,490 for black households, $65,041 for white households), and the difference in median family net worth is hundreds of thousands of dollars ($17,600 for black families, $171,000 for white families).

For the United States today, Martin Luther King, Jr.’s dream of racial equality still remains a dream.

The prophet Amos condemned those in his day who lived in luxury while they exploited the poor and maintained structures of inequality and injustice:

They sell the innocent for silver,
    and the needy for a pair of sandals.
They trample on the heads of the poor
    as on the dust of the ground
    and deny justice to the oppressed. (2:6b-7a)

…you who trample the needy
    and do away with the poor of the land,

saying,

“When will the New Moon be over
    that we may sell grain,
and the Sabbath be ended
    that we may market wheat?”—
skimping on the measure,
    boosting the price
    and cheating with dishonest scales,
buying the poor with silver
    and the needy for a pair of sandals,
    selling even the sweepings with the wheat. (8:4-6)

According to Amos, God vehemently rejected these people’s worship:

“I hate, I despise your feasts,
    and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies.

Even though you offer me your burnt offerings and grain offerings,
    I will not accept them;
and the peace offerings of your fattened animals,
    I will not look upon them.

Take away from me the noise of your songs;
    to the melody of your harps I will not listen.

But let justice roll down like waters,
    and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.” (5:21-24)

“Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream!”

Are our politics, our business practices, our criminal justice system, and our society at large overflowing with justice or do we trample on the poor and the downtrodden?  

What should we make of America as we celebrate the Fourth of July?  We do have much to celebrate, but we also have cause for honest introspection.  Perhaps we might set aside our hubris and self-righteousness.  Maybe if we are honest about our faults, we can be learn to be great in more of the ways that matter most.