Coates on Coates: A Book Review of Between the World and Me

Hailed as one of the best books of 2015 and winner of the National Book Award, critics continue to heap approbations on the newest work of the critical race theorist and emerging black intellectual Ta-Nehisi Coates.  Written in the form of a letter to his fifteen year old son, Coates writes about what life in a black body is like in a world build upon the systematic enslavement and destruction of black bodies.  Though we are allowed to overhear this conversation between one black man and his son, it is clear that the real audience for this book is the white "race," a people Coates constantly refers to as "the Dreamers" due to their singularly undivided focus on attaining the American Dream -- an edifice that they have constructed by means of oppressing and (ab)using black bodies.  What is the Dream? "It is perfect houses with nice lawns.  It is Memorial Day cookouts, block associations, and driveways.  The Dream is treehouses and the Cub Scouts.  The Dream smells like peppermint and tastes like strawberry shortcake."  And, try as he might to attain the Dream, it remains ever inaccessible to his people because "the Dream rests on our backs, the bedding made from our bodies" (11).

Though deeply cynical and acerbic in its tone, Coates does powerfully communicate to the white reader many sharp insights into life and struggles of black women and men.  Coates exposes the ways in which large-scale systems -- legal policies, city districting and policing, cultural attitudes, and so on -- operate to disadvantage those with black skin.  Particularly insightful is Coates' recurring argument that the enslavement of black bodies was and is a profoundly physical act, not some abstract idea.  Racism destroys particular people with particular experiences, preferences, and characteristics.  This racism "is a visceral experience... it dislodges brains, blocks airways, rips muscles, extracts organs, cracks bones, breaks teeth" (10).  The insidious ideology of white supremacy possesses a foul taste, a rancid smell, and leaves dead bodies in its wake.  If Coates' highly emotive language feels like a punch in the gut, it does so for good reason.

Regrettably, Coates structures his argument in such a way that a white man like myself is denied permission to voice any disagreement lest I be charged with the crime of "privilege" or even "racism." (Nevermind the fact that as a black man Coates seems to know precisely what is going on in the white mind).  And though I plead guilty to the former, recognizing the way my social status has shaped my own perception of the world around me, I want to resist the latter label.  Likewise I reject the tendency ubiquitous among both the far left and the far right to deny certain people the right to dissent, to express reasoned disagreement, and to subject every idea to rigorous scrutiny.  If we cannot dialogue, after all, what hope do we have to arrive at even a modicum of understanding?  Yet this, it seems, is precisely what Coates considers to be impossible.  Rooted dogmatically in the Nietzschean ethic of "will to power," the author's arguments throughout the book assume that relations between whites and blacks must ever remain marked by struggle, conflict, and even violence.  Assuming that white people can change, that they might one day be anything other oppressors, that they will stop plundering black bodies for their own personal economic gain, Coates tells his son, is harmful idealism that distracts from the pragmatic, ongoing project of the struggle for black power.  In this world, one either eats or gets eaten.  And the Dreamers have been feasting on black flesh for far too long.

Given his rejection of theism and the uniquely Christian hope that the arc of the universe bends toward justice, it should not surprise us that Coates offers no suggestions for a way forward other than armed popular resistance.  Trashed as idealistic gas is the pacifism of Martin Luther King; in its place Coates seeks to revive the militant tactics of the Black Power Movement and the violent rhetoric of his hero Malcolm X ("If he hated, he hated because it was human for the enslaved to hate the enslaver, natural as Prometheus hating the birds.  He would not turn the other cheek for you.  He would not be a better man for you.  He would not be your morality") 36.  For this reason, Coates denigrates those heroes of "Black History Month" who staged sit-ins, marched for freedom, and "seemed to love the worst things in life -- love the dogs that rent their children apart, the tear gas that clawed at their lungs, the fire hoses that tore off their clothes and tumbled them into the streets" (32).  Nonviolent methods are lauded by whites because pacifism poses no genuine threat to white power, Coates cynically argues.  It is an oppressor's morality.  Besides, any willingness to suffer or die nonviolently for a cause depends upon the conviction that history is aiming at a particular end or telos.  Yet that is not the world we inhabit, according to the author.  Ridiculing those who believe that the meek will inherit the earth, Coates inhabits a universe that is purely "physical, and its moral arc [is] bent toward chaos then concluded in a box" (28).

As a Christian and a theologian, I must part ways with Ta-Nehisi Coates at this juncture.  Though he has much to teach me about endemic racism, the social and physical conditions of urban poverty, the black diaspora, the shortcomings of the white Dream, and much more, I must (at the risk of being discarded as another privileged white oppressor) declare my belief in the possibility of reconciliation and transformation.  Christ's prayer for those who crucified him remind us today that the cycle of violence -- long though it may have lasted -- can grind to a halt through the power of forgiveness.  History is not condemned to be, as Coates believes, one long game of "king of the mountain" in which whites stand on top of the pile, shoving down black and brown pretenders to their throne.  In contrast to all of this stands the kenotic movement celebrated by Paul in Philippians 2, the master who washes his servants' feet, the black baptist preacher who instructs his followers to overcome hatred with love.

For though Coates' vitriol positively drips with righteous indignation, he never offers to me a convincing reason why I ought to share his outrage at injustice.  For if the world we inhabit really is mere chaos that ends in a box, for what reason might I consider surrendering my status as a white male?  If that's the game we're playing, then I will do what I will do, compelling others to serve my own purposes and making no apologies for doing so.  Coates either overlooks the danger of the oppressed becoming the oppressor or else he tacitly approves of it.  And it is this great struggle which provides Coates and his son with meaning and purpose in their lives.  In perhaps the most honest moment in this letter, the author states the conclusion that he is compelled to embrace: "Perhaps struggle is all we have because the god of history is an atheist, and nothing about this world is meant to be... These are the preferences of the universe itself: verbs over nouns, actions over states, struggle over hope" (71).  This is a profoundly dark and cynical perspective from which to advocate for "racial justice," one which effectively renders terms like "good," "true," "beautiful," and "just" devoid of any meaning beyond the personal and subjective.  And so I have every right to reject the author's idea of justice just as much as I might claim to dislike tomatoes.  Who is he to argue with me?  On what grounds will he convince me otherwise?

Thankfully, I believe in the God of Justice and Peace who provides content and definition to such ideas, enfleshed in his very body hung on a cross and resurrected.  Just as guns will one day be reforged into garden tools and just as the lion will one day lay down with the lamb, so too I cling to the hope that "one day little black boys and girls will be holding hands with little white boys and girls" and we will know peace.  This was Dr. King's dream.  One day we will all wake up to find that this reconciliation is the fabric with which this universe was woven all along.

Free Methodism and the Poor

Last Thursday I gave a presentation to the Family Camp of the Wabash Conference that I am part of. I'm posting this because a number of people asked to have access to it. It is free for anyone to use.

View it at this link:

PowerPoint Presentation: Free Methodism and Ministry to the Poor

Welcoming the Stranger

This article was written as a submission for the magazine Light and Life.

Each Monday roughly eighty residents of my community crowd into the little sanctuary of our church in order to receive a few bags of groceries from our food pantry. Increasingly, we have noticed that many who are coming look and speak different from us – they are Latinos who have come to our city of Indianapolis in order to find a new life and escape the destitution of their homeland. Each week I look into their smiling eyes, wishing my Spanish were not so poor and wondering what story they have to tell. What could have brought them here to the inner city? How horrible must it have been to leave your culture, language, and family for a strange land?

You don’t have to be a news junkie to figure out that immigration is a very heated topic in today’s culture. With over 70,000 foreigners arriving in the States each day and projections that by 2042 white Caucasians will be in the minority, it is no wonder that many people have strong feelings about the issue. As the left and right debate over better immigration policy, what ought to be the Christian’s response to immigration? What does the Bible teach us about the alien within our midst?

First and foremost, we must recognize that immigration is not just about policy; it’s about people – people that God loves dearly and calls his own. God has always had a soft spot in his heart for those who are stranded in a foreign land. God intended for his people to be renowned for their hospitality and compassion for those on the margins of society. The Lord commanded his people in this way: "'When an alien lives with you in your land, do not mistreat him. The alien living with you must be treated as one of your native-born. Love him as yourself, for you were aliens in Egypt. I am the LORD your God” (Leviticus 19:33-34). Indeed, such demands to welcome, respect, and care for the physical needs of the immigrant can be found consistently throughout the Old Testament. In fact, as one Free Methodist bishop recently pointed out, the Bible has much more to say directly about the issue of immigration that it does about the issue of abortion.

The New Testament is equally clear. It is no coincidence that Joseph, Mary, and Jesus were themselves migrants in a foreign land. The threat posed by Herod necessitated their flight to Egypt. For this reason, according to the Roman Catholic Church, Joseph, Mary, and Jesus “are, for all times and all places, the models and protectors of every migrant, alien and refugee of whatever kind who, whether compelled by fear of persecution or by want, is forced to leave his native land, his beloved parents and relatives, his close friends, and to seek a foreign soil.”

Perhaps the most fundamental principle of the New Testament which calls Christians to radical love and acceptance of the foreigner is the second greatest commandment: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus consistently redefines neighbor as anyone who is in need – not simply those of our own ethnicity (Luke 10:30-37). The lavish love of the Father which sends rain and sunshine on both the righteous and the unrighteous must be imitated by those who claim to be his children.

But what if the foreigner in our midst is here illegally? Some will object that caring for illegal immigrants is immoral since they stand in violation of the laws of the land. But as Christians we answer to a higher authority and when the laws of a nation conflict with the laws of God, there must be no doubt in the believer’s mind which should take precedence (Acts 5:29). Unfortunately, many politicians and pundits have capitalized on mankind’s natural fear of those different than ourselves. But believers must see through such ploys – when we look into the eyes of an illegal immigrant, we do not see “one of them” or “a national security risk.” Instead, we see a woman or man created in the image of God for whom Christ died.

Illegal immigration has often sadly been construed as a national security issue. But for the Christian it must primarily be seen as a human rights issue. Instead of focusing on how we can care for the poor and destitute, our voices have sometimes been subverted by a militant nationalism which demands building up walls instead of tearing them down. Bill Mefford, a graduate of Asbury Seminary and United Methodist leader, stated it clearly: “When the focus of the church is blurred from defending the rights of immigrants and their families, to also defending the rights of the State, we come dangerously close to forfeiting our prophetic call to hold the State accountable for its treatment of immigrants. When the church loses its prophetic calling, our mission becomes little more than societal maintenance by assimilating the vulnerable into their assigned place at the bottom of the social, economic, and political order, no matter how unjust that order may be. This is a skewed and unbiblical missiology.”

It is high time for us as a church to set aside our political differences and with one voice proclaim to the immigrant (legal or not): We are on your side! God loves you and so do we! Following the law of love will lead us not only to show extra concern for the alien who might live next door, but also to advocate for them on a political level. Currently thousands of Christians around the nation are signing a petition created by the advocacy group Christians for Comprehensive Immigration Reform. I believe the words of this petition are consistent with the heartbeat of the first Free Methodists:

As a Christian, I believe my faith calls me to view all people, regardless of citizenship status, as made in the "image of God" and deserving of respect; to show compassion for the stranger and love and mercy for my neighbor; and to balance the rule of law with the call to oppose unjust laws and systems when they violate human dignity.

These biblical principles compel me to support immigration reform legislation that is consistent with humanitarian values, supports families, provides a pathway to citizenship for immigrant workers already in the U.S., expands legal avenues for workers to enter the U.S. with their rights and due process fully protected, and examines solutions to address the root causes of migration.

Let us set aside our fear, resist being duped by the politicians, and, as the people of God, stand in solidarity with the aliens in our midst.