Ecclesial Justice: The Problem of Sunday Morning and the
Movement towards Beloved Community
Rev. C. Anthony Hunt, D.Min., Ph.D.
United Theological Seminary, Dayton, Ohio
August 23, 2018
The
world today is wrought with social, economic, political and religious
upheaval. Over the past several years,
in the United States and across the globe, we have become more divided along
various lines. In the U.S., the social
and political division that we now experience is not really new, but it
challenges our sense of normalcy in ways that perhaps we have not been
challenged in the past.
About seven years ago, I was asked, in another academic
setting, to address the matter of “Sunday Morning”, and answer the question,
“Is it the Most Segregated the Hour of the Week? This is the “Problem of Sunday Morning”. I believe that this is a matter that
continues to weigh on the churches in many respects today. And so the questions today are, (1) what does
ecclesial justice look like in the 21st century, (2) how might we go
about addressing “the problem of Sunday Morning”, and (3) what would it look
like for the churches, as the Body of Christ (he embodiment of Christ), to move
towards becoming Beloved Community?
I propose that a great deal of the problem of Sunday
Morning, and division in and among churches today, is rooted in the persistent
problem of race and racism in America.
It is thus, important that division in the churches, and particularly
race division, be viewed against the historical backdrop of the racism in American
society, in general. In 1903,
African-American sociologist W. E. B. DuBois pronounced that “the problem of
the 20th century is the problem of the color-line (The Souls of
Black Folk). And in 1944, Swedish
sociologist Gunnar Myrdal discussed the plight of African Americans (the Negro
Problem) within the context of what he referred to as the "American
dilemma" (An American Dilemma: The Negro Problem and Modern Democracy). This
dilemma continues to exist some 74 years later.
