Guilt In African American

You would not believe all the positive comments this discussion on race has generated. In most cases, I hear what an eye opening discussion. Unfortunately, for some others I have received an apology. I say unfortunately because I know far too many white people carry around with them this tremendous burden of guilt. Guilt for all the atrocities of their ancestors. As a pastor and an African American I wanted to offer them absolution just to ease their pain. Instead of doing that on a one-on-one basis I decided to address this issue in this particular blog post.

William Shakespeare described guilt in Macbeth as “life’s fitful fever.” And the wise King Solomon, gives a solution to guilt’s grasp in this way “Love and faithfulness reconcile

By using that guilt time and time again it achieves its desired results. You get some victories. However, you also create resentment and anger. By playing on people’s guilt you don’t create a culture or atmosphere where people care about you as a person. You create a relationship founded on coercion. The people you guilted into a decision may give you what you want, but they have very little respect for how you achieved what you got. And the more this practice is on display the greater the gulf between the relationship

I will avoid dumping on any particular political party because both fall into the similar traps. Nevertheless, in the political arena you see this played out as political groups try to use the racial divide to get votes. One side will accuse the other of wanting to go back to Jim Crow days in the South, and put blacks back into the cotton fields. The other side then has to fight back on yell all the louder we are not racist. Meanwhile, the real issues go unaddressed. Poverty and underemployment are real factors destroying the communities. The family structures are breaking down. Young people are committing genocide in their own communities with the rampant gang violence in our cities and we are not addressing it because we are focused on how bad the other side is for America. What is bad for America is that this growing detrition or our inability to work side by side and solve the issues that are ripping our country apart. The more we fight and call each other names to more the black family is at risk of extinction. Ok I needed to get that off my chest. The white guilt thing is destroying