From Lament to Action - Anti-Racism in the Church of England

I recently found a black and white photograph of my great grandfather, who was ordained an Anglican priest in 1940 in the south-east of Nigeria – a black man standing tall in his clerical garb.

I thought of him on Monday night as I watched the BBC Panorama programme Is the Church racist? which gave a damning account of individual encounters with racism and prejudice faced by black and minority ethnic clergy within the Church of England in the UK.

Some might wonder whether the Church’s institutional racism – as Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby described it last year - is just another step that feeds into a ‘woke’ agenda, the latest form of self-flagellation by social justice warriors.

But peering beneath the surface of the state Church and finding racism lurking beneath it is not new. It didn’t start with the Black Lives Matter movement.

The Church of England’s anti-racism taskforce has today published its report into institutional racism. As the House of Bishops said last year when the Commission was formed: “For the Church to be a credible voice in calling for change across the world, we must now ensure that apologies and lament are accompanied by swift actions leading to real change.”

But reports which show the biases that exist in institutions like the Church of England, again, are nothing new. The Church itself has produced scores of reports calling out the racism in its midst over the past few decades.

And yet here we are. In 2021. With black and brown clergy saying they feel excluded, discriminated against and made to feel less intelligent, less included, less worthy, less valued than their white counterparts.

This goes beyond political correctness, but cuts to the heart of the Christian gospel – the story at the crux of the faith that the Church of England professes.

A story that believes that all are made equal, created in the image of God, worthy of inherent dignity and respect.

It’s time for real, tangible changes to be made, as the anti-racism taskforce’s report From Lament to Action shows.

But in order to move forward, there has to be a facing up to the wrongs that have been done; there must be lament. But remaining in lament – saying sorry over and over again – can not in itself make the future better.

Confession is important – a facing up to sin. But even more importance is repentance. The Greek word metanoia translates as a transformative change of heart, an about face – a complete turning around.

There is something here we all can take from this – a collective recognition that things haven’t been as they should have been – whether in the church, other faith communities, or in our nation.

But change is always possible – change that is real and seen and felt.

As Martin Luther King Junior said, in speaking about the ‘fierce urgency of now’: “This is no time for apathy or complacency. This is a time for vigorous and positive action.”

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This blog is adapted from a script I had originally planned to deliver on BBC Radio 4’s Thought for the Day on 21 April, but following the verdict in the trial of Derek Chauvin, I presented this one instead.