Critical Race Theory: Podcast

 I recommend the podcasts by Christianity Today in general, but especially this week's Quick to Listen. A young scholar is interviewed on Critical Race Theory. While I can't agree (or perhaps empathize) with all his points, overall his explanation is very good and clarifying as to what CRT is and where it came from. He himself does not adopt all its five tenets, which he delineates. 

Big takeaways: CRT is not a worldview. It's a legal theory about race relations in the history of the U.S., and isn't even global in application.  That puts it in a different category and makes it less scary. Not that I'm falling at its feet, just that I'm not afraid of it and that we'll all be communists if we think about it.

He also gives a helpful view of privilege. Any white person who denies they are privileged is disingenuous. But almost all Americans are privileged. He admits he's privileged even as a minority (Latino). The issue is not to be ashamed of the reality of our privilege, but to do something with it. He gives the example of his wife needing milk from the store at 10 p.m. He as a man has more privilege to go to the store late at night than a woman does. So he uses that privilege to help his wife and keep her from going into a dangerous situation. 

Still, I don't think the church needs it IF (the big if) we could read Scripture honestly and repent of our deep-seated bent, (some parts of it chosen, some parts of it innate to human nature) to distrust or alienate ourselves from people different from us. We don't get to do that as Christians, and never have.  

Addendum: Interestingly, I am teaching life group next week and looked at the Gospel Project materials. The same speaker from the podcast is the author of the lesson materials.  Humph!