• Engage

    Baby Steps toward Racial Reconciliation

    Racial injustice. Color blindness. White privilege. Reparations. Christian unity. Woke up. Systemic racism.  A few years ago these were terms that I as a white woman knew little about and rarely even considered, much less understood. I grew up in the Jim Crow South surrounded by people who looked just like me. Although Brown vs. The Board of Education had demanded an end to school segregation years before, the reality was that my schools were as segregated as ever until high school. My parents were strong Christians who had been taught that white people were superior. But I noticed the inconsistency of their faith and actions and wondered. After the…

  • Engage

    Six Ways to Grow in Unity

    I’ve been disturbed by the trend to disagree without unity within the body of Christ, not only in this putrid political climate but also within churches. Belittling Christians who don’t agree with us or treating them as enemies is undermining our unity, which Jesus clearly identified as the way the world would see the reality of who he is (John 17:20-23). So it’s no small thing! We are divided by our backgrounds, life experiences, the biases of the teaching and preaching that we hear, and the people we hang with. (And yes, we all have biases because of pride and the preconceived ideas that we fail to recognize.) Is it…