The Cross and the Lynching Tree

by James H. Cone

nation called

reflect on this failure is to address a defect in the conscience of white Christians and to suggest why African Americans have needed to trust and cultivate their own theological imagination.

therefore, must see that “love is the motive, but justice is the instrument.”

shameful, the most tragic problem is silence.”[51]

concluded his letter with a statement that surprised me: “I think he will be an excellent man on your faculty.”[57] Niebuhr’s affirmation of my presence at Union meant much to me then and still means much to me today. I wish that my time at Union had coincided with Niebuhr’s. I would have enjoyed engaging race and theology with him as I did with John Bennett, Paul Lehmann, Tom Driver, Roger Shinn, Beverly Harrison, and other members of the Union faculty. I would have granted some validity to his criticism of the Barth influence, which is less today. But the critique about integration is another matter. It would have been challenging to engage him on my failure to appreciate the progress in integration. What most whites call “integration” (or in the language of today, diversity) is often merely “tokenism.” There is very little justice in any educational

institution where black presence is less than 20 percent of the faculty, students, and board members. There is no justice without power; and there

power...

one,

or three tokens. Although...

As in the resurrection of the Crucified One, God could transmute defeat into triumph, ugliness into beauty, despair into hope, the cross into the resurrection. And so, like Paul, Mrs. Bradley was “afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed but not unto despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed” (2 Cor 4:8-9).

real,

“if racial healing is ever to come to our society, it will mean remembering and retelling our story of racial injustice and honoring the voices and the actions of those who stood against it.”[15]

When we remember, we give voice to the

victims.

Whites today cannot separate themselves from the culture that lynched blacks, unless they confront their history and expose the sin of white supremacy.

America has the courage to confront the great sin and ongoing legacy of white supremacy with repentance and reparation there is hope “beyond tragedy.”