Holy Heretics: Losing Religion and Finding Jesus Ep. 52 White God, Brown Jesus: Decolonizing Christianity w/ Dr. Miguel De La Torre
The vast majority of Americans worship the white god—the god of Christian nationalism, white supremacy, domination, patriarchy, wealth, power, and colonization. The god of guns and empire, the god that exists to make white men great again. It shouldn’t surprise anyone that powerful white people created a god in their own image, in the image of white men has this god been created. As Dr. Miguel De La Torre responds, “What we say is Christianity today is really an ideology of white supremacy and nationalism…This is what evangelical Christianity is today.” And in service of this false evangelical god, white westerners are blind to the victims of their philosophical and theological fabrication. Our deep-rooted blind spots are so common in white evangelicalism and are further engrained by wealth, history, race, and social standing to a point where the vast majority of Christians in the west are living a version of Christianity that is completely anathema to the historical Jesus.
However, if you grew up in non-white spaces, in colonized countries, or in economically challenging environments, odds are your faith looks radically different. Odds are you serve the brown God of the oppressed instead of the white god of MAGA Christianity. Which is just one reason why those of us deconstructing evangelicalism are in such dire need of liberation, liberation from the white god that continues to colonize our hearts and minds. One of the paths toward freedom can be found in the liberation and post-liberation theology movements from Latin America.
Liberation theology is a social and political movement attempting to interpret the gospel of Jesus Christ through the lived experiences of oppressed people. Liberation theology has its origins in Latin America in the mid-1950s as socio-economic development created by peasant workers and farming populations who had been driven into desperate poverty. With the economic unrest came political unrest, and military dictators took over many governments in the name of national security, only further marginalizing the poor. But from these oppressive experiences came a theology that drives its legitimacy from the perspective of the poor and oppressed. Liberation theology gave us queer Jesus, black Jesus, immigrant Jesus, and Marxist revolutionary Jesus. It is a version of faith that identifies exclusively with the oppressed.
It is ironic then that Latin American liberation theology just might save white people from ourselves, but only if we have the humility to come face to face with our colonial past and present drive for power and domination. This episode deconstructs the white god and dives into other forms of evangelical oppression including gender oppression, LGBTQIA+ marginalization, white supremacy, and nationalistic Christianity. Dr. De La Torre offers a practical way forward in our attempt to free ourselves from the white man’s god.
Bio
Rev. Dr. Miguel A. De La Torre is Professor of Social Ethics and Latinx Studies at the Iliff School of Theology in Denver, Colorado. He has served as the elected 2012 President of the Society of Christian Ethics and served as the Executive Officer for the Society of Race, Ethnicity and Religion (2012-17). In 2020 the American Academy of Religion bestowed upon the the Excellence in Teaching Award. Dr. De La Torre is a recognized international Fulbright scholar who has taught courses at the Cuernavaca Center for Intercultural Dialogue on Development (Mexico), Indonesian Consortium for Religious Studies (Indonesia), University of Johannesburg (South Africa), Johannes Gutenberg University (Germany). Additionally, he has lectured at Universidad Bíblica Latinoamericana (Costa Rica), The Association for Theological Education in South East Asia (Thailand) and the Council of World Mission (Mexico and Taiwan). Advocating for an ethics of place, De La Torre has taken students on immersion classes to Cuba and the Mexico/U.S. border to walk the migrant trails. Among multiple yearly speaking engagements, he has also been a week-long speaker at the Chautauqua Institute, and the plenary address at the Parliament of World Religions De La Torre has received several national book awards and is a frequent speaker at national and international scholarly religious events and meetings. He also speaks at churches and nonprofit organizations on topics concerning the intersection of race, class, gender, and sexuality with religion. In 2020, the American Academy of Religion bestowed on him the Excellence in Teaching Award. The following year, 2021, the American Academy also conferred upon him the Martin E. Marty Public Understanding of Religion Award. De La Torre is the first scholar to receive the two most prestigious awards presented by his guild and the first Latinx to receive either one of them.
Quotes:
“For white people to get saved, they have to learn how to worship the black Jesus.”
“For our economy to function, men of color have to mostly be unemployed.”
“I have to constantly be suspicious of my worldview.”
“White evangelicalism must be crucified. It has to die.”
“Evangelical Christianity has become an apologist and supporter of the rise of U.S. empire.”
“The death of Christianity is because of evangelicalism.”
“What does the Gospel have to say to the oppressed?”
When I worship the white god, I am worshipping a philosophical and theological position that justifies oppression.”
“Badass Christianity is a radical implementation of the Gospel message.”
“I believe in whatever the poor believe in.”
“All forms of oppression really begins with gender oppression.”
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This episode was produced by The Sophia Society. Music is by Faith in Foxholes.