Guest contributor Willie Jennings (Yale) offers a response to the death of George Floyd and the black experience of racism and police brutality. In order to practice the discipline of hope, he suggests that we must take hold of a shared anger, hate what God hates, reshape communities with attention to the violence of segregation, and rethink the formation of police officers and our understanding of criminality.

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Show Notes

Dr. Willie Jennings, The Christian Imagination: Theology and the Origins of Race
Jenning’s first time being pulled over by a white police officer, at age 14.
A first experience of helplessness
Helplessness forms a person for a lifelong fight against hopelessness.
Hope is a discipline, not a sentiment.
Living the discipline of hope in the USA requires anger.
Anger connected to the righteous indignation of God.
This connection is dependent on two characteristics: the destruction of life, and that it is shareable.
The righteous indignation of God is meant to be shared.
God invites us into shared fury.
Jesus keeps anger from touching hatred.
Everything built in the US is built on the sinking sand of race and class and greed and is under the control of financial capitalism.
Hope, turn to communities, and rethink the formation of police officers.
How might hope be shared through the sharing of anger, which is bound to God.

My Anger, God's Righteous Indignation / Willie Jennings (Response to the Death of George Floyd)