Is there no escape from the scourge of white supremacy?

Letters from Pastor Jin S. Kim

EDITOR’S NOTE: These passages from Pastor Jin S. Kim were originally posted on social media, some as personal posts and others as public letters or calls-to-response for the Church of All Nations (CAN) where he pastors. Through his pastoral duties at CAN as well as the courses he leads and facilitates in Underground Seminary, Pastor Kim strives to assist North American Christians in following and embodying a model of Christian community that emphasizes decolonization and anti-racism study and action as not only orthodox but essential Christian praxis. Kim immigrated to the US from Korea when he was seven years old. Kim contributed these passionate and informally written notes from various social media mediums to provide a personal example of how a pastor in the US can respond to the current examples of police brutality, racism and colonization in North America, in such a way as to call Christians to increased awareness, engagement, and repentance.
-SM    


May 26, 2020
(A)
This is horrific. Yesterday,  May 25, 2020 a white Minneapolis cop murdered a Black man by pinning him down with a knee and choking him to death over 8 excruciating minutes. He was already handcuffed the entire time and only begged to breathe. At about 4 min. mark, the man no longer talks or moves, but the white cop continues to choke for 4 MORE minutes, at times grinding his knee deeper into the man's neck in a sadistic manner. He only relents from choking when the EMT finally arrives.
Mayor Jacob Frey needs to call the Minneapolis Police Department to account in the most forceful and decisive way possible. The MPD's spokesman gave a pathetic, terse, highly defensive public statement that did not even acknowledge the choking. This is the same police force that killed Jamar Clark in 2015.
This is such an outrage and sacrilege - one can hardly find the words. May God be with the victim & his loved ones.
May God's wrath be upon this racist perpetrator, cast out into the darkness where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth!
 
(B)
On the same day that George Floyd was murdered by a white cop in Minneapolis, a Wall Street executive in NYC could easily have gotten an innocent birdwatching Black man killed if the police believed her.
Turns out this Amy Cooper donated to the campaigns of Barack Obama, John Kerry and Pete Buttigieg, suggesting that she identifies as a liberal. She claimed earlier today, "I am not a racist." Watch the video. Just sit with her statement and think about the gaslighting that people of color have to endure everyday in this white supremacist country.
Here's a question. What difference does it make if the typical white woman is conservative or liberal? There is a type: the passive-aggressive damsel-in-distress white-liberal woman who will not hurt a fly but will outsource her racist violence to police and other structures of white society.
I've been the victim myself numerous times of this very type. Liberal mainline denominations are crawling with them. Toxic white masculinity, assault rifle-toting neofascists, powerful liberal predator men who get away with it, collapsed white men who do nothing as racial horror unfolds before them, liberal white women who will weaponize race in a heartbeat, evangelical women who vote for Trump. Is there no escape from the scourge of white supremacy? Is there no relief from the ugliness, horror and danger of whiteness?

May 27, 2020
White supremacy and white fragility are two sides of the same white coin. Whiteness is deadly in both conservative and liberal guise. It's truly amazing that every election cycle PoC have to choose between two types of our own oppression, basically, the lesser of two EVILs.

May 28, 2020 
[Addressed to CAN members]
Beloved,
My heart is heavy. We are all feeling it as South Minneapolis burns. Yes, businesses are being vandalized, but we must not conflate the true and originating violence - state sponsored terrorism against black and brown bodies - with the collective protest and understandable reaction to that violence. There was a solidarity protest in Los Angeles yesterday. This is already going national.

The murder of Mr. George Floyd by four MPD officers, yes, all four, is criminal enough. But even more frightening and disturbing is the utter calm of the white cop who was choking a helpless man to death over eight minutes, looking at bystanders, almost posing for the camera, knowing that murdering a black person in cold blood and in plain sight is something he can do with impunity. His eyes were that of dissociated evil. His is the face of American racism. For some of us, that is the face of our father, our grandfather, our brother, our uncle, our cousin, our son.

The young officer protecting not a dying Black citizen but white cops he works with is both infuriating and heartbreaking. In his face I see my relatives, my people, all the waves of Asian immigrants who "pulled ourselves up by our bootstraps" on the backs of Black neighborhoods and Black customers, then moved on to more "successful" white neighborhoods and schools. That's how we immigrants get whitewashed and baptized into white supremacy.

On the same Memorial Day, an aggressive white woman, a Wall St. executive and politically liberal, tried to get an innocent Black man killed by lying on her 911 call and feigning the classic white damsel-in-distress act that has gotten countless black men beaten, imprisoned or killed for centuries. That he is alive is pure luck. What does it say about our country that we consider Mr. Cooper "lucky"?

People of Color, and Black people in particular, are under grave threat by the dual forces of white supremacy and white fragility. Just recently we learned that Ahmaud Arbery was gunned down and murdered by a white father & son team for jogging in his own neighborhood in Georgia, my home state.

In January of 2004 we launched Church of All Nations as a response to the original sin of racism in America. We dreamed of a diverse community that through our loving, courageous, prophetic and countercultural solidarity would be an authentic witness to God's love for the world in Jesus Christ. We are here for such a time as this. We say things that very few churches would say, and do things that very few dare to do. You are part of such a church.

And make no mistake that Trump and the right wing financial, business, religious and cultural interests that support him are making this a more dangerous country to live in for the marginalized than in recent memory. Trump is not the only evil in this country, but he is a shorthand for assessing where people are. About 43% of Americans are hardcore Trump supporters no matter what he does. Most of that 43% is white people.

At some point, for those of us with Trump supporting family and friends, we must say enough is enough. If Trump is reelected this November, that is literally a mortal threat to people of color. We must have the courage to choose our kinship. What does light have to do with darkness? I will not judge your process. We may not fully differentiate from toxic racist family by the next election cycle. That's okay. But know that that is not without cost to our sisters and brothers of color, and to our own integrity. Happiness is being proud of ourselves. I urge us to move in this direction so that we can cultivate true kinship, grow our dignity, and be truly happy.

Over the last 16 years, as we have never flinched from moving deeper into truth, compassion and justice, we have lost dear members who left for a variety of reasons. I'm aware we may lose some members in this season too as we intensify our prophetic witness. But we have always chosen to do the right thing, the hard thing, even if that made us a smaller or more financially struggling church. I hope we will all hang together through this, and as always, demonstrate grace for those who want to journey on a different path.

Tonight I will host a Zoom call open to the entire congregation from 8-9pm. I will share my thoughts in more detail, and our members will have a chance to offer brief prayers. We will create other opportunities to process all this in various formats.

I love you all with all my heart. Our hearts break together. O Lord, in your mercy, hear our prayer.
Your pastor,

Jin


June 1, 2020
(A)
The ideology of white supremacy embedded in the physical bodies of white people makes all white people a potential threat to PoC. In that sense, it makes very little difference if a white person is male or female, conservative or liberal. The most important work for a white person is to repent somatically and to ask God to exorcise the demon of whiteness from their body. (This work is too big and cannot be done alone; find a church or community that helps do this work, rare as they may be.)[See EDITOR’S FOOTNOTE for more on this]*

Converting a white conservative into a white liberal only gets us #AmyCooper. You tell me, does that sound like progress to you?

(B)
Some of us have been warning for years, even before Charlottesville in 2017 but even more afterward, that our nation is sliding into fascism. Donald Trump has been stoking fascism because he is a fascist. He is the only world leader I know that publicly uses the term dictator in a positive way.
Trump quoted infamously racist Miami police chief in the 1960s Walter Headley by tweeting a few days ago in reference to the George Floyd protests in Minneapolis “when the looting starts, the shooting starts”.

On Sat. May 30 he tweeted that he was ready to unleash "the most vicious dogs, and the most ominous weapons, I have ever seen" if protestors approached the White House's security fence. He also made it clear that he would "stop mob violence."

In another tweet Sat. he tried to get his supporters to come out to counter protest by posting, "Tonight, I understand, is MAGA NIGHT AT THE WHITE HOUSE???"

I am warning my fellow Americans as clearly as possible: We are under real threat of descending into a fascist state. Just look at the stark difference between how law enforcement treats white right wing protestors with assault weapons and peaceful Black protestors with cardboard signs.

At the least, stop being afraid of calling what we are seeing a descent into fascism, and recognize that Trump is actively dog-whistling white fascists to come out of the woodwork to create race riots and race wars out of peaceful protests. That is exactly what happened to Minneapolis last week. We've got to keep calling out fascism again and again so that we do not find ourselves asleep at the wheel when Nazi Germany happens to us.

June 3, 2020
I am antifascist.
I am antifa.

June 7, 2020
People of good conscience can be on a spectrum on controversial issues like American policing, like from defund the police to abolish the police.

June 8, 2020
If you don't get by now that law enforcement in America is a tool of state sponsored terrorism against black bodies, going on 401 years, you gotta ask yourself how WILLFUL and SELF-SERVING your ignorance is.

And that goes for whitewashed PoC too.
#BLM 

June 9, 2020
Church of All Nations held a prayer vigil last night behind our building to honor George Floyd and #blacklivesmatter. We recited the names of all African Americans killed by police in Minnesota since 2000. Inspired by the words of the Rev. Dr. King, we confessed together in unison:

Almighty God, we confess that we have become all too well adjusted to racial violence, discrimination, economic exploitation, police brutality, mass incarceration, encroaching militarization, and the destruction of our mother earth. We confess that we have lacked the kind of imagination that makes for a better world. We confess that our self-serving ignorance only perpetuates an unjust status quo. We confess that we give in to fear, paralysis and hopelessness because of our lack of faith. Yet, in our sin you sent us your beloved child Jesus to save us from empire. Give us assurance, strengthen our faith, and fashion us that we may be maladjusted to the evils of this world. Help us to follow in the way of Jesus, the humane one, who leads us to true life. Amen.

June 11, 2020
Do most of us sensible people have any idea what's really going on at Trump rallies and why they're packed every time? It's true he's a moron, but he's a charismatic moron who makes it clear that he disdains (inferior) people of color and is very much in love with (superior) white people. He tells the arena packed with white people, "You're the elite, you're the elite!" Trumpers don't just support him, they are in love with him, and back at ya. This is the kind of spell that Hitler could cast. The effect on the crowds is very similar if one compares film footage. If you're a typical collapsed white person, Trump invites you inside his arrogance and, if you're white, makes you feel POWERFUL with him. Like that feeling when your school or home team wins the championship, except multiply that feeling by a lot at these rallies.

Trump gives his base a type of emotional catharsis about liberal sin, the redemption of whiteness, and the glory and supremacy of America that has a more powerful effect than even old time evangelical revivals. After all, the true religion of America has always been America (white nationalism).

As their churches are full of old white people and many congregations literally dying of old age, they get to go to a Trump rally which is nothing but a tent revival where liberals and PoC go to hell and white conservatives go to heaven, which is America. These people are born again alright, as American Nazis inside a cult of personality.

Conservative/Republican boomers are hopeless. My advice is to shake the dust off your feet and build a society around these people who are trapped inside the cult of white supremacy that Trump so obviously represents and stokes.  

June 13, 2020
My family stopped by the intersection of Chicago Ave & 38th yesterday where George Floyd drew his last breath. It has become a living memorial, an open sanctuary, an ongoing protest against white supremacy, a neighborhood block party, a street festival, a carnival for children, a site of pilgrimage, a place of resurrection of the spirit.

May you rest in heaven now, brother George Floyd, and may your spirit keep inspiring us here on earth.


[FROM 7 YEARS AGO]
May 28, 2013
A post-Memorial Day reflection: Jesus prophetically challenged the established religion and empire of his day, not because they were more oppressive or distorted than in other eras, but because the massive temple complex and Roman totalism seemed like a permanent inevitability, to which Jesus' response was, No it ain't, the kingdom of God is at hand!

No religious institution or nation-state is inevitable; they are a teeter-tottering provisionality in the face of God.





*EDITOR’S FOOTNOTE: 
After reading and discussing this passage amongst R!P!S! editors, I asked Pastor Jin if he could clarify what he meant when he talked of exorcising “the demon of whiteness.” 

His response:  
"The most important work for a white person is to repent somatically and to ask God to exorcise the demon of whiteness from their body.

Jesus asked him, “What is your name?” He replied, “My name is Legion; for we are many.” Mark 5:9
The demon possessed man was a resident of the Decapolis, a group of 10 cities under direct Roman rule, and all founded by the preceding Greek Empire. Colonial settlers ruled this region and often clashed with their Semitic neighbors. Pigs were foreign to this area, and considered an "unclean" presence, like these Greco-Roman colonizers. The disturbed man knew he was demon-possessed by Legion, meaning the primary unit of the Roman imperial military that oppressed the people of the land. In that sense, I see the name of our collective national demon possession as colonial settler whiteness.

"I knew when I posted that on fb that it would be controversial. Imagine how difficult that is to hear, even for my own committed church members who are white. But it is one of the most important and urgent things to say in our time. Most white people are not racist in their mind, but almost all (def above 99%) are racist in their body. This is why somatic therapy is something we take very seriously at CAN; cognitive therapy has run its course.

"Also, I'm happy to add "white and whitewashed person" in the original post. That's the true meaning I was going for anyway, about the ideology of whiteness, which infects PoC as well, not white people per se."

-SM

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Jin S. Kim

is founding pastor of Church of All Nations (https://www.cando.org/) and founder of Underground Seminary (https://www.undergroundsem.org/). In 1975 his family emigrated from Korea when he was 7 years old. He grew up in South Carolina and Georgia, went to Georgia Tech, Princeton Seminary, and has a Doctor of Ministry from Columbia Seminary. Jin has loved serving the local church (esp. the beautiful people of CAN!) as a pastor continuously since 1993, and takes his apostolic calling seriously in sharing the good news of Jesus far and wide. Jin is passionate about justice, ecumenical unity, and decolonizing the church in favor of village renewal. He & Soon Pac love being with their two grown children and their parents.