An Interview with Jeremiah Wright

Posted by Benjamin on: 04.27.2008 /

Jeremiah Wright has been much in the news lately because he is Barack Obama’s pastor and some sound bites of him which a lot of people found offensive have been played endlessly in the mainstream media and on youtube. Last Friday PBS broadcast a 50 minute long interview with Dr. Wright and Bill Moyers. In the interview, Dr. Wright addresses a lot of core justice and compassion interviews in gripping, reality-based ways. I was riveted. He talks about America’s history of perpetrating terrorism, from the Native Americans to African slaves to Japanese prison internment camps. He talks about how the God of the perpetrators is *never* the God of the victims–that these two groups envision God in very different ways. He explains what “liberation theology” means. He talks about the movement from revulsion over what has happened to us into desire for revenge against unarmed innocents. He talks about the difference between culture and Christ. He talks about the experience of African-Americans in America, and the parts of MLK Jr.’s story that noone likes to talk about.

It seems just and compassionate to me to let him be heard at more length, since he’s actually almost diametrically opposite of the image of him which has been created (something that might perhaps be said of God.).

So here’s the embedded video in two parts

Or you can watch the whole thing and/or read the transcript here at PBS

He put a challenge to us in 1970, late ‘69, early ‘70, I’ll never forget. He said, “You know, you come into the average church on a Sunday morning and you think you’ve stepped from the real world into a fantasy world. And what do I mean by that?” He said pick up the church bulletin. You leave a world, Vietnam, or today you leave a world, Iraq, over 4,000 dead, American boys and girls, 100,000, 200,000 depending on which count, Iraqi dead. Afghanistan, Darfur, rapes in the Congo, Katrina, Lower Ninth Ward, that’s the world you leave. And you come in; you pick up your church bulletin. It says, there is a ladies tea on second Sunday. The children’s choir will be doing. He said, “How come our bulletins, how come the faith preached in our churches does not relate to the world in which our church members leave at the benediction?” Well, it hit me. And it hit me several different ways. Number one, I know there’s a church publication, the bulletin, the weekly bulletin. But what about the ministry? And what about the prophetic voice of the church that’s not heard? We’re talking about things that our members are wrestling with a whole bunch of other things. And the sermons and the ministries of the church don’t touch those things.

So, when, I looked and said this church had said to me, in fact not just to me, the church, the congregation has said, “OK, we were started by a white denomination. We were started in this community to be an integrated church. Ten years, that hasn’t happened. Are we gonna be a black church in this community? What are we doing for this community?” They put together a statement that shows all the candidates for the pulpit. I was one of the candidates. They said, “Can you lead us in this new direction? How do we minister to this community in which we sit?” Not just on Sunday, first you have to attract people to come– or even be interested in our worship experiences on Sunday. But what do we do in ministry that speaks to the community and the world in which we sit? That’s Martin Marty. That’s Martin Marty.

Would love to hear your reactions.