So What Is Black Liberation Theology, Anyway?

With today being Easter, there was nothing but religious programming on television this morning. As I channel-surfed, I stumbled upon TV One, which was showing a December 2007 sermon by Rev Jeremiah Wright, Barack Obama's embattled spiritual advisor and former pastor of Trinity United Churc of Christ.

Amid all the talk about Wright over the last few days, this was the first time I actually watched a full sermon to really get a idea of where he was coming from. It got me to think about what black liberation theology is.

According to Wikipedia, black liberation theology is a Christian theology that came out of the 1960s and based on the ideals of progressive social change and pan-Africanism. "This theology maintains that African Americans must be liberated from multiple forms of bondage—social, political, economic and religious," continues on the website. "This liberation involves empowerment and seeks the right of self-definition, self-affirmation and self-determination."

Rev. Wright is considered "a national leader in promoting theological education and the preparation of seminarians for the African-American church."

Below are the quotes by Wright most people are familiar with:

"We bombed Hiroshima, we bombed Nagasaki, and we nuked far more than the thousands in New York and the Pentagon, and we never batted an eye...and now we are indignant, because the stuff we have done overseas is now brought back into our own front yards. America's chickens are coming home to roost."

"The government lied about inventing the HIV virus as a means of genocide against people of color" and "[t]he government gives them the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law and then wants us to sing 'God Bless America.' No, no, no, God damn America, that's in the Bible for killing innocent people...God damn America for treating our citizens as less than human. God damn America for as long as she acts like she is God and she is supreme".

Okay, with all this said, I did watch a full sermon - not slicing or dicing by the cable networks - jus the straight talk from his mouth. In this sermon he spoke a great deal about how the nation wants to pretend racism no longer exists and how it has neglected victims of Hurricane Katrina. For all intensive purposes what he said in the sermon was correct. This is a country that wants to put on blinders and act like racism is dead, and this country is neglecting recovery in the Gulf Coast.

While I do agree that his statements on 9/11, HIV/AIDS and Israel are a bit extreme, maybe if everyone looked at a full sermon they would have a more balanced view of this guy...

By the way, what the heck is post-racial??? Seems like a new term created since Obama got into the race.