Theology in the Raw - 761: #761 - Politics, White Evangelicalism, and Race Relations in the Church: Justin Giboney

Episode Date: October 14, 2019

Justin is a lawyer by trade and co-founder of the And Campaign, which helps Christians become less tribalistic and more Christian in their political affiliations. Preston and Justin talk about faith and politics, democratic candidates, and the pros and cons of political affiliation. Then, they launch into conversation about some blind spots that white evangelical Christians have about race relations and racism in the church today. Justin Giboney is an attorney and political strategist in Atlanta, GA. He is also the Co-Founder and President of the AND Campaign, which is a coalition of urban Christians who are determined to address the sociopolitical arena with the compassion and conviction of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Mr. Giboney has managed successful campaigns for elected officials in the state and referendums relating to the city’s transportation and water infrastructure. In 2012 and 2016, Georgia’s 5th congressional district elected him as a delegate for the Democratic National Convention and he served as the co-chair of Obama for America’s Gen44-Atlanta initiative. A former Vanderbilt University football player and law student, Justin served on the Urban League of Greater Atlanta Board of Directors. He’s written op-eds for publications such as Christianity Today and The Hill. Support Preston Support Preston by going to patreon.com Connect with Preston Twitter | @PrestonSprinkle Instagram | @preston.sprinkle Check out his website prestonsprinkle.com If you enjoy the podcast, be sure to leave a review.

Hello, friends. Welcome back to another episode of Theology in the Raw. I have on the show today Justin Giboney. Justin Giboney is an attorney and political strategist in Atlanta, Georgia. He has managed successful campaigns for elected officials in the state and referendums relating to the city's transportation and water infrastructure. In 2012 and 2016, Georgia's fifth congregational district elected him, Justin, as a delegate for the Democratic National Convention, and he served as the co-chair of Obama for America's Gen 44 Atlanta Initiative. A former Vanderbilt University football player, A former Vanderbilt University football player. Give it up for Vanderbilt and law student.

Give it up for law students. See, it just doesn't have the same ring to it. Justin, the fact that you're a football player, I'm sorry, man, but that's way more impressive than a law student. I already knew you were a law student, but I'm reading your bio. As you can tell, I'm reading this thing. And now you just got like, I't know mad respect for me that was already there but now it's like compounded because you're a football player for Vanderbilt anyway Justin served on the Urban League of Greater Atlanta Board of Directors additionally Justin has participated in LEAD L-E-A-D Atlanta Outstanding Atlanta and the Georgia

Bar Association's Leadership Academy he's written op-eds for publications such as Christianity Today. I've gotten to know Justin through a network, kind of a private behind the scenes network for Christian leaders. And I have just been, Justin doesn't even know this, but I remember seeing him a few years ago when he didn't have a clue who I was. And I remember just thinking, dude, this dude, I want to sit down with this guy and talk with him because he just seems incredibly brilliant and thoughtful and gracious. And the fact he's a football player doesn't surprise me because he's totally yoked. So I'm so excited to have Justin Gibbity on the show. And I'm pre-recording this introduction after we had the interview and it was so incredibly good. I learned so much from Justin.

He is the real deal. We talked a lot about race relations in the church and, oh gosh, I just so resonated and learned from so much of what he said. And we talked a lot about politics and the AND campaign that he's a co-founder with. You'll hear more about the AND campaign in this interview. So without further ado, here is I am here with Justin Giboney, who has been, I would say, maybe an acquaintance. We've been part of a couple different organizations and kind of see each other in passing. We've corresponded a little bit, but I've been a huge fan of the AND campaign, the organization he's going to talk about.

So anyway, I'm already doing too much talking. Justin, thanks so much for being on Theology in the Rock. Man, Preston, thanks for having me. I'm excited about it. So why don't we give a quick, why don't you give a quick overview of who you are? I really want to hear about the AND Campaign because when you describe it, man, I'm just like, oh my gosh, this just seems like something that most of my network is really hungering for. So I'm excited for them to get to know you and the AND Campaign. Yeah, not a problem.

I'm Justin Giboney. I live in Atlanta, Georgia. I'm a Christian, a biblical Christian, and I'm an attorney by trade. And I've spent a lot of time, a lot of my professional career in politics. So running campaigns, doing political strategy, things of that nature. And kind of as I went about doing that, things of that nature and kind of as I went about doing that I began to see this tension between my Christian convictions and me kind of being in Atlanta in a very progressive space kind of where the progressive the secular progressive movement was going a lot inside the Democratic Party and so I started trying to figure out ways to to to deal with that because you know it was interesting I was running campaigns for for for people I knew and friends

and seeing friends run for office who shared my beliefs. But once they got into the political space, couldn't really express those beliefs or, you know, really pretty directly had to surrender those beliefs, so to speak, before they were able to or eligible almost to be in the political arena. And I saw that as problematic because the folks I went to church with, the folks that I sat down at the table for dinner with, you know, while we may have, you know, had certain beliefs that

aligned with the party, certainly when it came to social issues, we weren't there. And there were a lot of us. So I'm thinking, well, why is it that in a city like this, you have to go all the way to the left to even talk about politics? And I realized that it was because of a lack of organization. But at the same time, I had friends who were in the Republican Party who were going through something similar, who shared some of the values, but then felt like the party was going too far right. And that the party wasn't showing enough compassion when it came to immigrants and things of that nature. So they were having the same issue. And so in 2012, I ended up going, running to be a delegate at the Democratic National Convention.

And at the Democratic National Convention, And at the Democratic National Convention, it was an interesting kind of a life-changing experience because there were a few things that went down. Number one, there was a group that was trying to, I guess, like take God-given out of the platform, out of the platform. So when you go to the Democratic National Convention, what you're doing is choosing a candidate and then choosing what will be in the platform.

And so, you know when it came time to vote to see uh it was a voice vote when everybody voted in all the state delegations which you see is this big uh you know in the in the big like coliseum or whatever it was very clear that the people that wanted that didn't want god given to be in the platform were louder than the people that wanted it to stay in there god given really given really is just a nod to natural law. It's not anything for any one religion. And that moment was interesting to me because to see how excited people were to take that out or to not have it in the platform and then how the other people were a little more quiet, I kind of went home and I told myself, you know, I got to do, I have to do something to change what's going

on in politics right now because I shouldn't have to do, I have to do something to change what's going on in politics right now, because I shouldn't have to feel like I need to compromise my beliefs to be a part of what's going on. So I went back to Atlanta, started anybody who I could find who I knew was a Christian, who I knew was in politics, whether they ran their county party or whether they were, you know, running campaigns like I was. I got with them, sat down with them for lunch, and then I created this group called Crucifixing Politics, which is really like a Bible study slash support group for people who are in the same position.

We would meet at my church. It was probably maybe about, maybe it got up to 10 of us. We'd meet at my church and just talk about the issues, talk about how we felt, you know, where the party was going and stuff like that. And eventually what I saw was that us coming together made everybody more bold and so eventually um crucifix and politics you know i meet i meet um show baraka who's a hip-hop artist i meet angel maldonado who is a pastor in here in atlanta and we decide to create the and campaign and campaign is basically um it is us saying that we're not going to choose between love and truth and so the scripture where we get this is from

ephesians 4 14 through 15 where paul is telling the church of ephesus that a mature christian is always able to speak the truth and love right it doesn't matter what you know false teachings are around it doesn't matter what you're going through your circumstances you should be able to speak the truth and love, right? It doesn't matter what, you know, false teachings are around. It doesn't matter what you're going through, your circumstances, you should be able to speak the truth and love. We said, ah, so our witness should be about love and truth, not one or the other.

It should be about compassion and conviction. And for whatever reason, our political landscape tends to separate those two, right? So you have people who talk about justice. You have people who talk about values. But for some reason, we act like those can't be joined together. And when we look at the gospel, they are joined together. You look at Jesus's ministry and what he did, you know,

he was always loving people. He was always, you know, in a sense, liberating people from certain circumstances. He showed social concern, but he also paid attention to the value side of it. So he would tell the adulterous woman, you know, go, but sin no more. Right. He would tell the lame man to get up and walk, but stop sinning. You know, you can even go to Exodus in the Bible where, you know, God liberates the Hebrews, but he also gives them the law. He also asks something of them.

And so you see this love and truth coming together. And we thought that's the key. That's what we're missing because Democrats, you know, we're focusing on the justice. We're focusing on, you know, the compassion, but we don't really want to talk about the truth side of it. And we're less compassionate and we're actually less loving when we're not truthful. On the other side, you know, you had Republicans who would talk about the moral issues, talk about value, but there was a lack of compassion. And you are not being truthful if you're not being compassionate. It actually forces you into kind of hypocrisy and things of that nature and to almost, you know, bigotry at some times. And so we saw that as the key to what was going on to kind of fixing how Christians were looking at politics, to say step back from what you're doing in your party

and focus on the gospel first and foremost and do this with that kind of framework. Do you find that Christians, this is a multifaceted question, it seems like Christians are very kind of polarized in terms of their political allegiances. And I would say for most of evangelicalism, at least white evangelicalism, there's a strong association with the Republican Party and can even be a

Democratic Christian. Now that's kind of the facade, the perception. Are you finding that there's a much larger number of Christians that are actually looking for more nuance, that don't want to be completely aligned with one party or the other, or see pros and cons in each party? may lean one side or the other do you find more christians to be more centrist at heart in your experience yeah i mean you have people you have you have folks everywhere so you have some folks who are christians who are extremely progressive and that they would never even think about questioning you know the progressive side of

the argument you have folks who are extremely conservative and wouldn't question that. But you do you do find quite a few people who are seeing the flaws on both sides. And that's one of the things that the campaign emphasizes. If you want to be a Democrat, be a Democrat. If you want to be a Republican, be a Republican. We don't really care. But don't just go along with the tribe. Yeah. Be willing to question and put your ideology through biblical scrutiny. All right. Understand where your side falls short, because if you don't understand where your fault side falls short, well, then you just become an accomplice to whatever, you know, that tribe is doing. And that's not what Christians should be. And you can say that. I love loving this, man. I know probably 98 percent of my audience is like, that's where I'm at, too.

But do you get push or do you get some flack for that i mean even as uh calling yourself a democrat i'm and i want to ask you you know where you would maybe depart from other democratic values in that party but um yeah do you get people that from both sides i mean being a democrat and talking about uh being comprehensively pro-life i mean other democrats a lot of Democrats don't want to hear that. To talk about, you know, sexual orientation and gender identity in a way that aligns with the, you know, historic Christian sexual ethic, there's not things that people want to hear, but it's things that need to be said. And then, you know, from the right to have a conversation about social justice,

to have a conversation about how compassion should come first and how we as Christians at times on the right have an addiction, seem to have an addiction to power and seem to be able to put up with things that we shouldn't because we don't want to lose that power and that at the end of the day, politics is really more about us helping others and us, you know, furthering human flourishing and protecting human dignity than it is about christian self-interest yeah just trying to get people but but yeah we we get bullets from both sides and that's kind of the you know the nature of the beast to a certain

extent yeah do you find that i mean you've been at this work for a while well a bit now um do you find it seems like things are getting more and more polarized. Is that just because I'm first? I mean, I typically don't pay too close attention to politics, but how can you not in the post-Trump era? So I've been trying to kind of like follow stuff, whatever, but I'm like, man, it just seems like these polarized views are getting more extreme almost. Is this how it's always been,

or do you find it getting worse and worse in terms of like the the aggressiveness on on kind of both extremes it's pretty bad now i think i think it's just different because even if you think back to the civil rights movement i mean yeah you know you have some people not wanting to overturn jim crow well that's pretty divisive right that's pretty i think there's been a lot of division throughout history. I think communication has changed. So the way that we communicate it is different. You have social media where you didn't have it before. I don't know if it's less divisive. I think it's more divisive among different demographics. But if you go to my tradition, which is kind of the

black church tradition, there's always been some level of division in regard to those who don't want to come around when it comes to civil rights. There's always been that tension. There's always been a serious tension. I don't know if there's more of a tension or just in other segments of society, that tension is more divisive than it had been. But I think in a lot of ways, it's just expressed differently. And the modes of communication have changed. But it's been fairly divisive for a while. Well, and certainly I would say, I mean, with the in the Trump era, I mean, Trump represents a pretty extreme kind of republicanism. kind of republicanism but then i would also say that the backlash it's almost like trump is an extreme this way but then he's almost created or caused or nurtured a another extreme kind of

reaction to to him um have you i mean yeah so what are your thoughts give us a little overview of justin gibney i have said that Trump was actually almost a positive for the far left because his extremes made their extremes not seem so bad or even made their extremes seem necessary. So where before you might not be able to say something that was really, really extreme on the left, now you can say it. And some people are like, yeah, that's what we need. And then we have the interesting thing about our politics now. It's so silly that the two sides actually, it seems like go further extreme just to spite each other. Right. So if you're going to, you know, if you're going to have an abortion law,

then I'm going to make it a legal up, you know, up until the person is up, up until the child is born. Right. Yeah. Well only up until a couple of. Nobody would have even suggested that. But now it's almost like they spite each other by going as far to the left or to the right as possible. So, yeah, I think there's something to what you're saying. Where is that going to lead? Like it can't – it's either going to lead to George Orwell's 1984,

you know, like Big Brother, or it's going to create an exhaustion, I think, Big Brother, or it's going to create an exhaustion, I think, and where the extremes are going to become more so polarized that there's going to be this huge wake in the middle of people saying, all right, let's get back to kind of traditional Republicanism, Democrat, you know. Yeah, I think we have to be serious about the fact that this could lead to the unraveling of the country in a lot of different ways yeah i mean if christians especially and i do put the onus on christians don't step up step out of the parties or distance themselves from the parties and that doesn't mean you have to leave your party but distance yourself enough to critique and to correct your party then i think it just gets worse and worse and worse. Yeah. And you can, you know, we can talk about violence. We can talk about all these things. But people are really in a bad place right now.

Our discourse is toxic. And it's not getting any better. And sadly, in a lot of instances on both sides, Christians aren't healing it. We're actually perpetuating some of it. How would you recommend? aren't healing it. We're actually perpetuating some of it. How would you recommend, I get this question a lot from Christians who have staunch, you know, Republican, you know, family members or whatever to where it's just, it's, it just seems so,

for someone who's not steeped in that kind of environment, I know a lot of Christians are like, I don't even know how to talk to my parents anymore about politics. Because if I even raise any kind of question against republicanism, whatever, do you have any kind of advice in your experience in your work? Is there, what can a Christian do when they're trying to interact with other Christians who are so politically aligned that it's like, how can you get them to just maybe just rethink some of that? Have you seen any things that work in those kind of relationships? Yeah, no, that's a good question. And I think it just starts with a conversation. You know, one of the things that that I try to do when talking about people on both sides who are just staunchly conservative or staunchly progressive is first agree with them. Right. It's first say, you know what? You're right. The left does tend to go too far on this particular issue.

You're actually right that um maybe they don't quite understand human nature the way they should there's something missing there right they don't quite get that and then have a conversation about that and then say but don't you think that your side could do this or do that and i think what you want to try to do is create common ground to say no i'm not saying that your side is without. Because too much of what we do is we go into a conversation and basically tell the other side that what you're saying is completely wrong and I'm completely right. Well, because of that, neither side has credibility with the other.

And I think to gain credibility with the other, you have to be honest about your side's faults, but you also have to give ground when the other side has a point. And if we can go in the conversation like that, I think it's very helpful in those initial conversations. And they're just being very thoughtful in how you present the flaws of the side of the person you're speaking to, right? How do you tell them, well, the Bible says this, but you guys are actually doing this.

And isn't that problematic? And you know, it depends on the person or whatever but i do think it starts with finding that common ground and letting them know that what they're saying does have some merit if it does right sometimes it doesn't but that's from um one of my favorite writers jonathan height i don't know if you've read this stuff um or who's that uh making friends and winning you know winning people yeah people. Yeah. Carnegie, right? Yeah, Carnegie, Dale Carnegie. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Or at least Jonathan Haidt talks about, you know, 90% of why we hold on to our beliefs isn't really because of rational reasoning. It's because we are committed to the tribe or it's just, you know, there's other things that work so that if you just try to destroy somebody's rational argument with rational argument, the walls are going to be up. But if you can, exactly what you said, I mean mean meet them where they're at show them honor respect them as a person then sometimes the the the reaction of walls can come down to where you can actually have a conversation yeah you just got to get them out of that self-defensive posture yeah because when we get in conversations about politics or about race everybody's on the self-defense because they don't want to be seen

as the one that's to blame. And while that posture isn't necessarily Christ-like, because I think we're supposed to be humble, I think it's a very prideful stance, but we go into these conversations in a very prideful way. And it's just about kind of

getting those defenses down to say, man, I'm not here to put, you know, to put everything off on you or to say you're, I'm not here to, to put the, you know, to put everything off on you or to say you're the, you're the bad guy and everybody else is the good guy. I'm here for a conversation because we need to figure this out. So you, you, you said several times you're, you would affiliate with the democratic party. What are some,

what are some areas, some values where you would maybe depart from traditional democratic values? Yeah, sure. I think abortion is one of those the end campaign is very uh vocal about you know the fact that these that a baby is is alive from conception on and that we need to uh recognize the human dignity there and i think the um the democratic party does a terrible job of doing and i think it's really unfortunate when it comes to sexual orientation gender identity where i agree with the party on being um compassionate on making sure that nobody is mistreated and nobody is bullied and i think we need to go out of our way to make sure that's not

the case that can't just be rhetoric it needs to be real i just simply disagree with the truth of the matter um and i think um some of you, some of the ways that they treat people who disagree with them on that is, is really sad is, is, is, is, is, is unjust in its own way. And, and, and I think it'll have really bad consequences if it continues that route. But I know a lot of people that have paid for maintaining their kind of historic Christian sexual ethic. Right. With the abortion thing, because this is, and as my audience knows, I don't affiliate with either political party. And I've got kind of some Mennonite leanings between faith and culture questions. But what, so I was raised very, you know, Republican environment, traditional evangelical kind of circles. And there is this perception, and I'm not saying it's right or wrong, that the abortion is such a huge thing that a lot of people are like, how can you? I understand there might be things in the Democratic Party that have good values. There might be some things in the Republican Party that are you know more good than not or whatever but how can you say you're a christian and affiliate

with a party that would be pro pro choice what's your response to that yeah the first thing i say is that my party isn't part of my identity right so if you meet me i'm like hey i'm justin the democrat right it's it's a tool it's a political tool. And for strategic purposes, there's a lot of reasons to use that as a political tool. So that's the first thing I would say. Like every decision that the Democrats make, I don't feel like it's the decision I'm making. In fact, I can fight against those. I can vote against those if I want to. Nothing precludes me from doing that. But I also say that, you know, to me, pro-life is more than just being pro-birth. And when I look over at the Republican Party, when I look at how we deal with race, when I look at how they deal with immigrants, when I look at how they deal, you know, with even, you know,

young black men getting shot in the streets, I don't see the pro-life ethic in the way that many seem to think that is on the Republican side. And so I have questions there, too. I have questions in how the president talks about immigrants or talks about other countries. Well, how can you support that? I think both sides have a good case to say, hey, that's not Christian. Why would you support it? And you say, no, I don't support it. In fact, I speak up against it.

And so just because I may have one that that I may side with more often, it doesn't mean that I am endorsing everything that they do. And in fact, I feel it necessary for me to be vocal about what I disagree with. So once you take your once you take your identity out of it, and once we stop acting like that's a part of, you know, it's your party is such a serious part of you, you begin to see it as more of a tool and more of a strategic mechanism. I mean, you can be, there's a difference between affiliating with a, for lack of better terms, a tribe versus being tribalistic. You know, if you're tribalistic, then you have this allegiance to a particular tribe, whatever that tribe is, could be a denomination or whatever. tribe, whatever that tribe is, could be a denomination or whatever, then that your allegiance to that tribe supersedes critiquing that tribe when that tribe does something that's, you know, goes against your values. Exactly. And to be honest, I don't know how much I'm even in the tribe, so to speak. You know, I talk a lot about partisan loyalty. And what does it mean to be loyal to your party? Does that mean that when your party does something wrong, you support them? Does that mean that they had when they have bad policy, you support them? My answer is no. So I don't really

even believe in partisan loyalty. But I do believe to be a part of the process. Thurgood Marshall talked a lot about being part of the mechanisms that make society work. I can be part of those mechanisms and not necessarily identify with the party. And that's really what I'm about. So as far as tribes go, I mean, maybe I'm part of the tribe to some extent, but I just don't, you know, if you saw me in a conversation with a bunch of Democrats, it would be very clear that my stances were a lot different, almost to the point of where they wouldn't want me there. So good.

And I think all Christians should be that way. And do you find a growing number of Christians, like everything you're talking about, do you find a growing number of Christians really resonating with what you're kind of? Yeah, once they see it's an option. So the problem is a lot of people just didn't see. They said, hey, if I'm going to be involved in politics, I got to either be a Democrat or Republican. And that means that I can't do this or can't do that and the and campaign

saying no we think you should get involved in parties because it's just a more effective way to to engage but that but there's a different way to do that that doesn't mean that you follow them and that's the main thing that we're saying you cannot follow behind a party or a political tribe you can engage them, right? You can vote in their primaries. You can have your say when it comes to their platform, but they're not the master, right? And so you need to depart, as you said earlier,

critique them when necessary. And once people see that there's a different way to go about politics, then they do get really excited and say, oh, so I can kind of create my own or create this more gospel centered way to go about it and i think most people see that as a relief where are you at on the death penalty you know we we we haven't taken a stance on that me personally i'm not a fan of it um we haven't we haven't weighed in on that yet so there's not an official and campaign uh position uh but i do see questions

there especially when you look at the history of the fact that there have been a lot of people that have gone through the death penalty that you find out they're innocent or whatever i think there may be a better way because i don't know that it's a deterrent i'm not exactly sure what what um what use it serves but that's a kind of that's an ongoing conversation within the campaign as a whole and so the 2020 election do you have a favorite candidate or how are you thinking through the various candidates here on the democratic side yeah i'm still processing it i'm gonna be honest with you i'm not uh really really excited about any of the candidates right now i think there's a long way to go i think on a lot especially the social issues, there's been kind of a race to the left in a way that ignores a lot of the very, you know,

the Orthodox or biblical Christians who are in the party that are a very serious part of the party's base. I think they've been ignored. And so I'm not really excited about any of them, but I'll keep watching the debates. I'll keep reading their policy prescriptions and try to to make a decision so someone has a gun to your head who you voting for though can you not say do you not want to say it's too early uh you know and i i just might have to take the hit because i yeah it's too early and uh yeah i'm just not there yet i mean i would you and again i'm speaking out a lot of ignorance here just trying to to like, whatever. But like, it seems that of all the people that could beat Trump, if your goal is we need to get Trump out of the office, anybody else is going to be better than him. Would you is it true that Joe Biden would have the best chance at that or not necessarily? That's what I keep hearing, that if you vote for one of these more extreme candidates, man, it's just not going to be.

We're just going to keep Trump in the office. Yeah, that's what the data is saying. The numbers in the polls are saying it's saying that people trust Joe Biden and that people feel like he is the best. But there's a long way to go. All right. So we'll see if that stands. I mean, he has his own issues. He's, you know, kind of backpedaled on different things when it comes to abortion and all that stuff so will he continue to do that uh but generally that's what the numbers are saying that that's what people that's how people are feeling uh and we'll see if that that uh holds up and he he is he does seem really old like i man i don't know like some

his mind doesn't seem to be clicking as much as I would want a president of the United States to be firing. I mean, for the most part, I think he sounds really compelling. Yeah, the top three candidates in general are older. I think that's something that people will consider. How much, I'm not sure. But, yeah, that's part of the conversation. So it's Biden, it's Bernie, and then it's Warren, right? Are those the top three?

Mm-hmm. Okay. So, again, as a centrist, as a nonpartisan person, I've been impressed with the little I've paid attention with. Tulsi, is it Tulsi Gabbard? I keep forgetting her. Gabbard, yep. Yeah.

I like her stuff on speaking out against militarism and some things there. But yeah. And she also spoke up on religious liberty, too. Did she? And I really appreciate that because nobody was brave enough to do that. Yeah. And so, yeah, that really stuck out to me. She's just having some trouble.

And that's the thing, you know, for somebody who's taking those more centrist positions, it's just hard to get through the primary. Yeah. And she's so I don't know. It doesn't positions, it's just hard to get through the primary. Yeah. And she, so I don't know, it doesn't look like she's going to be in the next debate. And I think that's unfortunate. Really? I don't, yeah. I don't know if she really has a chance, but I mean, yeah, she seems,

I don't know if you, if, if the Democrats can put up a more centrist kind of person, it seems that I don't know. It seems like that would resonate with a much higher percentage of the population than they would think, but I don't know. You would think so. And with a much higher percentage of the population than they would think. But I don't know. You would think so. And, you know, you know, we would urge, you know, in both parties, we would urge to get people who are more centrist and are more thoughtful and not just going along with the wave, so to speak. But it's just tough because the thing that happens is your more um extreme people are the

people who are who are the most active in primaries yeah and so the people who are coming to the events that are the people that are uh they are more likely to vote in the primary uh and so you end up with the more extreme candidates and guess whose fault that is that's our fault yeah right it's this fault of the people who who are on either side that are more moderate or just aren't controlled by the ideologies, you know, the most popular ideologies of the day. It's our fault that we don't get as involved as we should. Well, let's maybe leave politics for a second. Talk about just Christianity, evangelicals and whatever. Where are you and you're are you affiliated with the denomination or what's your kind of theological? Where do you put yourself theologically in the Christian spectrum?

Yeah, so I go to a traditional kind of Black Baptist church. And so we are more Orthodox. We have a very high view of the Bible, although there's always a mixture of folks in there. But we in general have a very high view of the Bible. I wouldn't call myself Reformed, but, you know, the AND Campaign talks a lot about, so, you know, the Apostles' Creed, all that stuff, that's stuff that we would, you know, we would align with. And so the AND Campaign, everybody on our leadership council, you know, everybody involved with us and our chapters are people who take the Bible very seriously, that see it as infallible, that see it as true, and that take the words as

truth. And so generally, that's where I'm at. And some of the details, you know, we may differ on, but in general, we are on that more orthodox side of the conversation. Okay. And you mentioned, you know, race relations, and I know this has been a big conversation within the church. And do you find, and this is a broad statement, I know we're talking about big, you know, when you talk about evangelicalism, that's such a big tent, but do you find, would you, how would you describe the interaction between evangelicals and race relations within the church, say in the last 10 years? Like, do you find it to be very hopeful, to be underdeveloped and in need of much more progress?

Or how would you think through that? Yeah, I find it wanting, right? It's not where it should be. I don't think it's where the Bible commands us to place it. But I do have calls for hope. And so one of the things the AND campaign does, we go into a lot of a diverse group of churches. So we have people that are evangelical, white evangelicals. Again, we have folks from the, you know, from, from, from Asian churches. We have, you know, it's just

a range of biblical churches that we talk to. And people are, I think to a certain extent, people are starting to see this as an issue that the church has to deal with. And I've said before, I'll say again, I don't think the race issue gets better in America until it first gets better in the church. And I think for too long, we have allowed the world to kind of lead the way on that. And then, again, we've even perpetuated some of it. But we have the same Bible. We have the same Great Commission. We have the same Great Commandment. We have enough common ground to come together between races. churches look and how we fellowship, how we talk to one another. And again, it all goes back to building relationships, finding common ground, not being on the defensive when we have race conversations, and really just being honest about the history of race relations in America.

When I first started the AND campaign, I assumed that people were clear on the history of race in America. And that was just a bad assumption. Because I was very surprised to see how many people were just uninformed or miseducated when it came to race, and what this conversation has really been about. And so we've had to take that on, we've had to take on the responsibility of teaching folks just the facts, the historical facts about what's been happening in America since 1619, right? When it comes to race. Can you give us some of those facts just for our audiences? Like, well, what exactly is he talking about there? I mean, yeah, I mean, well, you're talking about over 200 years of slavery, you're talking about in slavery,

you know, the black church having to be a church that was invisible. It was called the invisible institution because in a lot of on a lot of these plantations, these slaves were these enslaved people were not allowed to gather, were not allowed to worship God. And so you can have a conversation about that, especially within the religious liberty conversation. But even after, you know, the emancipation you still had uh jim crow right you have all these you have redlining you have all these things throughout history that have not only separated the black family but also uh not allowed black people to really create wealth and build wealth things of that nature and so when we talk you know a lot of times when people talk about race, they're thinking, well, I haven't done anything myself. I haven't done this myself. I don of their race. Or have you gone out and done the work to hire somebody, you know, to find somebody

that's qualified and hire somebody that's different to give people an opportunity. And if you haven't done that, while you might not be directly responsible, there's still some responsibility because of the system that you may have benefited from. And so we want to have those conversations in a real way and in a way where we can talk through it and nobody's expected to know everything immediately. And if we disagree, I'm not saying that you're somehow a demon, but that we can have a continuing relationship and conversation on it. My next question was going to be, it might be totally related to this,

is what do you see as some blind spots within, let's just say white evangelicalism, whatever that means to, to the race conversation. What, I mean, if I can put words in your mouth, you know,

it would be maybe not understanding the, the, the ongoing effects of hundreds of years where there, we can all agree there has been massive inequality of you know beyond just inequality but just oppression and slavery and everything that there's that there's lasting social effects that just because we had a black president doesn't mean that those are all gone would that be yeah you just get the feeling that it's like why are you still complaining right yeah you know slavery's gone jim crow is gone why are you still complaining

but if you look at disparities if you look at who's who's going to prison at higher rates right if you look at if you look at education disparities then either you you believe that you know black people are somehow inferior or it could be the fact that there are still uh side effects and lingering issues from the 200 plus years of slavery and then all this time of Jim Crow, which didn't end that long ago. Right. I mean, so we're in a situation where my grandfather's father was murdered by two white men. You have a situation where my parents had gone through very serious racial issues. This wasn't, we act like this was, you know, 300 years ago. It actually wasn't that long ago. Jim Crow didn't end that long ago. You know, many, you know, many folks, you know, as a

millennial, some people, some millennials' parents went to segregated school. So we tend to want to have like a short memory when it comes to these things, but they weren't that long ago, and there are lingering effects. Now, one thing that I do always say is that, again, God asks something of everyone, right? So there's no situation. You know, sometimes we set up, okay, there are the oppressed over here and the oppressor over there, and God is only asking something of the oppressor. It's just not true. It's just not how he's worked. Everybody is held to a standard. It's just not true. It's just not how he's worked. Everybody is held

to a standard. Everybody has to be loving. Everybody has to go about things a certain way. And so I think there's room for that conversation. But yet and still, if we look at the dynamics of our society, I think when it comes to white evangelicalism and some people in that space, it makes sense that you would have to take the first step. It makes sense that you would have to open up in that conversation and that you may have the resources that aren't in other areas to where you do have to take some of the onus on yourself. And so we certainly won't set up in kind of a perception that this is a false equivalent, that we're all equally responsible.

I'm not saying that. But I think everybody needs to come to the table with humility and really with aspiration, because we know that we have a God that can do all things. Give us some advice. I mean, what can, a lot of the white evangelicals I would interact with, me being one of them, is like, man, what can we do? Like, we hear you saying that, and I'm like, man, it makes total sense. I could see these blind spots, but what can white evangelical, let's just say leaders, or just people do to do exactly what you're saying? Bring in diverse speakers, right? I mean, that's one thing that you can do. Bring somebody in who can have a constructive conversation about race and Christ and Christianity and all that stuff.

I mean, there are some excellent communicators, even within the AND campaign, that would love to come to people's churches and have that conversation in a real way, in a way where it's going to be constructive and it's not just going to be a bunch of finger pointing that's not helping anybody. But these are tough conversations that need to be had. And that's one place to start creating opportunities where, you know, whether it's tutoring in certain areas or whether it's finding a minority led church and saying, well, how can you know what you need? How can we help you? That's another way. And then just listening, listening when people have something to say, listening when people say that they're hurting, because we tend to dismiss people um as being

hypersensitive or whatever just because we don't understand i don't want to take the time to understand where they're coming from so i live in boise uh we call it white ho it's uh not idaho is 92 percent 93 percent caucasian um i think it's point zero uh no point uh point eight percent point nine percent african america i think i think that's less so there's like in boise boise's um the boise metro area is 600 plus thousand people a third of the state lives in this in this metro area and so there's i think one maybe two black churches which are 70 70% black and 30, you know, um, and what I've gotten to know, one of the pastors, I haven't talked to him in a while, but I got to know him. Um, I, I, we went there a few times to the church, black, black, traditional black Baptist church.

And he literally, I mean, he's, I would say the best, or at least one of the best preachers in town. And we've had some really great conversations about what, man, you're, you're in, you're living in Idaho, dude. Like what's that like? And I said like and i said well how many you know he's been pastoring here for probably 20 years he's incredible and not so let me he's a very good rhetorician he's also has an md or a d min like a doctorate he's an he's a he's a very good exegete, has a traditional black preaching style, if I can, most people know what I'm saying there. But I mean, he's incredibly, he's not just a good rhetorician, he's a good exegete. He's a good all around preacher that would resonate with a very Bible believing kind of church. And I asked him how many times he's been invited as a guest speaker

at other churches. I think he said like once in the last 20, like once since he's been here, maybe even twice. And that really clicked on me because when I talk to people here in Boise, Idaho, I don't, I don't, and maybe I'm totally blind to it. I don't sense a lot of blatant racism. Like it's just not like you hear people, they would resonate with everything you're saying and this, that, but there is that just kind of, and I mean, it's not a demeaning way but just just just ignorance like i don't i'm kind of unaware that there's things i could be doing to not just not reinforce racism but to actually you know

improve race relations and yeah yeah no that's good and one of the ways i think that's right one of the things that i always say is remember that justice is active. Right. Justice isn't a lack of injustice. Right. If I sit at home all day and really don't interact with people, I can't really say I'm a just person. I might not be an unjust person, but I'm not just justice is active. Right. You almost have to be proactive about it, especially when you understand the history and the dynamics of a place like America. especially when you understand the history and the dynamics of a place like America. Once you understand those dynamics, I think to be about justice is that is to actually go forth and do something about it, even if it isn't right there in your face. Right. And just like, you know, discipleship, just like evangelism. There is a lot of opportunity to help people and do things that that that that promote human flourishing. There is not a lack of need. And so if you're really

serious about doing it, you can get it done, but you do need to listen. And I think sometimes, you know, people go into the situation overzealous or ready to kind of be that savior. And people don't need a savior. Number one, people need to be listened to and they need somebody who understands their issues from their point of view. And so I think there's ample opportunities to get involved, to help people, to bring about justice, whether it be in education. I mean, if you're a teacher, you can tutor people. I mean, there's tons of opportunities to do it, but you got to want to do it. And as Christians, we have to understand that justice isn't just about not going, you know, not going around and falsely putting people in prison. There's a lot more to it than that. That's good. That's really good. I hosted a, uh, here in Boise, a public forum on,

I forget what it's called, like a race relations or something. And I had that, that, that preacher I was telling him about, I had him come and, uh, talk. And then I had another person. I, I like to have people on different sides kind of give, give talks. I mean, here they weren't on different viewpoints, but I had a white guy and a black guy talking about race relations and everything. And it was actually really cool. This public forum, probably 100 people there, and half of them were black, half were white.

I don't think Idaho has seen so many, unless they go to a black church, so many black people in one room. But it was so good because once we really established that this is a safe place to speak your mind like don't just come and sit and like just nod and agree like no if you have a frustration speak up and so the for the first you know hour it was just you know people like yeah yeah whatever you know but then when they felt the freedom you could see people getting you know saying this this is some frustrations i have with you know this society that is exactly what you're saying it's like i don't i don't they

would say i don't encounter blatant racism but i encounter a lot of kind of indifference or just ignorance about what it's like that no like we haven't yes we've come a long way since jim mccrow but we still have a long way to go and and it's easy for white people to just think that we've kind of arrived but um yeah one guy got real heat it was i was like oh man this one guy man he was uh going on for a long time so there was some deep purging that stuff it's not always pretty yeah no yeah but it was so good i was really impressed with both sides i did see see nothing was resolved. There were some serious tensions. I'm glad that people spoke out,

but I'm also glad that people were working hard to listen. And that was, yeah, it was good. But what are your thoughts on, if some people say, well, hasn't affirmative action solved a lot of this stuff? What are your thoughts on affirmative action and what does that accomplish? What are some pros and cons to affirmative action? Yeah, I personally think

affirmative action has been helpful. You know, you know, in fact, when you talk about affirmative action, because the way I see it is, it's not about putting people who are not qualified in a certain position is about giving people an opportunity. Okay, even for myself, if it weren't affirmative action i'm not sure that i went to would have went to vanderbilt law school right and so when i go and speak and people say wow i like how you articulate this i like you did a really good job you know this is just excellent how you articulate which don't you know never tell somebody they're articulate because that means you expected them not to but i think even when people are coming

from a good place and they say man man, you really articulated that well, blah, blah, blah. Oftentimes I say, I mean, you know, I am a beneficiary of affirmative action. Right. And so you get to see that it's not that people, you know, when people didn't have it, when people don't have an opportunity, they don't make it to where they could be. It's not necessarily taking somebody who's not fit or who, you know, who isn't ready for something and putting him there. It's giving people an opportunity that they wouldn't have. So I do think that has been a, has been a benefit. I think, I think it has been helpful. And, but, but I think that if you look at the history and if you look at it through the years, I think, I don't think that's where it necessarily should end. Okay. Can you help us? What are some other so wow you're really articulate you're saying thank you for helping us understand why that can be unintentionally offensive what are

some other things you hear white people do if we're going to stay on this side of the conversation for a while what are some other things that people say that's just out of ignorance unintentional but it's like ah you shouldn't say that because of this this this you know i i tend to be you know i tend to be more uh gracious when it comes to that stuff so i don't harp a lot you know i'll tell people like that that may not have come off well but i don't harp you know i'm not one of those people that's gonna harp on a whole lot of stuff i know when i speak to people of different cultures or i have conversations that i don't necessarily understand i'm sure i make mistakes sure so i think think rather than kind of saying, well, this is wrong, this is wrong. I think number one, just listen to people and have an honest conversation. The people who are

trying to be constructive will be able to appreciate that. Even if they say, Hey man, I just want to correct you on this or that. We can get into this situation where it's like, you know, a woker than thou, right? And if you don't know everything, every word you're supposed to say, right. If you don't say this phrase properly, or you don't pronounce this properly, then I'm going to come at you. And that's just not, that's prideful. And so I don't get too much into that. I do, you know, if I can correct somebody here or there, but just do it with love. And that's really what I focus on more, man. I'm not, I'm trying to get to a place where we can work together better yeah and

if that means i have to overlook some things and i hope people would overlook some things with me that's just part of the process i appreciate that so but with openness like what are some things though that you're not harping but just help educate us on what are some things that you hear people say that you know um i think just treating people and i think both the left and right get this wrong i think it's just about treating somebody as a peer right um i think just treating people and i think both the left and right get this wrong i think it's just about treating somebody as a peer right um i think sometimes on the left they treat people of color um almost like they don't expect them to be as smart so i gotta help you out right i don't don't let anybody criticize this guy because he's on our side and he's you know he's black or you know she's a black woman therefore she can't be criticized but i'm like

that's just treat me as a peer you know what i mean that that's telling me that somehow you think that that your expectations are lower of me um because when you look at you know and we've had some of this if you look at some of the i mean on twitter or wherever some people feel like there are certain activists or whatever that you can't criticize. And I just think that's wrong. I think treat people as a peer and listen to them and have respect for them. And I think both sides can get that wrong because when you look at Martin Luther King, you look at Fannie Lou Hamer,

you look at all these great communicators from my community, they didn't need people to protect them from being criticized because they had done their homework. They knew what they were talking about. Just people treat people as if they have something to give and treat them with respect and dignity. And I think that's the general rule that I would get at. I don't have a whole list of stuff that, you know, upsets me or anything. I think the general rule is treat people with respect, expect them to be able to, you know, to tell you what's going on and to be thoughtful. Because when you don't expect somebody to be thoughtful, you know, you expect that they need you more than you need them. Then it comes through in your conversation.

Yeah, I'm going to give throughout a and I think this is a Republican. Maybe it's not just partisan, but I hear it mainly from Republicans, especially when it comes to race relations. Um, and the whole idea of, you know, that there's social factors that could be more oppressive than people realize. Um, I've heard people say that if you graduate high school, you don't get somebody pregnant and, uh, Oh, what's the other one to get a job or something. I don't know that then you're not going to end up in jail and prison. You're not going to end up, you know, with a child on a wedlock and all this stuff. I mean, just you have certain moral decisions, some real basic ones that you can make.

And if you do those things, it's generally going to work out well for you. What would be your response to that? And I think usually it's said in conversations about race. Yeah, I don't think that's without merit. What I would say is it's not always that simple and everybody's not starting off with a clean slate. Right. So if you come from a situation where you haven't had the opportunity to build up your self-worth, to build, to understand who you are and your own human dignity. understand who you are and your own human dignity. If you haven't been educated properly, if you're raised in a situation where you're, you know, you almost look down on yourself, or you don't have a lot of confidence and things of that nature, you come from a community that has been that has been exposed to such, you know, oppression or so many issues that it makes it hard to see things as clearly as you might see them. So yes,

I think that is a, I think that's a good framework for success. And, you know, I have three boys, I'm going to tell my boys to do exactly that because I think it is helpful, but we have to have the grace and understanding to understand that everybody can't see that so clearly and not everybody comes from a situation where that even makes sense to them. And so, and also if we understand grace ourselves, then we understand that the only reason that we're not in similar positions is because of the grace of God. It's not because we're so much smarter. Our culture is so much better than somebody else's. It's by grace. And so I think we just need to understand, yeah,

I don't have a problem with people kind of teaching that that's the way to go. The problem that I have is when we look at others and say, why couldn't you just do that right when you know nothing about their history you know nothing of what they've been through teach it it's good it makes sense right but have grace on people who may not have come from the foundation that you have and may have made mistakes right because depending on where you come from and depending on who you are you can get away with mistakes that other people can't necessarily get away with. That's so good. Where can people find you, the end campaign?

Can you maybe as we finish up, give a quick word of what if people are like, man, I want to I want to have this guy come out or I want to look into the end campaign. How can how can I benefit from the end campaign or how can we, you know, connect with them? How would you direct people? the campaign or how can we you know uh connect with them how would you direct people yeah so you can always reach out to us whether it's for speaking engagements or anything else through engage engage at and and campaign and and campaign.org engage at and campaign.org you can go to our website and campaign.org uh You can follow us on Twitter at, at, at, and campaign. We're on Facebook, all those things. If you want to, you know, want to get involved,

you can also go to our website and you can get on our email list and you'll get updates about what we're doing in different cities. If you really, if you get really interested in your biblical believer, hit us up and we can have a conversation about a chapter in your area and other believers you can connect with in your area and so forth. But yeah, those are the main ways you can touch with us. Awesome. Justin, thanks so much for the work you do. I've been looking forward to this podcast. And yeah, I just love how you, going back to the original thing about the truth and love.

I mean, you as far as I can see, you seem to embody that so well, this persistent seeking for truth and yet doing so in such a loving and gracious manner. So I just yeah, I wish. Yeah. Wish we live closer. We can hang out more, man. Yeah, no, no doubt, man. I definitely try. And thank you for your work, because when an issue comes up within your expertise, man, and I've reached out to you before you've gotten back to us, I really appreciate what you do, man. Keep it up. I know it's not easy, man, but you too do it with compassion and conviction. That's why I appreciate that. Yeah. Well, let's keep in touch, man. Thanks for being on Theology in a Row. All right, now. take care, brother.