Nothing has created as much division among Christians within my lifetime as the “anti-woke,” “anti-CRT” movement.
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That crowd responds to such a statement by saying something along the lines of, “It’s not anti-CRT causing division—it’s CRT itself! It teaches people to view each other through grievances and separates them according to race.”
To which I respond, “Really? Have you read CRT theorists? Furthermore, what Christians do you know of who pushed for CRT in your world?”
This article is the thirteenth of a series of articles addressing the question, “How should Christians process Critical Race Theory?”
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The idea that CRT is infiltrating the church is nothing but gaslighting. I have never personally met a Christian who identified as a proponent of CRT. I do not promote CRT. Yet, I have met quite a number of people who are “anti-CRT” and who accuse me of promoting it.
What Is Gaslighting?
According to Wikipedia, gaslighting is a colloquialism, loosely defined as making someone question their own reality. The term may also be used to describe a person who presents a false narrative to another group or person which leads them to doubt their perceptions and become disoriented or distressed.
The idea that CRT is this big, dangerous monster subtly deceiving people all over the place, even those within the church, is an example of a false narrative.
While I share the concern about how CRT tends to posture people to see the world through grievances, that is not actually taught by the theorists themselves. Such a notion more arises as people apply CRT throughout society.
Even more importantly, however, Christians were not out there busily promoting CRT.
Some Christians were wanting to address racism, and they began getting labeled as having “embraced CRT.” But most of them didn’t even know what CRT was. They hadn’t come to the issue of racism from having sat in a lecture on CRT. They came to it from having seen or experienced its pervasiveness first-hand.
To say someone has bought into CRT because they are addressing issues of racial justice when you don’t know what has led them to address it strikes me as profoundly arrogant. Especially when they don’t themselves claim to embrace CRT.
Related Article: Thinking Through the Black Lives Matter Movement
What is behind it? Is it really made up of Marxist radicals who want to overthrow America? Does it have connections with witchcraft? And if so, should Christians really be using the slogan? Doesn’t using the slogan align oneself with the movement and, therefore, with demonic influences?
Christians have a theological basis for addressing issues of justice. Many have witnessed or experienced injustice resulting from racial prejudice. To interact with a secular theory as we collectively grapple with the problem of racial injustice does not mean one has “bought into” CRT or embraced an “unbiblical worldview.” This is simply a form of gaslighting, a way of shifting the conversation from focusing on a real issue to focusing on a perceived issue that distracts us from the other thing.
It is the anti-CRT crowd using alarmism and guilt to their self-satisfying ends, not Christians who simply want to treat each other with the dignity of being equal bearers of the image of God.
Another form of gaslighting often used is the claim that CRT is an “unbiblical worldview” because it comes from secular sources.
First of all, CRT theorists pulled from Christian writings about as much as the founding fathers of America pulled from Christian writings for developing the constitution. Any notion of America being a “Christian nation” ought to equally acknowledge that CRT is “a Christian theory.”
Personally, I think that is extremely flawed because neither America nor CRT are “Christian” in the sense of working from a framework that embraces the Gospel as a transformative prescription for its lenses through which it sees the world. Neither America nor CRT are trying to accomplish the goal of seeing things the way God does.
Why This Matters
Even more concerning, however, is the fact that there are many areas of life where we are willing to receive instruction from non-biblical sources. Why are people so insistent on CRT needing to be inherently biblical in order to learn anything from it? After all, do we not embrace the doctrine of common revelation or common grace: that there are undeniable truths about life and the world that can be realized by anyone regardless of their faith status? It should not be alarming to us to realize we can learn something from someone who isn’t a Christian.
For more on this very issue, I recommend these pieces by Christian, conservative commentator, David French:
- Structural Racism Isn’t Wokeness, It’s Reality
- On Racial Justice, Individual Guilt, and Institutional Responsibility
Feel free to share your responses to this article in the comments below. Please be respectful to each other as you do. Grace and peace.
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