Things to Read On Race, Christianity, and Aotearoa

We started Metanoia in order to intersect issues of life and faith in Aotearoa New Zealand. This is something we are passionate about, based on the firm belief that the gospel of Jesus matters for our world and culture today.

This week has been a painful and difficult one for many in the wake of the public murder of George Floyd and subsequent protests and conflict in America. Our own cities saw thousands turn up in solidarity, and for many across the West this tragedy and great evil has sparked conversations about race and injustice within different communities.

Despite the distance we might feel from the flames and terror of police brutality in the US, the history and ongoing reality of Aotearoa New Zealand is that it is a society built on the marginalistion of non-white peoples, particularly that of tanagata whenua. In our own history Mãori faced the full brunt of European colonisation and violence.

These are difficult, sensitive, and contested realities to talk about, but they demand our attention. Most importantly, as an editorial team at Metanoia, they demand a break from white silence and ignorance. It is not up to people of colour to educate us about our own sin and blindness. Pãkehã too must begin to talk about race.

And why? For the very reason I began this article stating: the gospel of Jesus matters for our world today, it matters beyond anything we can dare to hope. For if Jesus really is the world’s true King, then everything under his reign is different. To quote black theologian Willie Jennings, “Christianity marks the spot where, if a noble dream joins hands with God-inspired hope and presses with great impatience against the insularties of life, for example, national, cultural, ethnic, economic, sexual, and racial, seeking the deeper ground upon which to seed a new way of belonging and living together, then we will find together not simply a new ground, not simply a new seed, but a life already prepared and offered to us.”

Yet in our ongoing racial history this has not been the case. Instead, we have a diseased intimacy, a deformed shape of intimacy and violence which has in part given birth to the current events of America. Jennings again writes, “A Christianity born of such realities but historically formed to resist them has yielded a form of religious life that thwarts its deepest instincts of intimacy. That intimacy should by now have given Christians a faith that understands its own deep wisdom and power or joining, mixing, merging, and being changed by multiple ways of life to witness to a God who surprises us by love of differences and draws us to new capacities to imagine their reconciliation. Instead, the intimacy that marks Christian history is a painful one, one in which the joining often meant oppression, violence, and death, if not of bodies then most certainly of ways of life, forms of language, and visions of the world. What happened to the original trajectory of intimacy?”

Here at Metanoia, we want to live in the discomfort and difficulty of that question: What happened to the original trajectory of intimacy?

There have been many great lists and recommendations in the wake of Floyd’s murder going around engaging in whiteness, race, and racism. Yet few we’ve seen speak from within Christian contexts and from within the context of race in Aotearoa. Unfortunately, this is in part because there are few resources that reflect on these things all together.

So, we’ve compiled an (incomplete) list of things that might not get shared very much elsewhere. We would love to add to it. If you have something to contribute reflecting on race in identity, culture, and as it relates to Christianity in Aotearoa, get in touch at editors.metanoianz@gmail.com. If we missed something off this list, tell us and we’ll update it.

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Resources to Help (not be racist)

Shorter Stuff

Willie Jennings, “My Anger, God’s Righteous Indignation.” A compulsory listen from leading black theologian Willie Jennings, given in response to the shooting of Floyd and the subsequent outburst. Potent, personal, and full of wisdom.

James Cone, “Theology’s Great Sin: Silence in the Face of White Supremacy.” Black theologian James Cone, reflecting on his life in service of theology, laments the continual silence on racism and evil from white theologians and urges for its end. It’s an academic text, so sourcing it might be tricky for some, but it is worth getting access to if you can.

Walter Brueggemann, “Jesus Acted Out As The Alternative to Empire.” A transcript from Old Testament scholar Walter Bruegemann on what he calls the ‘prophetic imagination’ of the OT prophets. This new reality of justice is at the heart of God’s kingdom, a countercultural reality that comes to its pinnacle in Jesus.

Andrew Picard, “From Whiteness Towards Witness: Revelation and Repentance as Unbelonging To Empire,” in The Art of Forgiveness. One of the few biblical-theological works from within Aotearoa that reflects explicitly on whiteness and processes of ‘unbelonging’ from systems of racism and empire. Written by the head of the grad school at Carey and easily accessible in the College’s library. 

Andrew Picard, “Confessions of a Recovering Racist.” Transcript of the Sutherland lecture delivered at Waitangi during the 2014 BUNZ Hui. A personal and constructive piece in understanding oneself within white privilege and grappling with the history that earned it and why it matters to the gospel.

Longer Stuff

Willie Jennings, The Christian Imagination: Theology and Origins of Race. Willie Jennings’ essential work on the origins of racism in the process of European imperialism and slavery that has given way to the diseased and disfigured modern racial conditions of Christianity in America and the West today (also the text quoted above). A demanding read, but worth every second and beautifully written.

Love L. Sechrest, Johnny Ramírez-Johnson, and Amos Yong, eds. Can 'White' People Be Saved?: Triangulating Race, Theology, and Mission. An edited book of different contributors reflecting on race and whiteness within Christianity. The title is a play on words; yes, of course white people can be saved—that goes without saying—but what about the totalising process of whiteness in society?

Videos

Willie Jennings, “Can ‘White’ People Be Saved?” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SRLjWZxL1lE.

Andrew Draper, “The End of Whiteness.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YPBKvTQcf2c.

James Cone, “The Cross and the Lynching Tree.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RPM-AtBWHrI.

Stories of Aotearoa

Emilie Rãkete, “The Whakapapa of Police Violence.” In a powerful piece from The Spinoff, Emilie Rãkete addresses the relationship between the fires of American racism and the systemic issues that affect Mãori in Aotearoa.

David Galler, “The Restraint Technique That Killed George Floyd Has Been Used Here Too.” An intensive care specialist recalls working with a young man who eventually died from being held in the same position as George Floyd in Aotearoa.

Max Harris, “Racism and White Defensiveness in Aotearoa: A Pãkehã Perspective.” A piece introducing the everyday features of whiteness and racism as it plays out in New Zealand society from the perspective of a white person.

Moana Jackson, “Understanding Racism in this Country.” Mãori lawyer Moana Jackson who specialises in Tiriti and constitutional issues reflects on racism in Aotearoa and its effects.

Alistair Reece, “Why Pãkehã Need To Know Who They Are.” Pãkehã public theologian Alistar Reece reflects on understanding Pākehā identity through Te Tiriti and what that sort of relationality entails.

Madeline Chapman, “The Single Object: A Mighty Pen.” Madeline Chapman shares the story of Ika Toloa who, amidst the decades of dawn raids and police frisking, was unjustly arrested in Tãmaki Makaurau for a false ‘theft’ worth the value of a pen.

Rose Lu, “All Who Live on Islands.” A biographical article reflecting on the experiences of forgiveness and invisibility growing up as a Chinese New Zealander. Her book of the same name is also a very valuable, longer read.

Emma Ng, “Old Asian, New Asian.” Emma Ng reflects on the Labour Party’s 2015 anti-Asian housing statistics that discriminated against ‘Asian sounding names’ and the long history of legislative and culture discrimination against Chinese settlers in Aotearoa’s history. Equally, her own book of the same name is a shorter, yet very valuable read.

Witi Ihimaera, Pounamu, Pounamu and The New Net Goes Fishing. Collections of short stories from the first published Mãori novelist. Reflects often on the clashes of growing up brown in a white society.

Aniska Sankar, “Who’s The Real Problem? On White Supremacy and Institutional Gaslighting.” A confronting account on the process of gaslighting which downplays the reality of marginalisation people of colour face in Aotearoa written in the wake of the Christchurch attacks.

The Oh Nine, “Ihumãtao: A Conversation.” An interview with two Christians, one Mãori one Pãkehã, involved in the occupation and whenua protests at Ihumãtao.

Decolonisation in Aotearoa

Bianca Elkington, Moana Jackson, et al., Imagining Decolonisation. A short, accessible collection of essays from both Mãori and non-Mãori reflecting on the detriments of colonialism on Aotearoa with concrete, real-life examples of action that seeks to demystify decolonial and anti-racist actions.

Ani Mikaere, Colonising Myths - Mãori Realities: He Rukuruku Whakaaro. A collection of papers from Mãori scholar Ani Mikaere on topics of legal process, Tiriti interpretations, and identity configurations as it relates to tangata whenua. More technical, but very worthwhile.

Linda Tuhiwai Smith, Decolonizing Methodologies. The landmark text on decolonial method in research and academia. Technical and specific, but indispensable in its field.

Histories of Aotearoa

Jay Ruka, Huia Come Home. Though brief and not without its gaps, this is still the most accessible read out there to situate Aotearoa’s history explicitly in context to Christian identity and witness. If you need a place to start, this is it.

Ranginui Walker, Ka Whawhai Tonu Matou: Struggle Without End. Ranginui Walker was a preeminent Mãori historian who sought to tell New Zealand history through an indignenous lens. It still stands an essential reading of our nation's history and the ongoing struggle for justice, equality, and tino rangatiratanga.

Vincent O'Malley, The New Zealand Wars: Ngã Pakanga O Aotearoa. A recent and accessible history of the New Zealand Wars, events which shaped much of the civic structure and settlements of Aotearoa that many New Zealanders still know little about.

Claudia Orange, The Treaty of Waitangi. The definitive, secular work on Te Tiriti o Waitangi.