[Dialogue] {Spam?} 01-16-08 Spong in S. Africa

[KroegerD at aol.com]

January 16, 2008 
Reflections on our Final Days  in South Africa  

On our last few days in South Africa, we tasted the land in several ways.  
With Professor Izak Spangenberg as our guide, we went on a four day, three night 
 safari in Kruger Park near the Mozambique border. With Professor Hansie  
Wolmarans as our guide we ventured into the depths of the historic gold mines,  
the wealth from which turned this nation into a battlefield between competing  
European powers. We explored underground caves where some of the earliest 
fossil  remains of original human life were discovered and we spent almost an 
entire day  touring the Apartheid Museum where the horrors of the recent past were 
on full  display. Through photographs, narratives, videos and old television 
footage  South Africa's 20th Century history was brought vividly into the 
present. These  vignettes of yesterday showed just how much both the political and 
religious  leaders of that nation had sought to justify the hostility they 
had lived out  toward black people. People in the west had only glimpsed most of 
this material  through brief clips on national televised news or an 
occasional newspaper  article. In this museum, however, it was quite impossible to 
escape the  unrelenting horror that apartheid was.  
The museum's concentration focused on that time between 1948 when the  
National Party came to power committed to apartheid, to the moment when the  
election of Nelson Mandela in 1994 brought that era to an end. For me it was as  if I 
were seeing anew the racist side of American politics, reflecting both the  
overt hostility of the black-hating Klansmen as well as the perfumed racism of  
main stream politicians. I recalled the code words from my past: "States'  
Rights" and "strict constructionist judges." "States Rights" were never really  
about the rights of states. It was a slogan to make one's opposition to the  
humanity of black people seem to be something positive rather than what it in  
fact was; and "strict constructionist judges" was little more than a 
subliminal  pledge that this candidate would not appoint judges who would uphold the 
rights  of a minority, whether it be people of color, women or homosexual 
persons, when  that minority challenged the comfort level of the establishment. In 
this manner  justice and equality were kept from being the gift of a nation to 
its citizens.  
Techniques, frequently employed in both South Africa and the USA, were also  
visible in this museum. Politicians in both countries sought to make basic  
rights a matter of a referendum to be settled by popular vote and not something  
constitutionally guaranteed to all people. Of course, in both South Africa 
and  the USA it was the concerted efforts to prevent black people from voting in 
the  first place that allowed this appeal to be made with great confidence.  
The Museum forced us to look at the implications of the National Party's  
stated conviction that black people were subhuman creatures, incapable of ever  
doing more than the simplest kinds of manual labor, and its subsequent decision 
 not to allow blacks to be educated beyond this definition. That of course 
made  their rhetoric self-fulfilling. We examined the history of the Bantu 
homelands,  set up by this government to avoid giving black people citizenship in 
South  Africa. By making blacks "citizens" of these "nations" the authorities 
could  treat them as "immigrants" inside white South Africa, and then require 
them to  carry passes and thus make it illegal for blacks to remain in a white 
area after  sundown. It became a crime to be black in a white area and black 
people could be  arrested on sight.  
The museum enabled us to examine documents that demonstrated that anyone who  
opposed this government was presumed to be guilty of treason. Anyone who took 
up  arms in the struggle for freedom was both a "communist" and a "traitor." 
We  looked at the evidence that a supportive moral cover was given to 
apartheid by  the Dutch Reformed Church, which was, during this period of history, the 
defacto  "established church" of South Africa. I recalled the times I heard 
Jerry Falwell  condemn the freedom movements in South Africa as "communist 
inspired," when he  demanded that the United States support the apartheid 
government of South Africa  as "the only bulwark against communism on the African 
continent" and when he  called Nelson Mandela a "communist" who deserved to be 
imprisoned. It is  disillusioning to see how easily Christians are co-opted by 
power when it has  status and is installed in high places.  
On video we listened to the actual speeches of the leaders of apartheid,  
people like P. W. Botha, A. H. F. Verwoerd and the Rev. Daniel F. Malan, the  
Dutch Reformed Church minister turned politician, but we heard it in the light  
of our place in history. It was shockingly cruel. In retrospect one wonders 
just  how much these apartheid leaders really believed the things they were 
saying.  Were they blind to the tides and ultimately to the verdict of history? 
Clergy  who get involved against such public issues as the rights of women or gay 
and  lesbian people have a rare ability to see reality only through a lens 
that makes  their prejudices not just valid, but even holy. Witness the 
pandering to  homophobia on the part of the Pope, Benedict XVI, and the Archbishop of  
Canterbury, Rowan Williams. Current American politics reveal that nothing 
much  has changed. God is frequently invoked in this nation in the name of an 
ongoing  prejudice. We even saw in this museum the police trucks in which the 
victims of  police brutality in the Soweto riots in 1976 were carted off to the 
morgue. This  museum made no attempt to hide from the past no matter how 
embarrassing it had  become in the light of history.  
The Apartheid Museum was the most emotional experience I have had since I  
visited Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem. In both places one enters 
 a dark age of humanity and sees the evil of which human life is surely 
capable.  In both places resolve is made not only to let this evil never again 
arise in  human history, but also to recognize just how fragile the layers of 
civilization  are that separate us from the beasts of the field. My response to 
visiting both  museums was to be unable to eat for about 24 hours and to be 
drawn into the  uncomfortable activity of processing intellectually and 
theologically the  indelible stain that both the Holocaust and apartheid have placed on  
Christianity and its sometimes all too convenient use of "the Scriptures" to  
justify assaults on the humanity of those who are "different."  
On our last day in South Africa we visited the symbols of the new South  
Africa. Our guide was Bernard Spong, the retired Executive Secretary of the  
United Church of Christ in South Africa. Originally a British citizen, Bernard  had 
come to South Africa as a missionary. He identified himself with the  
struggle for freedom, became a South African citizen and dedicated his life to  the 
destruction of apartheid. He expressed a great love and affection for those  
whose full humanity he had fought so untiringly to affirm. Bernard was not  
interested in going to the Apartheid Museum. That, he said, was the past. His  joy 
was to show us the future: the Supreme Court building, the New Constitution  
and the Bill of Rights. That Bill of Rights was certainly remarkable, even by  
current American standards. South Africa has now extended both freedom and  
equality before the law to all people, all races, both genders and even to  
homosexual, bisexual and transgender people. South African leaders understand  
things that most politicians in the United States, I fear, do not yet  
understand, namely that the violation of the humanity, the dignity and rights of  any 
person is a violation of all people. Any prejudice that is tolerated against  
any victim in any land ultimately diminishes all the people of that land. Any  
discrimination allowed in any nation against any person dehumanizes all of the 
 people of that nation. There is no moral justification and no appropriate  
biblical text that can be cited to ease the guilt of our ongoing prejudices. An 
 act that defines anyone as less than human or that challenges the equality 
of  any person cannot finally be squared with the Christ whose stated purpose,  
according to the Fourth Gospel, was to bring abundant life to all that God 
has  made.  
The joy that came through Bernard Spong's eyes, as he led us through the  
symbols that incorporated the understandings upon which the new South Africa was  
being built, was visible for all to see. His pride in his adopted nation was  
palpable. His willingness to endure the persecution and hardship that were 
not  only expressed toward him, but also to members of his family, was seen as  
worthwhile. For him the struggle had been a cleansing experience and now in 
his  retirement he can live into the victory that his personal sacrifices helped 
to  bring about.  
The fact that the New Court was erected adjacent to the jails that once  
housed both Gandhi and Mandela was a fitting symbol. Bernard took us into those  
cells that he had visited many times, and with which he had himself been  
threatened. He paid a price for his witness, but he is now at peace and I am  
confident that he hears the voice of God and of South Africa's citizenry saying  to 
him. "Well done, Bernard, well done!"  
Giants were in the struggle for the soul of South Africa. Among them were  
Desmond Tutu, Bernard Spong, Helen Suzman and Nelson Mandela, just to name a  
few. I cannot tell you adequately, however, what a privilege and a thrill it was 
 for me to realize that my grandparents six generations ago, John Spong and  
Laeticia Halfhead, who lived in Kent County, England, in the late 1700's were  
the direct ancestors of both John Shelby Spong in America and Bernard Spong 
in  South Africa. The fact that we could meet as battle scarred clergy in 2007 
in  South Africa and celebrate together the victory of the human spirit over  
slavery, segregation, colonialism, apartheid, sexism and homophobia was the  
fitting end to a long journey  
Much became quite clear to me on this final day in South Africa. My long held 
 convictions were renewed that the struggle for justice is worth the cost and 
 that the negativity that is rooted in prejudice will never prevail. Bernard  
Spong joins me in calling the religious and political leaders of our day into 
a  new recognition of this reality.  
John Shelby Spong  
Question and Answer
With John  Shelby Spong 
Kenneth Jacobson from Frazee, Minnesota, writes:  
The news has been received that a California Episcopal Diocese (San Joaquin)  
has reached the second stage in voting to leave the national Episcopal 
Communion  over the issue of homosexuality. The media is describing the anti-gay 
position  as biblical, the pro-gay as being against Bible teaching. After reading 
 Living in Sin and The Sins of Scripture, I cannot believe that  it is that 
simple. Reporters are not doing their job of careful investigation.  
    *   Have these biblical stories and texts that are quoted to support the  
anti-gay position ever been read, analyzed, thoroughly debated, and defended  
in bishops' conferences? These are supposedly intelligent people who respect  
scholarship. How can they support exclusion on such flimsy evidence?  
    *   Am I wrong to think this struggle among Episcopalians might be a 
healthy  thing, and that resistance from the highest levels might be a way of 
teaching  and illuminating facts and reality, exposing the prejudice for the evil 
it is?   
    *   Where is all this going? What could or should be done to bring about 
a  rational and acceptable result? Your thoughts and your comments would be 
very  much appreciated. 
Dear Kenneth,  
It is not fair to expect secular journalists to be biblical scholars, nor  
should it be anticipated that they would spend the necessary time to research  
the issue. It is for that reason that they tend to accept uncritically the  
oft-repeated Evangelical Protestant and Conservative Roman Catholic definitions  
that the Bible is anti-gay. If these people were honest, they would have to  
admit that the Bible is also pro-slavery and anti-women.  
There is also a widely accepted mentality that if the Bible is opposed, the  
idea must be wrong. That is little more than nonsensical fundamentalism. The  
rise of democracy was contrary to the "clear teaching of the Bible." as the  
debate over the forced signing of the Magna Carta by King John of England in  
1215 revealed. The Bible was quoted to prove that Galileo was wrong; that 
Darwin  was wrong; that Freud was wrong; and that allowing women to be educated, to 
 vote, to enter the professions, and to be ordained was wrong. So the fact 
that  the Bible is quoted to prove that homosexuality is evil and to be 
condemned is  hardly a strong argument, given the history of how many times the Bible 
has been  wrong. I believe that most bishops know this but the Episcopal 
Church has some  fundamentalist bishops and a few who are "fellow travelers" with 
fundamentalists   
The Bible was written between the years 1000 B.C.E. and 135 C.E. Our  
knowledge of almost everything has increased exponentially since that time. It  is 
the height of ignorance to continue using the Bible as an encyclopedia of  
knowledge to keep dying prejudices intact. The media seems to cooperate in  
perpetuating that long ago abandoned biblical attitude.  
That is not surprising since the religious people keep quoting it to justify  
their continued state of unenlightenment. That attitude is hardly worthy of 
the  time it takes to engage it. I do not debate with members of the flat Earth 
 society either. Prejudices all die. The first sign that death is imminent 
comes  when the prejudice is debated publicly. The tragedy is that church 
leaders back  the wrong side of the conflict, which is happening today from the Pope 
to the  Archbishop of Canterbury to the current crop of Evangelical leaders. 
That too  will pass and the debate on homosexuality will be just one more 
embarrassment in  Christian history.  
John Shelby Spong 



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