Race for Justice: Quakers add their voice to a new book on race relations
Quakers in Britain have contributed to a new book examining race relations within British churches over the past quarter century, and hopes for the future.
Race for Justice: the struggle for equality and inclusion in British and Irish Churches brings together racial justice and diversity officers and senior church figures from across Christian denominations, including Anglicans, Baptists and the Church of Scotland.
The book marks the 25th anniversary of Racial Justice Sunday, established when the UK was facing up to overt and subversive racism, characterised by the killing of Stephen Lawrence in Eltham in 1993. This murder, and other racist attacks, gave mainstream visibility to the struggle of many to obtain equality and justice.
The fight against racism
Edwina Peart, diversity and inclusion co-ordinator at Quakers in Britain, and Paul Parker, recording clerk, join other contributors equipped with front-line experience in the fight against racism in offering their perspectives on race relations.
In 2017, Yearly Meeting agreed that racial diversity required continued attention within Quaker structures and practices. Recent work has included increased discussion and facilitated learning around racism, and this year's annual gathering agreed that Quakers would make practical reparation for the slave trade and colonialism.
In their chapter, Peart and Parker observe that the single heroic narrative of Quakers as abolitionists against slavery obscures a deeper truth: some Quakers themselves were slave holders and traders. Work to root out slavery involved not only action in the outer world, but among Quakers themselves.
Peart writes: “Separated, neither of these strands could achieve such a profound goal. Current racism highlights the continued need for similarly integrated interventions. It is also raising consciousness of the work that remains to be done."
Cautious optimism
Both are cautiously optimistic about the future of race among British Quakers. But Parker observes: “It seems that the unlearning of habits, language, assumptions and previously-unexamined biases is something that each generation has to discover, and work on, anew.
“In a faith community committed to equality and justice in so much of its outward work, we discover, again and again, that when it comes to ourselves the beam in our own eye disqualifies us from helping to remove the mote in others'."
Race for Justice, edited by Richard Reddie, director of justice and inclusion at Churches Together in Britain and Ireland, is published by Monarch Books, priced £9.99, in e-book and paperback form and can be bought from the Quaker Bookshop.