As Morning Blend has been reading through Be the Bridge this summer, we've been compiling a list of additional things to read and learn.
Pat Clark wanted to share this article about racism in Minneapolis housing: https://www.minnpost.com/
Beth sent us all this review of the book Jesus and John Wayne:
Hey all my historian prof friend wrote a review of Kirsten DuMez's Jesus and John Wayne:I finished Kristin DuMez' _Jesus and John Wayne_. It's accessible to a general audience and I *highly* recommend it as a way to understand evangelicals' multi-decade love affair with John Wayne characters--portraits of domineering and pugnacious manhood, coupled with demure femininity. I wrote a short review below.The book is both a history of this love affair with "complementarianism" (the idea that men and women should be different and complementary, and men should be in charge), and a history of how evangelicals have actualized these prescriptive gender roles through foreign policy and narratives about foreign policy. I've honestly read a very large fraction of the books published on the topic of the Religious Right, and the role of gender in empire-building. But, this book is original in a lot of key ways. It does so much vital work to illustrate how the War in Iraq actualized the rhetoric of pugnacious manhood that had been stirring among evangelical men for decades. She shows how this prescriptive literature of manhood and womanhood had consequences: it really hurt a lot of innocent people, especially Muslims in the period after 9/11. DuMez painfully illustrates, as she puts it in the subtitle, "How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation." From the start, she defines evangelicals by the cultural products (books, decor, leisure, etc) that they consume. In the end, she reminds us that evangelicals have been deeply entrapped by cultural prescriptions that are not at all indigeous to the Christian faith.The book left me really upset at the ways evangelicals have contributed toward the suffering of Muslim Americans, and a whole lot of innocent people, especially Muslims, abroad. This wasn't new to me, of course. But, I never quite contemplated how evangelical gender complementarianism could provide the springboard for such real expressions of violence (not only, but especially through the American military). DuMez argues that Ronald Reagan and George W Bush were fore-runners to Trump in their "Big and Strong!" foreign policy initiatives and ability to get evangelicals to vote as a block. Trump, she argues, carries on this tradition of rebelling against both gender equality/sameness and the historic foreign policy initiatives that emphasize the "feminine" virtues of peace, alliances, and diplomacy.
Tesha sent the following links:
Here are the resources from the United Methodist Church site - they have quite a bit on racism right now, with a conversation guide and tips for talking with kids. There is also the Town Hall video link from July 1 that included a bunch of great leaders.Here’s the direct link to the town hall:
Also - Here is the link to Denise Pike's stuff on Mapping Prejudice. She put together an art/history display for the Hennepin History Museum at one point, called Owning Up. It may be at Sabathani now.Here's her own site:The Mapping Prejudice site:
Arlette sent this out:
Here is an interview that Kerri Miller did yesterday on MPR with Kristin Kobes Du Mez, the author of "Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation."https://www.mprnews.org/episode/2020/07/28/the-impact- of-white-evangelicals-on-us- politics
If I missed anything that you all would like to share, feel free to share in the comments or send me an email. I'll make another post as we add more things.
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