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Barack Obama plans to reach out to Muslim world

Barack Obama has finally spoken out on the need to reach out to parts of the world that have been disenfranchised in the past 8 years:

Barack Obama plans to reach out to Muslim world is based on an interview with he President elect in the Chicago Tribune.

".... I think we've got a unique opportunity to reboot America's image around the world and also in the Muslim world in particular,'' Obama said Tuesday, promising an "unrelenting" desire to "create a relationship of mutual respect and partnership in countries and with peoples of good will who want their citizens and ours to prosper together. The world, he said, "is ready for that message. ...

Obama said the country must take advantage of a unique chance to recalibrate relations around the globe, through a new diplomacy that emphasizes inclusiveness and tolerance as well as an unflinching stand against terrorism. .."

This sounds good. Lets pray with his heavyweight foreign affairs team he can deliver.

And on the race issue on which he was forced to speak out in his Primary campaign:

... And then there are the grand issues, like the burden placed on him by history. As the first African-American president, he acknowledges, he thinks about it.

"The biggest challenges we face right now in improving race relations have to do with the universal concerns of Americans across color lines," he said. "If we are creating jobs throughout this economy, then African-Americans and Latinos, who are disproportionately unemployed, are going to be swept up in that rising tide."

"I think that more than anything is going to improve race relations," he said, "a sense of common purpose. ... ''

There will be many millions praying that the light touch of a reconciling heart that is evident in him on this issue remains true.

House Formally Apologizes for Slavery and Jim Crow - NYTimes.com

Very encouraging news:

House Formally Apologizes for Slavery and Jim Crow - NYTimes.com.

..... Five states have issued apologies for slavery, but past proposals in Congress have stalled, partly over concerns that an apology would lead to demands for reparations -- payment for damages. The Cohen resolution does not mention reparations. It does commit the House to rectifying ''the lingering consequences of the misdeeds committed against African-Americans under slavery and Jim Crow.''  It says that Africans forced into slavery ''were brutalized, humiliated, dehumanized and subjected to the indignity of being stripped of their names and heritage'' and that black Americans today continue to suffer from the consequences of slavery and Jim Crow laws that fostered discrimination and segregation. The House ''apologizes to African-Americans on behalf of the people of the United States, for the wrongs committed against them and their ancestors who suffered under slavery and Jim Crow.'' ''Slavery and Jim Crow are stains upon what is the greatest nation on the face of the earth,'' Cohen said. Part of forming a more perfect union, he said, ''is such a resolution as we have before us today where we face up to our mistakes and apologize as anyone should apologize for things that were done in the past that were wrong.''

British Baptists head to Jamaica with slave trade apology

"The truth has set many Africans and Caribbeans free. Emerging from the apology is now a willingness and enthusiasm to work towards addressing, and strategically challenging the legacies of the transatlantic slave trade with the hope that one day all Baptists will belong to a family that is free from prejudice and racism.”

Link: British Baptists head to Jamaica with slave trade apology.

Slave trade victims need reparations, say church bodies

Link: Slave trade victims need reparations, say church bodies.

"Many churches were actively involved in the transatlantic slave trade in Africans and colonialism; hence the church's mission has been seriously compromised and betrayed by its historic complicity with two of the most blatant forms of oppression that occurred within the 16th and 19th centuries," the statement says.

"Further, the church's pastoral and prophetic roles in the contemporary period are obstructed by its voluntary amnesia about its corporate sin and silence regarding the past - as well as regarding the present - responsibility to bring justice to those still suffering from the legacy of the transatlantic trade in Africans."

The church bodies also stated that "while there have been some acts of repentance and confessional statements made by some churches" these have largely "not been effective enough" in eradicating white supremacy, systemic racism and the ongoing legacy of the transatlantic trade in Africans.

Ecumenical conference to tackle racist patterns left by slave trade

"Abolished, but not destroyed: Remembering the slave trade in the 21st century"

Link: Ecumenical conference to tackle racist patterns left by slave trade.

Remembering the church that existed 200 years ago as a threatened and enslaved community in the dungeons and ports, the ranches and plantations, bearing witness to the prophetic hope of liberation through resistance and revolt, the conference will celebrate those African cultures and spiritualities that made this witness possible.

Slave Trade’s Legacy Lingers Among Britain’s Black People, Says Jackson

Link: Slave Trade’s Legacy Lingers Among Britain’s Black People, Says Jackson | Christianpost.com.

The slave trade ended [but] slavery did not end and the legacy has not ended,” 

“The legacy of slavery lingers in ways that can be measured today,” Jackson said, pointing to the higher mortality rates and shorter life expectancy within black communities, as well as high numbers of young black people in prison and substantial disparity between black and white students at top universities such as Oxford and Cambridge.

“Hard work and effort and excellence cannot offset the impact of inheritance and access; so there you have structural inequality,” he said.

Jackson made clear that an apology from the U.K. government for the slave trade would be “empty without a commitment to reconstruction.”

“Words and action must go together, otherwise apologizing is a ceremony,” he said.

Apologising for the Slave Trade

I need to write more about The Lifeline Expedition, a journey of reconciliation on the 200th anniversary of the abolition of the British Atlantic slave trade,  in which we were involved both nationally and in Luton. However for now here are articles on the recent apology brought by Ken Livingston, Mayor of London. 

Livingstone breaks down in tears at slave trade memorial

London mayor apologizes for slave trade in a Boston US paper

In China, Xinhuanet:  Mayor apologizes for London's role in slave trade   (see extension)

He had spoken on this at the time of the main national commemorations in March:

Why I am saying sorry for London's role in this horror   Ken Livingstone wrote in the Guardian in march. See the very long comments.

London mayor 'sorry' for slavery   BBC in March

The Indepenedant is not so sure:   The slave trade's not so black and white, Ken   (see extension for text)

Nor the Teelgraph:  At Ken Livingstone's Tears I Cry Foul   (see extension for text)