Bring Traditional Commitments Back to Center Stage

This shift does not mean that either economic justice has been realized or that racial integration has been achieved. Today, income inequality in America is greater than in any other industrialized nation in the world. While everyone benefits from the income growth during the last two decades, the benefits flow to the top. Forty-seven percent of the gain goes to the top 1 percent of the population, 42 percent goes to the next 19 percent, and the remaining 12 percent flows to the bottom 80 percent of the workers (New York Times, Dec. 15, 2001).

Justice, according to Reinhold Niebuhr, is a balance between equality and freedom. When equality is significantly reduced, people begin to sense a loss of control over their lives and their communities. A corollary to the decline in equality is a parallel decline in voter participation. In the minds of many in the bottom 80 percent of the population, big contributions have come to trump their voices and votes.

From the beginning of industrial America, the door to income growth has been unlocked by education. For example, the income gap between receiving a high school diploma and dropping out is 30 percent. In terms of race, the education gap results today in 26 percent of all black families and 41.5 percent of all black children living in poverty. Overall, 53 percent of all working Afro-Americans express profound dissatisfaction with their incomes. Obstacles to advanced education for Afro-Americans are an invisible block to equality.

A 1998 study by the Southern Education Foundation of the colleges and universities in the 19 Southern and adjoining states found a bleak picture of “continuing segregation fueled by political fatigue, court rulings” and other factors. In these 19 states, which educate three out of four black collegians, the percentage of African-American freshman only climbed from 15 percent in 1976 to 17 percent in 1996. Indeed, the proportion of freshman actually declined in nine states (New York Times, Aug. 26, 1998). The reasons for the lack of progress are identified as court orders restricting affirmation action, the fatigue of the region’s political and administrative leadership, and especially the unease of black freshman with attending the overwhelmingly white flagship state institutions.

In summary, it is impossible to deal with income inequality without dealing with the obstacles to African-American integration into higher education. The Presbyterian Church can model such a response by:

1) resourcing black congregations in order to equip them better to assist their young people to enter white flagship state institutions with confidence and a supportive network;

2) enabling diverse racial youth groups within the church to build bridges of mutual respect and support; and

3) utilizing pulpit, institutional presence and networks to encourage regional political and administrative leadership to grapple again with the challenge of desegregation. By giving the means to every black Presbyterian session and pastor to equip their youth to survive and even enjoy the flagship universities, the denomination will make the typical African-American Presbyterian church the most attractive congregation in the nation. This is one of those cases where doing right makes the best strategic scene in the long run.

The momentary victory by one side on ordination standards gives the larger church a unique opportunity to restore traditional commitments to center stage. The Presbyterian Church can inform the conscience of the wider society by dealing with the real and pressing challenge of the interlocking threesome of race, education and money. If neglected the threesome are a cancer on the democracy.

If the church can show the wider society how to deal with these challenges, the church can bring America towards a closer approximation of the nation’s pledge of liberty and justice for all. If the church is willing to put aside its sex war, it can regain its historic role of informing the national conscience.