James Baldwin is the prophet we need

I am ashamed, or at least embarrassed, to admit that I hadn’t even heard of James Baldwin until a few years ago. One of the most important American thinkers of the last century, and I didn’t have a clue who he was. It was almost as if my conservative evangelical context shielded me from the ideas of queer people of color.

Fast forward to the dawn of the pandemic and on to the present, and Baldwin has been everywhere I look. My cohort at the Center for Faith & Justice talked about him with reverence. The Christian Century (a magazine where I also work) published an article that described him as not only a prophet but an exorcist for the American church. Several friends and acquaintances recommended both his novels and essays, and I received two of his collections for Christmas. I decided I would read Baldwin almost exclusively in 2023, but I made an exception to read a book about Baldwin (and my review of that book will appear in the Century later this year).

Why is James Baldwin lurking behind every corner of my life? Perhaps it’s just the result of God being a trickster. But it could also be that I am hearing a voice I have needed to hear—a voice that is helping me continue to envision the theological identity of Harbor (or at least my part in that identity).

If you’re part of Harbor, you know that certain theologians have left a huge imprint on our pastoral team. Thus they have indirectly shaped our life together, from Willie James Jennings’s theology helping to form the initial vision for Harbor, to Naim Ateek to Christena Cleveland to Howard Thurman to Amy-Jill Levine to James Cone to Julian of Norwich to . . . (it’s a long list).

To add James Baldwin’s name might feel weird. “One of these things is not like the other.” Which is to say that Baldwin famously left the Christian tradition of his youth, and officially he never returned to it or any other expression of Christianity. He continued to incorporate scripture, mysticism, morality, and, yes, theology in his writings, but it wasn’t really clear what his faith commitments were (if any).

But he is helping to shape my theology, and I bring that theology with me to my work at Harbor. So I’d love to share just two snippets of his writing and some thoughts on why they resonate.

It is not too much to say that whoever wishes to become a truly moral human being (and let us not ask whether or not this is possible; I think we must believe that it is possible) must first divorce themself from all the prohibitions, crimes, and hypocrisies of the Christian church. If the concept of God has any validity or any use, it can only be to make us larger, freer, and more loving. If God cannot do this, then it is time we got rid of Him.

Before anyone leaves to go write a comment about how I’m a heretic, I want to state that I am not saying we should get rid of God. But what I like so much about Baldwin’s harsh insistence here is that it frames theology in a way that preferences pragmatism and love.

If we want to evaluate a given theology or religious system, how do we do it? It certainly depends who you ask. Some would say a theology is good if it’s True, which is to say that its beliefs correspond to (mysterious, unknowable, metaphysical) reality. Others might say that a religious tradition is good if it wins converts or influences the culture. Baldwin would say, “Look at its fruits.” What kind of effect does a theology or religion have on the people who practice it?

This sounds an awful lot like an ancient teacher who said, “Every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit.”

Still, though, this is only part of the evaluation. Okay, so we look to the effects, to the fruit, of a theology. But what are good effects, good fruit? For Baldwin, the best fruit theology can offer is to “make us larger, freer, and more loving.” And, as in the Bible, the greatest of these is love. Love is the overarching theme in much of Baldwin’s writings (and the lack of love in his childhood church is why he left the faith).

This is a helpful lens for me. As I engage with the Bible in my own life and at Harbor, I can ask myself questions like, “Is this interpretation of scripture making me more or less free? More or less loving? What other reading might move me closer to solidarity with those in the margins?”

For our final Baldwin blurb today, here’s one about race (in a letter to his nephew):

There is no reason for you to try to become like white people and there is no basis whatever for their impertinent assumption that they must accept you. The really terrible thing, old buddy, is that you must accept them. And I mean that very seriously. You must accept them and accept them with love. For these “innocent” people have no other hope. . . .

These are your siblings—your lost, younger siblings. And if the word integration means anything, this is what it means: that we, with love, shall force our siblings to see themselves as they are, to cease fleeing from reality and begin to change it. . . . We cannot be free until they are free.

It’s hard to add much to these powerful words from uncle to nephew. It is remarkable to me (and perhaps even more so now than in 1963 when Baldwin wrote these words) to think of the most salient aspects of racial justice not as reparations or privilege or dismantling white supremacist systems or DEI initiatives (as crucial as these things are, and no doubt Baldwin would agree)—but as interconnectedness and love. Interconnectedness that sees our freedom as bound up in each other’s freedom. Love that tells hard truths and works together to make change.