Who Lynched Willie Earle? Preaching to Confront Racism
Pastors and leaders long to speak an effective biblical word into the contemporary social crisis of racial violence and black pain. They need a no-nonsense strategy rooted in actual ecclesial life, illuminated in this fine book by a trustworthy guide, Will Willimon, who uses the true story of pastor Hawley Lynn’s March of 1947 sermon, “Who Lynched Willie Earle?” as an opportunity to respond to the last lynching in Greenville, South Carolina and its implications for a more faithful proclamation of the Gospel today.
By hearing black pain, naming white complicity, critiquing American exceptionalism/civil religion, inviting/challenging the church to respond, and attending to the voices of African American pastors and leaders, this book helps pastors of white, mainline Protestant churches preach effectively in situations of racial violence and dis-ease.
Effective 21st century preaching demands a more perceptive understanding of both race and Christian faith.
This readable and engaging book moves at a fast pace and utilizes the best thought on race and violence in America without scholarly jargon.
This book encourages contemporary church leaders to engage scripture/theology and issues of race and justice.
Like Lincioni s Five Dysfunctions of a Team, it uses scenario thinking around actual events to expose key blind spots and problematic practices, offering concrete solutions for pastors who would preach into the contemporary crises and conflicts around race.
Using a true story and an actual sermon as a test-case response to racial violence, this book assesses both positively and negatively a pastor s homiletic response to a real-life situation and uses insights from this assessment to identify practical preaching strategies from this example highlighting it s success and failure.
Preachers specifically will gain some useful, theologically defensible principles for preaching to social crises, particularly those occasioned by racial violence.
Readers will understand how intertwined American self-image is with American sin and race. They will gain a better understanding of how our popular, civic theology is unsuited to help us think deeply about the history and present day reality of racial justice in America.
Readers will discover how white privilege and power and white dominated narratives of American exceptionalism require us to think more perceptively about race and the Christian faith as practiced in America.
Readers will learn an episode from the history of prophetic preaching in American Methodism and will gain insights on Christianity and racial justice.
Product Details
- Title : Who Lynched Willie Earle?: Preaching to Confront Racism
- Author: Willimon, William H.
- Publisher: Abingdon Press
- Publication Date: 2017
- ISBN: 9781501832529
Feeling most at home behind a pulpit, Will Willimon’s deepest calling is to be a preacher and truth-teller of Jesus Christ. He is Professor of the Practice of Christian Ministry at Duke University Divinity School and retired Bishop of the North Alabama Conference of The United Methodist Church, after serving for 20 years as faculty member and Dean of the Chapel at Duke University. He lives in Durham, North Carolina.
Will Willimon has published many books, including his preaching subscription service on MinistryMatters.com, Pulpit Resource, and Fear of the Other: No Fear in Love, both published by Abingdon Press.