The Anti-Racism Commission and Team are sponsoring the second Diocese of New Jersey One Book project. The first, highly successful, program was sponsored last spring by the Committee on Lifelong Christian Formation, and featured Kenda Dean’s book, Almost Christian.
Bishop Councell’s choice for our fall One Book is the recently published Becoming an Anti-Racist Church: Journeying toward Wholeness, by Joseph Barndt, which “provides an informed, incisive, and passionate analysis of the challenge racism poses to our collective ability to live out our faith.” Probing the uncomfortable topic of “Christian complicity in the structures and ideologies of racial oppression,” and supported by a wealth of theological, biblical, social, and historical evidence, the book offers both practical advice and resources as well as urgent motivation to take up the challenge of building an anti-racist church. Joseph Barndt will be keynote speaker at the Anti-Racism Commission’s fall conference, November 12, at Trinity Cathedral.
Please publicize the One Book program in your parish!
Use the link in the 'recommended books' on the right side of this blog to buy your copy online from Amazon Books.
Books are also now available at the Cathedral Bookstore in Trenton and the Cokesbury Bookstore of Princeton Theological Seminary.
Discussion groups and online discussion will follow a 13-week timeline covering a chapter per week, beginning the week of September 18 and finishing the week of December 11.
Online conversation-starters will be put up one week in advance, on this blog. All are invited to join the conversation by posting comments and questions.
Parishes and convocations are invited to form their own reading and discussion groups to meet on a weekly basis, following the timeline posted below. Online discussion is open to all, and postings and comments on this blog will follow the same timeline. You are encouraged to inform others and spread news of the One Book project as widely as possible.
One Book Timeline--Fall 2011
Becoming an Anti-Racist Church: Journeying toward Wholeness,
by Joseph Barndt
Week of Sept. 5--Bishop Councell: Invitation to the Diocese
Introduction & Context
Week of Sept. 18--Week 1--Intro: 11 am Sunday morning
Week of Sept. 25--Week 2 -- Biblical Context for an Anti-Racist Gospel
Part I – The Past: Racism & Resisting Racism in Church History
Week of Oct. 2 --Week 3--A Tale of Two Churches
Week of Oct. 9 --Week 4--Racism in US Church History
Week of Oct. 16 --Week 5--Resistance in US Church History
Week of Oct. 23 --Week 6--Racism & Resistance in the Post-Civil Rights Church
Part II – The Present: Racism in the Church Today
Week of Oct. 30 --Week 7--Race, Prejudice, Power in Today’s Church
Week of Nov. 6 --Week 8--Captive Christians in a Captive Church
Week of Nov. 13--Week 9--Institutionalized Racism in the Church
Week of Nov. 20--Week 10--Cultural Racism/Multicultural Church
Part III – The Future: Shaping an Anti-Racist Church
Week of Nov. 27--Week 11--God’s Call to Become an Anti-Racist Church
Week of Dec. 4 --Week 12--Getting It Done: the Organizing Task
Week of Dec. 11--Week 13--Institutionalizing Anti-Racism in the Church
