My humble proposal of an attempt to be Christocentric rather than Afrocentric will not be received with approval by many African Americans that I know. I hope to live long enough to witness another African American become a candidate for President of the United States of America—a candidate who is pro-life and pro-righteousness. Yet my hope may ring hollow to many other African Americans who are celebrating a Democratic victory that happens to seem pro-African American. To the celebrants, I might be labeled as sore loser seeking to justify his reasons for siding with conservative white America rather than with Black America.In writing elsewhere about "how I have wrestled through the Christian version of the Uncle Tom epithet" (with respect to my embracing of Reformed Theology), I have penned this thought:
If a person would allow himself to be pigeonholed into becoming a person of a nationalistic or ethno-centric thought out of the fear of being viewed as an Oreo or Uncle Tom, then Reformed Theology is not for that person. But neither is the Gospel, for the Gospel calls each of us to stand against an ethnic-centered philosophy of one's own race, for such a philosophy is naturally conformed to this present world and is in need of redemption. If you cannot stand against your own culture where it does not square with the Scriptures, you are the one who is ashamed of Christ, and such shame has nothing to with philosophical or ontological Blackness; it only has to do with your view of the majesty of the God who calls you to deny yourself in order to follow Christ. ("Sovereign in a Sweet Home, Schooling, and Solace," in Glory Road: Our Journey Into Reformed Christianity, ed. Anthony Carter [Wheaton, IL: Crossway, Wheaton, forthcoming])
I am fairly certain that if J. C. Watts had been the Republican nominee for President, and if he had been running against Hillary Clinton as the Democratic nominee, the great majority of African Americans would have found reason to vote for the wife of the "first Black President" and her liberal ideals rather than for Watts and his conservative ideals. In doing so, such a vote would indicate that the great majority of African Americans have feelings about the type of African American who would be deemed worthy their votes for the seat at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue—who would be worthy of African Americans' approval as their choice for their representative in the White House. Seemingly, for the Black Nationalist and the liberal, not every African American would qualify to wear an honor for which our ancestors were stolen, enslaved, whipped, lynched, dehumanized, and killed. Likewise, it is my opinion that my ancestors experienced such suffering and injustices so that it would be possible for any African American to reach the Oval Office, but not so that every African American, regardless of qualifications, could reach the Oval Office. Those who fought for civil rights for African Americans were doing so out of a moral impetus to see African Americans treated humanely—as human beings rather than like chattel or as 3/5ths-human. I think the best way to honor their work and lives when the office of Commander in Chief is within reach would be to continue that moral quest. That quest is continued by finding a candidate who seeks to see African Americans, even those in the womb, treated humanely—as people rather than as cattle for our labor and experimentation or as a 3/5th-human fetus.
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