The Christian campus in black and white

W. E. B. Du Bois wrote his prophetic words “the problem of the 20th century is the problem of color line” decades before the landmark Brown v. Board of Education ruling. Yet those words allowed blacks to note how the removal of Jim Crow from educational institutions was slow in many parts of the country. Often among those responsible were Christian segregationists in Christian schools and colleges. And while Christian schools and colleges today have sought to promote greater diversity in student numbers, there are few people of color teaching in the classroom and in leadership positions.

In Divided by Faith: Evangelical Religion and the Problem of Race in America, Michael Emerson and Christian Smith examine resistance by white evangelicals toward racial integration as they sought to protect their sense of homogeneity. And Christopher Myers’s White Freedom Schools: The White Academy Movement in Eastern North Carolina, 1954 – 1973 details the growth of segregated independent and Christian schools following the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The number of such schools exploded after 1968, when the Supreme Court demanded absolute integration. By 1970, roughly 500,000 students attended segregated private schools in North Carolina. Many operated from a position that defied integration, often referring to the day of the ruling in the Brown case as “Black Monday.”

The problems that existed for blacks during the 1950s and ’60s are still experienced today. After integration, attitudes at secondary and post-secondary Christian institutions shifted from overt paternalism toward blacks to acute color blindness. Christian institutions continue to operate under a faith-based notion that Jesus does not see color, which is another form of expressing dominant culture beliefs. Since the late 20th century, campuses ignoring the color line have added to the alienation of black students and faculty members.