American Mennonites and Racial Reconciliation — Nathan Zook — Ep. 076

Hello everybody, welcome back to another episode of Anabaptist Perspectives. I'm here with Nathan Zook. We're in Washington, D.C., just pretty close here to your house. You live here. You're also a pastor in a church up in Baltimore. The U.S. Capitol is right here, right in the heart of the American Capitol. One question I have for you is, how have the Anabaptists provided a unique perspective, especially historically, when it comes to issues of "races" or different ethnicities here in America? Probably one of the earliest and most famous examples would be in 1688. There were three Mennonites who came to the so-called New World. They were settled near Germantown in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. There was no ordained Mennonite minister or bishop here in the colonies, and so they began attending the local Quaker fellowship.

They joined up with a Pietist individual, and they articulated a petition against slavery to the local meeting. This is not a political petition. This is a petition to the local congregation where they were worshiping in Germantown. They articulated the idea that humans are created by God and that slavery was wrong on so many levels, including dividing the sacred institution of marriage, dividing husbands from wives as their owners would take them into different states and so forth. Some of those three Mennonites became Quakers at some point, but they were definitely some of the early people to speak out in this college. It's the first known written document against slavery in the world. Wow. So it's a key factor.

Like 90 years, give or take, before the founding of America, before the Declaration of Independence. Right. To my knowledge, there were no Mennonites in good standard of a congregation in this continent that owned slaves. There was one man who came from Germany as a Mennonite, never joined the church here, was believed to have owned a slave, but did not become affiliated with the local Mennonite church once he moved here. It does seem like Mennonites were able to remove themselves from that institution, which was pretty widespread among almost all other denominations in the New World. Wow. So let's go through some American history then. How have Mennonites expressed themselves when it came to issues of slavery, different ethnicities, how they're treated?

I'm thinking, you know, before the Civil War, what was up to that point, and then that Reconstruction period, the Civil Rights Movement then later, you know, of the 20th century. Kind of walk us through that. I mean, there's always going to be exceptions, you know, Mennonite individuals who go astray or drift into the practices of the society around them. But for the most part, Mennonites were pretty consistent in definitely not owning slaves, but also in trying to love people on both sides, whether the slave owners, slaveholders, or the slaves themselves. I was reading recently a case of a congregation, a district, a Mennonite district in Virginia, where some of the local Mennonites would assist their plantation neighbors of other denominations with getting in the crops, you know, harvesting and so forth.

And so in return, some of those plantation owners would send their slaves to help out with the Mennonite farms. And so Mennonites in this one district determined that they would pay for that labor, even though there's been reciprocal. They volunteered for the slave owner and they would help them, but they were going to pay, but they were going to pay the slaves the money. And so it was an individual way to love their neighbor. They didn't owe anything to the plantation owner because they'd already worked on their field themselves, but they were going to pay the slaves as having dignity as human beings. You know, there's ways to address these issues without getting politically involved.

Paul talks to the slaveholder, Philemon, and asks him to, you know, welcome his escaped slave back into fellowship. And so there's ways to, in a quiet manner, but yet a loving, strong manner, to love both sides in these kinds of issues, even whether it's the abuser, the oppressor, or whether it's the person being oppressed. So do we see that kind of mindset carrying further into history, you know, further along? I'm thinking especially the last century where, you know, the Civil Rights Movement and things. Was there any involvement there from the Mennonites? There were definitely Mennonites who were involved in various elements of the Civil Rights Movement, but there were also those who took a very quiet approach as well.

And I was reading about, also in Mississippi, a group of rural northern Mennonites who went to help set up some camps, sort of outdoors camps to help youth and so forth. Camp Landon in particular was a place where the staff were trying to invite, you know, Blacks and Whites to be part of their campgrounds and so forth. The voluntary service workers went out one day to a local hospital to sing, and they were singing in the different wards. And as the story goes, they were in the main ward where the Whites were located, and then all of a sudden one of the nurses said, "Hey, what happened to that group? They just disappeared. Did they leave already?"

And the other nurse said, "No, they went into the Black wards to sing." And that was unusual. Ah, yeah. And she said, "Well, they're Mennonites. They don't take a side on the racial divides." And that's a quiet testament that, you know, we're not protesting, we're not marching, but we're actually here to say we love them as equal with the others. And they actually went there with the idea they would help assist in needy African American communities. They were trying to reach out to both sides in the racial categories. Yeah. A consistent living out this, you know, holding a sign is one thing, but actually living it day to day is a much harder and that's more rare, you know, in a way.

So historically and currently, Anabaptist people have not gotten politically involved, I mean, as a general rule. So then we have cases like, you know, writing petitions and things like that would feel maybe foreign to us. What are some ways that Anabaptists were able to stand up against these things? I think on one hand to exemplify in their churches that they don't have to be segregated. When some of the early Anabaptist movements began reaching out in, you know, communities, Native American communities or Black communities, they would set up several separate churches for that group. And then they began maybe saying, "Hey, you know, we're all equal in Christ. We should all be worshiping together." And so taking that stance, you know, decades before Martin Luther King Jr. mentioned that Sunday is the most segregated day of the week, Mennonites were already moving in the direction of we are going to be worshiping together as fellow brothers and sisters.

And they were ordaining African American ministers. They were ordaining Native American ministers and trying to emphasize that in the church we're all equal. We can be a refuge from the racial tensions around us. And the real testimony is that we can be people who show love even when society is looking down on that. And not following the trends of society. When society moves in a more progressive direction, that's not when we take our cues. We take our cues from the scripture. We will be probably at the forefront of having an integrated congregation. And I think that Mennonites have, Anabaptists in general, have a reputation for helping out in disaster relief and so forth in areas that may not be among the most powerful or trying to set their sights on ingratiating themselves with people who are wealthy or powerful, but helping those who are our neighbors and need our help.

It's all about loving your neighbor. Right. No matter who that neighbor might be. And acknowledging that that neighbor is every bit as equal in God's eyes, every bit as loved by God. I mean, and God talks in the, I didn't look up the scripture before I came here, but he mentions the Assyrians are mine, the Egyptians are mine, and these are people I've created too, just like the people of Israel.

And so as we move into, you know, our day and age, just like whatever ethnicity or race we are part of, God loves the others just like he loves us. In recent years here in America and currently too, racial tension seems to be very high right now. And that could be tempting to try to get involved politically or to vote or to really be vocal about our position, our perspective.

What would you say to churches or individuals that are really wrestling with this? How can they have their voice but still hold true to these Anabaptist values? We need to consider that are we linking ourselves up in partnership with those who are using unloving methods to get their goals accomplished? So scripturally, yeah, rioting is not what we're called to do. On the other hand, though, we are called in Isaiah to break the oak of oppression and to, you know, our fast that we have chosen. Is it not to, the fast that God has chosen, is it not just to remove ourselves from eating or is it to help those who are in need and oppressed?

And so understanding, trying to sympathize with those who don't see society as privileging their race or ethnicity. And maybe not, definitely not adopting those radical methods, but also emphasizing and listening to them and realizing that there is a real pain here. And how can we, as I think as Anabaptists, we can love those who are being oppressed, but we can also love the oppressor. And that's where it gets very touchy. We're not to be focused on maybe what people think about us. We're focused on what does Christ call us to do? How would Christ respond? And so he was living in a very oppressive society where the Jewish people were being oppressed by the Romans.

It was no question. It was one of the most oppressive periods or empires at that time for the Jewish people. And so he's not calling out the Roman Empire for being oppressive. Following Christ means we will be loving everybody involved. Maybe not in the way that they want us to, maybe not in the way that they feel we should respond, but still being approachable and loving. I think Anabaptists have been wise to, when they've tried to refrain from getting too caught up in the scientific categorizations of people. And if we can avoid stereotyping people and avoid making assumptions or profiling people because of their perceived physical appearance, I think that's a really strong testament we can have to others.

That's really interesting. We did an episode with Clayton Shank down in New York, and he was talking about different prejudices and things he's faced in the city. And that was a big one he mentioned was hospitality. It was so huge in breaking down barriers.

You know, just opening it up and just saying, you know, come, join us, be part of us. It's not just, I'm your friend. You're a part of my family. And they would have people over for supper or whatever. It's really interesting to hear some of those stories and how powerful that can be. And that's something, you know, I think all of us could do that. Absolutely. You raise a great point. A number of years ago here in DC, I was taking a group of Bible study, Bible school volunteers around the city. And we were about to get on the metro, and a group of teenagers were sitting on the grass near the sidewalk there as we were walking.

And our group, if you look at us, we all were of European descent. Yeah. And the people and the teenagers there made some comments that were racially tinged comments, prejudicial comments against us. And so I heard what they said. I knew what they said because I knew the local culture. I sort of had my guard up. I wanted to protect my group from hate or prejudice.

But the people I was with, they didn't know what the teenagers had said. They didn't understand the comments they had made. And they smiled. They showed love. They smiled and said, "Hey, how are you doing?" And they began talking to them. And a beautiful interaction took place. Those teenagers began responding very positively to that. Whereas if they had been trained or orientated about the words being used, they might be like me and put up their guard. Last question here, but what are steps that believers, followers of Jesus, can take in a country like the United States where there is still a lot of unrest over, you know, different groups of people? How can we help bring peace to that situation?

I think a big part of it is just really attempting to be very careful when we talk, that we are not emphasizing and highlighting race and racial characteristics in our jokes, in our stories. I mean, there's so many times we'll tell a story about, "I saw this person," and we add to it their race. Our physical characteristics are beautiful things created for us by God. But we don't have to always make that the central focus of the story. Because then it becomes the idea that because of that person's ethnicity, therefore that's why they act in this way. And that's in many cases not the case. I didn't experiment with my son, my oldest son. I haven't worked with my other children.

But my oldest son, I was very careful in his first seven years of life not to ever mention a person's ethnicity around him. It worked. It was interesting. We really did not talk about people in terms of their ethnicity. One time we were playing with these little Fisher-Price toys. Like wooden bodies and wooden heads. And the head was one color, the body a different color. And so he says, "Hey, can you pass me the Black man?" So I looked at the characters, and the only person with the face that was darker than the rest was next to him.

So I looked around, and I saw a man, a little figure next to me with what I would call a white or pale face and a Black suit. So I passed that to him. He said, "Thank you." I said, "Can you?" So I looked to the man that had a darker face and said, "Can you pass me the green man?" Because he had a green suit. He said, "Sure." He passed me that man. He was judging people by their clothing. That's really fascinating because I focus so much on maybe the physical characteristics, when in reality our clothing changes. And who we are is more about who we are inside, not about the physical appearance and so forth.

A step we can take, I think, is to put ourselves in situations where we are in the minority. And that's been a big part of my life. I grew up in a neighborhood the first 18 years of my life. And actually, currently, I live in a neighborhood where I'm a racial minority. You know, putting ourselves voluntarily in those kinds of situations, I think, can be good because so often we as Americans expect diversity to happen by other people adopting our culture and fitting in with us. And we feel comfortable when we are in the majority, and then they can just come visit us. But what if we put ourselves in the situation where we are in the minority and we go live among people or visit in their homes?

I think it's a way to let people know genuinely that you care about them and that you have a comfort level that you don't have to always be in the majority. One thing, getting back to the early how Mennonites or Anabaptists have viewed race, one thing that keeps coming up again and again in the historical books on segregation and on integration and so forth was that a big reason for all of society, all of white society, not just Mennonites, but to oppose integration was because there was a fear of intermarriage, racial intermarriage.

And as I've talked in churches, through Bible schools or in sermons on racial relations, one thing that comes up again and again is we like the idea of we're all equal, we're all one in Christ, but the intermarriage issue is something that people have a little more difficulty with, whether they're Mennonites or not. And I think we're moving past that as a church, but there's been some real pain in the past for people who have joined the church. They were following Christ. They're following Mennonite guidelines.

And people say, you know what, we don't want our children to be in the same youth group or marry you because of the danger of marrying you and so forth. Biblically, there's nothing wrong with intermarriage. The only time intermarriage is talked about in a bad way was married idol worshipers or, you know, in the Bible. And in Christ's line, we see a lot of, you know, intermarriage, you could say, with Ruth and others that came into that. I've heard people say, "We're reluctant to have our children, be raised in a Mennonite church because who will marry them?"

Wow. And so if that's the impression we were giving off. Yeah. Thank you so much for sharing and for taking the, it's kind of a lightning round of a topic, but I think you broke it down really well and gave us a lot to think about. I really appreciate you taking the time.