However, in a world where Bishop Eddie Long can be accused of being a child molester and garner the support of the majority of his congregation, it calls us to question the level to which some of our Black churches truly care about what happens to Black children. As blogger Son of Baldwin observes, “We love ovum and sperm. We love zygotes and embryos. We even love fetuses. But we do not — no, we absolutely do not — love children.”
Let me be clear, it is not uncommon for child abusers in the church—sexual and otherwise—to be protected by the incessant valorization of the Black male preacher. Long represented much of what the church prizes: fame, fortune and prominence. To see him in any other light than as a “man of God” would mean compromising conservative, prosperity gospel theologies, many of which excuse the church from enacting justice. “God” is characterized as the supreme judge who determines the outcome of all individuals. Long’s followers left him to God for judgment, even as God, like most adults, is regularly a passive bystander when children are sexually abused.
Long’s church continued with business as usual, shouting and dancing week after week to their pastor’s homophobic, sexist and classist interpretation of the gospel. All of which detracted from the severity of the survivors’ testimonies of sexual assault and sent the message that sexual violence within an intracommunal context is status quo and does not warrant the church’s collective action and strides toward justice. Long also used the Bible, one of the leading moral texts of the Western world, to excuse himself of communal accountability. This should not be overlooked. The same Bible that is used against women, LGBTQ individuals and other marginalized identities, was simultaneously used to shame survivors and privilege harm-doers, and the church must acknowledge, as the Rev. Dr. Renita Weems notes, how Biblical text even endorses rape.
Alas, Bishop Eddie Long has passed away and he will soon be funeralized. However, Black church communities cannot bury his troubled past with him. The church—New Birth et al.—must reckon with the Goliath of child sexual abuse and rescue the true Davids, our children, from the perverse and death-dealing realities of molestation, incest and rape.
Ahmad Greene-Hayes is a doctoral student in the Departments of Religion and African American Studies at Princeton University. He also currently serves as an inaugural cohort fellow of the Just Beginnings Collaborative (2016-2018), where his project, Children of Combahee works to eradicate child sexual abuse in Black churches. Follow him @_BrothaG.
Article Appeared @https://newsone.com/3642647/eddie-long-and-the-black-churchs-legacy-of-child-sexual-abuse/