Racial Justice Resources
As members of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America we believe that Christ’s church is for all people. God calls each of us by name, and it is not our job to sort, divide, categorize or exclude. But as “saints and sinners,” we know and experience God’s work of healing and restoring as well as the persistent human pain and injustices of racism in the world. This is where God has put us, in the thick of life, where we participate in what God is doing by insisting on justice and upholding human dignity for the inclusion of all people in the life of the church and society.
We are called to be a church that embraces each person and confronts racial, ethnic, cultural, religious, age, gender, familial, sexual orientation, physical, personal and class barriers that often manifest themselves in unjust treatment, inequalities, exclusion and violence.
ELCA's Resource Guide for Racial Justice can provide a background of documents and suggested readings.
Locally, WITF's Toward Racial Justice is a biweekly series of virtual community conversations addressing systemic racism and injustice in Central Pennsylvania and beyond.
Another guide, The Anti-Racist Resource Guide, developed by educator Victoria Alexander, gives additional resources on interest.
The history of Racial Injustice has been explored recently in two different media outlets:
* Reconstruction: America After the Civil War by Henry Louis Gates, Jr. A preview of the series can be found at PBS and the full DVD is available through the Dauphin County Library System.
* The 1619 Project, published by New York Times Magazine. has garnered a lot of discussion over the last year. An interactive website has been developed and the pdf of the entire report is also on the web.
INTERESTED IN ADDITIONAL READING? These books and reports may be helpful to you.
These two titles and many more can be found at the Dauphin County Library System.
