Unmasking Racism: Coloring with Love in the Church, Community, and Academy

An interdisciplinary call to move from awareness to action against systemic racism.

For persons of faith who want to move from awareness to action, Unmasking Racism examines racism across Christian faith and practice in the church, the community, and the academy. The authors take an experientially based, multigenerational, interdisciplinary approach, drawing on contextually diverse and inclusive voices to read racism through sociohistorical, ecclesial, and theological lenses.

At the book's center is a constructive claim: that “love” can be understood as a strategic commitment to exposing systemic racism at every level of Christian faith and practice. Each chapter is grounded in the authors' own individual and collective experiences of wrestling with the sin of racism within various ministerial contexts. From that foundation, the book invites readers to consider love as a commitment to justice, to understanding the experiences of those disempowered by systemic racism, and to act on that understanding. Each chapter closes with action items designed to help readers visualize concrete next steps within their own contexts.

Unmasking Racism brings together four authors, Ernest S. Lyght, Michele E. Watkins, Julius E. Del Pino, and Jonathan D. Keaton, each writing from their own experience of confronting the sin of racism in ministerial contexts. The result is an invitation to take a step alongside them: to adopt a set of actions, or a series of processes, for unmasking racism where readers live, worship, and work.

Ernest S. Lyght, DMIN, is a retired United Methodist bishop who enjoys time with his family and his many hobbies.

Michele E. Watkins, PHD, is assistant professor of theology and religious studies at the University of San Diego and a provisional elder of the Northern Illinois Conference of the United Methodist Church.

Julius E. Del Pino, PHD, is a United Methodist minister currently serving as an elder and has taught at St. Paul School of Theology and Yale University Divinity School.

Jonathan D. Keaton, STD, is married with children and is a retired bishop in the United Methodist Church.