16.11.2022

Partnerships and Subtle Racism

Bishop Sageus /Keib recieved the participants of the conference. Foto by: UEM.

During long and intense discussions, the participants exchanged their perspectives on racism. Foto by: UEM.

23 active UEM partnership members met in October in Windhoek, Namibia. They come from Namibia, South Africa, Germany, Indonesia, DR Congo, Rwanda and Tanzania, and are involved in various church partnerships. Subtle racism tends to be hidden, but it is a massive obstacle on the path to full partnership.

The Tanzanian theologian Emmanuel Kileo, who has been a church pastor in Germany for eight years, finds clear words for this: "If God's image is present in each of us and is related to our human dignity, then we degrade God when we degrade each other. Racism in the Church is then not only a sin, it is heresy, it is like a cancer in our churches."

That's why it's time to confront this issue.

Sarah Vecera, a speaker at the conference from the German side, said, "We're so deeply entangled in racism as a church that we have to find words for all of this first." Participants, she says, don't know at the beginning of the process "whether or not we can bear this anguish."

That means we have to go from ignoring racism in partnership relationships towards acknowledging it. Conference participants are aware that this process can be painful, but that at the same time it allows for trauma healing and new forms of genuine partnership.

It is not about condemnation, but about acknowledging guilt, pain and trauma. Having grown up in racist imprints unites all participants in partnerships of the UEM, in Asia, Africa and Germany, even if they have different perspectives on the topic. How can this recognition, and ultimately this healing, succeed? One example is Visolela and Erika, who grew up at opposite ends of a racist society, yet found each other in faith.

Frauke Bürgers, partnership officer of the UEM and organizer of the workshop, is convinced: "The conference was a great success, especially the open and trusting atmosphere, in which trauma and open wounds could also be addressed. Now the request and wish goes out to the partnerships to face the topic together in an open conversation, in order to overcome subtle racism in church partnership work."

Partnership in the UEM: Marked by the past, united in faith, and full of hope for a future in which healing is possible together.