Page 17 - Integrity Seminars - Special Report

[6] Remain open to

religious insight, contradictions between doctrine and

practice—perhaps enhancing their own
including prophetic
appreciation of religious perspectives in the
traditions that process.

Understanding Frederick Douglass is best
emphasize moral
facilitated by allowing him to speak for himself.
accountability and We don't have to look far for a concise summary
of his views. He stated them on the masthead of
forgiveness his newspaper (the link leads to an archive

image):

We wrote earlier in this "RIGHT IS OF NO
report that no one familiar SEX--TRUTH IS OF NO
with Douglass’s legacy can COLOR--GOD IS THE
deny his "lifelong radicalism" FATHER OF ALL, AND
in seeking to eradicate ALL WE ARE
slavery. It’s equally
important for contemporary BRETHREN"
students to appreciate
Douglass’s deep religiosity. Douglass’s newspaper
Ignoring or diminishing this masthead was an
affirmation of an early
characteristic--which might
religious experience he
be anticipated in the current
cultural divide between described in the "Life and
rural/urban; more educated/ Times of Frederick
Douglass" (1892):
less-educated; and religious/
secular--denies access both
to a defining trait in I was not more than thirteen
Douglass’s character and an years old, when, in my
avenue to forming Catalog of anti-slavery publications sold by loneliness and destitution, I
Isaac Knapp, 1838 /Wikimedia commons
broadly-based coalitions in a longed for
democratic society. In the current abortion some one to whom I could go, as to a father and
debate, for example, those defending abortion protector. The preaching of a white Methodist
rights might better understand their evangelical minister, named Hanson, was the means of
opponents if they appreciated that comparable causing me to feel that in God I had such a friend.
evangelical intensity also supported much of the He thought that all men, great and small, bond
Abolitionist tradition in Great Britain and the
and free, were sinners in the sight of God: that they
United States. With that historical foundation,
were by nature rebels against his government;
one can strongly disagree with the conclusion of
and that they must repent of their sins, and be
an argument (e.g. banning all abortion) while
reconciled to God through Christ. I cannot say that
respecting the underlying moral commitment
I had a very distinct notion of what was required of
and its source. Also, like Douglass, engaging
me, but one thing I did know well: that I was
with religious teaching allows critics to
wretched and had no means of making myself
highlight
otherwise. I consulted a

Integrity Seminars: Special Report January 2020 17