Sep 29 2024 49 mins
Race affects everything. From our everyday interactions to our sense of self, our educational prospects to our health outcomes, our career progression to our housing situation. Our race doesn't dictate all the details of our lives to us – but it has a major statistical impact on how we're treated and the opportunities we get. Systemic racism can negatively affect people from minority ethnic groups. And on a day-to-day basis, racist abuse and prejudice continue to blight far too many lives.
So if God is a God of justice, how should the church respond? What does the Christian story have to say about the way race and ethnicity fit into God's good creation? How do we have tough but essential conversations about racism in a way that balances love with urgency, unity with righteousness?
To explore these questions and more, Paul and Grace are joined by Chine McDonald, director of Theos think tank. Born in Nigeria, she moved to the UK aged four. She read theology & religious studies at Cambridge University before training as a newspaper journalist. She's a regular contributor to BBC religion and ethics programmes, including Thought for the Day on Radio 4, the daily service, and Prayer for the Day. She is the author of Am I Beautiful? and God Is Not a White Man, and sits on a number of charity boards, including Greenbelt Festival, where she's vice-chair, and Christian Aid.