Griffin Snyder Medium 8/7/20

I found this week’s information especially challenging. Not challenging because it was particularly hard to read or understand (although it was quite dense and packed with thoughts), but challenging to my personality and character. I’m specifically referring to James Cone’s writing, and his thoughts on Black theology and how religion (Christianity) should be treated as a tool of the oppressed, not the oppressors. I definitely agree with his assertions, despite how radical and challenging they are, even though I’m not Christian or even religious at all. I really like history, and the history of religion has always been especially interesting to me (I thought that this class would be more along those lines), so this piece got me thinking about how Christianity developed throughout history as a result of who supported it. In the early days of the religion, the historical Jesus and his apostles were very much an oppressed group, as the dominant Roman society would not accept their views on god and religion. As the first few generations of Christians died out and it was made the official religion of the Roman empire and especially in the medieval period however, people began to lose sight of the reason Christianity was so popular in the first place, that being its appeal to the poor and opressed and its rejection of material life. The vague and often contradictory nature of the bible allowed the ruling classes to transform Christianity into a tool of oppression and a justification for unfair social castes and systems, eventually including capitalism. Cone suggests that we should return to the original mission of Christianity. This analysis of Christian development and purpose really resonated with me, as I am well aware of how the religion has been twisted over two thousand years to resemble the ideas and society of the oppressors, rather than represent the plight of the oppressed (most notably Black people).