Yesterday, the Salt Lake Tribune published a story about rampant, and really disgusting, racism in St. George schools. It follows two Black sisters in the schools and the racism they face. And the racism is utterly unacceptable and thoroughly disgusting: everything from having other students touch their hair without permission to being called the n-word to being told to go back to Africa.
Now, unlike the Davis School District, which faced investigation by the Department of Justice and is party to an agreement to try to remediate widespread systemic and personal issues, the girls and their family say the school district is doing what it can, including a training program for all faculty, staff, and students.
Which is great. But there’s a long way to go.
Is this racism a Mormon problem? Absolutely. I mean, clearly not all Utahns are Mormons, and non-Mormon Utahns are clearly capable of being racists and/or engaging in racist behavior. But a little over 60 percent of the residents of Washington County belong to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; it is virtually impossible to imagine that none of the hateful vitriol comes from our coreligionists.
Over the last decade or two, church leaders have vocally condemned racism. They’ve made it clear that racism is incompatible with being a member of the church.
But the message doesn’t seem to have stuck, at least not with some subset of members. Why not? I really don’t know. Maybe they didn’t hear the statements. Maybe they don’t believe the things they are doing and saying are racist (though honestly, they’re calling Black girls racial epithets and telling them to go to Africa, so their beliefs are unreasonable). Maybe they don’t think racism—or the church’s statements—are a big deal.
What I do know is, those statements haven’t rooted racism out of the hearts of at least some of our coreligionists.
So what can the church do?
This is an honest question. I have an idea that I’ll propose in a minute, but I’d love to hear your ideas. Because I think this is a pressing problem. We can’t build a Zion community on a foundation of hate and racism. Our hearts won’t be one when we disregard our neighbors’ and sisters’ and brothers’ hearts. We can’t be save, individually or collectively, while indulging in “ugly and unacceptable” sin.
My proposal, which isn’t the only possible solution and will clearly not entirely solve the problem of personal and system racism, is this: devote a year of the “Come Follow Me” curriculum to rooting out racism.
I know, we usually focus on a book of scripture. But even when we focus on a book of scripture, we tend to read topically; the lessons focus on particular verses and stories to pull out a message. And why can’t that message be turning away from racism?
There are things that any such course of study would have to contend with. For instance, Nephi makes some fairly racist statements. But maybe we could teach ourselves that he’s fallible, that his racism was bad, and, in fact, that it at least in part underlay the collapse of the Nephite civilization.
Also, simply saying, “Racism is bad” isn’t going to be enough. The curriculum would have to teach us how to recognize our racist thoughts and actions, and perhaps how to model inclusivity and anti-racism.
Critically, it can’t be a single fifth-Sunday lesson. If explicit statements from prophets don’t change hearts, a one-off lesson also won’t. But a year dedicated to this study sends a message—one I believe that church leaders believe and care about—that this is an important topic, that racism has no place among us, and that its a topic worthy of intense and extensive teaching and learning.
Photo by Viviana Rishe on Unsplash