Restorative Racial Justice

A Call to Live in Flourishing Freedom

The Missing SDG:
A Call to Restorative Racial Justice

Offered as part of the 4th Session of the Permanent Forum on People of African Descent, the Baptist World Alliance is facilitating a UN Side Event entitled “The Missing SDG: A Call for Restorative Racial Justice” on Tuesday, April 15, from 10:00-11:30 am at the Church Center for the United Nations (2nd Floor). The session will be facilitated by Kasey Jones, Coordinator of Outreach and Growth for Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, and will feature the following topics and speakers.

Guest Speakers:
Presenting the Case for an 18th SDG – Racial Justice | Ahmed Reid
The UN General Framework for Agenda 2030 – SDGs | Gaynel Curry
Why Does Restorative Racial Justice Matter to the Global Church? | Emmett Dunn

Ecumenical Prayer & Worship Service

Offered as part of the 4th Session of the Permanent Forum on People of African Descent, the Baptist World Alliance is hosting an ecumenical worship service at the Church Center for the United Nations in New York City, NY. The theme is “The Missing SDG: A Call for Restorative Racial Justice.” All are welcome.

Guest Speakers:
Ambassador Suzan Johnson Cook | Diplomat and Faith Leader
Rev. Dr. Boise Kimber | President of National Baptist Convention USA, Inc.
Worship Leader:
Nicole Elaine Phifer

Racial Justice Resources

Black History Month Resources

The Baptist World Alliance joins with many around the world in celebrating Black History Month during the month of February.

In recognition of this significant time, the BWA has created a liturgical resource that can be adapted for your worship context as well as a Biblical reflection from BWA Director of Integral Mission Everton Jackson. Click below to access these resources.

A Global Baptist Family Standing Together

In light of the ongoing realities of racial injustice in the world, the BWA launched a special Racial Justice Action Group in October 2020 with unanimous affirmation from the BWA Executive Committee. Co-chaired by BWA General Secretary Elijah M. Brown and BWA First Vice President Karl Johnson from Jamaica, the Action group embarked on a two-year journey to:

- Focus the 2022 BWA Annual Gathering around the theme of racial justice featuring keynote speakers, the work of all 14 BWA Commissions, pilgrimages, and other points of prayer and action
- Engage in theological reflection related to the call for racial justice today within society and the church with special consideration of the subject of reparations
- Develop tools for ongoing engagement within the BWA, BWA Member Bodies, and Churches so that the pursuit of racial justice will remain an ongoing priority

Alongside the Co-Chairs, inaugural steering committee members of this Action Group included Cassandra Jones (Chair of the BWA Commission on Racial, Gender, and Economic Justice, USA), Everton Jackson (BWA Director of Integral Mission, Jamaica), Michael Okwakol (former BWA Vice President and Founder/President of African Church Empowerment Ministries, Uganda), and Silvia Rapisarda (Pastor of Chiesa Battista di Catania, Italy). Marsha Scipio was added in February 2021 upon her appointment as Baptist World Aid Director. In collaboration with with relevant BWA Commissions and a wider sets of key stakeholders, experts, and leaders, the Action group developed a statement centered on Restorative Racial Justice that was affirmed by the Executive Committee on July 9, 2022, and presented to the BWA General Council during the 2022 BWA Annual Gathering hosted in Birmingham, Alabama, USA, from July 10-15.

BWA Executive Committee Statement 2022-07.1 Restorative Racial Justice

Access Full Statement

The Need for Restorative Racial Justice

The human propensity to grasp and gather for ourselves that which belongs to our brothers and sisters is an ancient sin that continues to crouch at the doors of our hearts individually and collectively. Across history this tendency has been aided by the sinful lie of racism – to posit one’s self or one’s group as if it is inherently superior – with its many guises that are structured and unstructured, collective and individualized, intentional and unconscious, propagated or inherited.

The Gospel of Jesus redeems us from the sinful chains of inherent superiority for the freedom of inherent co-dignity in the image of God that receives its ultimate expression in “every nation, tribe, people and language standing before the throne and before the Lamb” in the fullness of worship and equality. Crucially, this freedom is not the eradication of those elements that have most often contributed to racism – nation, tribe, people, or language – but the celebration of this beautiful diversity of co-dignity in equality.

To live with this vision of flourishing freedom requires repentance, reorientation, restoration, and the pursuit of just righteousness. In so doing it sets both the captor and the captive free.