By Mel White<\/p>\n
For more than 40 years I\u2019ve been moved and provoked by the writings of James Cone, Union Seminary\u2019s distinguished professor of systematic theology. While reading his newest book, \u201cThe Cross and the Lynching Tree,\u201d however, I felt grief and anger on a whole new scale. I felt grief for the nearly 5,000 African-American men, women and children who were lynched between 1880 and 1940, and anger that during that 60-year holocaust, white preachers, evangelists and theologians didn\u2019t even notice. No author has ever made me more ashamed to be a white American Christian and at the same time no author has ever given me a more dramatic example of the sustaining power of the cross.<\/p>\n
All my life I had been taught that the cross was at the heart of my Christian faith. It has been a long time since I was deeply moved by it. \u201cThe Cross and the Lynching Tree\u201d helped me experience the cross on a far more visceral level. Cone says it simply: Jesus was lynched. He makes the connection between the crucifixion of Jesus and the lynching of African-Americans. He explains why understanding that connection is vital to understanding the meaning of the cross:<\/p>\n