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The Church and Slavery

On this bicentenary of the declaration to abolish the slave trade, the church has an opportunity to look back and re-assess its role in the enslavement of Africans during the trans-Atlantic slave trade. Many books have been written about slavery but very little if any about the role of Christianity in slavery. However, the irony is that Christianity is inextricably linked with the practice for four centuries.

With regards to the abolition,the church can be proud of the contributions of people like William Wilberforce, Thomas Clarkson and women like Hannah More. The church can also point to its multi-ethnic response with contributions by Olaudah Equiano and Ottobah Cugoano. By and large, practically all the initial leading figures in the anti –slavery movement were Quakers and evangelical Christians.

Unfortunately though, many Christians are either unaware of the church’s role or choose to be defensive about it all. History however shows that the church was part of the system that worked to enslave Africans. This is a very difficult issue for many Christians to come to term with as the Christian’s faith is based on freedom –freedom from sin, the flesh and the devil. After all, Jesus Christ’s mission to the world was to set people free rather than enslave them.

Regrettably though, some warped so called Christians, used the scripture to support their unforgivable actions by saying that Africans were cursed, had no souls and were pre-disposed to enslavement. Even one Liverpool clergyman by the name of Raymond Harris, went as far as writing a book on the subject in which he examined the scriptures for verses that endorsed slavery. Some other Europeans condemned Africans because according to them they had a different colour and as such were not fit to be Christians. How justifiable was that assumption when history shows that Christianity reached Africa just around the same time it did Europe.

It can easily be argued that European prejudices about Africans came to the fore when they needed labourers to work in their plantations in the Caribbean and the Americas; and then used all manner of negative theories and misconception to justify African enslavement.

I am not laying all the faults on the doorstep of the Europeans. Africans too have to bear the responsibility for giving away their own people cheaply to the Europeans and this is why I am not so keen on the call for apology or compensation from the Europeans for the enslavement of Africans. The question is; how can you quantify in either US dollars or pounds sterling millions of lives taken for enslavement in foreign lands? I guess that is a debate for another time.

Furthermore, it will be wrong to condemn the whole church for the enslavement of Africans because of the actions of some people in the church with misguided beliefs. History again shows that christian faith also provided the action and call for change by the abolitionists. It will also be useful to differentiate between the role of the ‘church’ and that of ‘Christians’ during slavery. The abolitionists like William Wilberforce and Dr Beilby Porteus attended the church but found themselves at odds with the church policy over the issue of slavery. The church in this bicentenary year, has the opportunity to right the wrongs of the past by committing itself to the eradication of racism and inequality in our society.

Tunde Martins