Of the spiritual strivings of Black Lutherans: the legacy of Dr. Albert "Pete" Pero.

But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by
the blood of Christ. For [Jesus] is our peace, who hath broken down the
middle wall of partition between us.--Eph 2:13-14 KJV

In the mid-1970s, the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago made one of the most important decisions ever in Lutheran theological education. It called the Rev. Dr. Albert "Pete" Pero to the faculty. I believe that this was a Spirit-led decision for the "flagship" seminary of the Lutheran Church in America, because this bold step removed a "middle wall of partition between" the African American community and Lutheranism.

Pero's arrival on the faculty accomplished something else. It began a process of the institution's valuing the right of African American people, along with every other racial/ethnic community, to think critically about the nature of their faith in God and Jesus Christ. By calling Pero to the faculty, LSTC expanded the theological table within Lutheranism. Theological education would look and feel different because an important invisible voice was now visible.

Before launching into the theological and ethical legacy of Pero, I want to make several observations. First, this essay is written by a person who, like Pete, was raised in the Lutheran Church. The same forces shaped us. We both have experienced racism in the church and society. We both have been educated within the Lutheran college and seminary system. We served as church executives. We both served African American Lutheran congregations. We are kindred souls in our journey within Lutheranism.

Second, this essay constitutes, no doubt, the first of many attempts by the second generation of African American Lutheran teaching theologians to build on the contributions of our elders. We face the challenge to more fully understand, articulate, and embody the vocation of an African American teaching theologian in a white denomination. Pete may not have resolved all of the issues involved in being an African American Lutheran theologian. That would be too much to expect of any one person. However, he brilliantly cut a path for the next generation. I thank God for his witness and faith in a God and Jesus who stood by him over the last 28 years in this place. Therefore, I write this essay about a person who played a significant role in my formation as a pastor and teacher in the church.

I want to focus on Pero's theological and ethical legacy. The essay begins with Pero's own declaration that "theology must develop in context." (1) Following that brief excursion, I look at how Pero conceptualizes the African American Lutheran experience. The final dimension will be an ethic that flows, I believe, from Pero's legacy. My goal is to unveil some of the challenges Pero's theological and ethical legacy presents in developing an African American Lutheran Black Theology of Liberation for the 21st century.

The spiritual strivings of African American Lutherans

In the critically acclaimed book The Souls of Black Folk the great scholar/activist W. E. B. Du Bois declared that the central problem facing America in the 20th century would be the color line. (2) Echoing the biblical witness, Du Bois identified what would occupy his scholarly and activist work for the next sixty years. Embracing the metaphor of "the Veil," Du Bois laid bare what life was like for people of African descent on the North American continent. (3) Du Bois's prophecy came true. The 20th century was fraught with many problems emerging from America's and the religious community's denial of its race problem. At the same time, Du Bois was interested in presenting the "gifts of Black folk" as a hedge against the denial that anything good came out of Africa and the diaspora.

History records the racist treatment of Africa's children on the North American continent. It also records the spirit of Africa's children to construct an ethos and worldview that empowered them to not only survive but to thrive. Yet, people of African descent still today experience racial terrorism in the form of racial profiling and subtle forms of racism expressed through code language (e.g., "safety concerns"). There is still great disparity between the income earned by African Americans and the white community. Our young people still lag behind in education despite the government's intention to "leave no child behind." While there have been some advances, many African Americans feel as Marian Wright Edelman, "It is utterly exhausting being Black in America--physically, mentally, and emotionally.... There is no respite or escape from your badge of color." (4) Many people of African descent have been baptized into this reality by the African American community and by the larger society. Moreover, this badge of color is a strong element in the theology and ethics of Pero.

Over the years, it has been my privilege to sit at the feet of Pete and hear the stories of his journey in the Lutheran Church. I gained much wisdom about how to navigate my existence and the existence of African Americans in this church. The most profound stories relate to his theological training. One laments when one hears, for example, how the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod treated African American men (there were no women seeking the pastoral ministry at that time) who responded to God's call to preach and pastor. In the age of "separate but equal," the LCMS sent African American males to Immanuel Lutheran College and Seminary in Greensboro, North Carolina, for "training" in the pastoral ministry. That institution was designated as the place to send people of African descent. Although the 1954 United States Supreme Court Brown vs. Board of Education decision banned "separate but equal" in public education, it wasn't until after 1962 that people of African descent could attend the "regular" seminary. Now Lutherans had been "saved." (5)

During the 1960s, Pero and many other African American pastors in urban congregations were deeply concerned about the racial climate in American cities. Many of those cities experienced "long hot summers." King's emphasis on nonviolent direct action and integration into mainstream America failed to resolve the situation of African Americans. The cry of "Black Power" and the resurrection of the speeches of Malcolm X served as a rallying cry for the liberation of the poor.

In response to the call for a cultural identity that led to self-determination, Pero organized African American Lutheran clergy. The Association of Black Lutheran Churchmen (ABLC) became the first official caucus of African American people within Lutheranism. ABLC gathered to develop strategies for taking charge of ministry by African American Lutheran congregations. While this may have threatened white Lutherans, the principal issue was how to move African American Lutheran congregations from being "Black Germans" to being authentically African American Lutherans.

This period of public activism experienced a new theological and ethical development, Black Theology of Liberation. Owing to the originating work of James H. Cone, the voice of Martin L. King Jr. and Malcolm X came together. Pero's participation in the evolving work of the National Conference of Black Churchmen (NCBC) and the Black Theology Project reflected his deep commitment to the liberation of poor people and the freedom of African American Lutherans.

I remember well the 1977 national conference of the Black Theology Project in Atlanta. The Rev. Cheryl Stewart Pero and I learned much about the theological vision of this first generation of African American theologians and activists. This meeting marked a new direction for a Black Theology of Liberation. Moreover, African American Lutherans were challenged to refocus their congregational ministry in the service of the poor.

Cone formulated the question that would guide theological and ethical reflection within historic Black churches and African American congregations and caucuses in white denominations. The question was (and still is today), What has the gospel to do with the Black struggle for liberation? (6) A call was issued for historic Black churches and African American congregations in white denominations to reclaim a cultural and religious heritage replete with multiple strivings toward liberation.

This brief description of the strivings of African Americans as full and equal citizens within the American journey has been fraught with rejection, ambiguity, and struggle. This struggle within society parallels the struggle of African American Lutherans. Given this context, along with Pero's participation in NCBC, the Black Theology Project, and organizing the ABLC, we can now focus on how Pero indigenized a Black Theology of Liberation within Lutheranism.

On being African American and Lutheran

The indigenization of a Black Theology of Liberation by Pero within Lutheranism revolves around a fundamental question, What does it mean to be Black and Lutheran? People of African descent within Lutheranism experience a double consciousness, marginalization and invisibility. In the African American world, we are at the margins because of our religious identity as Lutherans. In the Lutheran world, we are at the margins because of our racial identity as African Americans. This dilemma raises the issue of identity and identification so crucial for African American Lutherans. Pero wrestles with this double consciousness through his theological method and understanding of the human condition.

Pero's method begins with a correlation between the situation of African Americans and Scripture. The fundamental condition of people of African descent is racial oppression. Employing the work of African American psychologists and theologians, Pero uses words like unique, inferior, and invisible to describe the African American experience. For example, drawing from psychologists like William Grier and Price Cobbs, Pero contends that African Americans are unique. While the white community will use that uniqueness as a tool of oppression, Pero argues that the uniqueness of the African American community derives from its experience of racial oppression. (7)

Like most African American preachers and theologians, Pero holds Scripture in a dialectical relationship with the situation of African American people. Moreover, he does this with a Lutheran nuance. The kerygma is articulated through law and gospel. The law/gospel dialectic is a process that can be applied to the situation of all people. If one reads the situation correctly, one will see that all people suffer from oppression. (8)

God's law, for example, reveals the sinful nature of humankind. White Christians become aware of their misappropriation of God's revelation in Jesus Christ. On the ethics side, they learn that they use the kerygma as a tool to reinforce their own feeling of religious and social superiority. There is a failure in matching creed with deed. On the other hand, African Americans, especially those who are Lutheran, experience the law as a revelation of their desire to become something they are not, white Lutherans. Ethically, the law reveals behavior that resembles white Lutherans. Pero believes Scripture reveals that both cultures deny the very humanity God created. The kerygma, God's Word of forgiveness and liberation, embodied in Jesus Christ, liberates all people whether they know they are oppressed or not.

In 1986, Pero publicly announced more fully the dilemma of African American Lutherans. At the organizational meeting of the Conference of International Black Lutherans (CIBL), Pero confessed, "I have been a black Lutheran all my life. Symbolically speaking, I have been 'Black by day and Lutheran by night.' Literally this means that I have lived in two worlds paradoxically, one black, the other white." (9) Pero's confession did three things. First, it identified the principal crisis of African American Lutherans. The principal crisis is "the threat of psychological destruction." (10) Moreover, this threat emerges as an identity crisis. (11) Second, his confession created space for developing and articulating an indigenous African American Lutheran theology of liberation. This theology of liberation would be confessional in nature and accountable to the poor. (12) Third, Pero's confession implies an ethical posture that grounds itself in a Black Theology of Liberation and Lutheran, culturally and theologically.

The concept of double consciousness plays a significant role in Pero's understanding of being an African American Lutheran. That often-quoted passage, "One ever feels his twoness,--an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts, two unreconciled strivings; two warring ideals in one dark body," serves as a motif that conceptualizes an understanding of the African American Lutheran situation. (13) The spiritual strivings of African American Lutherans are simply attempts to make it possible to be African American, Lutheran, and American without being rendered invisible by other African Americans, Lutherans, and Americans.

The following diagram illustrates the paradox Pero is describing. Each culture has an integrity of its own. Each culture has a worldview encased in a variety of myths, practices, rites, and moral exemplars. Each culture has a set of values shaped by its experience with who Jesus Christ is and their social experience. The voice of each culture is critical in determining the universal.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

The dilemma faced by African American Lutherans is one of constantly looking at themselves from their own cultural perspective and looking at themselves from the perspective of European Lutherans. Does one choose one's cultural and religious orientation over one's denominational heritage? Is it possible for a synthesis of the two perspectives? Alternatively, does one avoid the issue altogether and leave Lutheranism? African American Lutherans responded in a variety of ways to racial exclusion in the Lutheran Church. Nevertheless, one must ask a question: Is this, in fact, a form of racial essentialism suggested by some postmodern African American theologians and ethicists?

Victor Anderson, a theological ethicist, would contend that the first generation of African American Liberation theologians are doing precisely that. In his framework, Black Theology of Liberation emerges from "ontological blackness." That is, ontological blackness is reification of a cultural identity in such a way that individuals who do not reflect that identity are outside the culture. "[O]ntological blackness signifies the blackness that whiteness created," Anderson writes. Moreover, ontological blackness with "its categories and its interests in racial solidarity, loyalty, and authenticity, conceals, subjugates, and calls into question African American interests in fulfilled individuality." (14)

Anderson's solution is a call for "a new cultural politics of black identity that meaningfully relates to the conditions of postmodern North American life." He therefore advocates "an African American public theology that has cultural fulfillment as the content of liberation and whose justifications are predicated on a new politics of black identity." (15) Quite simply, Anderson, in my view, is calling for a form of individualism that lacks accountability to the history and ethical norms of the African American community.

Pero, I believe, resolves Anderson's misgivings about ontological blackness through his concept of "self-transcendence" and "cultural transcendence." Pero does this by raising the theological question: What is the nature of the human being? Here we find a connection to Pero's method of correlation. That is, science and the doctrine of the Holy Spirit are crucial for understanding the previously mentioned concepts. Psychologists such as William Grier, Price Cobbs, and Gordon Allport clarify what constitutes the nature of a human being. The essence of a human being is "the character traits of the self ... but also that which transcends the self to other selves." (16) Self-transcendence or cultural transcendence goes beyond the categories of race, gender, class, and sexual orientation. The focus turns to the character traits of the individual as shaped and mediated through that person's cultural identity, their community of origin.

Character traits correlate, theologically, with the fruits of the Holy Spirit. That is, we can know the nature of a human being by his or her embodiment of the biblical fruits, namely "love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, fidelity, gentleness, and self-control" (Gal 5:22). What unifies all of God's people are character traits (fruits of the Holy Spirit). They constitute our religious identity. These traits (fruits of the Holy Spirit) given by the Holy Spirit externalize themselves through a diversity of cultures. The concept of self-transcendence or cultural transcendence represents human diversity actualized through particular cultures. (17)

Pero's controlling conviction, then, is that self-transcendence/cultural transcendence describes the yearnings of all people for spiritual and social wholeness. While many yearn to be identified by some category (e.g., race, gender, class, sexual orientation, or political persuasion), the Christian faith teaches that these categories do not matter in God's economy of grace (see Gal 3:28). In other words, these categories are overcome through the work of the Holy Spirit and lead to "beinghood." Self-transcendence/cultural transcendence argues for a unity in diversity. (18) All people find their identification grounded in a particular culture that promotes integration, stability, loyalty, and vision. An individual, therefore, is not an ahistorical conglomeration of genes and chromosomes. At the same time, to remain locked into one's cultural identification is narrow and a form of idolatry.

Let me illustrate how Pero embodies this. Several years ago, the LSTC faculty went on a retreat. Sessions given to various subjects related to curriculum would occupy our time together. Pete suggested that we include some type of social activity. One of the colleagues suggested a square dance. Pete responded, Why not have an "electric slide square dance"? In a humorous yet serious way, Pete embodied cultural transcendence. That is, he recognized dancing as a common activity among all cultures. In this case, the electric slide was particular to the African American community, and square dancing was particular to the white community. An "electric slide square dance" synthesizes a particular way dance expresses itself in both communities. Both communities go beyond just one way of thinking about and doing dance to embracing how another community thinks and does dance. Neither community's way of dancing is absolute. Rather, what is absolute is dance.

What type of ethic emerges from Pero's understanding of cultural transcendence?

An ethic of mutuality

As we have seen, Pero synthesizes an African American Lutheran Liberation Theology by drawing on the cultural/theological contributions of the African American community and the Lutheran community. What may be startling to find is the ethic that follows Pero's work on self/cultural transcendence. The following passage reveals a direction Pero is leading us.

The goal [of Pero's method of contextuality] is to get to know others in
their context and in the depths of their commitment to Christ in order
that mutual understanding may take place.... I believe that the way to
spiritual growth in the power/authority of Jesus Christ begins with
removing the walls of separation. As philosophic logic would dictate, it
is not possible to build walls to keep others out without those same
walls hemming oneself in. (19)

Pero's ethic of mutuality presumes that each cultural group knows the story of God's liberating act in the person of Jesus Christ. The process of mutuality begins with valuing the context of God's people in which the kerygma has been preached.

Second, the walls that separate communities from other communities are human constructs. That is, all people construct walls to reinforce some form of superiority. God however, has already removed the walls of separation. Our task as believers in God's mighty acts of liberation is to go beyond humanly constructed walls.

What are some elements, then, of an African American Lutheran Liberation Theology ethic of mutuality?

Pero's theological and ethical legacy, expressed through self/cultural transcendence, makes a fundamental statement about what constitutes a human being. The first element, then, is recognition that what constitutes a human being is the fruits of the Spirit. The Holy Spirit blesses God's people with various fruits (traits). To think otherwise is to violate the First Commandment and to grieve the Holy Spirit.

A second element is a focus on transcendence, religiously and socially. As Pero says, "When Christian people confess the truth of the Holy Spirit, they are declaring that God is the foundation of the cosmos and our human selves within it." (20) To know God, in this way, is to know that God is the creator of all people. Moreover, "to affirm the Holy Spirit is to say in the same breath that people fulfill themselves when they move beyond their culture themselves." (21) The self goes beyond itself and fulfills itself when the self builds relationships with other selves.

A third element is an emphasis on community with its inherent diversity. There is no doubt that individualism (i.e., the self as the sole determiner of ethical principles) is rampant. Postmodern life (if one wants to use that term) is marked by its focus on fragmentation, a loss of connectedness, and spiritual malaise. As Cornel West says, "The result is lives of what we might call 'random nows,' of fortuitous and fleeting moments preoccupied with 'getting over'--with acquiring pleasure, property, and power by any means necessary." (22) An ethic of mutuality suggests that being rooted in one's cultural identification is paramount for surviving and thriving in a postmodern culture. The African American community has never been against persons from the community pursuing their individual dreams. However, the African American community fails to support people who reflect, in their spirit and morality, what I call the "Clarence Thomas syndrome," namely, pursuing their individual dream with no sense of account-ability to the diverse history and heritage of the African American community. African American Lutheran theologians are challenged to develop and articulate a theology of liberation emanating from the Word of God from within the complexity of African American culture.

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Fourth, an ethic of mutuality names reality as it is. Like Du Bois, Martin Luther, and Pero, the next generation of African American Lutheran theologians must not sugarcoat the existence of African Americans within Lutheranism. Life behind the veil of color, in the church and society, needs to be uncovered for the sake of the spiritual health of the African American Lutheran community's witness in society. Moreover, as Luther wrote in his 95 Theses, "A theology of glory calls evil good and good evil. A theology of the cross calls the thing what it actually is." (23) The challenge for the next generation is developing careful theological reflections based upon the truth of our reality.

A fifth element is articulation of a new conceptualization of the African American Lutheran experience that includes our social location (middle class), gender issues, sexual orientation, and relationships within a global setting. Race is a thread that runs throughout the existence of African Americans in the church and society. The oppression of African American men, women, and children is far more complex today than in the 1960s and 1970s. The work of Womanist theologians like Delores Williams is helpful. While the exodus model with its emphasis on liberation from oppression is useful, it may be necessary to explore an African American Lutheran theology of liberation from an experience in the wilderness. (24) An ethic of mutuality, I believe, leads us to a theology that reflects the multidimensional and complex nature of oppression.

A sixth element is an African American Lutheran Liberation Theology that seeks transformation. The nature of transformation I have in mind is both internal and external. The next generation of African American Lutheran teaching theologians must see their work connecting with and in service to the approximately 50,000 African American Lutherans within the ELCA. Our purpose, as Pero, has said so many times, is to keep our communities from being defined theologically. The external nature of our service must be directed outward. Our theological writing, teaching, preaching, and service must be directed toward the people whose voices are excluded from the theological table.

A final element of an ethic of mutuality is institutional organization. Individual protests are important. The African American community supports individuals who express "righteous discontent." (25) At the same time, transformation of oppressive institutions and systems comes from organized efforts. Within Lutheranism, particularly the ELCA, this means that the work of the African American Lutheran Association (AALA) and CIBL is significant. Our mutual task is to clarify the historical and theological experience of oppression for the purpose of creating a contemporary vision of liberation.

The challenge of the theological and ethical legacy of Pero for the next generation of African American Lutheran theologians begins with our relationship with God who liberates us in and through the person and work of Jesus Christ the Liberator. The exercising of our vocation--our calling--as teaching theologians in the Lutheran church pushes us to say who Jesus is for us for the sake of the gospel. Moreover, what is at stake is the spiritual strivings of African American Lutherans. I find these words from Pero to be immensely instructive: "True discipleship is not cultural uniformity but an affirmation of cultural diversity." (26) To this, I say "Amen. Come Lord Jesus."

Thank you, Pete, for your faithful witness in this place, in the church, and in the world. Let's do the "electric slide square dance."

1. Albert Pero, Jr., "The Issue of Power/Authority in the Global Church of the 21st Century," Currents in Theology and Mission 24:3 (June 1997), 248.

2. W. E. B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk: Essays and Sketches. With an Introduction by Saunders Redding (New York: Fawcett, [1903] 1961), v, 23.

3. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk. His use of "the Veil" is based upon Exod 26:31-35, Isa 25:7, and 1 Cor 13:12.

4. Marian Wright Edelman, The Measure of Our Success: A Letter to My Children and Yours (Boston: Beacon, 1992), 23.

5. See Jeff G. Johnson's Black Christians: The Untold Lutheran Story, Forward by Martin E. Marty (St. Louis: Concordia, 1991), chaps. 9-11.

6. James H. Cone, God of the Oppressed (New York: Seabury, 1975), 6. For a history of the work of the NCBC and the Black Theology Project of the Theology in Americas one should begin with Cone's My Soul Looks Back: Black Theology and the Black Church (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1984).

7. Albert Pero, Jr., "Black, Lutheran, and American in a Racist Society," in Theology and the Black Experience: The Lutheran Heritage Interpreted by African & African-American Theologians, ed. Albert Pero and Ambrose Moyo (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1988), 160-63.

8. Albert Pero, "The Relationship of the Kerygma (Law/Gospel Dialectic) to the Black situation with special reference to the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod educational material," STD diss. (Ann Arbor: University Microfilms International, 1975), 2.

9. Pero, "Black, Lutheran, and American in a Racist Society," 152.

10. Pero, "The Relationship of the Kerygma," 227.

11. Pero, "The Relationship," 106.

12. Pero, "Black, Lutheran, and American in a Racist Society," 168-69.

13. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk, 16-17.

14. Victor Anderson, Beyond Ontological Blackness: An Essay on African American Religious and Cultural Criticism (New York: Continuum, 1995), 11-14.

15. Anderson, Beyond Ontological Blackness, 15, 18-19.

16. Albert Pero, "From Culture to Cosmos: God's Human Community Remains a Single Unit," Currents in Theology and Mission 28:3-4 (June/August 2001), 310.

17. Pero, "From Culture to Cosmos," 310.

18. Pero, "From Culture to Cosmos," 314-15.

19. Pero, "The Issue of Power/Authority in the Global Church," 251; emphasis added.

20. Pero, "From Culture to Cosmos," 313; emphasis added.

21. Pero, "From Culture to Cosmos," 313.

22. Cornel West, Race Matters (Boston: Beacon, 1993), 5.

23. Luther's Works 31:53.

24. Delores S. Williams, Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist God-Talk (New York: Orbis, 1993).

25. This phrase is from the excellent book written by Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent: The Women's Movement in the Black Baptist Church, 1880-1920 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1993).

26. Pero, "From Culture to Cosmos," 315.

Richard Perry

Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago