Letters: The C of E’s obsession with critical race theory

Christian approach

Sir: Dr Michael Nazir-Ali’s criticism of our report ‘From Lament to Action’ (‘Bad faith’, 1 May) was wide of the mark in its suggestion that Marxist-inspired critical race theory was the ‘intellectual underpinning’ of our approach. Far from it. The source material for our report was three decades of reports on the issue of racial justice from the General Synod of the Church of England. Doubtless there are valid criticisms which can be made of Synod; however, being a hotbed of radical Marxism is not one of them. Our report explicitly rejects any idea that our work should be viewed as a battle in a culture war. Rather we state that ‘our mandate flows not from identity politics but rather from our common identity in Christ’.

Alongside the 25 reports from the General Synod and 161 recommendations which we reviewed, the other source consistently quoted in our report is the Bible, in which our theological approach was firmly rooted. That approach could be summed up by Jesus’s teaching that the call for each of us in the Church is ‘to love the Lord your God with all your heart and mind and strength and to love your neighbour as yourself’.
The Revd Canon Arun Arora and The Revd Sonia Barron,
co-chairs of the Archbishops’ Anti-Racism Taskforce

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Sir: Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali was spot on in his analysis regarding the C of E’s obsession with critical race theory and identity politics. Unfortunately, it appears to have escaped the notice of the church hierarchy that the majority of church-going folk couldn’t care less as to the gender, ethnicity or sexual orientation of their vicar, but believe in a simple Christian message of fundamental equal worth for all humanity.