The tragic death of George Floyd in the US while in the custody of police has brought to focus historical lessons and people are questioning why somethings exist as they do today. One of these is the portrayal of Jesus as white.
Now the head of the Church of England is also bringing to forefront the topic of the ‘racial’ background of Jesus. In an interview with the BBC, Welby was asked whether the way the western church “portrays Jesus” needed to be “thought about again” and “re-imagined” following the protests that have now rocked many parts of the world.
While agreeing that the representation of Christ has to be reconsidered, the Archbishop said that different countries, cultures and languages have represented Christ in a way they understand.
“You go into their churches and you don’t see a White Jesus — you see a Black Jesus, or Chinese Jesus, or a Middle Eastern Jesus …
“You see a Fijian Jesus — you see Jesus portrayed in as many ways as there are cultures, languages and understandings.”
Welby added that the representations of Jesus were not, however, “who we worship” but rather served as a “reminder of the universality of the God who became fully human.”
Addressing calls for monuments with links to the UK’s imperialist history and slave trade to be removed, he said statues in Canterbury Cathedral would be put under review.
“We’re going to be looking very carefully, and putting them in context and seeing if they all should be there,” he said.
“The question [about whether they should all be there] arises, of course it does, and we’ve seen that all over the world.”
It is an interesting time to be alive to witness all these happen in the context of the teachings of the Bible and history that has been for so long hidden away to so many.
The above images and more, and predominantly white idols have been used in successive years to represent Jesus Christ who was in fact black. This disturbing truth has been hidden for many years especially in the enslaving of populations into a pagan religion that was being sponsored by the Roman Catholic Church.
Years after the death of Christ, as Romans started infiltrating the church, they started by copying the church of God and introducing idols that would seem to resemble the Apostles and even Christ, and over years, these images and idols have been ‘standardized’ to a version that the Church feels would be more acceptable to the world.
Exodus 20:3 Thou shalt have no other gods before me.
Exodus 20:4 Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth:
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