We are compelled by the examples of institutions which have undertaken this difficult but necessary work:
Christ Church Old North, Boston has led the way in our own Diocese, publishing research linking the church and the funding of its famous steeple to slaveholding Episcopalians.
St. Paul’s Cathedral, Boston which has launched a racial audit of its “current practices in staffing [and] funding and investments”among other things.
Virginia Theological Seminary has created a $1.7 million reparations fund.
In 2019, the Diocese of Long Island began a similar process and committed funds to reparations. Other dioceses, including Maryland, have begun to take steps in confronting their past.
In 2020, the Diocese of Texas announced during its recent Diocesan Council that it will devote a record-breaking $13 million to a reparations initiative “that aims to repair and commence racial healing for individuals and communities who were directly injured by slavery in the diocese.”
In 2021, the Diocese of Virginia established a $10 million reparations fund and a $500,000 fund for racial justice
Outside of the Episcopal context, institutions have gone further, with Princeton Theological Seminary in 2019 creating a $28 million reparations fund.
As one of the largest and wealthiest dioceses in the country, we believe our continued inaction on this issue is unacceptable and not in keeping with our baptismal covenant or our Gospel call to justice.
From limited research, we know that William Appleton, who contributed significant funds to the creation of ECM, Trinity Church, the Boston Episcopal Charitable Society, and St. Stephen’s in Boston, was one of the wealthiest people in Massachusetts. His wealth was derived from his ownership of ships which carried commodities around the triangle of New England, the West Indies, and Great Britain. We know that Isaac Royall Jr., a member of Christ Church, Cambridge and resident of Medford, owned at least sixty slaves. Through such wealthy individuals, our Diocese, its congregations, and the endowments held by these institutions benefited materially from the unpaid labor of enslaved people and the economic trading of goods made with their labor. A thorough engagement with our past will reveal the need for repentance, reconciliation, and reparations.
We are heartened by the work of the newly-formed diocesan Racial Justice Commission, which is working to further our commitment to end racism and other forms of oppression. We believe that all Episcopalians in the Diocese of Massachusetts are being called to respond to the ongoing injustice resulting from white supremacy culture - injustice which still creates an enormous divide in terms of education and opportunity for young people in our own churches, from Wellesley to Lawrence, and from Chestnut Hill to Dorchester. This moment and the Black Lives Matter movement call for nothing less than our full and honest engagement and response.
Last June, Bishop Eugene Sutton testified to Congress in support of H.R. 40, calling for the establishment of a federal Commission to Study Reparations Proposals for African-Americans. He said, in part: “If you are happy with the state of race relations in America, do nothing. If you are not happy, support the establishment of this commission for discussion and study.”
Endorsing Bishop Sutton’s prophetic witness, we believe doing nothing cannot be an option any more. A year of study, or more if necessary, followed by the creation of a significant reparations fund to benefit Black and Brown congregations, communities, and individuals, will begin to give our church the freedom, healing and credibility it needs to be a leader and ally in movements for racial and economic justice. Once the research has been done, and a fund created, we believe communities of color should make decisions about how to implement just remedies.
For further reading on the need for reparations as a step towards reconciliation, see Ta-Nahisi Coates’ ground-breaking Atlantic Monthly article from 2014 and Nikole Hannah-Jones’ more recent article in the New York Times Magazine. There are also a number of relevant articles that offer theological and Episcopal-specific reflections on the issue of reparations in this resource from Trinity Wall Street and in the film “Traces of the Trade” and the guides and materials associated with it.