Forty Five Minutes with a Black Muslim
Diocesan Press Service. April 5, 1963 [IX-9]
By John Cosby
The cab swerved to a stop. As I climbed in and said "The Cowley Monastery," I noticed that the driver was a Negro. He turned, looked at me and snapped "Are you a priest?"
I answered no, "Are you an Episcopalian?" The retort was "I am not a Christian." And we were off!
Fairly accurately, he clicked off various faults of the Christian church. He described it as the creation of whites; that Christ was dead 300 years before the church (as we know it) was born; that Christ was as black as he; that the King James Bible was written by poets for the people as they learned to read, to lead them astray; that man is supreme, and on and on.
He referred to early Christian missionary strategy as a way to gain control of the natural resources of Africa, its diamonds and minerals.
What does he conjecture for the contemporary who sees faults in the institutional church and believes that all men are equal? The Black Muslim described him with a story - there were two boats crossing a river, each with segregated (black and white) passengers. The white man, in question, alone saw a gaping hole and gushing water and realized his boat was sinking. He immediately got on board the black boat for the journey. The driver continued, saying the white man, with his desperate action, was driving himself into the river.
Questions about James Baldwin's article in the November 19 New Yorker brought forth "All Negroes in power agree with my religion but they can't say so because of their fear for their jobs, their positions." He was pretty convincing! What would you have countered with, had you been in that cab?