Epworth Church’s new initiative, Learning Community @ Epworth, aims to reach across divided politics and beliefs by bringing people together to learn and discover common ground. To kick off the learning series, Epworth will host John Archibald, two-time Pulitzer Prize winner in journalism and author of Shaking the Gates of Hell: A Search for Family and Truth in the Wake of the Civil Rights Revolution, published in 2021 and included as one of NPR’s favorite books of the year.
In his book, Archibald struggles with his image of his father, a Methodist pastor, as a moral authority in his life and his father’s seeming lack of engagement with the Civil Rights Movement in Alabama where he pastored. Archibald discovers the pressure the Methodist Church, among most Christian churches in the South, placed on pastors to remain silent or guard their words regarding the struggle for racial justice. Yet, he knew of his father’s support for racial equity.
John also shares his father’s acceptance of his queer brother, Murray Archibald and his husband, Steve Elkins, founders of CAMP Rehoboth. Still, his father never used his pulpit to speak up for LGBTQ justice. John’s book wrestles with the sin of silence, which always benefits the oppressor and not the oppressed. He writes not to condemn, but to learn from the past and change behavior in the future.
John will offer a presentation followed by a panel discussion. Epworth United Methodist Church invites everyone to attend the event on March 23 at 7:00 p.m. to learn and have conversations, and to create new relationships. That’s how the church will “shake the gates of hell:” one relationship at a time. Come, be a part of the change.
