Former US Vice President Joe Biden delivered a passionate rebuke of the "domestic terrorism of white supremacy," on Sunday morning at the 56th memorial observance of the 1963 bombing at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama that killed four African American girls.

"We must acknowledge that there can be no realization of the American dream without grappling with the original sin of slavery, brought to these shores over 400 years ago. And the centuries-long campaign of violence, fear, trauma wrought upon black people in this country."

Biden also acknowledged that white people, no matter their efforts, can never truly understand how racism and hate have affected African Americans throughout the country's history. He also warned that despite all people being equal was one of the truths America held as "self evident" as a nation still "we have not relegated racism and white supremacy to the pages of history." Read more here.

In what is believed to be the first payment of its kind, Glasgow University is to pay £20m in reparations to atone for its historical links to the transatlantic slave trade. In what has described as a “bold, historic” move, it has signed an agreement with the University of the West Indies to fund a joint centre for development research. The University discovered last year it had benefited financially from Scottish slave traders in the 18th and 19th centuries by between £16.7m and £198m in today’s money. Graham Campbell, who became the city’s first councillor of African-Caribbean descent in 2017, welcomed the agreement. “Our mutual recognition of the appalling consequences of that past – an indictment of Scottish inhumanity over centuries towards enslaved Africans – are the justifications that are at the root of the modern-day racism that we fight now. This action is a necessary first step in the fight against institutionalised racism and discrimination in Scotland and the UK and for the international fight for reparative justice.” Read more here and here.

Mayor of London Sadiq Khan has endorsed a proposal for a British slavery museum in the city to help combat modern-day racism as "welcome and timely". The idea has come from the Fabian Society which says the museum could help address discrimination against London’s black and minority ethnic population by challenging centuries-old tropes about racial inferiority.

The Fabian Society report in which the suggestion is made quotes Omar Khan, the director of the Runnymede Trust: “Until and unless Britain comes to terms with this history it will be impossible to understand much less eradicate the views that continue to justify racial inequalities today. It is unacceptable that the capital city of a nation that built a global empire and its wealth in large part as a result of its role in the slave trade has no significant museum or monument marking the role that London and Britain played in these historic atrocities." Bristol, Liverpool and London were the three main cities to benefit from the slave trade. Both Bristol and Liverpool already have museums covering this aspect of our history.

David Olusoga, historian and presenter of the BBC Two documentary, Britain’s Forgotten Slave Owners, also endorsed the proposed museum.  “The impact of the slave trade and enslavement is already stamped onto the fabric of London, but in ways we have learnt not to notice. Britain played a central role in the Atlantic slave trade and the fortunes built on the back of slavery flowed back to Britain. A new museum, in the heart of the city, would help us to acknowledge a history that for the most part is hidden in plain sight.”

Omar Khan added history dictated that the government and London’s financial sector had a “moral obligation” to help fund a museum.

​Read an article on this story here. Read the Fabian Society release here.

MJR trustee Dr Joe Aldred has written this excellent article (though we do say so ourselves) reflecting on racism in contemporary Britain. Here is part of his introduction:

This presentation is divided into four main, but short, sections. First, I say something about the nature of race and racism; second, I consider the case of Kelso Cochrane as exhibit number one; third, I consider Brexit as exhibit number two; and fourth, I consider the question, ‘is racism over?’  In conclusion, I offer four p’s for coping with racism, psychology, protection, protest, and power.

​Read the full article here.

St Catharine’s College, Cambridge has admitted that a bell it had on display for decades was originally from a slave plantation in Guyana. The bell, which carried the inscription "De Catherina 1772”, will be donated to the Rijksmueeum in Amsterdam, Holland for a major exhibition on slavery next year. The action follows the Cambridge University announcement of an inquiry into how the 800-year-old institution benefited from the slave trade, which was responded to by MJR. ​The bell was initially hung in a belfry outside the Porter’s lodge where it was used to “summon College residents to food and to prayer”, but in 1994 it was moved to a less prominent position and arlier this year it was “shuttered” from view while its origins were investigated. Read more here.

The slavery exhibition at the Rijksmuseum, the Dutch national museum, will focus on slavery in the Dutch colonial period, from the 17th to the 19th century, and will testify to the fact that "slavery is an integral part of our history, not a dark page that can be simply turned and forgotten about". The exhibition will run from September 25 2020 to January 17 2021. More information here.

Last week's Church of England General Synod unanimously backed a motion that churches should play a key role in combating serious youth violence in their communities. The motion called upon the churches to be pro-active rather than continue to be mostly reactive. 

Introducing the debate, Canon Rosemarie Mallett said the current raised level of youth violence was “in part because successive governments have failed to understand the causes of violent youth crime. These include the pernicious nature of poverty and trauma, and risk factors like school exclusion and adverse childhood experiences, along with public-sector disinvestment nationally and locally.”

“The Church is in a unique position, and we shouldn’t let that potential for action go. We must be the Samaritan and not the Pharisee... In most places, the church has been there for generations... A place of stability and peace for families and individuals that lack both of these in their lives is invaluable.” The church could be a place of reconciliation in areas where the families of victims and perpetrators lived side by side.

The debate called for Diocesan Boards of Education to encourage alternatives to excluding children from school; for dioceses to provide more training for church leaders and for the church to work more with other organisations to provide support and pastoral care for those affected.

MJR trustee Dr Joe Aldred contributed to the debate and quoted a 2008 report in which then Bishop of Liverpool Dr James Jones, wrote of the "ruinous impact of racism, deprivation, and low self esteem on the lives of many inner city youths, rendering them vulnerable to criminality as perpetrators and victims".

Read the official statement, a Church Times article, and Dr Aldred's response in full.

This poem was especially written for the 200th anniversary of the Peterloo massacre by Andrew Rudd, Poet-in-Residence at Manchester Cathedral, and featured in the Peterloo Commemoration Service on 7th July. A collectable letterpress ‘broadside’ print of the poem is available, in a limited edition of 200. The title lettering by Stephen Raw, is taken from a clandestine banner made after the massacre. This broadside has been printed at the Incline Press, Oldham by Graham Moss and Kathy Whalen, and costs £5. Please contact Andrew Rudd if you would like one. 

The Runnymede Trust, a race equality thinktank, is urging the government to make lessons on migration, belonging and empire mandatory in every secondary school in England. The Windrush scandal has exposed a “shocking lack of understanding” at government level about the winding up of the empire. At present just 4% of pupils taking GCSE history choose the “migration to Britain” option, which also covers the topic of the British empire.

The report states: “Migration and empire are not marginal events: they are central to our national story. As it stands the story we are telling is incomplete”. The reports findings are contested by the Department of Education, however historian and broadcaster David Olusoga said: “I find it hard to believe that the Windrush scandal could have been possible if we were a country that was aware of and educated in the history of empire, decolonisation and migration after 1945.” 

​Read more here and find the report itself here.

Last Sunday's service at Manchester Cathedral to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the Peterloo Massacre was a successful balance of penitence and lament, with celebration and re-commitment to justice and equality. It was developed from a suggestion from an MJR trustee, concerned that the churches complicity in the original tragic event and the consequences for legacy should be acknowledged. 

On August 16 1819 when 60,000 people gathered at St Peter's Fields in Manchester for a peaceful protest for democratic rights, the watching magistrates – several of whom were clergymen – panicked and ordered cavalry to charge and break up the crowd. What became known as the Peterloo Massacre saw at least 15 deaths and several hundred injuries, many of them life-changing. The churches mostly took the side of the authorities. This event was hugely influential politically and formative in the emerging radical character of a growing city. This character would include the dismissing of the church by the ordinary working people as being not for “us” but a part of “them”. 

The legacy of such events is carried down the generations to the present day, so we felt this significant anniversary was a crucial time to make a statement. A large congregation, including a number of civic dignitaries, gathered to participate in and be challenged by prayers, art, poetry, testimony and music. Worth particular mention is poet Andrew Rudd's “Rants, Whispers and Cries: Thinking of Peterloo” with its six “Beware-itudes” (depicted in banners by artist Stephen Rawe) which drew modern parallels with the tragedy of the original event. This all led up to an inspiring message about peace, peacemaking and the Prince of Peace from Rev Dr Deirdre Brower-Latz, principal of MJR partner the Nazarene Theological College, which was followed by a Holy Spirit-filled piece of improvised music from classical music ensemble ‘Epiphany’ which captured the moment and atmosphere superbly.

At their June 27 meeting the trustees of MJR decided to defer the Zong Project until such times as sufficient funding is found.

The decision was as follows:

• The project to sail the 'Zong' replica slave-ship round UK ports would be put on the ‘backburner’, pending such a time as when adequate funding becomes available. 
• MJR will continue to pray and take advice as to future timings and activities; and concentrate resources into existing commitments such as the exhibition, research and developing resources.

It is important to emphasise that we still believe in the Zong Project as an idea and concept worth doing to raise the profile of legacy issues. But, with some disappointment, we have had to postpone again, as we cannot as charity trustees legally commit to a project that is not fully funded. The funding that has been raised is being used to create the exhibition that would have toured with the ship, and we intend to take this to the ports (by other means!) to support and encourage the local support that is a vital component of the MJR vision.

We will also now be reflecting on and re-visiting that original vision and other aspects of it that have arguably been sidelined by the effort expended in trying to get the Zong Project to happen. This re-focussing and re-calibrating process will be in a context of prayer and we ask those of you who do to join us in taking this vision back to God for fresh revelation. And to consider other ways in which you could offer input and support.