It has been discussed that million subscriber Christian Youtuber Allen Parr is a gatekeeper to real discernment and is thus harmful to his audience, yet the theological issues surrounding Parr go deeper than his tendencies to pet wolves within the church and call them brothers. He is a soft proponent of Critical Race Theory and Social Justice, thus leading him to platform the author of Woke Church, Eric Mason for a conversation about “discerning truth from error.”
Eric Mason is one of the most prominent race-baiters in the Evangelical church today. Whereas Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson have irrevocably tarnished brands, Mason is less famous, so he is able to subversively infuse the same ideas into church circles. Like Parr, Mason attended Dallas Theological Seminary and served under Tony Evans, whom Parr admires, at Oak Cliff Bible Fellowship. Acts29, through Matt Chandler, was a major proponent of the Woke Church movement, with Chandler endorsing the book and its ideas. Mason is known for using Exodus to support modern reparations for slavery and has called black people who do not align with him “Angloids on the inside,” meaning that Voddie Baucham and Virgil Walker are not black. This is consistent with Critical Race Theory where one can be a black body but not a black voice. From this man, Allen Parr thinks his audience can glean wisdom.
At the beginning of the interview, Mason states that his emphasis on “racial reconciliation” is apologetic in nature, that he is contending for the faith. Basically, Mason describes a deeply held distrust of Christianity and a fundamental distrust of whites pertaining to religion, politics, and issues of “social impact.” He blames the “Western Church” and doctrine of demons for this strife.
Politics and Religion
Mason asserts that equating politics with faith is the biggest false teaching in the church today, to which Parr agrees. Parr laments political differences between “Christians” causing divisions within the church, as if these divisions are baseless and politics does not reflect theology. Parr’s mentality is that one should “build a bridge” with that “Christian,” not a barrier.
While this might have been true at some point in time, there is no biblical justification for voting for a party that stands primarily for abortion and homosexuality. This is not to prescribe voting for a Republican candidate, where conscious might dictate not voting at all as the best decision, American politics has become religious in nature. The Rainbow Jihad is a state sponsored cult. Abortion is viewed as a sacrament that must be state sponsored. With the increasing weaponization of the State, voting democrat in Colorado means you are sinning against Jack Phillips. The same is true in other states for a variety of Christian businesses, foster care organizations, or educational facilities. The religion of Branch Covidianism, as advocated by the political system, upended many businesses, shuttered churches, and imposed the idolatry of masks and poisonous vaccines upon the populace. The State has its desired religion.
Woke Church
Allen Parr then shifts the conversation into the topic of what is “woke,” asking Mason to define his terms. Mason begins by stating that the term was hijacked by the far left, having originated in black circles before being coopted, yet defines it as a consciousness to racial issues in America that one is “not asleep” to those issues. Mason asserts that the gays coopted the term in their campaign, altering the meaning in the process. Mason then speaks to the “double consciousness” that W.E.B. Du Bois wrote about, something that Benjamin Watson also used to define “woke.”
As was said against Benjamin Watson:
This notion of “double consciousness and all its implications” is exactly what the term woke means in its current context. Nothing has changed. In its present form, the term “woke” arose out of the assertion of social awareness or conscientiousness, often to perceived implicit or explicit problems through the lens of cultural Marxist ideologies. This encompassed hyper-sensitivities to language and the invention of microaggressions.
Instead of proletariat and bourgeois, the Marxist lens of Critical Race Theory views society as black vs. white. This racial ideology naturally lends itself to being adopted by other groups who can interchange the components for their preferred cause. While Mason might assert that the term has been hijacked, the Rainbow Jihad is using the term in its proper context, only that the “social awareness” has evolved to include other “marginalized” groups. This notion of social awareness or conscientiousness is inherently post modern in its emphasis on experience over empirical reality. In application, “double consciousness” is simply double emphasis on the speck in thy brother’s eye when there are two planks in thine own eyes.
Mason uses Matthew 23:23, where Jesus said, “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cummin, and have neglected the weightier provisions of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness; but these are the things you should have done without neglecting the others.” He then emphasizes the “justice and mercy” to equate to his definitions of justice, which is social justice.
Parr then explains that what happened to the term woke also happened to “Critical Race Theory” and “Social Justice” where other ideologies were grafted on to the term. With social justice, Parr describes how black people think it means issues of police brutality and accountability, fair trials, and equal sentencing. In reality, that is the motte and bailey where the real grievance is against the systems, which is why police brutality is racism even when committed by blacks, rather than the subculture in which incidents occur.
What happens is the Conservative Christian Camp, of which I am a Conservative Christian by the way…but let me just say the far right has taken that term and they will say lgbtq plus rights the or the right for women to abort their babies because all of that is social justice so you got to be careful to make sure you define these terms before you start passing judgment on somebody who says yes I’m for social justice, or yes I’m woke, or yes I am for CRT.
Parr believes these terms are loaded and proceeds to blame the right for adding these connotations to Social Justice as if these were not organically added to the definition of Social Justice by its own advocates. Without provocation, the Black Lives Matter movement added the gay and transgender agenda to the BLM cause:
We are guided by the fact that all Black lives matter, regardless of actual or perceived sexual identity, gender identity, gender expression, economic status, ability, disability, religious beliefs or disbeliefs, immigration status, or location.
Likewise, they also sought to “disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family.” Neither “the right” nor Conservative Christians added these connotations to CRT, BLM, or the term “woke.” The cultural Marxists did this of their own volition. To say there is no correlation between abortion and the rest of the social justice agenda is asinine, as CNN exit polling found that 83% of black voters, including 90% of black women, voted for abortion via Michigan’s Prop 3 in the 2022 midterm elections. Access to abortion is viewed as a social justice issue by the so-called black church. Despite having under 13% of the state population, Philadelphia, home of Mason’s Epiphany Fellowship Church, has 41% of Pennsylvania’s abortions, of whom 47% are repeat customers and at least 44% are black. Then again, Eric Mason previously blamed white people for the prevalence of abortion in the black community. The only people who delineate “racial injustice” from these other liberal movements are those in the woke church.
Parr would claim he is a “conservative Christian,” but he is punching at the Conservative Christians in favor of affirming the faith of those who hold to racial idolatry in the black community. Parr has no qualms name-dropping Voddie Baucham, an “Angloid,” but displayed no interest in debating the merits of whether Christians should be woke or indulge in Critical Race Theory. He has no interest in addressing the fact that CRT imputes sin on account of race and enacts partiality towards preferred groups based on perceived power imbalances. Eric Mason has a history of exhibiting partiality on account of race, and Parr is a bobble head to Mason as he peddles his woke ideology.
Despite the harms liberal ideologies have wrought upon the black community, there is, as Eric Mason described, a fundamental distrust towards whites, which rather than rectify through the gospel, they would rather pursue anti-white ideologies under the guise of Christianity. They do this to the detriment of the black community.
Allen Parr is gleefully platforming wolves like Eric Mason while gatekeeping real discernment within the church. Rather than build a bridge, we should build barriers to the hazards of Allen Parr.
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12 Responses
Firstly, he accuses men like Voddie, but has obviously never bothered to actually listen to anything Voddie has said about the subject. If he had, he would know that critical theory, which underlies CRT, “queer theory”, etc. was invented by white individuals, such as Foucault, who was a homosexual pedophile. He would know that it is an extensive philosophical belief system and worldview, which is completely antithetical to scripture.
By publicly judging and condemning men like Voddie Bauchum, without bothering or caring to even look into what they say, he has severely born false witness.
A born again Christian will not continue in sin (1 John 3:8-9). If Parr is a Christian, he needs to repent of falsely accusing other black men with whom he disagrees. False accusation is a serious sin. Deut 19:18-19 says the false accuser is to receive the same punishment as the accused would’ve received, and that we are to have no pity for the false accuser.
If he’s going to go around falsely accusing, while simultaneously demanding pity and compassion, he is in direct conflict with God’s word. A false accuser is not to be pitied.
Secondly, as was mentioned in the article, the biggest and loudest proponents of CRT are the same who conflated abominable sin with issues of race. BLM did that. Many blacks did that. I can remember posting under articles, written by prominent black individuals, many years ago how wrong it was to conflate skin color with abominable sin, continually saying “look here, you might as well be trying to wickedly say that it’s a sin to be black”. Many whites spoke up against it.
That wicked conflation of skin color to abominable sin goes way back – to the era of segregation and prior. And it is the fault of many wicked-minded individuals of all colors of skin.
Parr needs to be responsible enough to educate himself if he’s going to speak. If he doesn’t, he is going to inevitably bear false witness and falsely accuse.
The reason BLM conflates the two is simply because they’re not really pushing CRT, they’re pushing the underlying CT and all its derivations.
Feminist theory is another derivation of CT. BLM’s roots trace back to feminists.
The conflation goes back decades, but in the modern era the conflation of feminism with issues of race is significantly attributable to back-room deal-making with organizations like the NAACP, during the era of roe v wade. At times such mutual back-scratching has taken the lead, and CT was brought along with it.
If Parr wants to find the real culprits, he’d be wise not to ignore the feminists. In may ways, they pretty much run the CT show.
The issue of reparations is more difficult. It is biblical to make amends for wrongdoing, in some cases I believe as much as ten-fold. And it is not marxist to make amends. The critical theorists want to destroy the system, and put marxism in its place. They don’t really care about any sort of one-time reparation payment.
It’s biblical to make amends. Repentance is not just a matter of words, it’s also a matter of deeds – turning from sin, and righting your wrongs.
But there are many, many problems with the reparations idea.
For one, it begs the question who’s guilty. The guilty parties are all long dead. They were mostly British, Spanish, and African. So who is accountable? If you’re going to say, well those who bought and owned the slaves are the most guilty, and those who sold and trafficked them are not, that cannot work. You can’t stop at that point in the line of reasoning. You’d have to follow it through, essentially implying that any and all who bought the cotton were more guilty than those who owned the plantations. Same logic.
It begs another question, what about all others who’ve been done wrong. The covid mess is a good example. Federal, state, and local governments destroyed many lives and livelihoods. Is the government (taxpayer) going to also provide compensation for other such wrongs?
And another question, how much has already been paid, from loss of life and destruction of the civil war, to social programs, and everything in between.
There are many such questions and many problems with the idea. I don’t have the answers, and personally believe it’s not workable or feasible, but I’d say we should always debate from the standpoint of scripture. The concept of making amends and righting wrongs is very biblical, so don’t sidestep or ignore it. It is not a marxist idea (though the marxists may be trying to leverage it). It’s a different and distinct subject.
One of the main problems is inflation. If the government borrows another ten trillion to pay those reparation payments, and shoves all that fiat cash into circulation, it would create massive inflation – and I mean huge inflation. And inflation always most harms the poorest among us. Knowingly doing something like that would directly conflict with scripture, including Jesus’ own commandments to care for the poor.
Another problem is what is loving and what is not. Are you going to hand a drug addict a million dollar check? Is that love? Within five minutes they’ll have killed themselves. Obviously few blacks are drug addicts, but the point is there would be such instances, and many such questions.
It’s a very difficult problem.
You could create a much shorter list, working back the other way, and just ask, who hasn’t suffered loss as a result of government actions?
FDR stealing the gold. There’s a near infinitude of examples.
And why stop at one instance in time, 400 years ago. Is 400 years some sort of magic number?
Who’s ancestors weren’t done wrong by someone somewhere at some time?
Difficult problem, big can of worms.
This nation didn’t even exist 400 years ago. So I guess the British and Spanish should pay? Certain African tribes should pay also?
What about the Vatican? It has plenty of money, and it was complicit (in direct violation of scripture)
Considering it was a worldwide practice, who should pay? The UN? Well, we fund most of the UN.
Who was actually wronged? Not all blacks were slaves. Some were actually slave owners. Others free.
Who’s guilty. Who pays. Who was wronged. And so on. It’s a massive can of worms. Just the bureaucracy required to oversee it all would cost trillions – which the poor would suffer for the most.
We cannot take from someone who did no wrong, and give it to someone who wasn’t wronged. We cannot do it. We cannot advocate for it. That’s outright theft. Thou shalt not steal.
They like to say all whites benefited and all blacks were wronged, but they have no concrete substantiation for that claim. The facts actually indicate otherwise.
I could think of and post questions and problems all day long.
But the point is that any measures taken would have to align with God’s standards.
If you want to pinpoint when and how it started, you cannot ignore the case of Anthony Johnson vs John Casor in 1655. Perhaps Mr. Johnson, a former indentured servant himself, personally believed that Casor’s term of indentured servitude had not ended. I don’t know. But the court ruling was that Casor was deemed to be Johnson’s property for life.
As Wikipedia notes “This was the first instance of a judicial determination in the Thirteen Colonies holding that a person who had committed no crime could be held in servitude for life.”
In other words, that’s pretty much when indentured servitude (working off debts), became chattel slavery (ownership of human beings).
The judge in the case, and British crown would be the responsible parties, and any and all who later appealed to the case to justify ownership would be complicit, which includes, of course, Johnson himself, regardless of what he may have actually argued in court.
The point being, if they’re going to hold the descendants of slave owners responsible, they cannot ignore the descendants of Anthony Johnson, and other black slave owners. They would also have to pay.
Of course, some try to claim that any mention of the case at all is “white supremacy” but that couldn’t be further from the truth, at least in this case here. I don’t mention it out of racism. I mention it to point out the fact that the idea of reparations is a very difficult problem,if we are going to handle things in a manner that is in line with God’s standards. I mention it specifically because I will not deny that God’s word instructs that amends should be made, and wrongs should be righted, regardless of color of skin. I mention it because I don’t have the answers to such difficult problems, but I do know that we must follow God’s standards.
If the measure of guilt is to take from the entities and lineages that gained the most, then the most guilty culprits are entities such as the British and Spanish crowns, the Church of England (Anglican), and the Roman Catholic Church.
It is antithetical to scripture to measure guilt in such a manner. But by the reasoning of reparations-supporters, and their standard of measuring guilt, they cannot ignore the culprits who gained the most.
It is not a simple problem.
Those entities not only gained the most, they had the most power to stop it. Yet instead they encouraged it, knowing full well that the practice violates God’s word – which Peter makes very clear in his epistles, and which all Apostles and early church leaders made very clear by working to end the practice in ancient Rome – eventually succeeding.