On November 4th, the Carver Project hosted public dialogue between author Jemar Tisby and John Inazu on Tisby’s acclaimed book The Color of Compromise: The Truth about the American Church’s Complicity in Racism. Tisby’s book reveals the chilling connection between the church and racism throughout American history. A survey of the ways Christians of the past have reinforced theories of racial superiority and inferiority provides motivation for a series of bold actions Tisby asserts believers must take to forge a future of equity and justice.

Tisby serves as president of The Witness, a Black Christian Collective. He is also the co-host of the Pass The Mic podcast. He is currently completing his dissertation as part of the PhD program in history at the University of Mississippi. Prior to graduate school, Tisby served for seven years as a teacher and then principal of at KIPP Delta College Preparatory School.

Inazu is the Sally D. Danforth Distinguished Professor of Law and Religion and holds a joint appointment in the Washington University School of Law and the John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics. Professor Inazu’s scholarship focuses on the First Amendment freedoms of speech, assembly, and religion, and related questions of legal and political theory.

The John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics was a cosponsor of this program presented by The Carver Project.

Photography by Kelly Park.