“The constraint—the predestination—is so strong that it requires ending everything to envision a new way of relating,” writes Elisa Gonzalez in her issue 24 essay about Marilynne Robinson and the Black church, “No Good Has Come.” “To see each other’s souls, that miracle that leaves the world but not the seer untouched, they must commit an act of imagined violence: de-create to create.” On August 17th, Elisa will be joined in conversation by Point author Aaron Robertson, whose essay from issue 22, “It Was More Than a Notion,” chronicled the history of the Black Christian nationalist experiment of Albert Cleage, Jr., in Detroit. In both of their essays, they ask: Can the Christian church be a just institution? How effectively can interpersonal relationships help us stage a “new way of relating” to one another—as fellow believers, citizens, lovers and friends? In the U.S., why do we still speak of interracialism and integration so clumsily, without a clear sense of why we think it is a virtuous goal to pursue, or what it might mean?

Moderated by Phil Christman.

Tuesday, August 17th at 5 p.m. CT / 6 p.m. ET.
Co-hosted by Plough magazine. Register to receive the Zoom link.