What the ONE Conference Hopes to Avoid

I'm neck deep in event planning and message prep for next week's conference on racial reconciliation, so I'll be brief. I do, however, need to mention what the ONE event will not be about. I've run into a good deal of honest skepticism, mostly connected to previous movements of reconciliation that didn't pan out as advertised. So, for the sake of brevity let me quote Eugene Rivers from the book The Gospel in Black & White, edited by Dennis L. Okholm:

"I don't care how many football stadiums you all go to, and hug and cry and shout, if it is not bathed in the practice of telling the truth to my brothers and sisters and the practice of a spiritual discipline - of justice - then we're shuckin' and jivin'. So when we talk about reconciliation, I love to hug you, I love to cry, I love to beat my chest and howl at the moon. But in the absence of the truth, in the absence of justice, in the absence of compassion and forgiveness, we're living a lie. It's a lot of 'feels good.' It's a lot of 'sounds good.' It's a good photo op. It's great public relations. I can use it for fundraising purposes, especially when I get that one with the black and white boys hugging each other. Send that out and call it reconciliation. I can make a lot of money. But minus justice, minus the truth, we're living a lie."

I want ONE to be an event, and I hope it will be part of a larger missional, racial reconciliation movement, that is committed to the truth and committed to justice. Truth, because Jesus Himself is the "way, the truth, and the life." Justice, because the Cross is the ultimate vindication of the righteousness and rightness of God. We, at ONE conference, do not want this to be a reconciliation event about reconciliation. We want it to be a reconciliation event about the Reconciler.