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By Jonathan Petre, Religion Correspondent (Filed: 09/02/2006)
Two hundred years after Anglican reformers helped to abolish the slave trade, the Church of England has apologised for profiting from it.
Last night the General Synod acknowledged complicity in the trade after hearing that the Church had run a slave plantation in the West Indies and that individual bishops had owned hundreds of slaves.
Dr Rowan Williams: Apology 'necessary'
It voted unanimously to apologise to the descendents of the slaves after an emotional debate in which the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, urged the Church to share the "shame and sinfulness of our predecessors".
The Church's missionary arm, the Society for the Propagation of the Faith in Foreign Parts, owned the Codrington plantation in Barbados and slaves had the word "Society" branded on their chests with red-hot irons.
The Synod was told that the society's governing body included archbishops of Canterbury. Bishops of London and archbishops of York were involved in its management.
One archbishop, the Most Rev Thomas Secker, wrote to a fellow bishop in 1760: "I have long wondered and lamented that the Negroes in our plantation decrease and new supplies become necessary continually.
"Surely this proceeds from some defect, both of humanity and even of good policy. But we must take things as they are at present."
The bishop of Exeter and three business colleagues were paid nearly £13,000 to compensate them for the loss of 665 slaves in 1833.
The Rev Simon Bessant, of Blackburn, told the Synod: "We were at the heart of it; we were directly responsible for what happened." He said that, despite the efforts of Anglican reformers such as William Wilberforce, the Church was "part of the problem as well as part of the solution".
Mr Bessant amended a motion by the Bishop of Southwark, the Rt Rev Tom Butler, urging the Church to mark the bicentenary next year of the Slave Trade Act in 1807.
Bishop Butler said that a Synod apology could result in the Church becoming the "national scapegoat" for slavery when the whole country should share the guilt.
But the amendment was supported by speaker after speaker, including Dr Williams and the Archbishop of York, Dr John Sentamu.
Dr Williams said the apology was not political correctness but "necessary".
He was criticised in November after saying that missionaries "sinned" by imposing Hymns Ancient and Modern on places such as Africa.
Wha day yah mi read say the Catholic (Anglican spin-off a dem) pay out how much million, if not a billion, to all a the family who fa bwoy pickney get sodomize by the Chi Chi man priest dem.
And all dem do a come tell wi sorry fi the most atrocious acts against humans
Mi no want hear no sorry star. dat can’t help black people ya now !!!
I am also awaitng an apology from the arabs for their complicity in the slave trade!
In fact they had almost as many slaves as all the european countries did!
They had it before the europeans and then continued even after the europeans had ended their sordid slave trading!
seems like a conspiracy of silence to me!
Not so?
Some may argue that the Muslim version of slavery was not s brutal as the white man's version, it was horrible nontheless...the creation of eunuchs etc....young boys as young as 8-10 were castrated.
then the young women were made concubines or sex slaves.
That is History and fact too! Also, the arabs considered white slaves more valueable than black slaves...so race had a place in that too!
The arabs also hobbled their slaves who refused to embrace Islam.
Man jes plain evil..muslim, christian or atheist or Jew.
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It never fails, everytime someone talks about christians role in the slave trade man and man bring up the muslim slave trade to divert attention away from the obvious.
Well I will go on record to say that while the slave trade was atrocious it has nothing on the brainwashing that religion has done on our people over the years.(especially christianity)
I am with Marcus when he said that we need to teach our own brand of religion that suits our purpose(much like the Jews)
Dem a talk bout Anglican reformers and nah tell half the story. The slave trade was depressing wages in the European countries that were engaged in it and it was getting too costly to put down the uprising plus the whites that were out of a job were getting antsy as the move towards capitalism was well underway.
IN other words slavery was no longer worth it so dem fi stop with dem reformer crap if they were so against slavery where are there records on the fight against "colonialism"(another form of slavery) etc. etc.
Dem act like everything stopped 200 years ago and like slavery didn't take another form.
Dem really tek people fi idiot, then again.....
respect
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Leggo the Pearl!!! do me a beg unnu just leggo the Pearl
Originally posted by truetrini: I am also awaitng an apology from the arabs for their complicity in the slave trade!
In fact they had almost as many slaves as all the european countries did!
They had it before the europeans and then continued even after the europeans had ended their sordid slave trading!
seems like a conspiracy of silence to me!
Not so?
Some may argue that the Muslim version of slavery was not s brutal as the white man's version, it was horrible nontheless...the creation of eunuchs etc....young boys as young as 8-10 were castrated.
then the young women were made concubines or sex slaves.
That is History and fact too! Also, the arabs considered white slaves more valueable than black slaves...so race had a place in that too!
The arabs also hobbled their slaves who refused to embrace Islam.
Man jes plain evil..muslim, christian or atheist or Jew.
Hmmmm ill try again ...it needed to be highlighted nonetheless...
Respect TT its so true...lets bring back the Eastern Diaspora aswell - i just don't think that islam is ready to apologize for its involvement in the slavetrade...not fo r a forseeable future
Originally posted by Shatta_Cleve: It never fails, everytime someone talks about christians role in the slave trade man and man bring up the muslim slave trade to divert attention away from the obvious.
Well I will go on record to say that while the slave trade was atrocious it has nothing on the brainwashing that religion has done on our people over the years.(especially christianity)
I am with Marcus when he said that we need to teach our own brand of religion that suits our purpose(much like the Jews)
Dem a talk bout Anglican reformers and nah tell half the story. The slave trade was depressing wages in the European countries that were engaged in it and it was getting too costly to put down the uprising plus the whites that were out of a job were getting antsy as the move towards capitalism was well underway.
IN other words slavery was no longer worth it so dem fi stop with dem reformer crap if they were so against slavery where are there records on the fight against "colonialism"(another form of slavery) etc. etc.
Dem act like everything stopped 200 years ago and like slavery didn't take another form.
Dem really tek people fi idiot, then again.....
respect
Well fella you assume a lot...who says that I am a Christian?
Are you going to re-write history because it may suit your agenda?
Arabs traded in slaves way before Europeans did, and did it long after the europeans stopped!
I understand that oppression of blacks continue today by whites...but do you for one moment believe that the arabs don't oppress others?
Please!
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Quote:
Originally posted by Shatta_Cleve: Well I will go on record to say that while the slave trade was atrocious it has nothing on the brainwashing that religion has done on our people over the years.(especially christianity)
I am with Marcus when he said that we need to teach our own brand of religion that suits our purpose(much like the Jews)
respect
No need to reinvent it. It's everywhere we are whether in Surinam, Brazil, Cuba, Louisiana, Haiti, Saint Lucia, or Jamaica. It's so obvious that we have an abjective for it: EVIL.
How could a great thinker like Marcus have missed it? Mystery, they also call it that.
you can add the implementation of the Sharia law as the rule of law in many of the Nigerian states too not to speak of the muslim communities on the east coast of africa..
that said the "christian" involvement in the slavetrade is still present Kony being the prime example.
and then there is the catholic part in the genocide in Rwanda.
Both Religions Christianity and Islam should apologize
1) for the Slavetrade
2) the way they have seriously hampered the development of sustainable nation states in Africa
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You have misguided people in all religions, and people will use it to justify what they do. But if you dig deeper you will see how Islam instructed Muslims to treat slaves as human beings, which is opposite to what Christianity taught that slaves were less than humans. ans were numbered among the calttle. One of the first persons to convert to Islam was the Ethiopian slave Bilal (pbuh) and he rose to a high position in Islam. Slavery was a part of the system , but on the whole they were treated as part of the household, much like a "helper" today.
Unnuh stay deh feelin sorry for unnuh selves. In medieval times (the time of the prophet) the world was arranged with lords and servants. Muhammad may have had the luxury of an Ethiopian servant in Hazrat Bilal but many arabs also had arab servant. Europeans also had European servants. What history does not mention much about is the reverse, Africans with arab and/or European servants. It was a really common arrangement in medieval times and even before that.
It is kind of crazy how we fill in the void of not knowing our history with the eternal role of victim. At what point do we see the chattel slavery that devastated Africa for what it was and organize ourselves into being able to say never again? I agree that reparations should be paid to Africans and Africa for the slave trade the developed the “western world” that most of us live in today but that’s another story.
Tman, a wha kinda folly dat? Answer this: how on earth can what you have stated above(highlighted in bold below) make sense? If you're a man of African descent please run for cover now!
Regarding contemporary issues:
As best I can tell, the Moslem world rests somewhere between deafening silence on Darfur to indifference to ignorance of it - a picture more or less reflective of the West's viewpoint. It is also silent on Western Sahara, Mauritania, Chad and elsewhere.
Then, the other piece of ignorance you engage in is (again) more of that moral equivalence that fails everytime - on this occasion trying to compare the benevolence of islam over Christianity regarding the amalgamation of slaves in a slave-owning society. Folly writ large.
But, then again, I shouldn't be surprised because your "helper" statement indicates youh no have no sense of reality at all.
Quote:
You have misguided people in all religions, and people will use it to justify what they do. But if you dig deeper you will see how Islam instructed Muslims to treat slaves as human beings, which is opposite to what Christianity taught that slaves were less than humans. ans were numbered among the calttle. One of the first persons to convert to Islam was the Ethiopian slave Bilal (pbuh) and he rose to a high position in Islam. Slavery was a part of the system , but on the whole they were treated as part of the household, much like a "helper" today.
exactly....
