On July 29, 2008, history was made in the United States House of Representatives – well, kinda. Last week, the House formally apologized for slavery, Jim Crow, and for the racist social consequences that have followed. Never before has the U.S. government publicly apologized for the social institution that reduced Africans to chattel. On one hand, I was humbled, not by the apology, but by the tremendous sacrifice that led to it. To be in a moment where the U.S. House of Representatives publicly apologizes for slavery is certainly a testament to some level of social progress. And because any and all societal progress that black people have experienced is due mostly to the courage, perseverance, and radical love of everyday black folk, this progress should certainly be acknowledged. So I want to preface the remainder of this piece by paying homage to those who have paved the way.

Nonetheless, social progress notwithstanding, my initial reaction sounded something like this: “Really, an apology?!” As I sat with my thoughts, I was filled with an amalgam of emotions. I found it humorous (in a laugh-to-keep-from-crying kind of way), insulting (when considered vis-à-vis the racist realities that still dominate black and brown American life), and angering (at this juncture in our history, is this really all there is to our government’s analysis of America’s race problem?). An excerpt from Cornel West’s Race Matters will help to contextualize my thoughts:

Black people in the United States differ from all other modern people owing to the unprecedented levels of unregulated and unrestrained violence directed at them. No other people have been taught to hate themselves – psychic violence – reinforced by the powers of state and civic coercion – physical violence – for the primary purpose of controlling their minds and exploiting their labor for nearly four hundred years.

Some people, however, might posit that I’m being unfair, or at least a little harsh. What if the apology was sincere? What if there was real penitence present? As Christians, are we not called to forgive, “Not seven, but seventy times seven?”

I affirm the need to forgive. However, in this situation it is even more vital to remember the meaning of repentance. The Greek word for repent is “metanoia” and it means to change one’s mind or purpose. The U.S. government, regardless of any apology, cannot be properly forgiven because it has not undergone a sincere “metanoia.” For this apology to yield any meaningful sincerity, it must be reinforced by real, concrete action. A great starting point would be to cease building prisons in lieu of quality schools. This would contribute not only to the reconstruction of black families, but all poor families ravaged by our corrupt legal system. Sadly, this act of sincere repentance (and it is only one of many possibilities) will probably not happen, mainly because of a nagging feeling I had when I first heard of the apology. I had this strange feeling that the apology came with the House members sitting down, so as to protect their wallets. Real American repentance for racism is going to cost us, not just sentiment but also money, and a lot of it. That said, now let’s see how sincerely repentant our government is.

Ben Sanders III received his Master of Divinity degree from Union Theological Seminary in New York City and is a Ph.D. student at the Iliff School of Theology and the University of Denver. His interests include liberation theologies, and the study of the theological and ethical implications of black religion, race, and racialization.

Slavery in the United States did not end in a night or even a year or decade. Even now, long past slavery's demise, the twin poisons of racism and class oppression echo as terrible reverberations from our forefathers' horrific acceptance and perpetuation of brutal violence against their fellow humans. The whips and chains are gone, but the hatred and violence too often well up while inequitable social policies ensure the longevity of poverty for certain classes of people. Even after 150 years, we in the U.S. have a long road ahead in the abolition of racism and class oppression.

I begin with the U.S. because the timeline of our own struggle means everything when examining the hopes of India's Dalits. Yes, India is changing, but how quickly can a nation change social mindsets that have endured for well over 2,500 years, longer than any known form of human oppression? How do we even begin to dislodge a system ... Read the full entry »

In the shadow of India's economic miracle lies a people often deemed untouchable, largely impoverished, and seemingly invisible. Bubbling beneath the shimmering image of a new India is a cauldron of inequality, caste-based subordination, and religious tension that could boil over into even greater civil strife and violence. At the center of these forces lies the Dalit struggle. While Dalit rights are often denied and hopes are crushed, growing political, economic, and spiritual empowerment is fueling a movement for liberation. The emancipation of the Dalits could serve as the key to securing India's nonsectarian, democratic future. However, this future collides with the ancient system of castes, which still confers profound benefits or burdens upon Indians simply because of their birth names.

For more than 3,000 years, the caste system has divided Indian society into four distinct classes, or varnas. Outside this system are the Dalits, who according to caste are not considered part of human society and are therefore less than fully human. While untouchability was outlawed in the 1950 Constitution and atrocities against Dalits are prohibited through the 1989 Prevention of Atrocities Act, a lack of political will and widespread corruption at all levels makes the law all but obsolete. Untouchability remains particularly acute in the rural areas of India, where 70 percent of the population still resides. While a great deal has changed in the sprawling and more tolerant cities, in rural areas people's entire lives are circumscribed by a caste identity that suffocates their dignity and segregates their lives.

The Dalit population approximates that of the entire United States. Imagine the U.S. population living in a perpetual state of discrimination and marginalization. This should strike a familiar chord with our own recent history with Jim Crow segregation. According to Joseph D'souza, president of the Dalit Freedom Network and All India Christian Council, the government has outlawed the symptoms of untouchability but ignores the actual disease of caste that still relegates nearly 250 million people to an apartheid-like existence. Comparing the Dalit struggle to a system of apartheid may seem like hyperbole. However, the entrenched system of caste systematically subordinates a large segment of Indian society.

The name "Dalit" means "broken" or "ground down." Approximately 25 percent of India's vast population is Dalit. To this day, people from higher castes refuse to marry Dalits; they are relegated to occupations that are considered degrading; most caste Hindus will not eat or drink with Dalits; and the majority of bonded laborers and sexual slaves in India are Dalit. Caste is part of a Hindu belief that people inherit their stations in life based on the sins and good deeds of past lives. Despite signs of economic mobility, Dalits are often the victims of dehumanizing acts of violence and humiliation designed to keep them in their place. As I learned more about the mounting crisis of AIDS in India, it is the Dalits who are most prone to be living with HIV and most likely to die a painful death from the disease.

I first heard about the Dalit struggle at the World Conference Against Racism, Xenophobia, and Discrimination in 2001. A large contingent of Dalit activists were present in full force. Their message was that the entrenched caste system in Southeast Asia was equivalent to racism and that their voices could no longer be silenced. Unfortunately, their voices were drowned by so many other oppressed voices vying for global attention, and by the controversy around the pulling out of the U.S. delegation.

It took another six years for the Dalit struggle to capture my conscience. In a presentation about the modern-day system of slavery, Gary Haugen, director of the International Justice Mission, based in Washington, D.C., described India as the worst abuser of human trafficking in the world. During a series of meetings over the past year, Rev. Sam Paul, national secretary of public affairs for the All India Christian Council, and Dr. Joseph D'souza have brought the Dalit struggle even closer to home, asking Sojourners to become engaged in the international Dalit freedom movement.

A year later I find myself in the crucible of the Dalit struggle, spending a week with the Dalit Freedom Network and the All India Christian Council, visiting one of the provinces in India that is hardest hit by Christian persecution and Dalit oppression. In many parts of India, the Dalit struggle intersects directly with the issue of religious freedom, as nearly 70 percent of Christians in India are Dalit. While Christians constitute a small minority in India, 2 to 3 percent of the population still translates into roughly 30 million people. Many Dalits and tribal caste people converted to Christianity in order to escape religiously sanctioned inferiority within Hinduism, drawn to a new identity and equality in Christ. However, many in India cling to the notion that India is a Hindu nation and that to be Indian is to be Hindu. Dalit Christians are thus twice-oppressed, once as the outcasts, and then again as members of an often-despised faith. This series will explore the Dalit struggle based on my experiences over the past week through what has felt like a baptism by fire. I hope and pray that you will join me in learning more about this modern system of apartheid.

Adam Taylor is the senior political director for Sojourners. To learn more, read Hidden Apartheid: Caste Discrimination against India's "Untouchables." Feb. 2007

Nothing has exposed the severe ethical troubles of the world´s second largest burger chain quite so lucidly as a slave break in Florida´s tomato country in November.

Burger King, under fire for turning a blind eye to the rampant human rights abuses in the fields where they buy their tomatoes, decided to react. But in lieu of taking responsibility for the conditions, like McDonald´s, Pizza Hut, and Taco Bell have in recent years, Burger King opted to deny that farmworker enslavement and sub-poverty wages exist.

In mid-November, Burger King led a high profile press tour through Immokalee, Fla – the epicenter of our nation´s fresh tomato production and home to the award-winning farmworker group, the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW).

The CIW has unearthed, investigated, and assisted federal officials in prosecuting five forced labor operations in Florida agriculture in the last decade alone – resulting in the liberation of more than 1,000 people. By working together with people of faith across the country, the CIW has persuaded a number of major fast food restaurants to sign on to codes of conduct that establish a zero-tolerance policy for modern-day slavery.

Yet on Nov. 20, a so-called independent auditor accompanying Burger King on its press junket through Immokalee was quoted in the Miami Herald dismissing the CIW´s accusations of widespread abuse, stating: "We have found no slave labor."

The very same day, Nov. 20, a report was filed with the Sheriff´s office in Immokalee by three men - all of them tomato pickers - who had broken through the ventilation hatch of a U-haul truck their employers had locked them in and escaped. Earlier this month, their employers were indicted in federal court on charges of indentured servitude and peonage.

U.S. Attorney Doug Molloy called the operation – which, interestingly, was situated just three blocks from where Burger King was hosting its press tour – "slavery, plain and simple."

Why does slavery still exist? Slavery flourishes in U.S. agriculture because the everyday reality of sweatshop conditions provides the fertile soil that enable it to sprout, time and time again.

Farmworkers are among the least paid workers in the nation; to make $50 in a day, a worker must pick nearly two tons of tomatoes one-by-one. The back-breaking work they perform – without any benefits whatsoever – beneath a brutal sun (and at times a brutal crewleader) makes possible the food that nourishes our families and ourselves.

Until we fix a system that allows exploitation to be the norm, we´d be amiss to assume that the most extreme forms of that exploitation – human enslavement – will just vanish.

As such, Burger King would do well to carefully examine James 5:4 :

Behold, the wages you withheld from the workers who harvested your fields are crying aloud, and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord.

So too have these cries reached the ears of the Lord´s followers – accordingly, Burger King must and will be guided down the path toward justice.

Jordan Buckley works with Interfaith Action of Southwest Florida (interfaithact.org), animating people of faith to collaborate with farmworkers to eliminate modern-day slavery and sweatshop conditions in the U.S. agriculture industry.