Calls are mounting for evangelical publication The Gospel Coalition to address a piece that called Kyle Rittenhouse an “armed mass shooter,” like the Charleston church shooter.
On Friday afternoon, Kyle Rittenhouse — an eighteen-year-old who killed two men and injured a third while defending himself during a riot in Kenosha, Wisconsin — was <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/breaking-kyle-rittenhouse-found-not-guilty">cleared</a> of multiple murder charges. Since the August 2020 incident, left-leaning journalists, politicians, and celebrities have used the Rittenhouse case as evidence that the United States and its institutions are irreparably and systemically racist.
Among these voices was The Gospel Coalition — which, before the onset of COVID-19, the death of George Floyd, and the most recent presidential election, largely had a reputation for upholding conservative theological convictions grounded in the Reformed tradition. Amid the tumult of 2020, however, The Gospel Coalition accelerated its surrender to “wokeness” — more regularly publishing content that borrows progressive terminology like “<a href="https://quarterly.gospelinlife.com/the-sin-of-racism/">systemic racism</a>” and “<a href="https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/podcasts/as-in-heaven/how-racial-trauma-works/">microaggression</a>.”
In this context, <a href="https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/profile/k-edward-copeland/">K. Edward Copeland</a> — a council member of The Gospel Coalition and an Illinois-based pastor — published an article called “<a href="https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/why-i-hate-august/">Why I Hate August</a>” that joined the Left in arguing that Rittenhouse benefited from an implicit form of privilege:
<blockquote>Kyle Rittenhouse killed people in the middle of the street (on camera and in front of witnesses) and then, smoking rifle at his side, casually strolled past law enforcement. He didn’t run away. He didn’t hide. He showed no fear. He assumed there was something about his person that would allow him to approach law enforcement with a visible semi-automatic weapon that had just taken lives — and live to tell about it. More than a few witnesses pointed out that he had just shot several people. Yet he was able to leave the scene and the state.</blockquote>
Copeland placed Rittenhouse in the same category as the Charleston church shooter — a white supremacist who murdered nine African American churchgoers during a 2015 service in Charleston, South Carolina:
<blockquote>When armed mass shooters (Kyle Rittenhouse, [Charleston church shooter], etc.) are apprehended without incident, and unarmed black people are killed out of fear that they might be armed, we have a more insidious problem than “a few bad apples.” This thing is cultural, pervasive, and abominable.</blockquote>
Per Daily Wire policy, the Charleston church shooter will not be named, and quotes containing his name have been altered to read: [Charleston church shooter].
Despite Rittenhouse’s acquittal, Copeland’s assertion has neither been removed nor addressed by The Gospel Coalition.
Though The Gospel Coalition was, unfortunately, not the only Christian publication to negatively characterize Rittenhouse, others have retracted their statements. Mere Orthodoxy recently added an editor’s note to its November 2020 piece entitled “<a href="https://mereorthodoxy.com/kyle-rittenhouse-aaron-danielson/">Death Does Not Come For The Deserving</a>,” apologizing for using words like “murderer” and “criminality” to describe Rittenhouse and his actions.
But there has been no similar action from The Gospel Coalition, despite several calls to repentance from many Reformed and evangelical theologians, ministers, and writers.
“The Kyle Rittenhouse trial is a shocking and depressing example of injustice. It’s especially saddening that Christian organizations like the Gospel Coalition joined the mob and falsely labeled Rittenhouse a ‘mass shooter like [the Charleston church shooter],’” <a href="https://twitter.com/SlowToWrite/status/1458544197301112842">commented</a> blogger Samuel Sey. “It’s shameful.”
“This article by @TGC is one of the reasons why evangelicals have remained divided by social justice. This article ignores the law &amp; villainizes an innocent man by promoting the CRT / BLM talking points,” <a href="https://twitter.com/JoshBuice/status/1462041708225601537">added</a> G3 Ministries director Josh Buice, calling The Gospel Coalition’s actions “irresponsible” and “anti-gospel.”
As described by Grace Bible Theological Seminary provost Owen Strachan in a recent <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/theologian-warns-woke-pastors-are-preaching-neo-racism-they-think-the-ultimate-medal-they-can-win-is-to-offend-no-one">interview</a> with The Daily Wire&#8217;s Megan Basham, many evangelicals “tragically are being taken captive by an ideology that has nothing to do with Scripture.”
“Pastors who formerly had a reputation for staunch Reformed doctrine that defied the world and made many disciples now are giving lukewarm lectures based in godless sociology texts,” he argued. “It is an absolute abdication of biblical conviction.”
Instead, pastors should proclaim “the uniting gospel of Jesus Christ that brings people together from every background, every skin color, every ethnicity, and proclaims that they are presently one family, by virtue of the death of Christ, and saving faith given us by God.”
“What we are now taught today,” explained Strachan, “is that white people have more sin to confess than they thought they did. They may have thought they had become Christians, and are free now from condemnation. But instead, because of this newfound structural guilt, white people who have been Christians for years and have individually committed no sin of racism are still condemned. Not personally, but structurally. They are not free in Christ, as they once believed.”

Kyle Rittenhouse

Calls Mount For Evangelical Publication To Retract Article Likening Kyle Rittenhouse To ‘Mass Shooter’

Dylann Roof

The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) has listed 10 military bases as &#8220;Confederate monuments&#8221; that need to be taken down; Fort Rucker, Fort Benning, Fort Gordon, Camp Beauregard, Fort Polk, Fort Bragg, Fort Hood, Fort A.P. Hill, Fort Lee, and Fort Pickett.
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Public monuments and statues, public schools, counties and cities, holidays, and military bases named for Confederate figures have &#8220;the potential to unleash more turmoil and bloodshed,&#8221; <a href="https://www.splcenter.org/news/2017/08/15/send-letter-its-time-take-down-confederate-monuments">warns the SPLC</a>.
<a href="https://www.splcenter.org/20160421/whose-heritage-public-symbols-confederacy">Via the SPLC</a>:
<blockquote>
Following the Charleston massacre, the Southern Poverty Law Center launched an effort to catalog and map Confederate place names and other symbols in public spaces, both in the South and across the nation. This study, while far from comprehensive, identified a total of 1,503.
These include:
<ul>
<li>
718 monuments and statues, nearly 300 of which are in Georgia, Virginia or North Carolina;
</li>
<li>
109 public schools named for Robert E. Lee, Jefferson Davis or other Confederate icons;
</li>
<li>
80 counties and cities named for Confederates;
</li>
<li>
9 official Confederate holidays in six states; and
</li>
<li>
10 U.S. military bases named for Confederates.
</li>
</ul>
</blockquote>
Confederate flags and other displays related to the Confederacy hurt blacks, according to the SPLC:
<blockquote>
But the argument that the Confederate flag and other displays represent &#8220;heritage, not hate&#8221; ignores the near-universal heritage of African Americans whose ancestors were enslaved by the millions in the South. It trivializes their pain, their history and their concerns about racism &#8212; whether it&#8217;s the racism of the past or that of today.
</blockquote>
The SPLC urges its supporters to support its campaign for removal or changes to Confederate displays by contacting news media outlets and politicians.
The removal of Confederate monuments and statues and renaming of public buildings, parks, cities, streets, schools, and military bases is necessary to prevent &#8220;white supremacist [acts] of terror,&#8221; asserts the SPLC.
Dylann Roof, a white racial nationalist who murdered nine black churchgoers in the Charleston church shooting, is highlighted by the SPLC as the type of person created by &#8220;the South&#8217;s 150-year reverence for the Confederacy.&#8221;
The SPLC is regularly referenced by news media outlets such as CNN, MSNBC, The New York Times and The Washington Post as a legitimate resource for information about racism.
The SPLC is a <a href="https://donate.splcenter.org/">501(c)(3)</a> nonprofit organization, affording it federal tax exemptions with the IRS.
H/T Peter Hasson at <a href="http://dailycaller.com/2017/08/31/splc-says-army-bases-are-confederate-monuments-that-need-to-come-down/">The Daily Caller</a>.
Follow Robert Kraychik on <a href="https://twitter.com/kr3ch3k">Twitter</a>.

SPLC: Army Bases Are ‘Confederate Monuments… Take Them Down’

Leftism

Race

Racism

Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC)

Dylann Roof, the racist butcher who slaughtered nine people in a church at Charleston, SC, has zero regrets about his barbaric actions.
In the weeks following his massacre, Roof <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/04/us/dylann-roof-sentencing.html?_r=0">wrote</a> in a jailhouse journal, &#8220;I do not regret what I did. I am not sorry. I have not shed a tear for the innocent people I killed.&#8221;
Roof&#8217;snracism continued to flow out in the pages of the journal.
&#8220;I do feel sorry for the innocent white children forced to live in this sick country and I do feel sorry for the innocent white people that are killed daily at the hands of the lower race,&#8221; Roof wrote. &#8220;I have shed a tear of self-pity for myself. I feel pity that I had to do what I did in the first place. I feel pity that I had to give up my life because of a situation that should never have existed.&#8221;
Roof&#8217;s manifesto explains that his race obsession began when he saw the media hype around George Zimmerman fatally shooting Trayvon Martin, but yet there was no coverage of black-on-white murders. This somehow led to Roof&#8217;s twisted, bizarre conclusion that he needed to murder blacks.
&#8220;I have no choice,&#8221; Roof wrote. &#8220;I am not in the position to, alone, go into the ghetto and fight. I chose Charleston because it is most historic city in my state, and at one time had the highest ratio of blacks to Whites in the country. We have no skinheads, no real KKK, no one doing anything but talking on the internet. Well someone has to have the bravery to take it to the real world, and I guess that has to be me.&#8221;
Joey Meek, a friend of Roof&#8217;s, told <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2015/06/19/us/charleston-church-shooting-suspect/">CNN</a> that Roof longed for the days of segregation and aimed to launch a race war.
&#8220;He wanted it to be white with white, and black with black,&#8221; Meek said. &#8220;He had it in his mind, and he didn&#8217;t really let nobody know (what he was going to do).&#8221;
<blockquote>
&#8220;I do not regret what I did. I am not sorry. I have not shed a tear for the innocent people I killed.&#8221;
Dylann Roof
</blockquote>
Nobody took Roof seriously, as he constantly used racial slurs as a manner of joking and had nonwhite friends, but it turns out that Roof was serious&#8211;and deadly. When Roof was committing his evil actions in the Charleston church, he coldly told one of the survivors that he had &#8220;to do this, because y&#8217;all are raping our women and y&#8217;all are taking over our world.&#8221;
Federal prosecutors are seeking the death penalty for Roof, who isn&#8217;t even angling for the insanity defense, as he calls psychology a &#8220;Jewish invention.&#8221; It&#8217;s safe to say that nobody will be shedding any tears for Roof should he be sentenced to death.

Racist Charleston Butcher Dylann Roof: ‘I Do Not Regret What I Did’

Charleston

Murder

On Thursday, Dylann Roof, 22, who murdered nine black people in a June 2015 attack at Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina during the victims’ Bible study in a racially motived attack, was <a href="https://apnews.com/64fe31eeb836440e89c918a3c47cbdf8/The-Latest:-Jurors-convict-Dylann-Roof-in-church-slayings?utm_campaign=SocialFlow&amp;utm_source=Twitter&amp;utm_medium=AP">convicted</a> on all 33 counts after a jury took less than two hours to reach its verdict.
Roof was convicted by a jury of nine white people and three black people; they will meet on January 3 to decide if Roof should face life in prison or the death penalty.
The panel of nine white people and three black people will reconvene next month to decide whether Roof faces life in prison or the death penalty. Roof simply stared ahead as the verdict was read.
Before the verdict was reached, the jury had asked to rehear part of Roof’s videotaped confession. Roof had told the FBI that he murdered five people; he was surprised he had killed nine people.
Witnesses in the trial testified that Roof had visited Charleston numerous times in the months before the attack. Defense attorney David Bruck argued Roof was suicidal, and never understood exactly what he had done.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Nathan Williams told jurors Roof waited until the Bible study group had its eyes closed for prayer before he shot and killed them; Williams added that Roof believed black people were animals and less than human.
In Roof’s “manifesto” he <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2016/12/13/us/dylann-roof-murder-trial/">wrote</a>, &#8221; &#8220;The event that truly awakened me was the Trayvon Martin case . . .” He added, “Negroes have lower Iqs, lower impulse control, and higher testosterone levels in generals. These three things alone are a recipe for violent behavior.” Roof stated wanted to start a race war by targeting Emanuel AME Church. He wrote, &#8220;I have no choice. I am not in the position to, alone, go into the ghetto and fight. I chose Charleston because it is most historic city in my state, and at one time had the highest ratio of blacks to Whites in the country.&#8221;
Roof represented himself for much of the trial.

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Dylann Roof

Calls Mount For Evangelical Publication To Retract Article Likening Kyle Rittenhouse To ‘Mass Shooter’

SPLC: Army Bases Are ‘Confederate Monuments… Take Them Down’

Racist Charleston Butcher Dylann Roof: ‘I Do Not Regret What I Did’

Racist Charleston Killer Convicted. Will He Get The Death Penalty?