Eastminster Presbyterian Church East Lansing, MI

An open and welcoming church serving East Lansing and the MSU campus community

Sunday Worship 10:00 a.m. 1315 Abbot Rd., East Lansing, MI | 517-337-0893
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You are here: Home / Reading Together: Caste

Reading Together: Caste

All-Church Book Read in June

Come join a book discussion centered on social justice at Eastminster in June. At noon, starting June 7 and running each Monday through June 28, we will be exploring the book “Caste: The Origins of Our Discontent” by Isabel Wilkerson, who also wrote “The Warmth of Other Suns.

An Amazon review reads:

An Amazon Best Book of August 2020: It has been ten years since Wilkerson’s award-winning The Warmth of Other Suns was published. While that book pointed to the great migration of Black people to the north as an “unrecognized migration,” this new book points to our entire social structure as an unrecognized caste system. Most people see America as racist, and Wilkerson agrees that it is indeed racist. She points out that we tend to refer to slavery as a “sad, dark chapter” in America when in fact it lasted for hundreds of years—but in order to maintain a social order and an “economy whose bottom gear was torture” (as Wilkerson quotes the historian Edward Baptist), it was necessary to give blacks the lowest possible status. Whites in turn got top status. In between came the middle castes of “Asians, Latinos, indigenous people, and immigrants of African descent” to fill out the originally bipolar hierarchy. Such a caste system allowed generations of whites to live under the same assumptions of inequality—these “distorted rules of engagement”—whether their ancestors were slave owners or abolitionists. And the unspoken caste system encouraged all to accept their roles. As Wilkerson develops her argument, she brings in historical figures like Martin Luther King, Jr. and Satchel Paige. She even looks at the Nazis, who turned to us when they were seeking ways to institutionalize racism in the Third Reich. As I read this book, I finally had to consciously stop myself from highlighting passages. Because I was highlighting most of the book. –Chris Schluep

Welcome to Eastminster

Welcome to Eastminster Presbyterian Church, a diverse and dynamic congregation in the heart of the greater Lansing region. We are a church family who comes together to praise our Lord, learn and grow in the image of Jesus Christ, and serve the community, nation, and World through our missions. Located just minutes from the campus of Michigan State University and the Michigan Capitol, we offer a wide array of educational programs, service opportunities, and ministries and fellowship for all ages. Please join us, to feel the warmth, love, and acceptance that Jesus Christ has taught us all to embody.

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Mission Statement

We, the members of Eastminster Presbyterian Church,
celebrate the grace of God and the redeeming love of Jesus Christ.
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Eastminster Presbyterian Church
1315 Abbot Road
East Lansing. MI 48823
Phone: (517) 337-0893
Email: office@eastminsterchurch.org
Office Hours: 10-4; Monday – Thursday

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