Confessions
The N-Word
Surely this is more exaggerated anti-woke propaganda? The Daily Mail has reported that 'St Augustine has been depicted as a black man in a children's book written by Church of England officials as part of its diversity drive'. This has also been reported by other reputable sources.
To begin with we can ask, 'who cares?'. If a children's illustrator wants to make things more interesting, by shading in a few of their characters, where's the harm? But despite the efforts of those who would like to move towards a raceless society where skin colour is irrelevant (I have much sympathy with this constituency), we have to recognise that race matters. When the Church of England decides to depict one it's Saints as black, there is likely to be some motive behind it. Some have said that woke is in retreat, but woke continues to operate as it often has, choosing soft targets and with plausible deniability (did the CIA really invent this phrase?). 'It's no big thing, we coloured him in brown, and he may well have been black and what does it matter anyway?'.
The question of what 'we' as a society teach our children is a matter of public interest. Of course we can defend religious freedom, and trust educators to do what they are qualified to do. But what we are seeing is a by-passing of public debate, the disregard of adult opinion and a direct appeal to children, the children being the future, and being in no position to challenge what they are being told or to understand the absurdity of what they are being taught or the social or political purpose behind it. Adults are written off as lost, and the children 'shall lead then' as it say in the bible.
I'm by know mean a biblical scholar, but I've picked up a bit here an there, I always have to look up my biblical quotes such as:
'Verily I say unto you, Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven'- Matthew 18:3-5 KJV
I understand this quote, and I understand the need for faith, humility and trust, sometimes! We might not know much about St Augustine, but we may be aware of the paraphrase 'Make me holy, but not yet', from Augustine's Confessions. I won't pretend to be a Medieval scholar, but I do like the idea of scholarship (in general) and I've had a copy of Augustine's confessions on my shelves for decades and I admit that I find this kind of thing heavy going, but Augustine does seem to have been an interesting and engaging figure. I'm more of an anti-intellectual existentialist myself, and my go to guide is a little book by John Macquarrie called Existentialism - An introduction, guide and assessment, Augustine is name-checked several times, Macquarrie writes, '...it is with Augustine (354-430) that we come to the most powerful existential presentation of Christianity since St. Paul, and one that has been of such enduring significance that even today existentialists, Christian and non-Christian alike, acknowledge an affinity with the great North African scholar'.
So, what is the relevance of Augustine's colour? The answer is 'none'. It is of course belittles a great thinker, to re-invent him to appeal to children. It would also be insulting to adults to suggest that a philosopher has to be coloured in to capture their attention, children have no choice and don't know any better.
A while back I wrote a piece called 'What does a black philosopher look like?', I've also called myself 'the leading black philosopher of my generation, and the creator of 'Black Cartesianism'. My grand claims, to paraphrase Hume, have fallen stillborn from my keyboard. The N-word is hovering 'narcissism', but mine is an invitation, or a challenge, if we have to go back to Medieval times to find a philosopher who by some tenuous logic could conceivably have been black, to make us feel proud. Well, maybe I am the best available black philosopher around, and given the apparent paucity of the competition, that may be no great claim.
In my piece called 'black Cartesianism' I asked the question 'what is the difference between a black Cartesian and a white Cartesian?' and my answer was, there is no difference. So what does a black philosopher look like? A shaded in St Augustine in a children's book apparently. That will keep us happy until our Church of England slavery reparation monies come through (cheque lost in the post?).