Pat Sawyer: Cautions Regarding CRT

The second of three posts on Dr. Sawyer's thoughts and concerns about CRT.

In this second article of our three-part series, I want to offer five of eight cautions regarding critical race theory. As we get into concerns about CRT, we must understand that the postmodern nature of CRT allows for the receiver of the CRT text to partly determine how he or she wants to interpret and embrace the CRT text. To put it another way, the authority of determining what a particular CRT tenet means lies to some extent with the one reading and receiving the tenet and not exclusively with the one authoring and offering the tenet. While it is certainly the case that one could interpret a CRT idea in a way that is ultimately ‘wrong’ and diametrically against the spirit of the knowledge area, it is still nevertheless true that the knowledge area is a reflexive, and to some degree, contested space that makes room for diverse interpretations and applications that are still considered within the realm of CRT.

With that said, what follows are concerns that are rooted in a legitimate understanding and application of CRT. This does not mean that everyone will have these identical takeaways when engaging the ideas of CRT, but it does mean that these takeaways are not only genuinely possible but are in fact happening with a number of people who name the name of Christ in various quarters of the larger Church. Again, it is possible to understand aspects of some of these tenets in ways that are not opposed to biblical Christianity, but my concern is the ways in which these tenets can possibly lead people into false societal and cultural viewpoints and, most importantly, into heterodoxy. As I unpack the following cautions, bear in mind that the individual tenet associated with each caution may only have a minor or ...

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