Summary

In Chapter 1, "The Color of Compromise," Tisby describes the bombing of Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama on September 15, 1963, that killed four young girls. Above them, a stain-glassed window depicting Christ and the little children was destroyed, the face of Christ blown out. Thousands mourned in the streets afterwards. Lawyer Charles Morgan Jr. gave a speech asking who threw the bomb, declaring, "We all did it" (14).

Not everyone agreed with Morgan. Even members of the Christian church in the South opposed him. This dissension was a "refusal to act in the midst of injustice," which Tisby says was "itself an act of injustice" (15). He says the church's continued indifference to racism needs to change, introducing the primary interests of the text.

Since the start of American history, evangelical Christians, in particular, have condoned racist systems. Tisby defines racism, examining privilege, power, and...