The kind of anemic truth-telling in which Sharpton trafficked will also be the undoing of mainstream Black churches. Their limp-wristed leadership, their refusal to blend real political critique with substantive theology, and the investment of Black male preachers in being both figureheads of the movement and friends of those with political power rather than fighters for real change run the risk of rendering the Black church an institution increasingly irrelevant to 21st century political change.
The optics of the heavily Black male preachers and preachers-by-proxy including Sharpton, T.D. Jakes and Martin Luther King III, who showed up and had a front row seat at the funeral, suggest that this is exactly the kind of outdated model that we are being asked to invest in again. Jesse Jackson, who had been the subject of vitriol early last week, sat a few rows back in the audience, clearly dethroned from a place of either honor or leadership or relevance.
It is easy in times like these to suggest that there is a crisis in Black leadership, to pathologize Black people further by suggesting that we do not have the political acumen to figure out the right direction in which to head. But as I speak to activists on the ground and prepare to ride this weekend to Ferguson with people from across the country, I believe we should give the emerging leadership credit for, at the very least, knowing what kind of leaders they do not want.