First, the church must be honest about sin, both historic and personal. The American racial heritage is checkered and deeply troubling. The fact that Christians participated enthusiastically in the slave trade and the institution of slavery takes our breath away today. Looking back, we can only conclude that our spiritual forebears too often lost sight of and even muzzled the doctrine of humanity on the matter of racial and ethnic equality. The concept of chattel slavery is a low point in the annals