It is difficult to overlook the significance of the domestic and global events occurring when the Rev. William Moses Summerville took the reins as executive director of the Baptist Peace Fellowship of North America (BPFNA).
National Guard troops were on the ground in Los Angeles, responding to relatively small protests over ICE agents seizing immigrants at their workplaces. The United States was about to bomb nuclear facilities in Iran after several days of Israel preemptively attacking its Middle Eastern foe. Also, Summerville officially began his duties as the first African American to lead the organization on Juneteenth, the holiday that celebrates the end of sanctioned chattel slavery in the United States.
I recently visited with Summerville about this historic confluence of events. Portions of our conversation have been edited for clarity. He humorously acknowledged the seeming absurdity of becoming the leader of a Baptist peace organization amid so much conflict.
“You know that statement, ‘You don’t find any atheists in foxholes’?” he asked. “So, I’ve got a military background, and I get it. But you are definitely going to find some agnostics there. All that to say, I’ve got some questions for God, but I do believe he has called me ‘for such a time as this.’”
Summerville is no stranger to peacemaking, having served for two decades in roles that include pastoral leadership, chaplaincy, politics and academia. He currently serves as pastor of Kingdom Come Community Church in Long Beach, California.
When it comes to the historic nature of being the first Black leader of the largest Baptist network of international peacemakers, Summerville is aware of all it means—but not content with mere symbolism.
“If I’m going to be in this space,” he said, “I’m going to make sure that I’m not just a ‘Black face in a high place,’ but I’m going to push for real Black progress.” That progress includes addressing systemic racism and white supremacy.
“We’ve got to wash this standardization of whiteness off of us as hard as we can,” he said. “We’re also here to engage and dismantle white nationalistic theology, because it’s not Christian. It’s not even evangelical.”
On the situation in the Middle East, Summerville denounced the U.S. and Israel’s preemptive strikes against Iran, appealing to the figure Christians claim to follow to lay out his case.
“We affirm and follow that Palestinian Jew, Jesus Christ, as the founder of our faith,” he said. “And we call him the ‘Prince of Peace.’”
It is because of who he follows, Summerville notes, that he stands against “preemptive, unilateral, and even congressionally approved war in the name of self-defense, because it’s not self-defense.”
Summerville believes in a peacemaking strategy that doesn’t see peace as apathetic or as something that avoids conflict, but instead asks, “How can we be creative within conflict?” He suggests turning “confrontations into ‘carefrontations’” as we seek to embrace the humanity of all those in front of us.
According to a statement announcing Summerville’s appointment, BPFNA serves more than 4,000 individuals and congregations in the United States, Canada, Latin America and Africa. It is the first Baptist organization with a formal commitment to bilingualism, requiring official communication in both English and Spanish.
More information on Summerville and BPFNA can be found here.
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