James Baldwin: The Fire Next Time

In The Fire Next Time, James Baldwin begins talking about what it was like growing up as a black child in Harlem. He talks about how his life was predetermined because he was black, which is a reoccurring theme we see in many books. He grew up with Christian faith, but as time went on he slowly started to develop little trust with the Christian faith. This being because of how much the Bible pushes for everyone to love each other, but most Christians are filled with hate towards either whites, blacks, Jews, or Muslims. He also talks about police brutality. This theme is also reoccurring. We talk about police brutality happening even today against African Americans. “After all, I had seen men dragged from their platforms on this very corner for saying less virulent things, and I had seen many crowds dispersed by policemen, with clubs or on horseback. But the policemen were doing nothing now. Obviously, this was not because they had become more human but because they were under orders and because they were afraid (48).” This quote would be able to be used to describe police brutality today as well as back then. This book was difficult to read for me, due to the fact  that I have also questioned my Christian faith because of some of  the things the modern day church believes. It was also comforting knowing that other people have questioned their faith because of things that other Christians have said or done. Baldwin brought into light many of the flaws of religion and how racist the ideologies are to make black people not succeed.

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