The Resurrection Church Oakland (PCA) held this event last week.
In related news, spectacularly unethical Fulton County prosecutor Fani Willis sent an angry letter to Representative Jim Jordan of Ohio, the Republican chairman of the House Judiciary Committee today. She is furious that the committee is quite appropriately investigating the degree to which her part of the “Get Trump!” lawfare last year was orchestrated and coordinated with the Biden Administration.
“Rather than honor and uphold the oath you took, you have chosen to expend your time attempting to bully me, which is a complete waste of your time,” Willis wrote. “Might I suggest that instead of attempting to disrupt this office’s work protecting the people of Fulton County, that you celebrate Black History Month by visiting children in your district to teach them about the many contributions African Americans have made to this country—including those who have advanced democracy by successfully advocating that this nation live up to its ideals that everyone is equal before the law and everyone has the right to have their voice heard through exercising their right to vote. That would be a much more productive use of your time.”
___________________
Pointer: Not The Bee.
Ethics Alarms 
The interesting part is that this Black History Month event was held at a church that is organized with the Presbyterian Churches of America (PCA). This denomination is not exactly woke in it’s outlook as it does not allow women to serve as pastor or elder, and also considers homosexuality as a sin. Official reports on these positions were adopted by the General Assembly as recent as 2017 and 2021.
On race I see that the PCA also has a position report at the denominational website as recent as 2018 titled Racial and Ethnic Reconciliation Report. The link for all positional reports of the PCA is https://pcahistory.org/pca/digest/index.html.
A couple of snippets in this report of things the PCA rejects:
both.
incorporating racism or racial superiority.
God’s sovereign election.
the fall of mankind as its root.
Based on this I am inclined to state that the organization of a Black History Month for black worshippers by a church affiliated with the PCA is not Res Ipsa Loquitur.
Churches do have events and small groups or community groups that target people in specific demographics. Typically well-functioning churches have youth organizations, with youth groups segregated by age and gender. There may be small groups for men or women, marrieds or singles. There may be affinity groups for grief support, cancer survivors, or addiction recovery. Other groups and activities are outreach related, specifically targeted at certain demographics. Looking at ResOak’s website they have a college ministry program. So I am inclined to conclude that the Black History Month is an outreach event targeted at a certain racial demographic. And my guess is that one of the purposes is to get more people from this demographic to become affiliated with this church.
A question that may be asked is whether all targeting efforts directed at particular demographics, or all voluntary association of people based on particular demographic is bad because it is discriminatory. A common definition of discrimination is “Discrimination is the process of making unfair or prejudicial distinctions between people based on the groups, classes, or other categories to which they belong or are perceived to belong, such as race, gender, age, class, religion, or sexual orientation.” In other words discrimination is bad by definition.
However I think is quite normal for people to be willing to associate with other people based on affinity (common demographics, common interests, common history, common beliefs). A church organizes people based on common religious beliefs. I do not see anything wrong with this. In a same vein I can defend community groups and events targeted at certain demographics as contributing to the rich tapestry of church life. The challenge to which any church should rise is to be a place that is welcome for everybody regardless of demographic. And that requires a variety of ways for members and visitors to be engaged.
A problem arises when people are systematically excluded as happened during the Jim Crow era, when membership of certain churches was not open regardless of race. Looking at the staff page of OakRes my impression is that this is a majority white church.
PCA bringing a new twist on “the chosen”.
To be honest, I really have no objection to such a fellowship dinner if the the practice was accepted across all different types of groups of similar immutable characteristics. The reason for my lack of objection is that freedom to associate as one pleases outside of work should be allowed without social engineering. No one should be forced to include any non-member because such compulsion would render freedom to associate with whomever some one chooses impossible
However, because demand for such acceptance would cause the very group above who seeks to limit involvement by others would howl with claims of racism, the only just and equitable response would be to point out that this is a manifestation of black privilege and let it go at that.