“Trapped in a History Which They Do Not Understand:” Reading James Baldwin with Thomas Merton, Toward a Spiritual Theological Interpretation of Mass Incarceration

Abstract

This paper argues that Thomas Merton’s under-appreciated engagement with James Baldwin reveals Baldwin to be an essential resource for a theological account of mass incarceration and the spiritual sustenance of ati6on to dismantle the “New Jim Crow.” Merton highlights the religious insight of Baldwin’s conviction that white Americans are ravaged by a spiritual imprisonment that is concretized in distinct historical dynamics and which spell an apocalyptic foreboding. White Americans are, in Baldwin’s words, “trapped in a history which they do not understand.” With attention to the methodological and ethical pimalls of reading Baldwin theologically, and situating this exchange in the broader context of black theology and theological/spiritual responses to mass incarcera6on, it is argued that Baldwin produces essential and unique religious insights for interrupting the contemporary criminalization of black bodies. Merton's additions to Baldwin's thought is generative for future possibilities, particularly with Merton's development of a more robust mysticism.