A good essay on the history of race and the representation of Jesus in America.

As is often true, both the rhetoric and the silence speak volumes. Time and again throughout American history, what has been said about the color of Christ (and what has been left unsaid and displayed through art) highlights some of the most profound struggles within the nation.

How is it that a Jewish prophet from the Roman era could become so entangled with the American obsession with race? How could the color of Christ be invoked throughout American history to justify some of the worst atrocities of white supremacy as well as to inspire some of the most heroic civil-rights crusades?