I don’t think I like your religion

by Elouise

I’ve included a few comments below about the context for Morton’s lyrics.

Religion

I don’t think I like your religion
Don’t always make the best decisions
Not sayin’ you don’t have good intentions
I know that you are only human

But you blame your God when it’s your own fault
Where is the love that your God spoke of?
Your God has nothing to do with them
Nothing to do with them
Nothing to do with them
Nothing to do with them

That’s what you were told, let’s just be honest
You didn’t even take the time to find it yourself
You just took their words to be true
You don’t even know why you believe what you do

But you blame your God when it’s all your fault
Where is the love that your God spoke of?
Your God has nothing to do with them
Nothing to do with them
Nothing to do with them
Nothing to do with them

Your God has nothing to do with them
Nothing to do with them
Nothing to do with them
Nothing to do with them (repeated twice)

P. J. Morton lyrics to Religion, recorded on his Grammy-nominated hip-hop album, Gumbo

This past weekend I listened to a public radio interview with hip-hop artist P. J. Morton. His father, also a musician, is an ordained clergyman. Morton talked about his commitment to hip-hop, his religious upbringing, and the way it influences his music. I didn’t make notes, but here’s part of what I heard during the interview.

The religious language of white evangelical Christians who supported Trump for president reminds Morton of the way white slavers kept Black slaves in their place. Thus, “I don’t think I like your religion.” This kind of religion became a vehicle for inhumane political ends during slavery. Today, this kind of religion is still a vehicle for inhumane political ends. It’s supported now as then by unexamined, faulty assumptions about the God of Christianity.

Morton’s response is simple: Don’t blame God “when it’s all your fault.” Don’t expect God to bless your decisions. They’re based on faulty, unexamined notions about God. What you call God’s will, supposedly being worked out through Trump, is your own uninformed will dressed up in religious language. God is not your puppet. And Trump is not God’s agent sent to do your faulty bidding.

You are, after all, “only human.” Even though you may have good intentions.

Too bad the Grammys chose to overlook Morton’s prophetic music.

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 30 January 2018
Studio-recorded video found here on YouTube
Interview excerpt found here, plus a link to an audio of the full interview with Michel Martin on NPR’s All Things Considered