There's no right thing to say, no right thing to do. I once heard somebody say (addressing white people, of course), if you're having trouble understanding the doctrine of original sin, think of slavery. You did nothing personally, you're doing nothing personally, but the effects are all around, and the blood is on your hands, and no amount of scrubbing or denying will alter that fact. The blood is not a problem to be solved, or a crime to make restitution for. It is an irreducible fact of our lives, and the only choice we have is to live with it in a way that's as honest as possible. Some dignity may be possible that way.

I'm not trying to sell anybody on theological categories here. Just handing along something I found illuminating. It has stuck with me a good many years. There's a passage in "The Autobiography of Malcolm X" where he tells how after one of his talks, a tearful white girl asked him, "What can I do?" He answered "Nothing." He later regretted saying that, and the retraction would of course be his business, but I think he spoke a hard truth in the moment.

Adam

Adam