Barnes in Common

the magazine of Churches Together in Barnes
March/April 2006

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"What if God is a Black man?"

John Owen-Davies

During a remarkable five-day visit to South Africa in 1966, US Senator Robert Kennedy delivered five speeches condemning racial intolerance that many historians now view as arguably the greatest speeches made by the brother of slain President John F. Kennedy. The visit took place in a climate of intolerance and heavy censorship during the darkest years of South Africa's white supremacist policy of apartheid. Kennedy's message is as relevant today as it was 40 years ago.

In 1966 Hendrik Verwoerd, a leading architect of apartheid, was prime minister. Nelson Mandela, Chief Albert Luthuli – the 1960 Nobel Peace Prize winner – and other opposition leaders were either in prison or in exile.

Kennedy used his speeches to challenge forcefully the military-backed climate of fear and repression that gripped all aspects of South African life. It was a never to be forgotten time as we witnessed the ecstatic reaction at Natal University when Kennedy posed the question, "What if God is black?" as sullen military, security and other apartheid supporters looked on, aghast.

Earlier, at Cape Town University, Kennedy delivered his oft-quoted "ripple of hope" lines, now engraved on a memorial tablet near his grave at Washington's Arlington cemetery: "It is from numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is shaped. Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centres of energy and daring these ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance."

Verwoerd's government tried to curb media coverage of the visit after imposing a 180-day banning (house arrest) order on Ian Robertson, president of the National Union of South African Students which had invited Kennedy to the country. It also tried to stop foreign journalists from entering the country and limited press seats.

As a young British reporter on the Natal Mercury, I obtained one of the 60 press tickets for the Natal University speech, after several more senior people on the newspaper, whose editor was in contact with hardline South African Information Minister Connie Mulder, rejected all offers.

Kennedy arrived at the University two hours late after an ecstatic welcome from whites and blacks at Durban airport. He was also mobbed as he arrived at the University for his speech, the only one delivered without notes.

Addressing an audience of over 400 people amid tight security, he began robustly. He noted the presence in the front row of Archbishop Denis Hurley, sitting between the great liberal writer Alan Paton, author of Cry the Beloved Country, and Natal's chief police officer. Underlining severe problems faced by churches under apartheid, Kennedy said: "This means the archbishop can look either way". Denis Hurley smiled.

After discussing the West's fight against Communism, he said: "How many of us here who are white would be satisfied if we were black… Did God say that men were different? What a shock it would be if whites were to find that God was black." Then he added a line, that was censored out of reports: "What if Dr Verwoerd went to heaven and found that God was black?"

Apart from Natal and Cape Town Universities, Kennedy also addressed audiences at the mainly Afrikaans Stellenbosch University, Witswatersrand University and the Johannesburg Bar Council. His visit helped to change South Africa by bringing to the fore apartheid's injustices. But it took a further quarter-of-a-century for an end to the policy.

Three months after Kennedy's visit, Verwoerd was assassinated in Cape Town. Within one year, Luthuli had died in suspicious circumstances – official explanation: "hit by a train". Then, in 1968, Kennedy himself was assassinated in Los Angeles while seeking the US presidency. Forty years on from Kennedy's visit to South Africa, what progress are we making on tolerance towards our fellow human beings? A moot question.

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