I’m glad to be sharing my first edition of The Daily Brief. This is kind of a doozy because it’s a personal story. At first glance, it might seem like a niche story, something of limited interest outside the ELCA, but as we get into it, I think you’ll see why this story has ramifications for how we understand what’s happening in America with the rise of Christian nationalism and the real stranglehold that race and racism continue to have on so much of the American church.
Over the weekend before Father’s Day, a Lutheran bishop was elected in South Carolina who shares the same surname as the white supremacist who murdered nine Black church members at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston eleven years ago.
Why does this matter?
I want to begin by saying that this is a story I’m telling from the inside. In addition to being a journalist, I’m also a Lutheran pastor. I’m a pastor in the same church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, where this bishop was elected. It’s also the same church that was home to the mass shooter.
As I think about this story, I think of the words from Luke 6:41-42:
Why do you see the speck in your neighbor’s eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye? Or how can you say to your neighbor, “Friend, let me take the speck out of your eye,” when you yourself do not see the log in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will be able to see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbor’s eye.
When it comes to understanding racism, especially within Christianity, these words are essential. Many of us white Americans are so concerned with proving that we’re not racist that we want to distance ourselves from any history or connection to racism. In doing so, we fail to understand and truly listen to the hurt experienced by Black Americans and people of color in our midst.
Before getting into the controversy, I want to remember and honor the Emanuel Nine, who were killed on June 17, 2015: the Reverend Clementa C. Pinckney, pastor and South Carolina state senator; Cynthia Graham Hurd; Susie Jackson; Ethel Lee Lance; the Reverend DePayne Middleton-Doctor; Tywanza Sanders; the Reverend Daniel Lee Simmons Sr.; the Reverend Sharonda Coleman-Singleton; and Myra Thompson.
What happened in the ELCA over the past few weeks, and how does it connect to that horrific white supremacist massacre?
The South Carolina Synod of the ELCA held its annual assembly from June 11 through June 13. Like many church bodies, the ELCA is divided into smaller units of governance called synods. As part of the assembly, delegates elected a new bishop.
After a lengthy election process, they elected Wade Thomas Roof III.
Remember that name.
Now let’s go back to the man who murdered the Emanuel Nine.
We don’t want to give undue attention to mass shooters, but in this case, avoiding the subject would only create more distance between ourselves and the truth. The shooter’s name was Dylann Roof.
Notice the surname.
Dylann Roof was a white supremacist who was radicalized online. He was twenty-one years old when he committed the shooting. Afterward, he admitted that he hoped to start a race war. He left behind writings documenting his white supremacist beliefs and his desire to incite racial violence.
One of the most chilling details of the massacre is that Dylann Roof sat in Bible study with his victims for an hour before he killed them. He likely prayed with them before opening fire.
Dylann Roof was also a baptized and confirmed member of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.
He was a longtime member of St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in Columbia, South Carolina. He attended Lutheran camps. His grandparents and extended family were deeply involved in the ELCA through his father’s side of the family.
By the time of the shooting, Roof had reportedly become more distant from church life. But it is not true that he had no connection to the church. His family’s connection to the ELCA was real and deep.
I take pains to point this out because when many people hear about a white supremacist mass shooting, they make assumptions. A lot of Christians, especially progressive Christians, assume these beliefs only exist in more conservative branches of Christianity. We look for ways to reassure ourselves that racism belongs somewhere else.
But Dylann Roof was a member of the ELCA, a denomination generally considered progressive.
That’s an uncomfortable reality.
Four days after the South Carolina Synod elected Bishop Roof, the Reverend Nelson Rabell, a Black Latino ELCA pastor, raised a question in an online clergy forum.
He wrote:
Does anyone know anything about the newly elected bishop from South Carolina, the Reverend Wade Thomas Roof III, who is related to Dylann Roof, the white supremacist murderer who killed the Emanuel AME Church Nine? I hope and pray that he is able to bring racial healing to that synod. I’m just wondering if anyone knows about his views regarding racism and other justice issues.
Almost immediately, there was a great deal of defensiveness from white church leaders and pastors in South Carolina.
There seemed to be very little attention paid to the weight that the Roof name carries—not only for Black Christians in South Carolina but for Black Americans more broadly. Instead, many people focused on defending the bishop. Some accused Pastor Rabell of lying. They insisted there was no family connection. They argued that he was a good man and questioned why anyone would raise the issue at all.
Some context matters here.
Pastor Rabell had previously been accused of misconduct by a white bishop in Northern California. After a lengthy process, the church ultimately issued a public apology. Legal proceedings raised serious concerns about the conduct of the bishop who had made the accusations, and that bishop later resigned.
Some context about the ELCA also matters.
At the time of the most recent available data, it was the whitest denomination in America. Much of that has to do with the denomination’s roots in overwhelmingly white regions of the Upper Midwest—Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, and elsewhere.
But if you’re the whitest denomination in America, you probably have blind spots around race. You probably have unexamined assumptions about whiteness, about the church, and about how racism functions in American life.
The ELCA is generally regarded as part of the liberal mainline. It is grouped with denominations like the Episcopal Church, the Presbyterian Church (USA), and the United Methodist Church. The denomination voted in 2009 to allow LGBTQ pastors, although that decision also included provisions allowing individual congregations to maintain exclusionary practices.
Historically, the ELCA has often tried to hold competing perspectives together. Sometimes that desire for unity can become a reluctance to engage difficult conversations directly.
You can see some of that discomfort around race in this story.
It’s also worth noting that despite the denomination’s liberal reputation, more than half of ELCA church members voted for Donald Trump in 2024. At the same time, the church elected its first Black presiding bishop, the Reverend Yehiel Curry, in 2025.
So why was the question raised in the first place?
Pastor Rabell later explained that he had been contacted by a number of church leaders who believed there was some family connection, however distant. Only about one percent of South Carolinians are ELCA Lutherans. When people share a surname and belong to a relatively small religious community, it’s not unreasonable to assume there may be some connection somewhere down the line.
More importantly, Rabell said he wasn’t trying to judge the bishop. He wasn’t trying to accuse him of anything.
He wanted clarification on behalf of Black leaders and leaders of color who wondered what this election meant and whether they would be safe and supported in South Carolina. He understood the depth of pain attached to that name.
South Carolina Lutherans are also a relatively small community. Many white South Carolina pastors have personal connections to the victims of the massacre. Numerous AME pastors studied at the Lutheran seminary in South Carolina. The synod has previously lamented its connection to Dylann Roof. Many white Lutherans in South Carolina felt sensitive about being painted as racists or being judged by a denomination that is largely concentrated in the North.
So what has the new bishop said?
That’s one of the most troubling parts of this story.
There was no public discussion of the issue during the election process, despite multiple opportunities for candidates to address questions. Since the election, I and others have reached out directly to Bishop Roof and to synod staff requesting comment and clarification.
I have received no response.
I was told by someone connected to synod leadership that the bishop was on vacation and should be granted that time. I’ve also heard from sources who say concerns have been raised privately and that people have encouraged him to address them publicly.
But there has still been no public statement.
One of my concerns is the way racism is increasingly addressed in churches, institutions, governments, and corporations as a public relations problem rather than a gospel issue, a justice issue, or a matter of compassion.
The question becomes how to manage the controversy rather than how to address the harm.
As this story continued to unfold, Pastor Rabell also began receiving private messages from people describing what they viewed as a hostile environment in parts of South Carolina Lutheranism for people of color and for women.
The longer institutions remain silent, the more stories begin to surface.
I also have a personal connection to this story.
While researching my book Disciples of White Jesus, I traveled to South Carolina to investigate Dylann Roof’s connection to the ELCA and the role of online radicalization in his life.
I spent time at St. Matthew’s Lutheran Church in Charleston, where members had discovered that before the Civil War their congregation had owned an enslaved person. Rather than hiding that history, they chose to confront it publicly. They confessed it. They organized anti-racism events and worked to tell the truth about their past.
I came away impressed by the willingness of many South Carolina Lutherans to confront the state’s history of slavery and racism honestly.
I also spent a day at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in Columbia, where Dylann Roof grew up.
There, I had a powerful conversation with Roof’s pastor.
The pastor understood the trauma caused by the massacre. He lamented the role his congregation had played. He carried deep guilt and regret about his inability to reach Dylann Roof before the shooting.
What struck me was that we spent most of our conversation talking about grief, responsibility, and lament before he ever mentioned that he had personally known Clementa Pinckney.
Because he waited so long to tell me that, it felt less like self-protection and more like honest confession.
In recent days, I’ve heard many white Lutherans say that they feel more connected to the victims than to the shooter.
I understand why.
But those statements don’t always ring true to me. Sometimes they feel like another effort to distance ourselves from the realities of racism.
We want to believe we’re entirely separate from the problem.
The harder truth is that Dylann Roof emerged from our church. The victims were our neighbors. Both realities exist at the same time.
Since my visit, the pastor I interviewed has retired. St. Paul’s has voted to leave the ELCA and join a more conservative Lutheran denomination that does not ordain LGBTQ clergy. The congregation’s current council president is named Joe Roof.
Again, this is not about guilt by association.
It’s about the power of a name.
The Roof family has been part of South Carolina Lutheranism for generations. That history likely includes faithful service and good work within the church. It also includes a connection to someone who embraced white supremacy and violence.
Part of the pain of this story is recognizing that connection and resisting the urge to distance ourselves from it.
As white Christians, many of us want to remove ourselves from any association with racism. But the call of the Gospel is not to distance ourselves from the truth. It’s to examine ourselves honestly.
Throughout this controversy, many people directed their anger toward Pastor Rabell rather than engaging the concerns he raised. We often lash out at truth-tellers rather than examine ourselves.
As the conversation continued, many of the people who initially defended the bishop left the public discussion. Some continued their conversations privately. Statements commemorating the Emanuel Nine were issued. But there was still no public response from the bishop himself.
That troubles me.
It also troubles me that there appears to have been no public conversation about these issues during the election process. Looking at the bishop’s public record and social media presence, I have not found any previous public commentary about race, racism, or Christian nationalism.
What this story reminds me is that the scourge of racism touches all of us.
Politics don’t protect us from it.
Religious labels don’t protect us from it.
The question is not whether I am a racist or whether you are a racist. The question is what harm is being done to people of color—and to all of us—in the name of white supremacy.
As white Christians, we have to ask what we are protecting when we become defensive. As white women in particular, we have to ask what we are willing to give up in order to maintain access to privilege and systems that often remain riddled with abuse.
We are living in a moment when prominent political leaders, including members of the current administration, openly describe America as a nation for white Christians and portray nonwhite immigrants as invaders.
Jesus is not white.
Jesus is not American.
And if churches hope to offer a faithful witness against white Christian nationalism, we have to begin by removing the logs from our own eyes.
That’s what I see in this story from South Carolina.
The pain of Charleston continues to reverberate. The wounds are still present. And when white Christians are unable to decenter ourselves and our own defensiveness, those wounds deepen.
The work before us is not self-protection.
It is truth-telling, repentance, and the hard work of listening.
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