Race and the Cosmos

In Race and the Cosmos, Barbara Holmes boldly suggests that theoretical physics and cosmology have the power to break through our stalled and difficult discussions about race. At the intersection of ethics, cosmology, and physics, a new view of human life is emerging—a view not neatly divided along lines of race, ethnicity, class, or sexual orientation. Human life at cosmic and quantum levels has a unity independent of external social categories such as science and religion.The ways that modern culture defines us can no longer provide spiritual connections, Holmes says. Quantum and cosmic metaphors about self, society, and God point to origins, mysteries, and ultimate things. The worlds of cosmology and quantum mechanics offer us the resonance and rhetoric of a multi-dimensional universe, and give us new ways to talk about the individual and communal quest for moral fulfillment. The language of cosmology can replace older ways of thinking and talking about race and ethnicity. This new language unifies rather than divides, in a cosmic universe that is both staggering and healing in its human/divine scope.Barbara A. Holmes is Associate Professor of Ethics and African American Religious Studies, Memphis Theological Seminary. She is author of A Private Woman in Public Spaces. She lives in Germantown, Tennessee.