Only 2% of White People Owned Slaves

I heard someone say recently that “only 2% of white people owned slaves during slavery in America.” At first, it sounds like a harmless statistic. Maybe even a way of minimizing guilt. But when you dig deeper, you realize how misleading it really is.

By 1860, nearly four million Black men, women, and children were enslaved in this country. In the Deep South, Black people often made up the majority of the population 57% in South Carolina, 55% in Mississippi, yet nearly all land, wealth, and political power were concentrated in the hands of whites. While it is true that not every white family owned enslaved people, about one in three Southern white households did. And even those who didn’t were still part of a system that protected, benefited from, and depended on slavery.

Slavery wasn’t just about who owned human beings. It was about how the entire society was built to enforce racial hierarchy. Enslavement structured the economy, shaped laws, controlled politics, and dictated who held dignity. It was a system, not an accident, not a side note, not a 2% statistic.

And that’s why this matters today. The parallels are sobering. Then, wealth was concentrated in the hands of a few plantation owners. Now, it’s concentrated in the hands of the top 1%. Then, Black and brown labor fueled an economy they were not allowed to own. Now, Black, brown, Asian, Indigenous, and Latin communities—who have all sacrificed and contributed to the building of this country too often remain locked out of wealth-building systems while their work sustains the profits of others. The story has changed its vocabulary, but the narrative remains hauntingly familiar.

Still, this is not about painting all people with one brush. Not all immigrants are “illegal.” Not all Black people are criminals. Not all white people are racists. Not all churches are anti-gay. These sweeping narratives are easy shields to hide behind. What matters is this: if you belong to a group, you must be willing to confront the truths tied to that group not to defend them, but to change them.

If you are white, you cannot distance yourself from a history of racism; you must own it, unlearn it, and leverage your voice against it.

If you are Black, brown, Asian, Indigenous, or Latin, you must carry the inheritance of resilience and decide how to transform the survival mindset into new patterns of thriving.

If you belong to the church, you must wrestle with both its legacy of harm and its power to heal.

And here is where faith calls us deeper. We are creations of God, given dominion over the earth. That means stewardship is our collective responsibility. This world is not ours to exploit but to tend, to heal, and to restore. The narrative of division, domination, and despair will not change unless we recognize that it is under our care to change it.

Love must become our fuel, for love erases fear.

Joy must become our strength, for joy disarms anger.

Forgiveness must become our weapon, for forgiveness breaks bitterness.

Hope must become our vision, for hope dissolves despair.

We are not broken. We are becoming.

In truth, we have always been evolving since the beginning of time.

So let us take this moment in history and choose differently. Let us use our gifts, our callings, our abilities, and our knowledge not to defend what has been, but to shape what can be. Let us begin in ourselves, and let that work ripple outward into our neighborhoods, into our cities, into our states, into our nations, and into the world.

Yes, there are traumas. Yes, there are wounds inflicted by hatred and fear. But within us is something greater: the Spirit of God, the breath that spoke creation into existence. And if that Spirit is in us, then the power to shift this story is in us too.

The question is whether we will lean into it or stand by while the world we’ve been entrusted with collapses under the weight of our inaction.

God, grant us the ability to love one another beyond what we see.

Remind us that in each of us, there is Your image, Your imprint.

We ask for wisdom to overcome hate with compassion, fear with courage, and despair with hope.

Teach us to use our gifts not to tear one another down, but to build up, to heal, and to set free.

May our neighborhoods, our cities, our nations, and our world be transformed by Your Spirit at work in us.

Together we say: Amen.