Creating a Culture of Repair was a call-to-action read that pointedly guides you to tangible paths of restorative justice as well as a path to reparations. Every person would benefit from how the book lends itself to an easy read on an insurmountable painful truth of our country. It’s important to confront the issue and to have in hand something that allows us to see a future with a solution. It is the blueprint for a road to healing, forgiveness, and actual action to see Black people get their due justice and their share of the land they built.

Let's start by acknowledging that this writer and I do not agree. He thinks federal tax dollars should be used to pay "reparations" to all Black Americans on the probability that their ancestors include slaves. I don't think that's a viable idea; I think "reparations" should be made while people are alive, and should be made by the offenders, not by the taxpayers. Fortunately, more than half of this book suggests ways individuals, groups, and especially churches can (and should) make "reparations" to Black Americans who are still alive for whatever disadvantages they, themselves, have encountered. That's a good idea. Everyone should read this book.

Suggestions include some obvious, but often overlooked, things like supporting Black-owned businesses, helping Black students pursue higher education, offering after-school tutoring and enrichment to students in inadequate schools, and many more. Travel-related businesses could help Black Americans visit Africa. Hospitals could actively recruit promising entry-level workers with an interest in becoming doctors. As a minister, Turner has a lot of suggestions for ways White churches can "adopt" Black churches. He recommends tracing your genealogy, if possible, and finding out who owned slaves and who were slaves. There may be some surprises. Some Indigenous Americans owned slaves; some Black Americans were dragged along on the Trail of Tears. Some White Americans *were* slaves. Many family records have been lost, but some people who were connected by slavery may be able to find each other. Not all people want to meet the families connected to theirs by slavery, Turner warns, but for some families this can be a step toward closure and good will. Most families' history does not involve slavery, and Turner has suggestions for ways anybody and everybody can show good will.

If it weren't worth reading for so many other reasons, this book would be worth reading because it tells the story of the Tulsa Massacre. Readers who are not from Oklahoma may never have read this story before (I hadn't). It's a piece of history that should be known in every State.

If I'd been the editor of this book I would have asked for a little balance in a few paragraphs. No "rewriting" of history was necessary to say that Confederates were motivated to defend their homes, families, way of life, whether or not their families owned slaves; in fact many Confederates were teenagers who didn't own much of anything else either. Whiteness does still carry some "privilege"--White and/or fair-skinned and/or well-off, preppy-looking teenagers routinely get sent home with warnings for the same offenses that put Black and/or ghetto-type teenagers in jail--but it can also be a disadvantage. (Turner doesn't even consider the joys of being biracial, which can include being attacked for being White and for being not-White, or not-White-enough, on the same day.) Turner is righteously indignant with White America's erasing things like the Tulsa Massacre from the history books in forty-nine states, but his indignation would pack more of a punch if he were scrupulous about being more fair to his White audience than some White writers have been to his Black congregation. And more than once, when he was writing about how White Americans ought to think, talk, and write about White privilege, I thought he ought to have translated his ideas into some thoughts about how men ought to think, talk, and write about male privilege--which would probably have eliminated a few of the ideas about tax-funded handouts in this book.

Nevertheless. Are you a person of good will? Do you have friends who look different from you? Do you want to build trust and good will with those friends' other friends and relatives? Or do you not really know anyone who looks different from you, but wish you did? If so, you should read this book. Four and a half stars.

My thanks to NetGalley and Westminster John Knox Press for an eARC of this book to read and review.

This is one of those books that can go either way, and does. I'm not huge on "hot-button" issues, but I do try to read from both "sides" of different topics, to attempt to avoid echo chamber thinking and reinforcement.

That being said, I agreed with some of what he said and disagreed with the rest. It didn't anger me or make me shake my head in 100% bobble head agreement, so I guess either the book is down the middle or I am riding the fence until the cows come home.

Either way, this was an interesting, if not enthralling read. Some things said made perfect common sense to me, others made me raise my eyebrows at the complete veering from reality direction it went. It did raise questions that I wanted answers to and I wasn't a fan of how quickly a lot of very big statements, even ones I agreed with, were just glossed over without any digging into the topic. Granted, this wasn't trying to be a dissertation and there were 100 points being made, but I think some were just too bullet point to do more than glancing the surface, let alone scratching it.

Questions weren't answered, but it does encourage the reader to do research on their own to find the answers the questions this book raises. I however, wanted MORE from this book. It ultimately left me cold.

2, not bad but this is definitely a YMMV book, stars.

I wrote a review of this text for Today's American Catholic...this was written about month ago. A wonderful piece of writing.

In Creating a Culture of Repair, Robert Turner presents a broad and persuasive explanation of 100 actions individuals, society, institutions, and churches could take to address the historic and contemporary inequities suffered by African Americans in the United States across health care, education, housing, employment, the justice system, and the Church. Turner demonstrates how inequities embedded in laws, structures, and norms continue to have ramifications today, and reparations are a means of correcting these injustices. Turner presents numerous accounts, such as WWII African American veterans being unable to access monetary benefits through the GI Bill for college tuition and home mortgages because of discriminatory college entrance and mortgage lending policies and practices at the time. Another one of Turner's many eye-opening examples is the “Southern Manifesto,” a federal policy signed by 100 congressmen - including Klansman and Senator Robert Byrd - voting to fight integration through such methods as pupil placement boards, tuition grants, and school vouchers; this movement to defund and dismantle public education that began half a century ago still exists today. Additionally, Turner presents persuasive data regarding “environmental racism,” describing policies and actions that disproportionately and intentionally direct environmental waste and other harmful effects toward communities of color. Turner provides a thorough and convincing presentation of how systemic racism negatively affects everyone, and most significantly people of color.

Turner's book is well-organized, thoroughly-researched, succinct, and practical in its guidance for addressing racial inequities at the individual, societal, and institutional levels. Two aspects of the book, though, did not sit well with me personally. First, Turner describes the US government failing to fulfill its promise of forty acres to Black families during Reconstruction, while simultaneously giving away millions of acres through the Homestead Acts in the late nineteenth century; I wish he had acknowledged that the "giving away" of land across the Great Plains was actually the federal government taking land away from indigenous peoples. Second, at times Turner frames arguments from and within a Christian perspective. While I appreciate Turner's hermeneutics and recognize the ways in which the Church in the African American community has been a tremendous source of support, advocacy, and community mobilization, his perspective appears to overlook the ways in which biases towards Christianity as the historically dominant faith tradition in the United States marginalizes and creates inequities for people from other faith traditions. As we seek to address inequities, it is critical we recognize and address them in their many manifestations.

Overall, I highly recommend this book, and express gratitude to NetGalley and Westminster John Knox Press for the ARC.

Thank you to NetGalley and Westminster John Knox Press for the advance electronic copy of this title in exchange for an honest review.

This was a very thoughtful book of guidelines for White Americans interested in reparations to Black Americans for years of slavery, prejudice, inequality, discrimination, and worse. Not a long book, but packs in a lot of detail about the history that indicates the need for such reparations, as well as 100 specific directions to guide reparations. I hope it finds its way into the hands of politicians, community leaders, churches, and educators all over the country.

Highly recommend for both those interested in change and those who don't understand why reparations are necessary.

If you are looking for practical ways to support building a more equitable and just society, this is your book. I have learned so many ways that I as an individual can support as well as where more group effort and understanding is needed.

Creating a Culture of Repair is a clear, well-written exploration of what concrete actions can be taken, both by individuals and on a societal level, to begin to repair the harm done to Black people in the US. Turner definitely approaches the topic from a religious perspective, but the 1st 3 chapters are absolutely relevant to anyone, regardless of religious beliefs. I really appreciated that the book provides specific actions for people to take and campaign for, and the writing is beautiful and eloquent throughout--Turner's pastoral voice comes through clearly and powerfully.

Eye opening. Robert Turner takes the reader through a detailed list of racism with thoughts of how to repair this horror our country has created. I am a child of the south, white, more fortunate than most, and have made it a priority to try to learn more about Black history and the injustices that have been done. I appreciated the detailed information, presented in a logical and easily understood manner. I am horrified that so much of this was unknown to me. We have so much work to do.

"Creating a Culture of Repair: Taking Action on the Road to Reparations" by Robert Turner is a specific and constructive set of suggestions to how we might begin to repair some of the massive damage done to Black people and communities in the U.S. by slavery and Jim Crow laws and the still-obvious ideology of white supremacy baked into all our social institutions. Rev. Dr. Turner doesn't SAY "this book is for white people," but it seems aimed at those who recognize the problem and wish to eradicate it but who maybe aren't sure of its size and reach and/or who are overwhelmed by the enormity of the issues and don't have a clue of how or where they might start to do their part to work on it.
Turner is very clear up front that the problem is a societal level one that can't be solved by individual actions alone, but he outlines concrete steps that can be taken at 4 different levels (individual, societal (I think "community" and/or "cultural" would be a better name for this level, to more easily distinguish it from institutional), institutional, and spiritual) that will begin to chip away at the damage and give back some of what was stolen.
I'm intrigued by many of the actions he describes. Some were familiar to me (i.e., at the individual level: use your social media presence to speak in support of reparations, support Black-owned businesses, vote for leaders who support reparations, etc.) but others I would never have thought of. These include donating to organizations that provide bail money for those who can't afford it (as the current for-profit bail system is especially harmful to Black people who are more likely to be assigned bail and also more likely to have significantly higher bail amounts assigned to them) and donating to organizations that help pay for phone calls so inmates can stay in touch with their children (again, because our "criminal justice" system is disproportionately aimed at incarcerating Black people).
Each of the next levels/sections likewise contains intriguing suggestions for reparative actions. At all levels the actions suggested are in response to specific acts and practices and ideologies, historical and current, which have done harm to the U.S. Black population.
The book is clearly and persuasively written, with an occasional sprinkling of the sharp, witty, poetic language one might expect of a reverend doctor. It's definitely thought-provoking and useful and well worth the time and thought. I have come away from it inspired and more sure of concrete ways I might do better for the world.
It would have been a 5-star read for me had the author not chosen in section 2 to explicitly reject an intersectional approach. The book would have benefitted from the perspectives and input of Black women who might have pointed out things Turner misses about some important reparations needed to combat specific issues they and their families face-- issues Turner either ignores or gives scant mention, such as the deplorable levels of maternal mortality for Black women in the U.S. "healthcare" system, the lack of affordable childcare, the lack of affordable housing--and the disproportionate eviction levels--for Black women, especially mothers, and the wage gap, which is highest for Black and Hispanic women when compared to white men.
It's not only in current problems that Turner overlooks issues facing Black women; in at least two places when discussing sexual abuse of enslaved people by white "owners," Turner specifically mentions children while lumping men and women together under the single category "adult." I didn't see a single mention of the forced impregnation of enslaved Black women and the legacy of that, or of the continued denial of bodily autonomy of Black (and other) women today. The absence of discussion or emphasis on these issues brought to mind for me writings of Black feminists who have described how Black women have always been told to wait, have always been expected to take a back seat, as white feminists said to them, "Not now--first we have to deal with gender inequality," and Black men said to them, "Not now--first we have to deal with racial inequality."
Overall, then, this book is 3.8 stars for me, rounded to 4.

I received an ARC of this book. This review represents my own honest opinion. Thank you very much to the Dr. Turner and to the publishers for this thought-provoking read!

Thank to Westminster John Knox Press and the Author for a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

America has so much work to do. There were many topics in the book that I had very little to no knowledge of. I appreciate the diligence taken to educate the reader.

This books give actions that can be taken for individual, societal, and spiritual reparations that can be given to make amends for America’s racist past. As a religious person, I appreciated especially the spiritual reparations. There were many actions that were targeting many organization structures of churches that I believe my church could apply.

Overall, this book was very educational and I would recommend it to anyone.

If you've been reading & discussing racism & white supremacy, it's time for the next step. Reparations. If you think there nothing you can do, yes there is. Reparations. Turner outlines 100 ways of taking action as an individual, as a church, as institutions, as a society. He will challenge your thinking & prod you out of your chair.

From the start, CREATING A CULTURE OF REPAIR grips you with its powerful and insightful exploration into some of the vital steps needed for racial equity and healing in America. Robert Turner skillfully navigates through a narrative that doubles as both a scholarly resource and a motivational summons, rendering the intricate subject of reparations both understandable and captivating. The only thing that keeps the book from being a 5/5 for me is that it occasionally drifts into some more religious teaching aspects, which I don’t take issue with as author Robert Turner is a pastor. My concern is that it feels like he’s occasionally putting the control of these methods in the hands of “god.” While at its core, that doesn’t harm, I feel it lessens the impact of some of his points.

In CREATING A CULTURE OF REPAIR, Turner doesn’t just highlight the history of racial injustices; he scripts a pragmatic and structured strategy forward. His comprehensive action plan is split into personal, communal, institutional, and spiritual sectors, providing a well-rounded approach to societal repair. This layout empowers readers and assigns specific roles for diverse methods to enact meaningful changes, aligning with their unique abilities and circumstances.

What truly sets this book apart is its practical, hands-on approach to what could otherwise be an overwhelming subject. It’s far from a sit-back-and-read experience; it's a proactive, engaging manual that pushes its readers to take action, rethink established norms, and commit to long-term transformation. The strong endorsements from civil rights leaders like Reverend Jesse L. Jackson, Sr., and Senator Cory Booker amplify its significance, marking it as a timely contribution to the ongoing dialogue on racial equality. I believe this book would make an excellent starting point for someone who is trying to understand the core values of what equality should look like.

CREATING A CULTURE OF REPAIR is more than a piece of literature; it’s a rallying cry for mobilization toward reparative justice. Turner’s prose encourages readers to move from passive observation to active engagement in reparations. He calls on everyone to step up and partake in the actions necessary for forging a fairer, more equitable society. And no, this doesn’t mean taking the dollar from your pocket and throwing it up in the air like so many would have you believe.

This book is essential for anyone eager to delve deep into the complexities of reparations, desiring to comprehend and engage in the discourse and initiatives crucial for real change. Turner's detailed breakdown of actionable steps, rich historical insights, and contemporary applications equip this book as a fundamental tool in the movement for justice and equity.

CREATING A CULTURE OF REPAIR stands out as an influential guide that educates and motivates its readers to undertake decisive actions toward healing America’s longstanding racial wounds. It is a beacon for those looking to grasp and influence the broader racial justice and equity narrative, marking a significant step toward a reconciled and equitable society. With Turner's straightforward, methodical guidance supported by critical civil rights figures, this book will impact national discussions and activities surrounding racial reparations.

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This is one of the books that make me think “what if the United States didn’t have a culture of white supremacy. what greatness would have come from communities like Greenwood, in Tulsa. What if generation weath wasn’t wiped out for black citizens..how much better of a country we could be” This book is a good place to start some change. there are 100 actions broken down into individual, social, institutional, and spiritual repair. We can change a little by ourselves, and encourge other changes, encourage companies to contribute to change.

Thank you NetGalley and Westminster John Knox Press for a copy to read and think about.

I think this book is a great starting point for anyone who is ready to learn and take action to repair racial injustice.

The book provides a total of 100 actions of reparation in four sections: Individual, Societal, Institutional and Spiritual.

I appreciate the first two actions are acknowledging your privilege and supporting black owned businesses. Complete with explanations and examples.

I believe these actions are doable for most individuals and think the discussion points provided at the end will be very helpful.

Thank you to the author, publisher and NetGalley for the opportunity to read Creating A Culture Of Repair as an ARC.

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Thank you @netgalley and @wjkbooks for the ARC of this impactful book. I'm a social worker and Enneagram 8, so social justice issues and the hard work of societal repair are near to my heart. I'm also a person who highly values taking action, so this book truly spoke to that desire. The practical examples that Rev. Dr. Turner (@revdrrobertturner) provided in his book for how individuals, society, institutions, and spiritual communities can take action towards reparations are direct, persuasive, and tangible. Even with my professional background, when I thought about the term "reparations" I had a minimalistic view prior to this book. This book shed light on the multifaceted ways that we can work towards repair and to acknowledge the past wrongs of our ancestors.

This book has actions for everyone but will be especially impactful for white, evangelical Christians (a group to which I belong). If you also consider yourself a part of that group, I would challenge you to read this book, sit with any feelings of discomfort that it may bring up, and DM me your reactions/thoughts.

I still have a long way to go in my work against the privilege I have in this country because of my whiteness, but here are a few tangible steps I'm committing to after this book:

1. Prioritize shopping at African-American owned businesses.

2. Investing in nonprofits who seek to combat the race gap in homeownership.

3. Donating to historic African-American rights advocacy groups.

4. Supporting local organizations that feature and fund African-American artists and art programs in schools.

5. Reading books written by African-American authors that focus on African-American & African history.

This has to be one of my favorite reads of all time & on my must-read list!

Despite the rating, I don't feel like this is a bad book, just not the book for me. The title of this book intrigued me, as I definitely believe in the concept of reparations and am always interested to know people's ideas of how to go about them.

However, I can't really grasp who this book would be for -- I believe it is written primarily to white people (of which I am one) but I feel like it lives in an in-between space. As someone who started the book believing in the concept of reparations, I found it didn't go deep enough on any particular idea -- rehashed a lot of the existing ideas already floating around out there but not really delving into any of them or laying out the administration of them. On the flip side, for someone who has not yet wrapped their minds around reparations and the systemic problems black people have faced, I also found it didn't provide enough explanation to really get them to understand some of these ideas (some of the books referenced in this book, like The New Jim Crow do; I realize this book is not that, but the points were just too surface level to effectively educate someone who needs to be convinced still).

Additionally I am not religious nor affiliated with the church, so both the last section as well as the other references to the bible as reasonings for certain points didn't really hold water for me. That said, I did find myself in agreement with a lot of the Spiritual section for church-goers; so it's not that I found the arguments invalid, it was just not applicable to me or my views.

Overall it wasn't a bad book, it's just not what I personally wanted it to be.

This is an excellent book about how repairing things makes our lives different. Is it better to replace it? This book provides the answers.