Frederick Douglass

Slave owners at this time were all Christians. It was very looked down upon to not be openly Christian. Now, it is not like that at all. Everyday Christians are afraid to use their voice in case of being picked on. Back then, you had to be Christian, go to church, and pray every day as a white, male slave owner. It was expected of you. How does this make sense? Well, it looks terrible for us Christians to have believers who beat, raped, and demeaned slaves. According to Frederick Douglass, he cannot make sense of it. As Christians we are supposed to love everyone. Is that showing love? No. Douglass believes that slave owners put on the face of Christianity each morning to cover up their horrid acts. I’m going to be honest, there are people today who still do this. Everyday people wake up and pretend to be something they are not so others cannot see how horrible they actually are. We call these people hypocrites. But, technically we are all hypocrites. No one can live a perfect life so when we preach to live like Jesus everyday, we are being hypocrites. But, we should try to be like Jesus and as long as you are not hiding that your mistakes or sins, it’s okay because no one is perfect. Now whether or not we can prove what was going on in the slave owners’ heads, I don’t know. My guess is some of them were conscious their actions were causing them to put on a huge show of Christianity and some were not. Maybe they knew they were horrible people to “their” slaves and unconsciously tried to make it better. Douglass mentions that out of all of his masters, the religious were the most harsh. This leads me to believe that it was all a show and that they never actually knew God. A real Christian would never do that.