The Power of Testimony

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Growing up, I had very little contact with black people. My world
was almost entirely populated by pale-​skinned people of Dutch
descent. Such isolation is astounding in any time and place, but
especially so when you consider that I grew up in urban areas in the
sixties and early seventies.
My family lived in the Chicago area when I was born, and we
moved to northern New Jersey just before I began fifth grade.
In both places, we were part of a religious and ethnic subculture
that revolved around the Christian Reformed Church. This small
denomination is a Dutch version of Presbyterianism, with the same
Reformed roots and Calvinist doctrine. Its forebears came to the
United States from Holland beginning in the mid-1800s. They
were staunch farmers who knew how to persist through difficulty.
Running through their stoicism was a deep intellectual vein and
the belief that faith touches every aspect of life. Accordingly, the
denomination ran its own school system. These two institutions,
church and school, were the pivot points of our family’s life. My
parents both worked in the Christian school system—​ my father as
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