You can not discover lands already inhabited.

Injustice has plagued American society for years and years. And we cannot move toward being a more just country without understanding the root causes that have formed our culture and institutions. In this prophetic blend of background, theology, and cultural commentary, Mark Charles and Soong-Chan Rah reveal the far-reaching, damaging effects of the ‘Doctrine of Finding.’ In the fifteenth century, official church edicts gave Christian explorers the proper to about Unsettling Truths: The Ongoing, Dehumanizing Legacy from the Doctrine of Discovery claim territories they ‘uncovered.’ This is institutionalized as an implicit national construction that justifies American triumphalism, white supremacy, and ongoing injustices. The effect would be that the dominating culture idealizes a history of discovery, opportunity, extension, and equality, while minority areas have been traumatized by colonization, slavery, segregation, and dehumanization. Recovery begins when deeply entrenched beliefs are unsettled. Charles and Rah try to recover a common memory space and shared understanding of where we have been and where we ‘re going. As other nations have got instituted truth and reconciliation commissions, therefore do the writers call our country and churches to a truth-telling that will expose past injustices and open the entranceway to conciliation and true community.