I was at a women’s church event. The room was filled with Black women. The pastor speaking—a light-skinned Black woman—stood up and said, “You don’t have to lay on your back for a man.”

That wasn’t wisdom. That was assumption.

That sentence didn’t minister—it profiled. It leaned on a stereotype that Black women are sexually reckless, desperate for male approval, and in need of public correction. And the fact that it came from a light-skinned Black woman doesn’t absolve it. It exposes how deeply anti-Black and colorist narratives get recycled—even by those who benefit from proximity to respectability and lighter skin.

Let’s be honest:
That line is not said in rooms full of white women. Their sexuality is handled with euphemisms and grace. Black women get imagery. Bluntness. Shame. As if our bodies demand harsher language and stronger warnings.

That is not holiness. That is respectability politics wearing a collar.

Churches love to say they’re “colorblind,” yet Black women are constantly singled out for sexual correction—whether explicitly or through tone, language, and audience targeting. We are preached down to, not spoken with. Corrected for stereotypes rather than addressed as individuals.

And if you call it out? You’re labeled divisive. Bitter. Sensitive. But silence doesn’t make it holy—it just makes it normalized.

What happened in that room wasn’t accountability. It was profiling wrapped in scripture-adjacent language. A reminder that Black women’s bodies are still treated as public property—open for commentary, regulation, and discipline—even in church.

Racism in church doesn’t always shout.
Sometimes it testifies.
Sometimes it’s affirmed with amens.
Sometimes it comes from someone who looks like you—and that’s exactly why it survives.