scholarly journals The Difference Denominations Made: Identifying the Black Church(es) and Black Religious Choices of the Early Republic

2019 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 255-290
Author(s):  
Kyle T. Bulthuis
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Black Church ◽  
Early Republic ◽  
Black Churches ◽  
American Religious History ◽  
Black Religion ◽  
Religious Traditions ◽  
Black Clergy ◽  
The Difference ◽  
American Churches

ABSTRACTScholars of African-American religious history have recently debated the significance of the black church in American history. Those that have, pro and con, have often considered the black church as a singular entity, despite the fact that African Americans affiliated with a number of different religious traditions under the umbrella of the black church. This article posits that it is useful to consider denominational and theological developments within different African-American churches. Doing so acknowledges plural creations and developments of black churches, rather than a singular black church, which better accounts for the historical experience of black religion. In this piece, I analyze four different denominational and theological traditions that blacks followed in the early Republic: the Anglican–Episcopalian, the Calvinist (Congregational–Presbyterian), the Methodist, and the Baptist. Each offered a unique ecclesiastical structure and set of theological assumptions within which black clergy and laity operated. Each required different levels of interaction with white coreligionists, and, although some tended to offer more direct opportunities for reform and resistance, all groups suffered differing constraints that limited such action. I argue that the two bodies connected to formalist traditions, the Episcopalian and Calvinist, were initially better developed despite their smaller size, and thus disproportionately shaped black community and reform efforts in the antebellum United States.

The Doors of the Church are Now Open: Black Clergy, Collective Efficacy, and Neighborhood Violence

2016 ◽  
Vol 15 (3) ◽  
pp. 289-314 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kashea Pegram ◽  
Rod K. Brunson ◽  
Anthony A. Braga
Keyword(s):  
Collective Efficacy ◽  
Black Church ◽  
Urban Youth ◽  
Community Organizing ◽  
Youth Violence ◽  
Political Action ◽  
Crime Control ◽  
Social Institution ◽  
Black Churches ◽  
Black Clergy

Prior research has documented the historical significance of the black church beyond serving parishioners’ religious and spiritual needs. Specifically, several black churches are involved in community organizing, social service activities, and political action. Scholars, however, have paid less attention to its role as a potent social institution in community crime control and prevention efforts. We conducted face–to–face interviews with 30 members of Boston's Ten Point Coalition of activist black clergy to document the motivations for and mechanisms through which ministers became involved in efforts to reduce street violence, the varied methods through which ministers develop strategic coalitions and manage violence reduction initiatives, and the ways ministers address the complex challenges involved in doing this work. Study findings suggest that black churches can serve as sources of collective efficacy that can help mobilize other churches, community organizations, police departments, and neighborhood residents in a coordinated effort to address urban youth violence.

Family, Church, Community

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cheryl Janifer LaRoche
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Family Relations ◽  
Black Churches ◽  
Black Families ◽  
Free Blacks ◽  
Underground Railroad ◽  
Church And Community ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
American Churches ◽  
Church Organizations

This chapter explores the roles played by family, church, and community in the Black Underground Railroad movement. By mapping Black settlements, it clarifies and exposes the relationship between African American churches, settlements, and historic Underground Railroad routes. It shows how Black families sustained an important family organizational structure that drove the Underground Railroad. It explains how African American communities connected through family relations and intermarriage, church organizations, benevolent societies, and the fraternal structure of the Prince Hall Masons. It considers how maintaining family connections motivated escape from slavery, particularly when imminent sale threatened to break up the family. Finally, it highlights the ways that Black churches and their ministers helped free Blacks, or self-liberated men and women, to succeed in winning freedom for themselves and their loved ones.

Sacramental Shame in Black Churches

2020 ◽  
pp. 141-165
Author(s):  
Theresa W. Tobin ◽  
Dawne Moon
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Qualitative Study ◽  
White Supremacy ◽  
Black Churches ◽  
Personal Relationships ◽  
Church Members ◽  
African American Churches ◽  
Gender Minorities ◽  
Conservative Christians ◽  
American Churches

Drawing from a qualitative study of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) conservative Christians and their allies, our research names a form of spiritual violence we call sacramental shame that impacts the lives of LGBTQ members. Through this shaming dynamic, homonegative churches make constant displays of endangered belonging a requirement for sexual/gender minorities’ acceptance and even their salvation. This chapter explores how racist discourses impact sacramental shame experiences for African-American LGBTQ church members. African-American churches have long resisted the spiritual violence of white supremacy; however, with the goal of protecting an image of Blackness that defies the sexual stereotypes at the root of white supremacy, they often unwittingly instil in LGBTQ members distinct forms of sacramental shame. At the same time, many in these churches cultivate personal relationships with a liberator God who sides with the oppressed, avenges those who endure injustice, and inspires communal work for justice, promoting a life-enhancing ethos of love.

scholarly journals The Fight is on in Texas

2008 ◽  
Author(s):  
Edward Robinson
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
African American ◽  
Black Churches ◽  
Churches Of Christ ◽  
Primary Sources ◽  
Restoration Movement ◽  
African American Churches ◽  
First Time ◽  
American Churches ◽  
Growing Network

This groundbreaking work draws upon congregational histories and other primary sources to chronicle for the first time the story of African American Churches of Christ in Texas. Emerging out of the nineteenth-century Stone-Campbell Restoration Movement, the African American churches inherited from their white mentors both a Biblicist theology and a feisty spirit. Their “fight” was against religious error and in support of the true church as they understood it. Out of that “fight” emerged a growing network of congregations that by the mid-twentieth century reached throughout Texas. This book lifts out of obscurity the African American Christians who joined Ramsey’s “fight …out West” and who made black Churches of Christ in Texas what they are today.

Urbanization and the End of Black Churches in the Modern World

2007 ◽  
Vol 76 (4) ◽  
pp. 799-822 ◽  
Author(s):  
Curtis J. Evans
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
African American ◽  
Black Churches ◽  
Modern World ◽  
American Religion ◽  
Black Religion ◽  
Political Condition ◽  
African American Religion ◽  
Early Twentieth Century ◽  
The Way

Historian Wallace Best argues in his Passionately Human, No Less Divine: Religion and Culture in Black Chicago, 1915-1952 (2005) that historically “we have been more accustomed to think of religion as spontaneous and supernatural.” Best maintains that we have seen religion as “something that happens—outside of human control and irrespective of social context.” He wants to challenge this conception of religion by emphasizing the active production of a new religious culture by black Americans in Chicago in the early twentieth century. The agency of lower- and working-class blacks is what Best emphasizes in his rich analysis of religion and culture in black Chicago. Although it is not clear who the “we” is in Best's analysis because he does not cite any sources on this point, I do not quite see things the way that he does. As I will demonstrate in this essay, the historiography on African American religion has not posited a static or “supernatural” conception of religion. What strikes me about the history of interpretations of African American religion is the way in which interpreters have asserted that peoples of African descent were “naturally religious,” which meant that their religion was a product of biology and nature rather than of the “supernatural.” Generally, white interpreters in the early twentieth century set the terms of the debate by arguing that blacks were naturally religious and thus unable to compete in a modern industrial world. The political and social force of such arguments has been keenly observed by black interpreters, who were eager to offer in response a more socially progressive notion of black religion in order to enlist black churches in social reform, to counter images of blacks as inhibited by nature or biology from contributing to the cultural vitality of the nation, and to insist that black religion changed in response to social circumstances (and hence the common claim in the 1940s that it was very much a product, if not an epiphenomenon, of their economic and political condition).

Where Have We Gone From There?

2019 ◽  
pp. 58-85
Author(s):  
Dwayne E. Meadows
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Black Church ◽  
Christian Leadership ◽  
Black Religion ◽  
African American Culture ◽  
Political Empowerment ◽  
Faith Traditions ◽  
Southern Christian Leadership Conference ◽  
Suburban Life ◽  
Point Of Reference

It is the author's position that Martin King's final keynote address at the tenth annual session of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, where the theme was “Where Do We Go From Here” is a significant point of reference in the ongoing struggle of African Americans in America. Indeed, 50 years after King's sudden death, his turn toward economic and political empowerment is still the cornerstone of the Black agenda in America. Therefore, with the preceding as our contextual mooring, the author will consider that unique expression of African American culture, Black religion, and the Black church in its 21st century iteration. How has suburban life and the ongoing search for success and the “American Dream” affected Black faith traditions? What do we believe, and who is our God? What has become of the “Souls of Black Folk?”

A Survey of Black Churches’ Responses to Domestic Violence

2019 ◽  
Vol 46 (4) ◽  
pp. 21-38 ◽  
Author(s):  
Oliver Williams ◽  
Esther Jenkins
Keyword(s):  
Domestic Violence ◽  
Black Church ◽  
Exploratory Study ◽  
Black Churches ◽  
Lay Leaders ◽  
Couples Counseling ◽  
Convenience Sample ◽  
African American Churches ◽  
High Level ◽  
American Churches

A high level of church involvement among African Americans suggests the potential of the Black church in addressing domestic violence. However, very little research has examined this topic. The current study is an exploratory study of how aware African American churches are of victims in their congregation and how they respond to them.  The survey was conducted with a convenience sample (N=112) of church pastors and lay leaders, ¾ of whom were senior or associate/assistant pastors, from 9 cities and various denominations.   The results showed that these churches may underestimate the number of members who are victims, infrequently address domestic violence from the pulpit, and sometimes provided interventions that are potentially harmful, i.e. couples’ counseling and/or lack of safety risk assessment.   Respondents thought that their church’s response to domestic violence could be improved with more training for clergy and more knowledge of domestic violence resources. This paper provides recommendations for Christian Social Workers working with Black churches around issues of domestic violence.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document