African American Spirituality

The African-American community represents a paradox of sorts. While collective success has been achieved in many areas, African-Americans still disproportionately suffer from a variety of social ills. The residual impact of years of slavery and exclusion from the major institutions of American life are still trenchant. Yet there is hope. As we move forward into a new millennium, our greatest answers can be found by exploring the past.

With high expectations, Vanguards of a Missionary Uprising calls on Christian African-American students to step forward and lead a new international missionary movement. Celebrating their leadership potential, a veteran urban missionary makes this positive challenge from Jesus Christ's Great Commission in the Bible.

Willie Johnson. Granddaughter of a slave. Rejected by her father. Sold by her mother. Abused by her husband. How did a biracial woman become accepted to preach revivals in the Deep South and coast to coast during segregation and the Civil Rights movement. Listen to Through the Waters and learn how to rise above your obstacles from the inspiring life and ministry of Willie Johnson.

In 1831 Virginia, Nat Turner led a band of Southampton County slaves in a rebellion that killed 55 whites, mostly women and children. After more than two months in hiding, Turner was captured, and quickly convicted and executed. In the Matter of Nat Turner penetrates the historical caricature of Turner as befuddled mystic and self-styled Baptist preacher to recover the haunting persona of this legendary American slave rebel.

On October 3, 1807, Thomas Jefferson was contacted by an unknown traveler urgently pleading for a private "interview" with the president, promising to disclose "a matter of momentous importance". By the next day, Jefferson held in his hands two astonishing manuscripts whose history has been lost for over two centuries. Authored by Muslims fleeing captivity in rural Kentucky, these documents delivered to the president in 1807 were penned by literate African slaves, and written entirely in Arabic.

Servants of Allah presents a history of African Muslims, following them from West Africa to the Americas. Although many assume that what Muslim faith they brought with them to the Americas was quickly absorbed into the new Christian milieu, as Sylviane A. Diouf demonstrates in this meticulously researched, groundbreaking volume, Islam flourished during slavery on a large scale.

Most people think that money is the key to happiness, but when an ecstatic Nina Lawson wins millions in the Powerball lottery, her world is turned upside down. At first, she and her fiance, Rick, are delighted with the unexpected windfall and immediately begin planning their future. Soon, family members and friends begin coming out of the woodwork to claim a piece of Nina's winnings. But the most unexpected request comes from Todd, Nina's ex-husband.

The true-life story of the woman whose life sentence for nonviolent drug trafficking was commuted by President Donald Trump thanks to the efforts of Kim Kardashian West - an inspiring memoir of faith, hope, mercy, and gratitude.

This dissertation is an effort to think through the complexities of how African American literature interacts with what I am terming the notion of uncalling made visible by the heterodox Christianities that fall out of the scope of the Black. In other words, I analyze Black religiosity as an enactment of radical Black collectivity in counterdistinction to a politics of recognition. I argue it is this figure of the uncalled, operating out of heterodox Black religiosities, that can offer an alternative model for liberation and healing that is not bound up in outward cries for recognition.

In the United States, to be a Black American is to be a Black Christian. And there’s something to this assumption in that the vast majority of African Americans are Christian. However, in recent years a growing number of African Americans have said they claim no particular religious affiliation—they are Black “nones.” And of these Black “nones,” the most public and vocal are those who claim to be humanists.

The story is about a gossipy woman finding out that being a "good Christian" is indeed a 24 hour job.

Shay Tolliver has a world of her own intertwined with close friends located near and far. Terrell Fletcher moved to Arizona three years ago from Detroit, Michigan. But only a year and a half ago, he relocated to Lake Havasu City where Shay lives. They connect with one another through a social website for all types of people named Sexy Elite. Terrell reaches out to Shay one day and they find out they have more in common than meets the eye ordinarily.

What is the true nature and mission of the church? Is its proper Christian purpose to save souls, or to transform the social order? This question is especially fraught when the church is one built by an enslaved people and formed, from its beginning, at the center of an oppressed community's fight for personhood and freedom. Such is the central tension in the identity and mission of the Black church in the United States.

Great journeys often start with a single question. For D. K. Evans, a newly married professional in the Christian-dominated South, that question was, “Why Do I Believe in God?” That simple query led him on a years-long search to better understand the nature of religion and faith, particularly as it applies to the Black community. Evans took inspiration from John Henrik Clarke, Yosef-Ben Jochannan, Hubert Harrison, and John G. Jackson, champions of a rich Black tradition of challenging religious orthodoxy, and also from many others in his own community who had similarly come to question their core religious beliefs.

This audiobook and its short, attention grabbing collection welcomes the listeners to a better understanding not only about Christianity but also more importantly about the Caribbean people. Who is the Caribbean person? What is the impact of Christianity to the Caribbean history? These are just two of the many questions that this audiobook will answer and clarify for the listeners.

Feminism and atheism are “dirty words” that Americans across the political spectrum love to debate - and hate. Throw them into a blender and you have a toxic brew that supposedly defies decency, respectability, and Americana. Putting gender at the center of the equation, progressive “Religious Nones” of color are spearheading an anti-racist, social justice humanism that disrupts the “colorblind” ethos of European American atheist and humanist agendas, which focus principally on church-state separation.

Benjamin Tucker Tanner (1835-1923) was an editor, historian, and prominent theologian of his time who founded The Christian Recorder, an early African American newspaper. In his 1895 book The Color of Solomon, he contends that King Solomon of the Bible did not belong to the white race.

From his enslavement to freedom, Frederick Douglass was one of America's most extraordinary champions of liberty and equality. Throughout his long life, Douglass was also a man of profound religious conviction. In this concise and original biography, D. H. Dilbeck offers a provocative interpretation of Douglass's life through the lens of his faith. In an era when the role of religion in public life is as contentious as ever, Dilbeck provides essential new perspective on Douglass's place in American history.

A slave runs away from his master. A mutual friend steps in to mediate between the two of them. Can there be healing in such a scarred relationship? This is the situation faced in the book of Philemon. From this short New Testament letter, pastor and author Dhati Lewis (Among Wolves) unpacks key principles that Paul applied to being an advocate in the midst of division.

The 2012 killing of Trayvon Martin, an African American teenager in Florida, and the subsequent acquittal of his killer, brought public attention to controversial "Stand Your Ground" laws. The verdict, as much as the killing, sent shock waves through the African American community, recalling a history of similar deaths, and the long struggle for justice. On the Sunday morning following the verdict, black preachers around the country addressed the question, "Where is the justice of God? What are we to hope for?"