black church

To Pray or to Protest? The Both/And-ness of Black Christianity

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I want to argue that we need to have a more expansive understanding of black religious identities, an understanding that Womanist Theologians have already pushed us toward, an understanding that does not compartmentalize black religious thought and responses into shallow categories like “right/conservative/prayerful” and “left/academic/protester”; categories that are too small, too static, and too constricting for us to comprehend the diversity of black religious lives and black political activity.

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Tyler Perry’s Museum of Blackness

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Tyler Perry’s Madea franchise is part of a collective of black, fat drag, comedy-dramas. These films bear six distinguishing features: 1) they are considered “successful” because they gross more than their production costs; 2) they are accompanied by an R&B/gospel soundtrack, and 3) include casts of popular black actors and actresses who are well known within African American communities. Also characteristic of these films are 4) the use of multiple and arguably watered-down Protestant messages about the importance of faith in God, couched in comedic performance, to appeal to mass audiences. An additional feature is that 5) the black church is the space where a significant turning point and/or the film’s resolution occur. Most notably, these films are characterized by 6) the donning of intricately designed fat suits by black men (Tyler Perry, Martin Lawrence and Eddie Murphy) to parody black women.

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The Gospel Church and the Ruining of Gay Lives: An Interview with Anthony Heilbut

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Most insiders to this world are privy to the open secret of gospel’s deep reliance on the contributions and influence of gay men and women. But Heilbut opens wide the closet doors and peers in with the bright light of righteous outrage for the plight of the children in an increasingly homophobic religious culture, while also bringing a deeply felt sensitivity for the stories of the children and their musical sensibility. As he writes: “It is impossible to understand the story of black America without foregrounding the experiences of the gay men of gospel.”

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Martin Luther King in the Era of Occupy

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The prophetic tradition of black Christianity remains alive, if embattled. It is impossible to conceive of the civil rights movement without placing black Christianity at its center, for it empowered the rank and file who made the movement move. And when it moved, it was able to demolish the system of legal segregation. The history of black Christianity in America made that transformation possible, even as it frustrated some of the deeper-rooted aims of some activists who sought to address issues of income and wealth inequality as much as the formal legal structures of “civil rights.” That remains the prophetic task of the generation misleadingly labeled as “post-racial.”

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Melissa Harris-Perry: LGBT Advocates Need Public Progressive Faith

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“As a black, feminist, marriage-equality advocate I reside at an important intersection in this struggle. This movement must acknowledge the unique history of racial oppression, while still revealing the interconnections of all marriage exclusion. This work must reflect the feminist critique of marriage, while still acknowledging the ancient, cross-cultural, human attachment to marriage. This work must be staunchly supportive of same-sex marriage, while rejecting a marriage-normative framework that silences the contributions of queer life.”

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To Be Atheist, Feminist, and Black

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Sadly, there is still a fair amount of ignorance and bigotry toward black non-believers in African American communities due to the stereotype that atheists are immoral, rudderless, and not authentically black. This belief is especially insidious for black women. Mainstream African American culture places a high premium on black female caregiving, piety, and sacrifice. The patriarchal traditions of the Black Church, with their emphasis on charismatic black male leadership and biblical literalism, play a key role in socializing black women to be subservient and self-sacrificing.

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