Albert Cleage Jr. and The Black Madonna and Child (PDFDrive)

Black Religion / Womanist Thought / Social Justice
ALBERT CLEAGE JR.

AND THE BLACK
MADONNA AND CHILD
EDITED BY
JAWANZA ERIC CLARK
Black Religion/Womanist Thought/Social Justice
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University of Chicago Divinity School
Chicago, Illinois, USA
Linda E. Thomas
Lutheran School of Theology Chicago
Chicago, Illinois, USA
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Jawanza Eric Clark
Editor
Albert Cleage Jr. and

the Black Madonna
and Child
Editor
Jawanza Eric Clark
Manhattan College
Riverdale, New York, USA
Black Religion/Womanist Thought/Social Justice

ISBN 978-1-137-54688-3 ISBN 978-1-137-54689-0 (eBook)
DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54689-0
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I am truly indebted to the many people who have provided inspiration and
encouragement toward the completion of this book. They are too many to
name. I am thankful to all the contributors who took great time, effort, and
care to complete their excellent book chapters. In your own way, each one
of you is living out the great inheritance left by the Rev. Albert B. Cleage
Jr. Each contributor offered a unique perspective and evaluation of this
complex legacy. I am also indebted to the members of the Shrines of the
Black Madonna of the Pan African Orthodox Christian Church, the living
testimony to the work of Rev. Cleage. So many of you, in every region
(Detroit, Michigan; Atlanta, Georgia; Houston, Texas; and Calhoun
Falls, SC) have encouraged me to continue to develop my scholarship and
pay homage to our founder. You are greatly appreciated for your work
in helping this project come into fruition: Rev. D. Kimathi Nelson, Rev.
Aswad Walker, Rev. Velma Maia Thomas, Rev. Olubayo A. Mandela, Rev.
Kehinde Biggs, Rev. Mwenda Brown, Rev. Mbiyu Moore, Jilo Williams,
Ayanna Abi-Kyles, Michael Amir Bannerman, Sondai Lester, James
Tacuma Ribbron, Bakeeba Hampton, Ewa Ife Oma Oba, all the black
women interviewed for the chapter on the black Madonna and woman-
hood, and many, many others. Finally, I want to thank my wife, Jennifer
“Miniya” Clark, who has provided unwavering support to me throughout
this process and even assisted in the coordination of the contributors to
ensure timely submissions. Thank you! This book is my honest effort to
assess the legacy of Rev. Albert B. Cleage Jr. and the enduring value of the
black Madonna and child as we commemorate the 50th anniversary of
that great unveiling. To God Be the Glory!
v
CONTENTS
1 Introduction: Why a White Christ Continues to Be Racist:

The Legacy of Albert B. Cleage Jr. 1
Jawanza Eric Clark
Part I Albert B. Cleage Jr.’s Theology and Politics 19
2 The Theological Journey of Albert B. Cleage

Jr.: Reflections from Jaramogi’s Protégé
and Successor 21
D. Kimathi Nelson
3 Nothing Is More Sacred Than the Liberation of Black

People: Albert Cleage’s Method as Unfulfilled
Theological Paradigm Shift 39
Jawanza Eric Clark
4 “We Needed Both of Them”: The Continuing

Relevance of Rev. Albert B. Cleage Jr.’s (Jaramogi
Abebe Agyeman’s) Radical Interpretations
of Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X
in Scholarship and Black Protest Thought 59
Stephen C. Finley
vii
viii CONTENTS
5 The Black Messiah and Black Suffering 77

Torin Dru Alexander
6 Politics Is Sacred: The Activism of

Albert B. Cleage Jr. 97
Aswad Walker
Part II Representations of the Black Madonna and

Child, Christian Education, and Pastoral Care 115
7 The Black Madonna and the Role of Women 117

Velma Maia Thomas
8 Black Power and Black Madonna: Charting

the Aesthetic Influence of Rev. Albert Cleage,
Glanton Dowdell & the Shrine of the Black
Madonna, #1 135
Melanee Harvey
9 The Power of a Black Christology: Africana

Pastoral Theology Reflects on Black Divinity 157
Lee H. Butler
10 Image is Everything? The Significance

of the Imago Dei in the Development of African
American Youth 171
Almeda M. Wright
11 A Crucified Black Messiah, a Dead Black Love 189

BaSean A. Jackson
CONTENTS ix
Part III The Legacy of the Black Messiah

in the African Diaspora 207
12 The Crucified City: Detroit as a Black

Christ Figure 209
Kamasi C. Hill
13 Savior King: Re-reading the Gospels

as Greco-Africana Literature & Re-imaging
Christ as Messianic Pharaoh 227
Salim Faraji
14 He Is Black and We Are Queer:

The Legacy of the Black Messiah
for Black LGBTQ Christians 251
Pamela Lightsey
15 The “Black Messiah” and African Christologies:

Pan-African Symbols of Liberation 269
Josiah Ulysses Young
16 The Quest for a Radical Black Jesus:

An Antidote to Imperial Mission Christianity 285
Anthony G. Reddie
Index 301
LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS
Torin Dru Alexander is a scholar in the area of African American religion

and religious experience. The interdisciplinary perspective expressed in his
work is influenced by phenomenology, critical theories on race and gender,
and post-colonial/post-structuralist studies. He is a former editorial assistant
for Religious Studies Review and an assistant editor for The Encyclopedia of
African American Religious Culture (ABC-CLIO). He is working on a manu-
script entitled Of Our Spiritual Strivings: Africana Subjectivity and its
Relationship to African American and African Diasporic Religious Experience.
The Rev. Lee H. Butler Jr. is Professor of Theology and Psychology at the Chicago
Theological Seminary (CTS). He joined the CTS faculty as Assistant Professor of
Theology and Psychology in 1996. In 2006, he was promoted to the rank of full
professor and became the first African American to achieve this rank at CTS. A
former interim vice-president for academic affairs and academic dean, former
director of the CTS Master of Divinity program, and the founder of the Center for
the Study of Black Faith and Life at CTS, he is an Africana pastoral theologian
whose work focuses on honoring the cultural distinctiveness and the indigenous
traditions of African-descended peoples throughout the Americas. He explores
identity formation, African indigenous religions, American slavocracy, religiosity
and spirituality, black and womanist theologies, psychological historiography, and
health and healing. His current research projects focus on terror and trauma in
America to develop healing rituals that will restore communities to a celebration of
life. He is the author of Listen, My Son: Wisdom to Help African American Fathers
(2010), Liberating Our Dignity, Saving Our Souls (2006), A Loving Home: Caring
for African American Marriage and Families (2000), and numerous articles pub-
lished in many books and professional journals on the subject of pastoral care and
pastoral psychology. He is a past president of the Society for the Study of Black
Religion, a member of the American Academy of Religion, the Society for Pastoral
xi
xii LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS
Theology, and the Association of Black Psychologists. He received his Bachelor of

Arts from Bucknell University, Master of Divinity from Eastern Baptist Theological
Seminary, Master of Theology from Princeton Theological Seminary, and Master
of Philosophy and Doctor of Philosophy from Drew University.
Jawanza Eric Clark is Assistant (Associate) Professor of Global Christianity at
Manhattan College, Bronx, NY. He is the author of Indigenous Black Theology, a
work of constructive theology that incorporates the traditional African notion of
ancestor in the development of black theology, as well as other articles and book
chapters on black theology and African religions. Clark teaches courses in the
Philosophy of Religion, Comparative Theologies, and Theologies of Liberation.
He received his BA from Morehouse College, Master of Divinity from Yale
Divinity School, and PhD in Religion from Emory University.
Salim Faraji is Associate Professor and former Chair of Africana Studies at
California State University, Dominguez Hills. He is also the Founding Executive
Director of the Master of Arts in International Studies Africa Program at Concordia
University Irvine. He completed his Master of Divinity at the Claremont School of
Theology and MA and PhD at Claremont Graduate University. He is a member of
the International Society for Nubian Studies and specializes in early Christian his-
tory, Africana and Africanist historiography, Coptic Studies, and the Sudanic,
Napatan, Meroitic, and Medieval periods of Nubian history. He has presented
papers on Nubian Christianity at the 11th International Conference for Meroitic
Studies in Vienna, Austria, the 12th International Conference for Nubian Studies
at the British Museum, and the 13th Annual International Conference for Nubian
Studies at the University of Neuchatel in Switzerland. He is one of a handful of
Nubiologists in the USA and a distinguished scholar of Greco-Africana Studies.
Professor Faraji is a contributor to the Oxford Dictionary of African Biography and
the author of The Roots of Nubian Christianity Uncovered: The Triumph of the Last
Pharaoh: Religious Encounters in Late Africa.
Stephen C. Finley is an associate professor at Louisiana State University. He holds
a joint appointment in the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies and
the African and African American Studies Program. He is the co-editor of
Esotericism in African American Religious Experience: “There Is a Mystery”…
(2015) and the author of the forthcoming In and Out of This World: Material and
Extraterrestrial Bodies in the Nation of Islam. He completed his PhD in the study
of religion from Rice University.
Melanee Harvey is Lecturer in Art History in the Art Department at Howard
University. She is a doctoral candidate in the History of Art and Architecture
Department at Boston University. She presented her preliminary dissertation
research on the Church of God in Christ Headquarters, Mason Temple (Memphis,
TN) at a 2013 conference on religion in American life at King’s College in London.
In 2014, Melanee served as a Smithsonian Predoctoral Fellow, jointly appointed at
LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS xiii
Smithsonian American Art Museum and the Center for Folklife and Cultural
Heritage. Her research interests center on expressions of spirituality found
throughout the African Diaspora, ranging from the visual culture of Haitian
Vodou communities in the USA to the unrecognized architectural history of
African Methodist Episcopal’s building boom of the late nineteenth century.
Kamasi C. Hill is a historian, theologian, cultural critic, an award-winning film-
maker, and an avid art collector. He has been a public school educator for 20 years
and is also an adjunct lecturer. He specializes in twentieth- and twenty-first-cen-
tury American Religious History and Culture and his research also explores the
relationship between religion and popular culture. Dr. Hill has contributed to
several publications and has published several articles and blogs. Born and raised in
Detroit, Michigan, he attended Detroit Public Schools, Howard University, and
Garrett Evangelical Theological Seminary at Northwestern.
BaSean “B.A.” Jackson is the Lead Pastor and Organizer of Fellowship of Love
Church. He is an author, songwriter, preacher, and lifelong learner whose scholarly
interests include soteriology, pragmatism, theology, and leadership. B.A. teaches,
preaches, and lectures all around the nation and resides in Atlanta, Georgia.
Pamela R. Lightsey is an associate dean and clinical assistant professor at Boston
University School of Theology. She is also an ordained elder in the United Methodist
Church. Dr. Lightsey’s commitment to scholarship is infused in her work as a social
justice activist in LGBTQ and black communities. She has been recognized for her
work for marriage equality, in Black Lives Matter, and in investigating the impact of
moral injury on military veterans. Her research and teaching interests are in the
areas of just war theory, womanist and queer theology, and African American reli-
gious history. Her most recent works are Our Lives Matter: A Womanist Queer
Theology, and “Is Necessary Violence a Just Violence: Commentary on Meagher’s
Killing From the Inside Out” in Syndicate, September/October 2015.
D. Kimathi Nelson is the Presiding Bishop and Chief Executive Officer of the
Shrines of the Black Madonna of the Pan-African Orthodox Christian Church.
He holds the honorific title reserved for the presiding bishop, “Jaramogi.” The
Detroit native received his BA in theology/philosophy from the University of
St. Thomas. He matriculated to Yale Divinity School where he earned a Master
of Divinity Degree while serving as the President of the Yale Black Seminarians
and the pastor of the Black Church at Yale. However, he regards his most pro-
found educational experiences to have come from the 30 years spent under the
direct tutelage of his mentor and the church’s founder, the renowned theolo-
gian, Jaramogi Abebe Agyeman, aka Reverend Albert B. Cleage Jr. Bishop
Nelson has been pastor to churches in Detroit, Atlanta, Houston, and New
Haven. As the national director of the Black Slate, Inc., he has significant impact
on the political life of the African American community. He is also an authority
on African and African American History.
xiv LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS
Anthony G. Reddie is a Learning Development Officer for the Methodist Church.

He is also an Extraordinary Professor of Theological Ethics at the University of
South Africa. He has a BA in History and a PhD in Education (with Theology),
both degrees conferred by the University of Birmingham. He has written over 70
essays and articles on Christian Education and Black Theology. He is the author
and editor of 16 books. His more recent titles include The SCM Core Text: Black
Theology (2012) and Contesting Post-Racialism (2015) (co-edited with R. Drew
Smith, William Ackah and Rothney S. Tshaka). He is the editor of Black Theology:
An International Journal, the only academic periodical of its kind in the world.
Velma Maia Thomas holds a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Howard
University, a master’s degree in political science from Emory University, and a
graduate-level certificate in historic preservation from Georgia State University.
She is the author of several books on African American history and has contributed
to work examining the need to increase the number of African Americans serving
in top levels of missions and mission funding. Velma is an ordained minister in the
Shrines of the Black Madonna in Atlanta, Georgia, and a former manager of the
Shrines Cultural Center and Bookstore where she created the acclaimed Black
Holocaust Exhibit on slavery. Velma has served as a keynote speaker at universities,
libraries, and museums across the nation and was selected as a subject matter
expert for the Underground Railroad: The William Still Story which has aired
nationally on PBS since 2012. She continues to teach and conduct research on
African American history, with emphasis on the South.
Aswad (Alan) Walker is a lecturer in the University of Houston’s African
American Studies Program, writer/reporter for the Defender Media Group,
teacher at YES Prep North Forest, pastor of the Shrine Christian Center of
Houston, and author of three books: The 100th Monkey: Three Tales of Spiritual
Revolution, January 2013; Princes Shall Come Out of Egypt: A Comparative Study
of the Theological and Ecclesiological Views of Marcus Garvey and Albert B. Cleage
Jr., August 2012; and Weapons of Mass Distraction: And Other Sermons for a New
World Order, September 2004. His writings have also appeared in the Journal of
Black Studies, volume 39, number 2, “Princes Shall Come Out of Egypt: A
Comparative Studies of the Theological and Ecclesiological Views of Marcus
Garvey and Albert B. Cleage Jr.,” November 2008; the Frederick Douglass
Encyclopedia, “Harper’s Ferry,” Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, December
2009; UJIMA Magazine, “Making History Today,” University of Houston,
College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences’ African American Studies Program,
Summer 2003; and the Defender Newspaper, 2006–2015. Walker earned his
Master of Divinity from Emory University’s Candler School of Theology, and a BS
in Advertising from the University of Texas at Austin, where as a Heman Sweatt
Service Award-winning student leader, he co-edited the black student newspaper,
The Griot.
LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS xv
Almeda M. Wright is Assistant Professor of Religious Education at Yale Divinity

School. Professor Wright’s research focuses on African American religion, adoles-
cent spiritual development, and the intersections of religion and public life.
Professor Wright is currently completing a book on the spirituality and public
engagement of African American Christian adolescents, as well as continuing a
longer historical study of the radical dimensions of African American religious
education. She is also the editor, with Mary Elizabeth Moore, of Children, Youth,
and Spirituality in a Troubling World.
Josiah U. Young III is Professor of Systematic Theology at Wesley Theological
Seminary in Washington, DC. He is the author of numerous articles and a number
of books that focus on the problematic relation between Africana spirituality and
Western-derived Christian theology. His most recent book is James Baldwin’s
Understanding of God: Overwhelming Desire and Joy (Palgrave Macmillan, 2014).
LIST OF FIGURES
Fig. 8.1 Glanton V. Dowdell, black Madonna chancel mural,

sanctuary of the Shrine of the black Madonna, #1,
Detroit, 1967, oil on canvas. Photography by James
Ribbron, 2016 137
Fig. 8.2 Glanton V. Dowdell, detail of black Madonna chancel mural,
sanctuary of the Shrine of the black Madonna, #1, Detroit,
1967, oil on canvas. Photography by James Ribbron, 2016 146
Fig. 8.3 George Knox, Black Christ Crucified, 2004, bronze,
Reid Temple AME Church foyer, Glen Arden,
Maryland, photograph by the author, 2014 150
xvii
CHAPTER 1
Introduction: Why a White Christ Continues

to Be Racist: The Legacy of Albert
B. Cleage Jr.
Jawanza Eric Clark
March 26, 2017, will mark the 50-year anniversary of Albert B. Cleage Jr.’s
historic unveiling of a mural of the black Madonna and child in Central
United Church of Christ (UCC) in Detroit, Michigan 1967. This unveil-
ing was significant in that it occurred during the Civil Rights Movement in
America, specifically as the concerns among many black people in America
were subtly changing from a call for integration and demand for civil
rights to a cry for self-determination, nationalism, and black power. The
unveiling of this mural of a black Madonna and child in Central UCC on
Easter Sunday morning also preceded the violent eruption of racial anger
that would engulf and devastate the city just a few months later during a
hot summer in Detroit. Albert B. Cleage Jr. would seize the moment and
develop a relevant contextual theology that could reconcile the rage and
demand for self-determination among black power advocates with tradi-
tional Protestant Christianity, a religion that called for non-violence and
emphasized redemptive suffering, especially as articulated by the eloquent
Baptist pastor and leader Martin Luther King Jr. The unveiling of a black
Madonna and child and the claim that Jesus was a black Messiah launched
J.E. Clark ()

Department of Religious Studies, Manhattan College, Bronx, NY, USA
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2016 1

J.E. Clark (ed.), Albert Cleage Jr. and the Black Madonna and Child,
Black Religion/Womanist Thought/Social Justice,
DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54689-0_1
2 J.E. CLARK
Cleage’s Black Christian Nationalist (BCN) movement. It was an interpre-

tation of Christianity that claimed Jesus was a revolutionary leader sent by
God to liberate a black nation Israel from the colonization and control of
a White nation, Rome. The optics of this biblical struggle, for Cleage, mir-
rored that which was occurring in America at the time: black people seek-
ing liberation from a White power structure. Thus, contrary to Malcolm
X’s claim that Christianity is the White man’s religion, in fact Christianity
could be interpreted in a way that enabled it to be quite useful in a black
liberation struggle in America. The unveiling of the black Madonna and
child was the launch of this black liberation movement in America.
Now 50 years later, what is the legacy and lasting impact of this unveil-
ing? Has the idea of a black Madonna and black Messiah changed the
perception of, or had any impact whatsoever on, black identity in America?
Did images of the black Madonna and child proliferate, and does it reflect
contemporary depictions of Jesus and Mary at least in black churches
today? What has been the psychological impact of this imagery on black
people and black youth? Has it been influential beyond American society?
As a theologian, some of these questions are outside my preview; thus,
I have collaborated with other scholars to answer these and many other
questions. This text is not simply a tribute to this seemingly innocuous
moment in time, but it is a thoughtful reflection and critical examination
of not just the theological implications of this historic unveiling but also its
psychological, sociological, historical, and cultural impact on black people
throughout the African diaspora.
However, as a theologian, my specific disciplinary concern calls me to
evaluate the legacy of Albert Cleage Jr.’s theology, particularly the claim
that Jesus is the black Messiah, and encourage a revival of Cleage’s thought
in contemporary black theological discourse. Specifically, I argue that the
perpetuation of a White Christ in churches across America and the world
continues to be racist and deleterious to the psychological and spiritual
health of all Christians, but particularly black Christians, making Cleage’s
critique as relevant today as it was 50 years ago. Also his articulation of
Jesus as a black Messiah and not a black Christ is theologically significant
and actually shields his theology from the criticism voiced by many that
black theology glorifies and essentializes blackness and black identity fail-
ing to establish the proper distance between divinity/God and blackness.
The claim that Jesus was a black Messiah also requires an evaluation and
analysis of Cleage’s theological evolution as regards his doctrine of God
and his often unacknowledged affirmation that God is cosmic energy and
INTRODUCTION: WHY A WHITE CHRIST CONTINUES TO BE RACIST... 3
creative intelligence, a conception of God that coheres with many Eastern

religious traditions and postmodern and contemporary theologies. Fifty
years after his historic unveiling, Cleage’s theology continues to be rel-
evant, yet underappreciated and misunderstood.
“Until black Christians are ready to challenge this lie [a White Christ],
they have not freed themselves from their spiritual bondage to the White
man nor established in their minds their right to first class citizenship in
Christ’s kingdom on earth. Black people cannot build dignity on their knees
worshipping a White Christ. We must put down this White Jesus which the
White man gave us in slavery and which has been tearing us to pieces.”1
Cleage’s fundamental claim is that it is simply historically inaccurate both
to believe in, and visually depict, Jesus as a White person (i.e. a person of
European descent). Cleage refers to it as a lie that keeps black Christians
in America in “spiritual bondage,” presumably accepting of their inferior
racial status within the American racial hierarchy. His critique is similar
to that of Malcolm X, his contemporary and friend, who argued in the
early 1960s that Christianity is a religion of White supremacy, and that
White images of divinity, including “a White Jesus, White virgin, and White
angels” are “designed to fill [blacks] hearts with the desire to be White.”2
This image has been particularly psychologically detrimental to people of
African descent who have had to live in societies dominated by whites,
and where African-descended peoples’ race established the basis for their
oppression and subjugation. Whether during the antebellum and early
postbellum period in America, or late nineteenth-century European colo-
nization of Africa, African-descended people were encouraged to accept
an image of the divine/God as a White man. Both Cleage and Malcolm
X essentially argue that the symbol of a White Christ is an idol and an
imperial weapon used to perpetuate and legitimize White power and White
authority wherever and whenever they encountered African-descended
people and sought to control them (i.e. slavery and the Jim Crow era in
America, apartheid in South Africa, colonialism in Africa). Malcolm X’s
(El Hajj Malik al Shabazz) solution was the rejection of Christianity out-
right, since, for him, it is hopelessly stained by White supremacist ideology.
Cleage, however, argued the Christian religion as practiced in black and
White churches in America is grounded in a historical lie, and if Christians
could discover and restore the historical truth, then the religion itself could
be not only salvaged but actually useful in a black liberation struggle, in
fact a Pan-African liberation struggle. The historical discovery of the black
Messiah is the discovery of an interpretation of Christianity and Judaism as
essentially African in origin.
4 J.E. CLARK
Albert Cleage Jr. performed a theological paradigm shift away from

Jesus as the White or ontologically black Christ to Jesus as the black
Messiah. This shift is much more than a mere pigmentation change or dif-
ference in terminology, but a distinction that actually helps Cleage avoid
the reification problem of more orthodox black theologians. In fact, in
calling Jesus the black Messiah, Cleage is establishing that his Christology
is entirely distinct from his doctrine of God, that Jesus was a human being
and God is something else entirely. Later I, and other contributors, will
give particular attention to his doctrine of God and demonstrate this
distinction.
THE BLACK MESSIAH—ALBERT CLEAGE’S CHRISTOLOGY

First, in referring to Jesus as a black Messiah, Cleage endeavors to be
historically accurate by establishing that Jesus, as a human being, had to
be a person of color. When Cleage calls Jesus black, he is operating from
a broad definition of blackness based on a twentieth-century American
cultural framework. During slavery in America, in order to prevent bira-
cial children, who were often the product of the sexual objectification and
coercion of enslaved black women’s bodies by White male slave owners,
from claiming White identity and the right to inherit property, wealth, and
power, whiteness had to be as narrowly defined as possible. The old “one
drop” rule essentially defines black as non-white. Cleage therefore applies
this definition to Jesus. Jesus was black, because he was not White. He was
a person of color from a place in the world where all the people are people
of color. The Hebrews also became a people in Egypt, in Africa. So not
only is Jesus not White, but he is in fact of African descent (thus black).
For nearly 500 years the illusion that Jesus was White dominated the world
only because White Europeans dominated the world. Now, with the emer-
gence of the nationalist movements of the world’s colored majority, the
historic truth is finally beginning to emerge—that Jesus was the non-white
leader of a non-white people struggling for national liberation against the
rule of a White nation, Rome. The intermingling of the races in Africa and
the Mediterranean area is an established fact. The nation, Israel, was a mix-
ture of the Chaldeans, the Egyptians, the Midionites, the Ethiopians, the
Kushites, the Babylonians and other dark peoples, all of whom were already
mixed with the black peoples of Central Africa.3
Cleage takes a construct, race, which had no meaning at the time of Jesus
and applies it for the auditory and visual consumption of his contemporary
audience. Consequently, while Jesus would not have referred to himself
as a black Messiah, he IS a black Messiah for contemporary Christians,
because if he were living in America today, he would be forced to frame his
identity within an American racial structure. As Marcus Garvey asserted in
1924, “should Christ visit New York, he would not be allowed to live on
Riverside Drive but would have to reside in Harlem because of his color.”4
Cleage’s more provocative theological claim, however, is that Jesus
was a black Hebrew messiah. As a Hebrew messiah, all notions of Jesus
as the unique, exclusive, or singular son of God are eradicated. Messiah
simply means “anointed one.” And in Israel’s history, there were many
other persons (unfortunately only male) who were anointed ones. In the
Hebrew religious imagination, King David was the ultimate anointed fig-
ure. He was considered both the Son of God and Son of Man.5 In fact, the
messianic expectation during the time of Jesus was that someone of King
David’s personality and spirit would one day lead a reformation movement
to restore Israel to its former days of independent glory, which was the
reign of King David.
My point is that when Albert Cleage Jr. refers to Jesus as the black
Messiah, he is naming a human being of a particular hue who would have
seen himself as a freedom fighter seeking to rescue Israel from the imperial
authority of the Romans. His crucifixion is proof that the Roman authori-
ties saw Jesus as a threat and a dissenter worthy of execution. What Cleage
does is actually restore Jesus’ exclusive humanity. He frames Jesus as a
situationally bound, historically contingent, flawed human being who was
fulfilling a God-inspired mission on earth. He was ultimately unsuccess-
ful in achieving this mission (further proof of his human frailty), yet his
teachings, values, ethics, and ministry continue to stand as a testimony
in death over 2000 years later. Thus, while Cleage maintains Jesus was
black, his blackness is not glorified or divinized. His blackness carries no
independent weight, or value, and ultimately no meaning or significance
at all. The only reason to mention the blackness of Jesus is to correct the
historical inaccuracies in the Eurocentric depictions and expose the White
Christ as a White supremacist symbol. It is only necessary to mention
Jesus’ blackness as an act of resistance to a society that overvalues White
identity, or whiteness, by privileging it and conferring power over all other
racial identities.
6 J.E. CLARK
But this is not how black and womanist theologians have characterized
Albert B. Cleage Jr. in their works. I argue that their conception of his
theology is static, obsolete, and fails to appreciate his theological evolu-
tion and methodological insight. This failure leads to a too easy dismissal
of Cleage’s thought. I call for a reexamination and more thorough analysis
of Cleage’s theology which would provide academic black theological dis-
course with some much needed vitality and theological diversity.
Albert Cleage’s marginalization within black theology began early on in
the formation of the discourse. First, James Cone distances himself from
Cleage’s notion of blackness, because Cleage’s blackness is literal, thus
too particular and political. For Cone, blackness is a symbol for oppressed
existence. “Blackness is an ontological symbol and a visible reality which
best describes what oppression means in America.”6 Cone is clearly more
concerned than Cleage that blackness has universal appeal, which for Cone
means it more properly functions as a theological category. This concern
perhaps reveals more about the perceived task of a professional theologian
versus that of a pastor of a specific black church in a particular situation of
concern (Detroit 1967). Similarly, J. Deotis Roberts, in engaging Cleage,
affirmed a bifurcation between the black Messiah and the Christ symbol.
For Roberts, the black Messiah was particular to black people but the
universal Christ transcends the black Messiah and “reconciles the black
man with the rest of mankind.”7 For Roberts, the black Messiah might be
psychologically necessary, in order to overcome generations of internal-
ized oppression among black people, but the universal Christ ultimately
trumps Cleage’s black symbol of liberation. Reconciliation is ultimate,
while liberation is preliminary. Roberts also wants to preserve the univer-
salism within theology and sees Cleage’s constructions as too particular,
political, and culturally specific. For Roberts, Cleage’s theology is insuf-
ficient precisely because it lacks the universality intrinsic to the task of
theology. James Evans, however, disagrees with this concern of Roberts.
For Evans, “It cannot be denied that the concept of the black Messiah
answered a need in the beleaguered psyche of an oppressed people, but
to place Christ above and beyond the cultural, meaning-making matrix of
African Americans risk, at best, an unnecessary dichotomy, and, at worst,
the irrelevance of Christ to their struggle.”8
Dwight Hopkins, in his 1989 publication, Black Theology USA and South
Africa, also criticizes Cleage for his presumed narrow theological focus on
the black community. According to Hopkins, “The substance of Cleage’s
theology indicates a black God aggressively involved in the business of
black people.” Hopkins continues, “His one-sided use of human nature

connotes an inherent evilness on the part of White people and, conversely,
an inherent divineness in blacks… Moreover, part of Cleage’s simplistic
‘White skin equals the devil and black skin equals divine’ springs from his
absolute disdain for the use of class interests and Marxism as tools of social
analysis in his account of ‘blackness’.”9 At the time of Hopkins’ publi-
cation, his analysis was rooted in an obsolete representation of Cleage’s
doctrine of God and a failure to see that Cleage distinguishes God from
Jesus. Furthermore, the claim that Cleage ascribes “divineness to blacks”
contradicts other claims made by Cleage regarding the nature of blacks
and Whites in Black Christian Nationalism.
Mark Chapman correctly points out Cleage’s concern with the problem
of individualism as a sin that potentially infects all people.
According to Cleage, White society is corrupt because it pursues an individ-

ualistic conception of power. Likewise, he observed that “even as black men
scramble after individual power they become bestial.” Therefore, Cleage
presented his theology of Black Christian Nationalism as a safeguard against
“the dehumanizing effects of White individualism.” Unless black people
“learn to bury their individualism in the life of the Black Nation,” he argued,
they will succumb to the same demonic forces that have corrupted whites.
Chapman clearly provides evidence that would dispute the claims made by
Hopkins that Cleage essentializes whiteness as evil and blackness as divine.
In fact, I argue that Cleage’s conception of Jesus as the black Messiah
coupled with his later construction of God as cosmic energy and creative
intelligence jettisons the critique that black theology, and specifically
Cleage, glorifies blackness or black identity.
The affirmation of Jesus as the black Messiah is an effort to uproot and
disrupt the “power/knowledge” generated by the White Christ symbol.
It is in fact a “subjugated knowledge.”10 Michel Foucault often affirmed
the interrelationship between the exercise of power and the production
of knowledge. He claims “the exercise of power itself creates and causes
to emerge new objects of knowledge and accumulates new bodies of
information … the exercise of power perpetually creates knowledge and,
conversely, knowledge constantly induces effects of power … knowledge
and power are integrated with one another.”11 The construction of race is
itself an example of knowledge production created to advance the inter-
ests of those in power. The White Christ serves as a paradigmatic religious
8 J.E. CLARK
symbol of what has historically been America’s “regime of truth,” White

supremacy. In affirming Jesus as the black Messiah, Cleage not only
exposes the White Christ as a racist symbol, but the logical consequence
of his critique is the abolition of the concept of race itself. Once Jesus is
exposed as exclusively human, a man with flaws, frailties, and shortcom-
ings as well as gifts, the color of his skin ceases to have independent mean-
ing or value. The construct of race is itself exposed for what it is, a product
of American society’s “regime of truth.” And, to use Foucault’s language
further, the black Messiah emerges as “a geneaology,” which is seen “as a
kind of attempt to emancipate historical knowledges from that subjection,
to render them, that is, capable of opposition and of struggle against the
coercion of a theoretical, unitary, formal and scientific discourse.”12 (It is
also worth considering the ways in which Cleage’s theology functions as a
type of subjugated knowledge even within academic discourse about black
theology.)
Cleage’s Christological reconstruction, therefore, is not simply an inver-
sion of the racial hierarchy grounded in essentialist rhetoric, but ultimately
an attempt to move beyond racial constructs altogether. This Christological
paradigm shift is more specifically a movement away from traditional
European (primarily Greek) theological formulations to Hebrew/African
thought forms. Cleage is intentional about this philosophical/theologi-
cal reframing. He indicates that his goal is to “build a Black Liberation
movement which derives its basic religious insights from African spiritual-
ity, its character from African communalism, and its revolutionary direc-
tion from Jesus, the black Messiah.”13 Just as important as the historical
fact that Jesus was black is the fact that “Jesus was a revolutionary leader
engaged in a liberation struggle against the White, gentile world.”14 In
making this claim, Cleage tended to prioritize the Old Testament and the
synoptic gospels over the rest of the New Testament often making clear
that Jesus came to fulfill the Law of Moses. Cleage was also highly critical
of the Apostle Paul’s efforts to convert gentiles and presumably adversely
change, even corrupt, the religion of Jesus. Consequently, his basic claim
is that the nation Israel, of which Jesus was a part, was a black nation that
learned religion in an African nation, Egypt. He argued that the Hebrews,
in the Old Testament, were concerned with how best to function in life as
a group, as a people, God’s chosen people. The emphasis was on the col-
lective well-being of the nation. Cleage’s too easy binary between the Old
and New Testament, however, suggests that the theme within the biblical
text shifts from a concern about the prosperity of a nation on Earth in the
Old Testament to a preoccupation with individual salvation via Paul’s the-

ology in the New Testament. While there is evidence of that shift, I argue
this binary is problematic in that it ignores the theological diversity that
exists both in the Old and New Testament. Certainly the God we find in
the Book of Job, for example, is not concerned about the sins or blessings
of the nation, nor is the theology of the book of James preoccupied with
individual salvation and faith alone in Jesus Christ.
Cleage insisted this epistemological and ethical shift away from a con-
cern with the group, or a communitarian emphasis, to a preoccupation
with the individual, personal salvation, and the individual’s relationship
with God represents a shift away from the African heritage and African/
Hebrew thought forms to Greek, European, and ultimately mod-
ern Western thought and values, especially as exemplified in American
Protestant Christianity. While the dichotomy he makes between the Old
and New Testaments is imprecise, his concern about the shift from religion
with an African center of gravity in the Old Testament to religion with a
Greco-Roman center of gravity in Paul and certainly the post-Constantine
church is not to be ignored. Later, the acceptance of the Cartesian claim
that the individual is central and the foundation of knowledge production
is manifest in the theological assertion that salvation is achieved in the
individual acceptance of Jesus as a blood atonement for human sin. This
further exemplifies the difference between the White Christ and the black
Messiah.
In early America, the White Christ symbolizes “slave Christianity,” a
religion used as a civilizing tool and instrument of control to convince
blacks that their racial inferiority was a divine mandate. It also served to
make individualism virtuous thus working as the ultimate counterrevolu-
tionary device on slave plantations.
Slave Christianity is the Christianity that old master gave black people back
on the plantation. He defined Jesus with pictures of a White man with flow-
ing golden locks and blue eyes. The obvious absurdity was not immediately
apparent to black people. Jesus could not have looked like the pictures in the
bible, having been born in a part of the world reserved for black people by
God. But the whiteness of Jesus and Israel was basic to slave Christianity…
Slave Christianity has to do with individualistic salvation. Two thousand
years ago on Calvary a mystic event took place. Jesus was crucified and
somehow he rose from the dead. In this redemptive act, God made salvation
possible for individuals in all generations who believe. This meant then that
each individual must fight for his own little individual salvation.15
10 J.E. CLARK
Cleage’s claim is that black acceptance of the doctrine of the atonement

and the idea of redemptive suffering worked to pacify black people and
both helped them endure slavery but also vitiated their sense of pain, loss,
and anger providing a religious escape. “The slave could stand anything
the White man did, saying, ‘The White man can beat me, he can rob me,
he can cheat me … he can do anything, but I can take it all to Jesus and I
know that ultimately Jesus will triumph because through his sacrifice God
has already redeemed me. So whatever the White man does I can accept’.”16
Mark Chapman called our attention to this aspect of Cleage’s theology in
his work. I contend Cleage generalizes here in not making a distinction
between the slave church and the institutionalized postbellum Protestant
black church. This conflation fails to distinguish the radical elements of
slave Christianity as represented in a Nat Turner or Gabriel Prosser, for
example, who used their Christian faith to organize slave rebellions, and
the deradicalized black church of the late nineteenth and early twentieth
centuries, which tended to have an otherworldly emphasis.17 Nevertheless,
the black acceptance of the White Christ, for Cleage, is the acceptance of
Christianity as a religion of survival and escape. It is a pacifying agent that
keeps black Christians fixated on the afterlife. “This is the weakness of the
Black church. It was a survival instrument. It helped maintain sanity, but it
destroyed the possibility of a united Black Liberation Struggle. The Black
preacher preached escapism and individualism. He destroyed the possibil-
ity of black people’s fighting together to change oppressive conditions.”18
Cleage’s condemnation of the black preacher and the black church
was actually a condemnation of a particular type of Protestantism, which
functioned as an excellent antirevolutionary device. Max Weber discussed
how Lutheranism, and other varieties of Protestantism influenced by
it, worked to encourage among its believers fidelity and loyalty to God
despite the degree of suffering one might endure, and discourage good
works since those works were perceived as unrelated to the attainment of
salvation. “Lutheranism lacked any motivation toward revolutionary atti-
tudes in social or political relationships and any inclination toward rational
reformist activity. Its teaching required one to maintain, both within the
world and against it, the substance of the salvation promised by one’s
faith, but did not require one to attempt a transformation of the world in
any rationalized ethical direction.”19 Mary Daly refers to this idol as the
God of otherworldliness.20 This God demands loyalty, obedience, and “a
patient resignation toward the world’s institutional structures.”21 When
those institutional structures convey the message that black people are
inferior, whether via slavery, Jim Crow segregation, Supreme Court deci-
sions, inferior and substandard schools, redlining, and disproportionate
and extremely high rates of incarceration, this religion does not possess
the theology necessary to encourage revolt, resistance to, or transforma-
tion of, racist institutional structures. Orthodox Protestant Christianity,
in this way, functions as an effective slave-making device, for it ensures
quietism among its most faithful despite the injustices forced upon them.
Cleage’s criticism here suggests that what he actually favors is an
African-centered interpretation of Jesus, the nation Israel, and Christianity
generally; however, he never fully teased out the theological implications
of constructing a Christology within an African framework. While he did
incorporate what he called African communalism and spirituality into the
structure of the BCN movement (his attempt to restructure the black
church), he never articulated a full theological turn or engagement with
indigenous Africa. This is part of the work he left to his students and
those committed to honoring his legacy and ushering in his presence as
an ancestor.22
Albert Cleage Jr and the black Madonna and Child commemorates
the 50-year anniversary of Albert Cleage’s historic unveiling of a black
Madonna and child in Detroit, Michigan. While my individual scholarly
concerns involve an examination of the theological implications of this
unveiling, I have compiled this edited book of many accomplished con-
tributors whose excellent works examine the meaning of this historic event
from various disciplinary perspectives: biblical studies and psychology of
religion to Christian education and art history. Because Albert Cleage
was a pastor and a preacher of his theological, philosophical, and political
insight, I sought to bring together both academics and those in pastoral
ministry. This work includes the contributions of scholars and ordained
ministers.
Albert Cleage and the black Madonna and Child also includes contribu-
tions from insiders and outsiders. The insiders are those who have been
disciples of Cleage, one of whom was his protégé and learned under his
tutelage for 30 years. These insiders were included particularly to convey
the ways in which Cleage’s thought evolved in the latter portion of his life
after the publication of his only two books, The black Messiah and Black
Christian Nationalism, when Cleage receded from public life and explain
how the members of Cleage’s church, The Shrines of the Black Madonna,
specifically manifest the legacy of the black Madonna and child today. The
outsiders are those whose expertise leads them to want to critically engage
12 J.E. CLARK
Cleage’s ideas, the very notion of a black Madonna and black Messiah,
and wrestle with the implications of Cleage’s thought, specifically how it
might inform notions of blackness today prescribing avenues for meeting
the challenges of race in the twenty-first century. This book is in part an
effort to not only bridge the gap between these perspectives but also dem-
onstrate how each perspective is strengthened by the other.
SUMMARY OF CHAPTERS
In Chap. 2, D. Kimathi Nelson shares his personal insights and reflections
as one who studied and trained under Albert Cleage for 30 years. His reflec-
tions provide the unique insider perspective that uncovers Albert Cleage’s
theological evolution beyond the claims expressed in his two published
works, The black Messiah and Black Christian Nationalism. Nelson con-
veys the later Cleage’s conception of God as cosmic energy and creative
intelligence and his development of the Science of KUA, or the Science
of Becoming. The later Cleage wrote and spoke of a theosophic inter-
pretation of reality that moved beyond the political dimensions of Black
Nationalism in America. According to Nelson, Cleage “grew beyond sim-
ply being a pragmatic realist and became a revolutionary mystic concerned
with leading people to a personal theosophic experience as a necessary step
to giving total commitment to a revolutionary struggle for social change.”
Nelson allows this Cleage to speak for himself quoting at length from ser-
mons and unpublished essays written after 1978.
In Chap. 3, I argue that Albert Cleage offers an alternative theological
methodology that is worthy of reexamination and engagement within aca-
demic black theological discourse. His central tenet and claim that “noth-
ing is more sacred than the liberation of black people,” reflects a pragmatic
theological method that is guided by the lived experiences of everyday
black people in America. In this way, it differs from academic black theol-
ogy, because it does not seek validation within the academy or conform
to theology’s presumed universal imperative. Cleage’s approach is prag-
matic, malleable, and adaptable to the current situation of black people
in America. I argue that black theology today would benefit from a reap-
praisal of Cleage, since his theology offers a viable alternative and addresses
many critiques leveled at black theology and the problem of “ontological
blackness.” I contend Cleage provides a perspective and approach that
helps us counter black theology’s problem with history and its “opaque-
ness.” His methodology affirms theological experimentation and a radical
black ecclesiology whose sole concern is the liberation of black people.
In Chap. 4, Stephen Finley offers a textual analysis of Albert Cleage’s

understanding and explication of Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm
X. He argues Cleage is the first to present these two iconic figures as
complementary and not oppositional. Cleage’s was a radical interpreta-
tion, grounded in pragmatic realism, and remains relevant for African
American religious thought. Finley also argues that Cleage continues to
be a critical and constructive voice that can offer relevant insights to the
Black Lives Matter Movement and other social justice movements today,
particularly as it relates to the viability of marching. Finley thinks Cleage
is right that “seen together, Martin and Malcolm were exemplars of Black
radical praxis.”
In Chap. 5, “The black Messiah and Black Suffering,” Torin Alexander
explores the efficacy of Albert Cleage’s theodicy in light of his concern
for black liberation. Alexander is critical of the early Cleage, specifically
excerpts from particular sermons that suggest Cleage articulated a theo-
dicy of deserved punishment. Such a theodicy has been criticized previ-
ously by black religious scholars like William Jones and Anthony Pinn.
Alexander, however, is attentive to the later developments in the theol-
ogy of Cleage’s church but rightly raises the question of whether such a
change answers the question of divine involvement in black oppression. In
the end, Alexander argues that theodicy may be a “destructive discourse”
that many need to be abandoned.
In Chap. 6, Aswad Walker presents in great detail the breadth of Albert
Cleage’s significant involvement in politics in the city of Detroit and
throughout the state of Michigan. After starting and maintaining a news-
paper, The Illustrated News, organizing and/or participating in numer-
ous organizations in the 1960s and 1970s, like the City-wide Citizens’
Action Committee and the National Committee of Black Churchmen,
and running for governor, Cleage made a turn inward in the later part of
his life. Walker argues that after 1975, Cleage focused more on institution
building, but this did not prevent him from establishing the Black Slate
Inc., which has been invaluable in electing progressive black candidates
to political office around the country, particularly in Detroit, Michigan,
Atlanta, Georgia, and Houston, Texas.
In Chap. 7, Velma Maia Thomas presents a rare insider perspective
of the black women members of the Shrine of the black Madonna (Pan
African Orthodox Christian Church). She interviews several black women,
who have been members for more than 20 years, asking them to reflect
on the black Madonna and this church’s conception of womanhood and
motherhood. Does the church have a developed doctrine of Mary? What
14 J.E. CLARK
does it mean that the church is named after the mother of Jesus, and in
what ways, if any, does the church manifest a culture that is sexist? Thomas
allows these women to speak for themselves to courageously and critically
assess the legacy of the black Madonna and the role of women as members
and former members of the Shrines of the Black Madonna.
In Chap. 8, Melanee Harvey charts the aesthetic influence of the black
Madonna and child by examining how this depiction of Jesus and Mary
influenced and shaped the visual culture of the Black Arts Movement in
America. According to Harvey, Cleage’s depiction of a black Madonna
and child marked “his success in establishing a Christian icon as visual
symbol for Black Power.” She argues that Cleage’s aesthetic views influ-
enced artists nationally and “served as a catalyst for Black Nationalist art
production.” A series of images detailing the formation of depictions of
the black Madonna and child accompany her written work.
In Chap. 9, Lee Butler discusses the psychological impact of a black
Christology. He explains why the image of a black Christ was so important
to the Black Consciousness Movement and is still important to the African
American psyche today. Butler contends that many black people continue
to suffer from a pervasive racial self-hatred informed by their inability to
see the Imago Dei, the image of the divine, in themselves. He foregrounds
two articles from the March 1969 edition of Ebony magazine, which fea-
tures an image of a black Jesus on the cover. Butler makes clear the impact
that Cleage’s radical black Messiah has not only in improving the black
self-image but also in informing the development of an Africana pastoral
theology, a theology informed by resistance and liberation.
In Chap. 10, “Image is Everything,” Almeda Wright also delves into
the concept of the Imago Dei, the image of God, and its impact on the
Christian education of black youth. She wants to know: “what can we
give our youth?” and “where does God show up for them and where is
God absent?” Wright is concerned that because the black church is often
burdened by the politics of respectability it has not provided our youth
with the resources and strategies necessary for them to overcome a culture
that declares them disposable. She shares experiences of youth reflecting
on their own understanding of the Imago Dei. She then queries about
Cleage’s notion of a nation, specifically the concept of nation as counter-
culture, as safe, protected space that enables black youth to flourish and
realize their God-given potential. Wright challenges the church today to
embrace aspects of Cleage’s radical ecclesiology.
BaSean Jackson, in Chap. 11, makes an argument for resurrecting the

concept of the black Messiah for the black church based on his experience
pastoring a church where the members struggle with what to do with their
blackness. He laments mainstream Protestant Christianity’s emphasis on
individual salvation such that concern about social justice and affirmation
of the black racial self seems antithetical at worst and tangential at best
to what it means to be a good Christian. Jackson claims that Cleage’s
black Messiah offers the Christological framework that can help black
people love themselves. “The black Messiah was more communal than
individual, more existential than eschatological, and literally, not meta-
phorically, black.” But Jackson asks the poignant questions: Where did
Cleage’s Christ go? Why did he die? He ends by reminding us of Cleage’s
often ignored argument regarding biblical interpretation and the distinc-
tion between the ethically based religion of Jesus and Paul’s theology that
emphasizes individual belief and salvation in Christ.
In Chap. 12, Kamasi Hill examines the city of Detroit as a crucified city
and representation of a black Christ figure. In so doing, Hill discusses the
city as text and not mere geography. He maintains the city of Detroit rep-
resented a space for Black Nationalist resistance long before Albert Cleage
Jr. assumed a strong leadership role during and after the Detroit Rebellion
of 1967. He highlights the significant influence of the Ossian Sweet
trial, the leadership of Fannie Peck, Marcus Garvey’s Universal Negro
Improvement Association (UNIA), and the nascent Nation of Islam. As a
result, Hill adeptly demonstrates the way the city of Detroit symbolizes a
black Christ figure within the African diaspora.
In Chap. 13, Salim Faraji, defends Albert Cleage’s claim that Jesus was
a black Messiah by arguing that those who wrote about Jesus in the New
Testament were shaped and informed by ancient Egyptian religious cul-
ture. Faraji wants to view the New Testament as Greco-Egyptian or Greco-
African texts influenced by religious literature of late Egypt between the
first and third century BCE. Central to these Egyptian religious texts is the
focus on divine kingship to restore justice and order against outside invad-
ers. Faraji also reveals St. Athananius, the theologian perhaps most respon-
sible for the development of orthodox Christology, to be an Egyptian
Christian theologian influenced as much by Egyptian religious literature
as by Greek philosophy. “A consideration of ancient Egyptian and Nubian
textual sources may confirm Albert Cleage’s representation of Jesus as a
revolutionary black Messiah.”
16 J.E. CLARK
In Chap. 14, Pamela Lightsey is interested in exploring Cleage’s black

Messiah to find kernels that can facilitate the queering of womanist the-
ology. She argues that Cleage’s critique of individualism resonates with
womanist queer ideals. She starts by explaining the nationalistic and com-
munalistic emphasis of his theology. She then goes on to explicate the way
Cleage’s claim of Jesus as black correlates to her claim of Jesus as black and
queer, a claim that rejects heteronormativity. Cleage decries racial oppres-
sion and black people’s acceptance of it, and Lightsey adeptly extends that
critique to include those who would condone the oppression of the black
lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, questioning or queer (LGBTQ) com-
munity. Just as Cleage claimed black people have accepted a false and racist
theology, a slave theology, Lightsey makes clear they have also accepted
a false, heteronormative theology. And she rightly asks the challenging
question, “Can we Black LGBTQ persons imagine our lives in Cleage’s
quasi self-sufficient community of black people and institutions?” Her
chapter challenges Cleage and his adherents to respond to the questions
of womanist and womanist queer theologies.
In Chap. 15, Josiah Ulysses Young III details various representations
of the black Messiah as a Pan-African symbol of liberation through an
examination of Albert Cleage’s black Messiah and the Christologies of
African theologians, specifically the Cameroonian Engelbert Mveng and
Congelese theologian Ka Mana. Young notes how each theologian speaks
to his social–historical context, and he intends to demonstrate “the diver-
sity of the Pan-African symbol of liberation.” For Young, Pan-Africanism,
endorsed by Cleage and others, cannot be reduced to any one of its pro-
ponents. Through his explication of Mveng’s “anthropological impover-
ishment or wretchedness of the African person” and Mana’s “enfleshed
word” and appropriation of the Isis/Osiris myth, Young argues the neces-
sity for a variety of African diasporic theological perspectives in order for
the black Messiah to truly function as a Pan-African symbol of liberation.
And in Chap. 16, “The Quest for the Radical Black Jesus,” Anthony
Reddie writes of the urgent need for a radical black Jesus from the per-
spective of black people in Great Britain who have suffered the deleteri-
ous effects of Imperial Mission Christianity. He contends a black Jesus is
necessary to overcome the “effects of internalized oppression and self-
negation” that continue to impact the minds and psyches of black people
in Britain and throughout the African diaspora. James Cone provides his
paradigm for theorizing, yet Reddie acknowledges Albert Cleage’s con-
tribution and laments the truth that Cleage has been underappreciated
because he was not a career academic but was devoted to pastoral ministry.
NOTES
1. Alex Poinsett, “The Quest for a Black Christ,” Ebony Magazine, March,
1969, p. 176.
2. James Cone, Martin and Malcolm and America: A Dream or a Nightmare
(New York: Orbis, 1991), p. 170.
3. Albert B. Cleage Jr., “An Introduction to Black Christian Nationalism,”
unpublished essay.
4. New York Times, August 1924 in Tony Martin, Race First (Dover: The
Majority Press, 1976), p. 70.
5. Robert E. Hood, Must God Remain Greek? Afro-Cultures and God-Talk
(Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1990), p. 153.
6. James Cone, A Black Theology of Liberation (New York: Orbis, 1970), p. 7.
7. J. Deotis Roberts, Reconciliation and Liberation: A Black Theology
(Louisville: John Knox Press, 1971), p. 140.
8. James Evans, We Have Been Believers: An African American Systematic
Theology (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2012), pp. 102–103.
9. Dwight Hopkins, Black Theology USA and South Africa (New York: Orbis,
1989), p. 58.
10. Michel Foucault, Power/Knowledge, ed. Colin Gordon (Great Britain: The
Harvester Press, 1980), p. 82.
11. Ibid., p. 52.
12. Ibid., p. 85.
13. Albert B. Cleage Jr., Black Christian Nationalism: New Directions for the
Black Church (New York: William Morrow and Company, 1972), p. 16.
14. Ibid., p. 45.
15. Ibid., pp. 30–31.
16. Ibid., p. 31.
17. Gayraud S. Wilmore, Black Religion and Black Radicalism: An Interpretation
of the Religious History of Afro-American People (New York: Orbis Books,
1973), pp. 161–162.
18. Albert B. Cleage, Black Christian Nationalism, p. 32.
19. Max Weber, The Sociology of Religion (Boston: Beacon Press, 1922), p. 199.
20. Mary Daly, Beyond God the Father, p. 31.
21. Max Weber, The Sociology of Religion, p. 199.
22. See Jawanza Eric Clark, Indigenous Black Theology (New York: Palgrave
Macmillan, 2012).
PART I
Albert B. Cleage Jr.’s Theology

and Politics
CHAPTER 2
The Theological Journey of Albert

B. Cleage Jr.: Reflections from Jaramogi’s
Protégé and Successor
D. Kimathi Nelson
It is important to understand the theology and philosophy of Albert Cleage

as an evolutionary journey. It began long before the publishing of The
black Messiah in 1968 and Black Christian Nationalism: New Directions
for the Black Church in 1972. Unfortunately, it has become common for
many scholars to limit his thought to the two books that he wrote in
the span of five years. However, these books only serve as a window into
his thought at the time of their writing. Cleage was a minister. Ministry
is concerned with applying the will of God to specific human problems.
There are all kinds of ministries. Cleage’s ministry was concerned with the
unique problems facing black people. His social ministry was not a periph-
eral concern to the work of the church. It was the work of the church.
His theology was a by-product of his ministry. Cleage wrote to clarify his
organizational aims at a given point in time where specific problems in
D.K. Nelson ()

Shrines of the Black Madonna of the Pan African Orthodox Christian Church,
Houston, TX, USA

DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54689-0_2
22 D.K. NELSON
advancing his unique ministry were being fleshed out. He once wrote that
black Christian Nationalists are “pragmatic realists.”1 This describes the
Albert Cleage of the period in which the two books were written. But they
do not encompass the fullness of his evolutionary journey, a journey that
continued for another three decades, until his death in 2000.
In the years after the books, Albert Cleage’s theology continued to
evolve. However, he was no longer concerned with edifying the public
or debating the conventional wisdom of the religious establishment. He
was focused on the development of an organization that could actualize
black self-determination. He felt that such a prophetic ministry would
speak louder and more persuasively than anything he could say or write.
His time was spent on the development of leadership, institutions, and
programs that could realize this goal.
For those of us fortunate enough to have been under his tutelage, we
saw a man whose commitment to God allowed him to continue to grow
for the rest of his life. He grew beyond a need to argue the historic black-
ness of Jesus and the biblical nation, Israel (he came to regard this as the
least significant aspect of his theology. It was a verifiable fact of history). He
grew beyond the simple white–black racial dichotomy that defined black
existence in America. He grew beyond the anthropomorphic conception
of God. Contrary to what some scholars assert, Cleage never believed that
God was a physical being that had a color. His point was that Jesus was
historically a black human being belonging to black nation, Israel. He
grew beyond the provincial, garden-variety “black nationalism,” to view
black people’s struggle in cosmic terms. He said, “Good theology has the
potential to evolve from the specific to the universal.”2 He grew beyond
simply being a pragmatic realist and became a revolutionary mystic con-
cerned with leading people to a personal theosophic experience as a neces-
sary step to giving total commitment to a revolutionary struggle for social
change. His commitment to God led him to become whatever he needed
to be to serve as an effective agent of divine will. His example taught his
followers to do the same.
Cleage’s Shrine of the black Madonna of the Pan African Orthodox
Christian Church (PAOCC) is today one of the very few surviving orga-
nizations that arose out of the black consciousness era. It exists today,
and has a future tomorrow because of the evolving theological tradition
established by its founder. His uncompromising commitment to the ser-
vice of God through a Christian ministry dedicated to the unique and
THE THEOLOGICAL JOURNEY OF ALBERT B. CLEAGE JR.: REFLECTIONS... 23
underserved problems confronting black people continues to serve as the

foundational value and defining characteristic of our ministry today.
Albert Buford Cleage Jr. was an organic intellectual and original thinker,
developing his views over time as he sought solutions to the problems
faced by black people in the Detroit of his youth, and later, in the other
cities in which he resided and offered leadership to the black community.
Compared with most black children of his time, Cleage was a scion of priv-
ilege (his father was a prominent doctor who was a founder of the city’s
first black hospital in 1918 and became Detroit’s first black City Physician
in the 1929). The Cleage’s relative comfort provided a naturally inquisi-
tive child the opportunity to read voraciously, to reflect thoughtfully on
stark inequities he saw accompanying his father on house calls to the black
ghetto, to interface with local like-minded activists and carefully choose
how to make social transformation his primary vocation. Although he fell
under the tutelage of creative and intelligent pastor mentors, he found
them to be embarrassingly schizophrenic on Sunday mornings when their
radical and progressive social and political views took a back seat to the old
time gospel. He became determined to bridge that gap.3
Like many before him, Cleage came to the conclusion that the church
offered the only institutional framework that allowed progressive black
leadership the relative freedom to explore real solutions to the problem of
black oppression. He graduated from the Oberlin Theological Seminary
and was ordained in 1942. He had pastorates in progressive, prominent
churches in a number of cities for the next decade. When he returned to
Detroit, he served as co-pastor in a black Presbyterian church. In 1953,
in utter frustration with trying to shape a church, he left and decided to
build one.
Albert Cleage coined the term “black theology” in the early 1950s as
he worked to create a Christian ministry that was relevant to the growing
civil rights struggle and the rising tide of consciousness that was engulfing
people of color throughout the post-World War II world. Black theology
developed gradually as he preached each week about real conditions and
challenges existing for black people in the local community, across the
country and throughout the world. The first tenet of his newly founded
church was that, “No area of Black life is too controversial for our church
to be involved.”4 He sought to erase the distinction between the sacred
and the secular believing God to be relevant in all that we did. He defined
his ministry so that it could not be confined within the walls of the church
building. He declared, “There are 500,000 black people in the five mile
24 D.K. NELSON
radius surrounding this pulpit. That is my church. That is where I will

conduct my ministry.”5 Black theology was informed and shaped in the
ongoing battles to carry out a public ministry that involved securing basic
rights, dignity, and power for the black people.
Cleage saw how the black perspective was excluded from the local
newspapers, so with the help of his family, he provided the black commu-
nity with authoritative uncensored information about the subjects impor-
tant to them. They created a widely circulated black newspaper called the
Illustrated News. The newspaper delved into the gritty areas of black life,
exposing long unquestioned racist practices and the ghetto pathologies
that perpetuated black conditions. For Cleage, politics, economics, police
brutality, discrimination, bad schools, racist hiring and promotion prac-
tices, redlining, the problems of blacks migrating from the South, libera-
tion movements in Africa, and the entire sphere of black life was open to
theological reflection. This theological reflection comprised the subject
matter of every Sunday sermon. Over time, a uniquely black contempo-
rary theology began to emerge.
By the 1960s, Cleage had been preaching an evolving black theology
for two decades. However, his notoriety in the Detroit Community was
not the result of his preaching but his praxis. The array of activities he
was involved in representing the interests of black people was staggering.
His integrity as a champion of black people was beyond reproach. When
people had problems that reflected racism or injustice, they knew to call
Reverend Cleage. His actions became the reason for people from other
religious backgrounds to venture to the church services to experience
his unique theological reflections on contemporary black life first hand.
Cleage’s church became the unofficial spiritual home of the progressive
and revolutionary types. Even people who would never set foot in a tra-
ditional church service found Cleage’s preaching something with which
they could agree.
Hearing of the strange new gospel emanating from Cleage’s pulpit,
many intellectuals and scholars beat a path to the church’s door. Among
them was a young professor from Arkansas who was teaching at Adrian
College in Adrian, Michigan, 70 miles from Detroit. In 1967, James
H. Cone was a regular attendee at the church services and was noticeable
because of his furious scribbling of notes during Cleage’s sermons.6 That
April, Cleage unveiled the famous chancel mural of the black Madonna
and Child creating a national hysteria. Also that year, the Detroit Rebellion
erupted in July becoming the deadliest and costliest riot in American
history. At that time, a seat in the Shrine of the black Madonna was hard
to come by. Cone was still regularly attending in 1968, when Cleage’s
book—a compilation of his black theology sermons—The black Messiah
was published and became a national bestseller. Over the years, Cone has
been repeatedly taken to task by scholars and preachers who are aware of
his debt to Cleage. Some of these people have expressed to me that they
regard this oversight as a blemish on Cone’s considerable legacy. At the
inaugural Albert B. Cleage Jr. Leadership Symposium in Detroit in 2003,
Dr. Charles Adams, the Harvard-educated pastor of Hartford Memorial
Baptist Church in Detroit, conveyed to me his efforts to get Cone to
acknowledge Cleage’s contribution to his work. Dr. M. Shawn Copeland,
one of my professors at Yale Divinity School, was also a professor at Adrian
College at the same time as Cone. She helped him drive to Detroit on
occasion to hear Cleage preach two years before his book, Black Theology
and Black Power, was published in 1969.7
For Cleage’s part, he did not really care about academic acclaim. He
was not a trained systematic theologian. He was concerned with practicing
theology in the real-world efforts to change social conditions. Although
he was in regular contact with the leading black theologians and was
viewed by them as a trailblazing pioneer in the field, he was not seeking to
build a professional, academic career. His were theological ideas based on
his experiences in providing a relevant progressive ministry to black people
in a number of cities. He was in great demand as a speaker and spoke on
hundreds of college campuses, but he never accepted any offers to teach.
Even though he was a charter member of the National Committee of
Black Churchmen, an interdenominational committee including many of
the new black theologians, he resigned because he was critical of “school-
men’s theology,” which he regarded as a springboard into acceptance by
the white religious establishment rather than black empowerment.8 As a
matter of fact, Cleage quipped that black theologians in the academy were
indebted to those doing the work of black theology in the church. He
said, “Black theology was only of interest to academic institutions today,
because it has become an undeniable political force. They [the white acad-
emy] want to control and contain it. If black people do not do anything
with it, it will become irrelevant and black theologians will too.”9 Cleage
was not concerned with arguing with the religious establishment about
the validity or merits of black theology. He was concerned with building
an organization that could build the institutional power upon which black
self-determination could be actualized.
26 D.K. NELSON
During the time his books were written, this desire for black self-
determination was understood as “building a black nation.” Cleage did not
view the black nation in geographic terms. He believed that all American
ethnic groups had social, economic, and political power bases existing
within the fabric of the country. He said that black people are uniquely
naked without any institutional power base. This was the reason for black
people’s total powerlessness and exploitation. He taught that black people
are dependent upon the white system of power for everything. Thus, black
people need their own independent system of institutions to meet their
own needs and serve their own interests. He called it “A Nation-Within-a-
Nation.” This programmatic approach distinguished Cleage from most of
the other black nationalists who had no specific program for accomplish-
ing any concrete and attainable goals. For most people, black nationalism
was more of a sentiment than a process, a concept rather than a program.
“Black nationalism” was always an imprecise term that had almost as
many meanings as adherents. This impreciseness was in full evidence at
every gathering of black nationalists. The most notable of these gather-
ings was in Gary, Indiana in 1972 where thousands gathered under the
theme, “It’s Nation Time.” It proposed an ambitious and comprehensive
national black agenda, but conflicting and entrenched notions of “black
nationalism” held by the various groups in attendance made any serious
organization impossible. The convention concluded with the resolve to
work toward the black nation from the vantage points and perspectives of
each group represented. It called for “unity without uniformity.” Cleage
felt that the conference highlighted the basic problem of trying to orga-
nize black people with mixed agendas.10
Cleage had become convinced of the futility of trying to persuade other
leaders and organizations to adopt his point of view or methodology. He
had already concluded that his ministry needed a theology that allowed the
church to unify black people under a singular concrete program. Having
already built his own church, he now set out to build his own organiza-
tion. He erased all imprecision by building his organization on the foun-
dation of a clear creed, position, program, and leadership structure. These
things are spelled out in the second book, Black Christian Nationalism:
New Directions for the Black Church. From that moment forward, Cleage’s
black theology was no longer an intellectual debate with outsiders, but an
organizing tool for insiders.
Cleage’s book served as a training manual that rooted his members
in the black experience, with a black theology, a Pan-African worldview
and a specific Black Christian Nationalist program of building institutional

power. All of this was based upon Cleage’s central theological conviction
that, “The will of God is revealed in the experience of a people” and no
other authority was necessary to determine its validity.11
In 1975, Cleage published an article in the Black Christian Nationalist
Third Biennial Convention Booklet entitled The Black Church as a Change
Agent: Transforming Black Ghettoes by Changing black people. This docu-
ment marks a pivot from the political concerns of black theology to include
the inner psychological obstacles internalized by black people in centuries
of oppression. He writes,
BCN seeks to change slaves who suffer not only from a slave condition but
also from a slave mentality. Everywhere in the world black people are power-
less, enslaved by a hostile society that has declared them inferior, and incapa-
ble of full participation as equals. Four hundred years of powerlessness and
enslavement in a hostile exploitive society has had profound psychological
effects upon black people. We have been incapacitated for effective struggle
against our condition by a basic acceptance of the myth of black inferior-
ity imposed upon us by our oppressors. The powerless condition that has
been forced upon us by our oppressor has created the appearance of a real
inferiority … To liberate black people BCN must first be a psychological
CHANGE AGENT!12
In 1976, Cleage introduced a psycho-spiritual change process that

he called, The Science of KUA or the Science of Becoming. Cleage held
that human beings were created in God’s image and likeness but for cen-
turies black people had been redefined as “niggers” by their oppressor
(these uncomfortable facts had been previously pointed out by Carter
G. Woodson, E. Franklin Frazier, Frantz Fanon, John O. Killens, Stanley
Elkins, Abram Kardiner, and Lionel Ovesey, among others). Cleage
claimed that black people were acculturated in a racist socialization pro-
cess inculcating them with a negative belief system, the core of which was
the white myth of black inferiority. In essence, all black people have been
taught to share the same opinions and feelings about black people as any
white racist by virtue of being acculturated in the same racist culture. As
a result, black people identify with their oppressor, white culture, white
values, and white standards to their own detriment. In response, black
people have created a “false front” personality intended to de-emphasize
their “blackness” and hide feelings of shame, inadequacy, and inferiority.
28 D.K. NELSON
The tremendous amount of energy required to avoid facing the facts

of black existence rendered black people incapable of sustained, intelligent
action designed to change our condition. “Pretending not to be Black, or
pretending that Blackness is unimportant and does not stand in the way of
acceptance, constitutes the Black man’s daily exercise in futility.”13 Cleage
argued that the goal of the Science of KUA was to enable the participants
to reject the myth of black inferiority and its negative belief system, thus
allowing the participant to shed the false personality manifestations that
are built around an inferiority complex. The Science of KUA was designed
to help black people to rediscover the real and authentic self that was made
in the image and likeness of God so that they could act as full human
beings.
Cleage believed that upon recovering their full humanity, black peo-
ple could struggle effectively to change conditions and become effective
agents of divine will in the world.
We were created out of the substance of God possessing an inner divinity,

then conditioned by an evil world that taught us to hate ourselves because
of the color of our skin and texture of our hair. We have lost the integra-
tion of mind, body and spirit with which we were born and upon which we
are dependent to live full, meaningful and healthy lives. The free flow of
the inner life force has been blocked by the nature of our condition… It is
the responsibility of the church to heal us of our afflictions so that we can
change the world within which we live. The church must have therapies that
can liberate seekers from the socially-derived imprisonments that isolate us
from self, each other and from God, inhibiting us from becoming all God
meant for us to be.14
Cleage began to see the church as offering therapies to people malformed

by the mark of oppression. He saw the church as a “therapeutic commu-
nity” or Transforming Community in which people could be healed from
their socially imposed maladies.
A fundamental aspect contributing to the development of the Science
of KUA was Cleage’s evolving conception of God, which moved beyond
an anthropomorphic view. Once it was clear that we were not dealing with
a big man in the sky, the means and processes for relating to God had to
change. With a new conception of God, we needed new processes to relate
to a God of cosmic energy and creative intelligence.
The strength, value and potential of a church lies in its theology. The
theology of the Pan African Orthodox Christian Church represents a radical
departure from the theology now accepted in the traditional Black church.
God is the cosmic energy and creative intelligence out of which all things
are created and upon which we are all dependent for life and meaning. God
is the center and source of an infinite interconnected web of cosmic energy
within which we live, move and have our being. God is not a super-being
existing separate and apart from humanity somewhere off beyond the clouds.
God is the limitless energy, the boundless life force and power that permeate
every aspect of this vast universe. This conception of God conforms to the
recent discoveries made by physicists concerning the nature of the universe
and the concept of God, man, and the universe come upon by the ancient
African priests and mystics who created religion… We are created out of the
same substance as God, possessing a spark of the transcendent divinity that
is the ground of all reality. It is this spark of divinity within that gives us the
potential to experience God, to communicate with God and to act for God
in the world.15
For Cleage, the direct, personal experience of God as cosmic energy

and creative intelligence was the first object of an individual’s religious
life. This transformative theosophic encounter has to be actively pursued
by a dedicated seeker through the processes, disciplines, worship, fellow-
ship, and ministries of the church. “For the faithful, kutafuta (seeking)
is a way of life. If one is always seeking, one will come upon God.”16
Cleage believed that no amount of rational knowledge about the nature
and dynamics of the world system is sufficient to effectively change it. A
truly effective agent of divine will has to experience the energy and power
of God before he/she was capable of total commitment to God, which
he regarded as the requirement for membership in the Transforming
Community. Cleage’s idea of a church dedicated to personal and social
transformation required people who embodied that transformation, peo-
ple who were incarnations of a God experience. He believed, like Jesus,
that this direct experience of God is attainable by all human beings and
that the church has historically focused on control rather than facilitating
human flourishing through the power of God. Accordingly, the attain-
ment of personal transformation would lead to a commitment to social
transformation. “Jesus was revolutionary because he taught that obedi-
ence to the will of God supersedes loyalty to either church [the religious
establishment] or state.”17
30 D.K. NELSON
Like the ancient Egyptians, African pantheist, Chinese Taoist, and

indigenous spiritualist around the world, Cleage saw the universe as a cos-
mological unity made up of interrelated and interdependent forces with
divine principles and order built in. In light of this understanding, for
Cleage, the notion of white supremacy and black inferiority is not only
ridiculous, it is idolatrous! It is blasphemous! The struggle for black lib-
eration was now understood as a part of humanity’s obligation to bring
human society back into proper alignment with divine will, to find har-
mony and create balance in the universe. The black liberation struggle was
more than political. It was cosmic! The interrelated and interdependent
nature of the universe and all of its forces suggested that human society
should share the basic order, balance, harmony, and unity perceived in
everything.
This strengthened Cleage’s conviction that African communalism was
the only intelligent model for the social order. He believed that the com-
munalism taught by Jesus in the social teaching of the Gospels, modeled
in the early church as recorded in the Book of Acts, and practiced by the
socially advanced indigenous societies was the way of life in which God
intended human beings to live. In 1984, he proclaimed,
Human society cannot survive without a conscious restructuring of its basic

foundations. Total commitment to communalism as a way of life and accep-
tance of the Unified Field concept of God’s power are essential cornerstones
of the new order. We recognize individualism as a global cancer that has
infected and contaminated the whole of human life. Everywhere there are
inescapable signs of impending disaster. Ecological dangers can no longer be
dismissed as the cult fact of flower children living beyond their time. Nuclear
and chemical contamination, threaten the very existence of human life on
the planet, where man has poisoned the air, the earth, and the fresh water
supply. Gradually we are coming to realize that as important as these prob-
lems are, they are only symptoms of an underlying global sickness rooted
deep in an individualistic human psyche.18
Cleage further spoke about the essential nature of African communalism

by delving deeper into the forces that threatened full human actualization
when he added,
From the moment of creation, human beings, with God-given freedom of

the will, have carried the individualistic seed of ultimate destruction. This is
particularly manifested in a capitalistic society that is on a downward spiral
toward total individualism and the concentration of wealth, education and

power in the hands of fewer and fewer people. So a totally individualistic
society revolves around the whims and appetites of a few who use their con-
trol of wealth and the means of production to control the political, indus-
trial, and military complexes upon which life depends. During the past one
hundred years the value of human beings has constantly diminished. A pro-
cess of dehumanization has been at work inexorably squeezing the humanity
out of people who have come to place less and less value upon themselves.19
The urgency of Cleage’s point of view was turned up a notch because he

now saw his efforts to be not only a struggle for black liberation, but a
struggle for raw black survival.
The society of which we are a part is on a collision course with disaster.

The computer as made possible technological changes that are transform-
ing an industrial society into an information society requiring basic changes
in the way people live. Cybernetics and robotics are making most unskilled
and uneducated workers obsolete. The ordinary man can no longer enjoy a
secure “second class” existence. He is doomed to extinction.20
Cleage always taught that a theology must be rooted in a practicing

community in order to test the validity of its insights. This practicing com-
munity would adopt the insights that were valid and reject the ones that
proved invalid. Over time, a comprehensive theology would emerge. He
believed that academic black theology had no practicing community that
could carry out this process. He felt that, for the most part, black churches
remained imprisoned by the simple “bastardized” theology given to them
on the plantation as a means of control. This slave religion was impos-
sible to apply to anything but sin and deliverance, the promise of heaven
and the threat of hell.Cleage was convinced that black theology detached
from a practicing community was stillborn. No matter how brilliant its
insights, unless people were going to actually put them to work, they were
irrelevant.
Many aspiring black preachers are commonly exposed to new theologi-
cal concepts in seminary and immediately reject them out of hand tell-
ing each other, “That won’t preach!” What they are really saying is that
they lack the courage to preach a theology that is not mainstream and
conventional. In that sense, they are not truly leading the church but are
being led by what congregants will find theologically acceptable. “That
won’t preach” suggests these preachers are not permitted to expand the
32 D.K. NELSON
theological discourse beyond the one they inherited. And if they try, they
will end up aborting their careers or preaching to empty seats. Cleage
always dared to risk this possibility.
I am not primarily concerned with saving the church. I am trying to do the

will of God. We are immersed in a cosmic struggle between good and evil.
The church has more times than not, found itself on the wrong side of that
struggle. If we can’t change the church to make it relevant to that struggle,
then we are duty bound to fight it as just another human institution serving
the power interests of the status quo. But don’t play the church so cheap.
It will adjust and live up to its potential, if we have enough loyalty to God
to act with courage and conviction to carry out divine will and let the chips
fall where they may.21
Cleage shared Eddie Glaude Jr.’s critique of the black church in his
article, “The Black Church is Dead.” As a matter of fact, Cleage made
the same pronouncement in his poem, “Eulogy for the Black Church.”22
Cleage’s position was that the black church had been important in sus-
taining the black community through a time when it had nothing else to
depend upon. The black church was a total institution trying to provide, in
one way or another, everything the black community needed. It provided
critical services that would have been left unmet. But in today’s world,
this was no longer true, and we were left with the worst part of the black
church, which is its otherworldly theology and nonsensical religious tradi-
tions. He saw the rise of prosperity ministries as the logical next step for a
traditional black church that was already steeped in magical thinking. He
believed that prosperity ministries would eventually discredit the church in
the eyes of a significant portion of the population and drive many people
into private spiritualism and atheism. He makes clear, “I wouldn’t blame
them because there is just so much foolishness a person can take. But the
problem is that you need a group of people, an organized corporate body
to carry out any kind of program for social change. The black church’s
journey toward the ridiculous is making it difficult to engage intelligent
black people in any kind of Christian social action designed to change our
condition.”23
As the black consciousness movement, which had provided the impe-
tus for the growth and development of Cleage’s church into a national
movement, began to wane, Cleage recognized the need to structure
his church/nation to sustain itself through a wilderness period where
black consciousness would ebb. He understood the need to sharpen its

theological insights, codify its beliefs, and redirect its program emphasis
toward self-sustainability. In his last years, he was concerned with preserv-
ing his contributions for future generations. His concerns gradually shifted
from revolution to evolution and sustainability. He sought to prepare his
church/nation to continue the work of changing conditions for black
people, if not in an imminent social upheaval, then in a gradual system-
atic process of evolution from generation to generation. Cleage remained
committed to doing what he felt God called him to do regardless of its
popularity. He sought to find those who still had some consciousness and
provided them a church/nation that could serve as a vehicle to keep that
consciousness alive. Cleage realized he was preparing his church/nation to
carry on after he was gone, through a wilderness period in black American
life where a remnant would have to serve as a bridge to carry his insights
to future generations.
Speaking to his national leadership in 1978, Cleage said,
The Black revolution has just about run out of gas. We have to start plan-
ning for survival. The factories are being automated with robots and com-
puters. The machines are running themselves. Unskilled black people in
America are going to be economically obsolete. That means the cities will
become cesspools of crime, drugs, poverty and violence. We could offer an
alternative to that life by building communal Christian communities that
would provide a safe haven. BCN must be a refuge and a hope for black
people intelligent enough to seek it. We have to preserve what we have built
by institutionalizing it in the clothing of the church. BCN can continue to
grow and evolve if we can emphasize the “Christian” aspect of who we are.
We have to focus on transformation rather than revolution. The develop-
ment of the Science of KUA and the change process has to be our emphasis.
We are still revolutionary. We are not changing our program or what we are
about but we can’t have a revolution by ourselves. black people have to be
willing and they are not willing at this point. We are not changing our pro-
gram or our goals. We are changing our strategy and tactics.24
In a series of annual leadership conclaves between 1986 and 1996, Cleage

refined the structure of a church/nation that could survive and continue to
be relevant even though black political consciousness was evaporating. He
conceived of this evolving church/nation as a Transforming Community.
Although Cleage’s PAOCC still offered a wide range of social minis-
tries and programs, he became less focused on going out into the world
34 D.K. NELSON
to change conditions. He became more concerned with drawing seekers

into the church/nation so that they could become a part of an expand-
ing transforming community movement. He saw this remnant of socially
conscious black people as a “messianic community”—the last best hope
to continue to struggle for black liberation even in a climate where black
political consciousness was dormant.
The Pan African Orthodox Christian Church prepares sincere seekers for the
experience of God by enabling them to achieve: 1) Self-realization through
the integration of spirit, mind and body, 2) the opening of self to posi-
tive group interaction through the holy sacraments and the processes that
make up the Science of KUA to help the individual realize the will of God
in his/her daily life through total submission, and by actually casting off
the destructive behavior patterns that conceal his/her inner divinity, thus
enabling him/her to enter fully into the communal life a transforming reli-
gious community.25
Cleage’s PAOCC had morphed into a national institutional system that he

saw as, “the foundation for the establishment of a liberated Pan African
World Community.”26 It included cultural centers, nurseries and youth
centers, community service centers, law centers, health centers, political
education centers, technological centers, housing complexes, KUA edu-
cational centers, and a 4000-acre agricultural complex all rooted in the
ministry and theology of a black church dedicated to personal and social
transformation.
By the early 1990s, the expanding theological insights of Cleage’s evo-
lutionary journey had reached the point that they could be reduced to a
simple formula that provided a programmatic outline for the PAOCC.
We are Black. We are oppressed. We seek to end our oppression!

THE WORLD SYSTEM is an enemy system consisting of institutions
from which we are excluded and which serve the interests of our oppres-
sor. Our struggle for survival requires recognition of the fact that we are
outside of the system and must build counter institutions of our own. The
world system enslaves and exploits us through the ruthless use of institu-
tional power to establish and maintain white supremacy. We are the victims
of a “niggerization” process, utilizing operant conditioning based upon the
white declaration of black inferiority.
THE CONDITIONED SELF is helpless. We must break the chains of
operant conditioning through KUA and the Group Process. The conditioned
self accepts and then represses the white myth of black inferiority which
renders us psychologically sick. We cannot escape the pain of breaking the
chains of operant conditioning. The conditioned self must be healed by wip-
ing out the conditioning of an enemy system. We can then regain the ability
to think and act independently and begin to function in a Transforming
Community (communal society) which offers unity, structure, order and
discipline undergirded by a sense of divine meaning and purpose.
THE DIVINE SYSTEM requires a struggle for enlightenment through
KUA, The Science of Becoming What We Already Are. There is a Divine
System within which we live, move and have our being, but of which we are
seldom aware. It emanates from God who is the cosmic energy and creative
intelligence that created and controls the universe. God can be experienced
only by breaking through the limits of the rational mind and reaching a
higher level of consciousness where the power of God becomes available to
us. This state of enlightenment must be attained before we can reject indi-
vidualism and integrate spirit, mind, and body.
TRIUMPH OF THE DIVINE SYSTEM on earth is the objective of
all our struggles! We seek to bring the world into submission to the will of
God.27
CONCLUSION
In his theological journey, Albert B. Cleage Jr. did not fully reject any of
his past views because they served as steppingstones to his next insight.
On Bob Law’s nationally syndicated program “Night Talk” (one of the
last radio programs that dealt seriously with black life in America), Cleage
was asked, “If you were to write the books today would you change any-
thing?” Cleage responded, “I don’t believe I would change anything. The
books captured what I was trying to do and say at that time. They lay the
foundation for what I am trying to say and do at this time.28
Cleage was a minister in the truest sense of the word. Ministry, for him,
was doing the will of God as it applied to specific human problems. His
ministry was to the unique problems confronting black people. His theo-
logical journey is made up of insights stemming from that ministry. They
were never designed to fit neatly and comfortably inside the traditional
categories of systematic theology. Cleage’s insights emerge from concrete
action to ameliorate the effects of centuries of oppression, inequality, and
exploitation for people who have been declared inferior and intention-
ally underdeveloped through institutional racism. Cleage believed that
36 D.K. NELSON
the black church could be an instrument of healing and restoration. He

followed that belief all of his life. It led to some unique and unexpected
revelations that lay the foundations for an ongoing ministry of black
transformation, unification, and empowerment in his PAOCC.
Cleage rose to national prominence in a time of rising expectations and
social upheaval. Seeking to seize the time, he wrote two books that cap-
tured the zeitgeist and built a national church organization. But as times
changed, his ministry had to adapt. Cleages made a transition from a strat-
egy of revolution to one of evolution and sustainability. He created a min-
istry and a theology that engineered a process to use the church to move
black people toward full humanity (KUA) and self-determination (Black
Christian Nationalist Movement [BCN]). While it could be argued that
the complex theology and rigid requirements of the PAOCC may have
limited its appeal to a broader number of black people, it is equally possi-
ble that without these things the PAOCC might not exist at all. The pres-
ent iteration of PAOCC theology (Best Self Theology) seeks to be more
user-friendly by making the specific practices and rigid lifestyle require-
ments optional and replacing them with the central belief that striving to
be our best selves is the ultimate act of worship and our primary religious
obligation. The second obligation is to utilize our realized potential to
serve God by serving others in the struggle to bring the world into con-
formity with divine will.
Cleage believed that he was not building just a church for today, but
one that could guide black people in perpetuity if it continued to evolve.
His last written words convey his belief that God was involved in our his-
tory through an evolutionary process in which we had to consciously par-
ticipate. He believed that his ministry and the theological insights derived
from it provide a path for future generations of revolutionary seekers to
journey on from generation to generation.
To the Spiritual Community,

I give you
a mustard seed
with which you
can move mountains…
If you have a MIND to
***
Our church is designed to
“OPEN US” for the
EXPERIENCE OF GOD:
Our Groups exist to
mediate spiritual power.
Therefore, we are able
to bring all things
into conformity
with DIVINE WILL.
JARAMOGI
August, 1995
NOTES
1. Albert Cleage, Black Christian Nationalism: New Directions for the Black
Church (Detroit, MI: Luxor Publishers of the Pan-African Orthodox
Christian Church, 1987), p. xvii.
2. Conversation with Albert Cleage, Sept. 1998.
3. Conversation with Albert Cleage, 1980.
4. St. Mark’s Congregational Church Manifesto, 1953.
5. Albert Cleage, Sermon: A Parish Ministry Program, 1957.
6. Private conversation with General Masai Bolugun, head security staff,
Shrines of the Black Madonna, 1967.
7. Conversation with M. Shawn Copeland.
8. Albert Cleage, BCN Ministerial Training Group Lecture, 1972.
9. Ibid.
10. Ibid.
11. Albert Cleage, BCN: New Directions for the Black Church Class, 1972.
12. Albert Cleage, “The Black Church as a Change Agent,” 1975, unpub-
lished essay.
13. Albert Cleage, “Genesis II: The Re-Creation of Man,” 1984, unpublished
essay.
14. Albert Cleage, “KUA Program: The Science of Christian Rebirth,” 1991,
unpublished essay.
15. Albert Cleage, PAOCC Theological Statement, 1992.
16. Albert Cleage, “Kutafuta: To Seek the Experience of God,” 1982, unpub-
lished essay.
17. Cleage, “Genesis II: The Recreation of Man,” 1984.
18. Ibid.
19. Ibid.
20. Ibid.
21. Albert Cleage, Sermon Discussion, Shrine #10 Houston, TX, 1997.
38 D.K. NELSON
22. Eulogy to the Black Church poem: “Old mother Tatum wiped a tear from
her tired old eyes,
Just like Jesus said on the cross,
She mumbled to no one in particular,
It is finished;
She was right,
The Black Church was dead!”
23. Albert Cleage, Sermon Discussion, Shrine #10 Houston, TX, 1998.
24. Albert Cleage, Presentation to National Leadership at the 1st Pan African
Synod, Houston, TX, 1978.
25. Albert Cleage, “The Transforming Community (sermon),” 1983.
26. Cleage, “Genesis II.”
27. Cleage, PAOCC Theological Statement, 1992.
28. Albert Cleage, PAOCC Kutafuta Responsive Meditation, 1984.
CHAPTER 3
Nothing Is More Sacred Than the Liberation

of Black People: Albert Cleage’s Method
as Unfulfilled Theological Paradigm Shift
Jawanza Eric Clark
Albert B. Cleage Jr.’s 1967 unveiling of a mural of a black Madonna and

child on Easter Sunday morning at Central United Church of Christ
launched the Black Christian Nationalist (BCN) Movement in America.
This unveiling marked not only the symbolic genesis of Cleage’s con-
struction of black theology, but also an often unacknowledged theo-
logical paradigm shift, a methodological transformation with radical
ecclesiological ramifications. Cleage attempted to restructure the black
church in such a way that the black church could become the engine
fueling the black revolution in America. “The black church,” he asserted,
“must free the minds of black people from psychological ‘identifica-
tion’ with a white society which seeks in every way to destroy them.
black people who dream of integration perpetuate the mechanism of
their enslavement. They have been programmed to destroy themselves.
The black church must fight to free the black man’s mind so that he
can fight to restructure or destroy the institutions which perpetuate his
enslavement.”1 Such a restructuring, however, required liberating black
J.E. Clark ()

Department of Religious Studies, Manhattan College, Bronx, NY, USA

DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54689-0_3
40 J.E. CLARK
churches, pastors, and theologians from the tyranny of the traditional

Protestant theological method. It required instituting a new method
informed by a new norm and ethic.
In Black Christian Nationalism, Cleage makes clear that the BCN
Movement is guided by the singular principle that “nothing is more
sacred than the liberation of black people.” In fact, he determined that
which is ethical must be judged solely by the extent to which it contrib-
utes to the current liberation struggle of black people. “If it supports the
Liberation Struggle of black people, then it is good. If it is in opposition
to the Liberation Struggle of black people, then it is bad. If it supports
the Liberation Struggle of black people, then it is moral. If it opposes the
Liberation Struggle, then it is immoral.”2 In launching Black Christian
Nationalism, Cleage also established a radically pragmatic theological
method, a method that makes our contemporary experience the ultimate
judge by which we measure the truthfulness, effectiveness, and righteous-
ness of our actions. Cleage established a type of theological pragmatism
that continues to be misunderstood and underappreciated by black theo-
logians and religious scholars today. A more thorough analysis of his
approach, however, offers insight into ways of rescuing, or extending the
life of, academic black theology, a theology presumed by many to be dying
or even already dead. Cleage’s methodological innovations invite a revival
of his thought in the early decades of the twenty-first century.
In 1972, Albert B. Cleage Jr. called our attention to his concern that
“Black schoolmen’s theology is written for white acceptance.”3 Essentially,
Cleage claimed that black theology suffers because of its pursuit of aca-
demic theological validation. His contention was that oppressed black
people in America are participating in a movement, a black liberation
struggle, and this struggle is not concerned with “appreciating blackness
but with Black survival.”4 His statement was prescient in that it foreshad-
owed a 40-year fixation and preoccupation with ontological blackness in
black theological discourse. A vigorous reengagement with Cleage today,
I argue, will provide much needed vitality to this discourse, which hereto-
fore has been stifled and impeded by an inability to overcome the burden
of ontological blackness and redemptive suffering. Cleage’s theological
pragmatism offers us a way around these problems and, even given its lim-
itations, points toward a constructive and innovative approach to ensure
the relevancy and practicality of black theology into the future.
NOTHING IS MORE SACRED THAN THE LIBERATION OF BLACK... 41
THE PROBLEM OF ONTOLOGICAL BLACKNESS

Throughout the decade of the 1960s in Detroit, Albert B. Cleage Jr. was
already experimenting with and developing black theology through the
preached word. In his sermons from his United Church of Christ pulpit
in Detroit, he initiated the first black theological salvo when he claimed
that Jesus was literally a black person who was himself engaged in a lib-
eration struggle. “Jesus was the non-white leader of a non-white people
struggling for national liberation against the rule of a white nation, Rome.
The intermingling of the races in Africa and the Mediterranean area is an
established fact. The nation, Israel, was a mixture of the Chaldeans, the
Egyptians, the Midionites, the Ethiopians, the Kushites, the Babylonians
and other dark peoples, all of whom were already mixed with the black
peoples of Central Africa.”5 In claiming that Jesus was literally black,
Cleage also argued that he was a member of a black nation Israel strug-
gling for independence from the white colonial power, Rome. While other
black theologians were undoubtedly inspired by the boldness of this asser-
tion, it’s also fair to say that they were aghast at the theological implica-
tions of such a claim.
James Cone immediately begins to distance himself and his theology
from Cleage’s emphasis on Jesus’ literal blackness. In his only published
reference to James Cone, Cleage acknowledged him as a good friend. It
was also clear to Cleage that their projects are different. Cleage remarked,
“Cone drags white Christians are far as they are willing to go (and then
some) in interpreting Black theology within the established framework
which they can accept and understand.”6 It is the “established framework”
that later presents conceptual and methodological problems for black the-
ology. For Cone, the racial optics that Cleage establishes makes theology
exclusive, too particular, and essentially nationalistic. It robs theology of
its universal appeal and value. Cone realized such a theology would lack
credibility and not be taken seriously at a time in which he, and others,
were attempting to legitimize the Black Power movement as a Christian
movement in America. One difference between Cleage and Cone centers
on the question of audience. For Cone, blackness should not be under-
stood literally but must function as symbol. “The focus on blackness does
not mean that only blacks suffer as victims of oppression in a racist soci-
ety, but that blackness is an ontological symbol and a visible reality which
best describes what oppression means in America.”7 Blackness functions
42 J.E. CLARK
symbolically, not literally, and stands for “all victims of oppression who
suffer from whiteness,” or the ideology of white supremacy.
Cone’s view of ontological blackness is fueled by two concerns: the
black experience in America and the revelation of Jesus Christ. Cone
establishes the black experience as one of the primary sources for black
theology. And he defines the black experience as “a life of humiliation and
suffering.”8 This definition ultimately becomes the locus of the criticism
of ontological blackness, because it describes black existence in a way that
makes it dependent on the reality of white racism or white oppression. But
what has received less attention by other black theologians and scholars
of religion is the other concern that lies at the heart of ontological black-
ness: the revelation of Jesus Christ. In his discussion of the norm of black
theology, Cone first states that black theology “must take seriously two
realities,” then he clarifies that he means, “two aspects of a single reality:
the liberation of blacks and the revelation of Jesus Christ.”9 For Cone,
“the norm of all God-talk which seeks to be black-talk is the manifesta-
tion of Jesus as the black Christ who provides the necessary soul for black
liberation.”10 The error and correction is noteworthy, because I argue
Cone’s theology is plagued by the methodological incompatibility that
exists within these two realities merged into one. The liberation of blacks
requires a protean, pragmatic approach that is ultimately precluded by
the static absolutism of the doctrine of revelation. James Cone’s brother,
Cecil, pointed out this problem when he argued that James’ Christology
is inconsistent with the full range of the black religious experience. While
James Cone obviously had a number of critics, from Cecil Cone, Gayraud
Wilmore, Charles Long, and William Jones to the various womanist theo-
logians, Delores Williams, Jacquelyn Grant, Kelly Brown Douglas, and
others, who point out the sexist inadequacies of black theology, I want to
focus on the critique of Victor Anderson, whose argument against onto-
logical blackness has had a particular resonance among current assess-
ments of Black theology.
Victor Anderson argued black theologies are crisis theologies and
remain “theologies in a crisis of legitimation”11 precisely because of their
dependency on the concept ontological blackness. Anderson suggests the
problem lies in the fact that ontological blackness is steeped in Cone’s defi-
nition of the black experience, an experience of humiliation and suffering
in a world of white racism. Suffering becomes constitutive of black exis-
tence and black identity. Ontological blackness then provides a divine
canopy over this existential situation of suffering foreclosing the possibility
of “cultural transcendence over white racism.”12 According to Anderson,

“If suffering and resistance and white racism are ontologically consti-
tutive of black life, faith, and theology, then transcendence from onto-
logical blackness puts at risk the cogency of black theology.”13 In other
words, Anderson claims that ontological blackness is defined in such a
way that the act or possibility of liberation from white oppression would
actually dismantle black theology. Thus, it is a crisis theology because it
requires oppressed existence to maintain and justify itself and its catego-
ries. Anderson puts it succinctly, “Where there exists no possibility of
transcending the blackness that whiteness created, African American the-
ologies of liberation must be seen not only as crisis theologies; they remain
theologies in a crisis of legitimation.”14 This claim, made more than 15
years ago, that black theology depends upon “a blackness that whiteness
created” is a criticism that continues to confound and follow the project.
It is why many current engagements of black theology inevitably bring
up this problem. Anthony Pinn asserts that even after three generations
of black theologies, “God remains ontologically Black, with few excep-
tions.”15 Alistair Kee, in the questionably named The Rise and Demise of
Black theology, essentially reiterates Anderson’s criticism and announces
the death of black theology. But Kee adds little to the discourse since
he merely reappropriates critiques made earlier by black religious scholars
themselves. Gayraud Wilmore, for example, inquired whether we should
announce black theology dead in 1999. Current black religious scholars
take up Anderson’s criticism in one way or another and agree that indeed
the problem of ontological blackness is a major stumbling block.
I want to add my voice to this chorus. However, I think Anderson’s cri-
tique misses the reason for ontological blackness’ essentialism of suffering.
The problem Anderson correctly identifies is at heart a theological prob-
lem. It is really a problem of theological method rooted in the absolute
and exclusive nature of Christology and the doctrine of revelation. Eddie
Glaude, in criticizing Anderson, claims there is something not quite right
about “the blackness that whiteness created” claim. Glaude argues that
blackness does not rely simply on white racism for its existence but also on
the God we see in Jesus Christ, the second aspect of Cone’s norm. “Black
liberation theologians take themselves to be addressing the difficulty of
being both black and Christian. The reality of being black foregrounds
the ways in which race has overdetermined what Christianity might mean
in the United States and in the world. But God intervenes here, and the
powerful message and life of Jesus Christ, it is argued, stand as a profound
44 J.E. CLARK
negation of these political realities.”16 The God in Jesus, it seems, offers

the possibility of transcendence from white racism. But what if the funda-
mental problem in fact lies with this God we see in Jesus? I would extend
Glaude’s point to insist that it is not whiteness as culturally or politically
defined that is the problem, but that ontological blackness depends upon
theological whiteness for its existence. In other words, Cone’s ontological
blackness is hampered fundamentally by its dependency on the doctrine
of revelation and a theological method that derives from a European para-
digm. Thus, the problem lies not in “the blackness that whiteness created”
as much as the blackness that Jesus, through the doctrine of revelation,
creates, which is prior to the political production of whiteness.
Here is where Albert Cleage’s pragmatic approach, at the very least,
invites a reconsideration of methodology within black theology and pro-
vides an escape from the trap of ontological blackness. When Cleage
states, “Nothing is more sacred than the liberation of black people,”
he encourages a deconstruction of the discipline of theology itself. For
Cleage, there are no sacred cows or absolute theological constructs or cat-
egories to which we are beholden. What informs this theological approach
is only that which affirms our present experiences and advances the cause
of black liberation from white oppression. As such he presents a method
that is innovative, adaptable, and open to constant reexamination and
reconstruction. He contends, “We want to know: How does God work in
the world, and how does God relate to the Black Liberation Struggle? Is
either God or Jesus really relevant to the Black Liberation Struggle? And
what should be the role of the church in the Black liberation struggle?”17
Cleage understands that his theology is fundamentally rooted in a par-
tisan anthropology. It is we, black human beings, who are engaged in
this God-talk, and we are also the ones struggling for liberation. Thus,
our existential reality, our current experiences, must establish the basis or
criteria by which the liberation of black people is advanced as opposed to
a static theological history or absolute truth claims. For Cleage, it is even
fair to ask: Do we really need God or Jesus Christ to accomplish this task?
Ontological blackness, however, is conceptually hindered by the theo-
logical category revelation. As a result, it is imprisoned by a historically
bound, static conception of the truth we see in Jesus Christ. For Cone,
who is persuaded by the imperative established by Karl Barth, revelation is
necessary to eradicate the problem endemic to natural theology. But the
critique Dietrich Bonhoeffer posed to Karl Barth might also be posed to
James Cone if what results is not “a positivism of revelation.”18 In the case
of Cone, this positivism of revelation is really the heart of the ontological

blackness trap because it suggests a conception of blackness that absolu-
tizes the oppressed existence Cone argues is manifest in the ontology of
Jesus Christ. Christ’s being and mandate are static and overwhelming. It
is fixed and bound by the representation of Jesus Christ given to us by the
gospel writers. So while the black experience might be capable of estab-
lishing itself independently of white racism, the question is: can it establish
itself independently of the static norm set by Jesus in the biblical text? It
would seem then that the ideology of white supremacy is not as big a con-
ceptual hurdle to ontological blackness as are the pages of scripture and
revelation as a theological category.
J. Kameron Carter is attentive to this problem within Cone’s theology
and offers an analysis of the theological meaning of blackness. He calls
it “Theologizing Race.” Carter shows the depths of Cone’s dependency
on Karl Barth, yet commends Cone’s awareness of Barth’s theological
shortcomings for black theology and willingness to depart from him. The
question remains, however, if the departure is sufficient. It is certainly not
a radical break. According to Carter, Cone “has not broken far enough
away either from Tillich’s immanent dialecticism or Barth’s transcendent
dialectism.”19 Carter’s concerns lie in the problem of theology’s heavy
reliance on metaphysical abstraction which is symbolized in his engage-
ment with the Gnostic heresy. Christology is the locus for the problem.
He argues for theological concreteness: “a Christian theology of Israel”
that emphasizes embodiment and will not rob Jesus of his Jewishness in
favor of his Christian divinity. Carter agrees with Victor Anderson that
Cone makes blackness abstract, which is to say essentialist, through its
connection to revelation. Thus in creating a pure blackness, he leaves
whiteness in place. “Yet here is where Victor Anderson’s critique is most
powerful, because [Cone’s] settlement with blackness is a settlement with
the blackness that whiteness created. And therefore, the settlement with
the blackness that whiteness created is a settlement with whiteness, albeit
in the idiom of cultural blackness or cultural nationalism.”20 I understand
Carter to condemn efforts to establish any type of “pure” body or entity,
a deleterious abstraction, which he correctly identifies as a fundamentally
theological problem that encroaches upon political constructions of race.
For him, this theological problem undergirds the idea of whiteness. But
ontological blackness is essentially the same thing and is provided divine
sanction through the doctrine of revelation. For Carter, the goal there-
fore is to do theology in a way that affirms some type of “mulattic or
46 J.E. CLARK
miscegenized” embodied existence and “therefore Jesus himself as the

Israel of God is Mulatoo.”21 Carter contends, “As a theological problem,
whiteness names the refusal to trade against race. It names the refusal to
enter into dependent, promiscuous, and, in short, ‘contaminated’ rela-
tions that resist an idolatrously false purity… What is needed is a vision
of Christian identity, then, that calls us to holy ‘impurity’ and ‘promiscu-
ity,’ a vision that calls for race trading against the benefits of whiteness
so as to enter into the miscegenized or mulattic existence of diviniza-
tion.”22 Carter’s miscegenized existence (the diluting of the mythical
pure whiteness with blackness or blackness with whiteness) offers a theo-
retical frame for transcending the racial hierarchy and the idea of race
generally. “Miscegenized existence” is an appropriate description since
it valorizes impurity and hybridity and establishes them as fundamental
to embodiment. It discloses Whiteness and Blackness as abstractions, as
myths, stories we tell ourselves about human origins that contradict the
reality of embodied existence. Carter, however, is still working within the
established theological frameworks which include classical Christology,
even if he endeavors to adeptly reinterpret them.
A PRAGMATIC THEOLOGICAL METHOD

What Albert Cleage Jr. offers black theology is an opportunity to reeval-
uate the theological task and theology as “power/knowledge.”23 He
encourages black theologians to push beyond the discourse itself and con-
struct a different framework for God-talk. It’s a move that Charles Long,
pioneering black theorist and historian of religion, called for in his analysis
of opaque theologies, an analysis to which I now return.
In Long’s assessment of black theologians, he claims that James Cone
and Albert B. Cleage are both “essentially apologetic theologians working
implicitly and explicitly from the Christian theological tradition.”24 I am
arguing that in fact Cleage is not an apologetic theologian but a prag-
matic one. Long refers to black theology as a opaque theology because
of his contention that European methodological tools and modalities are
incapable of making translucent the black religious experience in America.
These tools obscure and obstruct more than they make transparent or
lucid. The good news is that “the opaque ones deny the authority of the
white world to define their reality, and deny the methodological and phil-
osophical meaning of transparency as a metaphor for a theory of knowl-
edge.”25 Long suggests that the potential of black theology is not just
as a critique of traditional Protestant theology’s complicity with racial

oppression but of the nature of theological discourse and method itself.
His argument calls for a reassessment of Cleage’s theology, especially since
Cleage was the one black theologian of his generation willing to do this
work of deconstruction. According to Long, “In every case, the claim
of these theologies is more than an accusation regarding the actions and
behaviors of the oppressive cultures … it is an accusation regarding the
world view, thought structures, theory of knowledge, and so on, of the
oppressors.”26 He maintains that “theologies are about power, the power
of God, but equally about the power of specific forms of discourse about
power.”27 Theological discourse centers power in the modern Western
world and in the hands of the creators of that world. Theologies opaque
then will remain opaque to the black religious experience, even as they
call into question the power of the white world to define reality, as long as
they continue to rely on the theological idioms, categories, and modali-
ties that derive from that discourse. What is needed is a radical theological
departure, a theological paradigm shift. “It is at this point that theologies
opaque must become deconstructive theologies—that is to say, theolo-
gies that undertake the destruction of theology as a powerful mode of
discourse.”28
The claim that “nothing is more sacred than the liberation of black peo-
ple” points toward “the destruction of theology as a powerful mode of
discourse.” While it is true that Cleage continued to frame his movement
in the veneer of Christian categories, these categories carry a radically dif-
ferent meaning than that of the mainstream Protestant black church and
even that of other versions of black theology. Cleage is asking us to consider
what theology and the church could manifest if the quest for freedom for
blacks was the sole criterion upon which our pursuit and understanding of
the sacred was judged. How might the church, still the primary and most
powerful institution in the black community, be restructured so that this
institution actually serves the needs of a growing black liberation struggle?
What would it mean to make the concerns of black people struggling to
be free, and not professional or academic legitimation, the priority of black
theology? According to Cleage, black theology has always been “more
important to black people than Black theologians suspect.”29 Freed of its
Eurocentric methodological shackles, which are theology’s universal imper-
ative and the abstract absolutism central to the revelation of Jesus Christ,
black church theology becomes a pragmatic discourse focused on the goal
of black liberation in America and ultimately all of the African diaspora.
48 J.E. CLARK
Cleage presents a theological methodology that is self-consciously

constructive and pragmatic by his willingness to foreground our present
experiences in pursuit of solving the problem of black subjugation and the
declaration of black inferiority in America. While he argued that Jesus was
literally a black Messiah, he also claimed that even if the historical Jesus was
not black, or even if Jesus never existed, black people would either have
to make him black or construct a new faith. His questions about the rel-
evancy of Jesus Christ to the black liberation struggle convey a similar sen-
timent. These comments suggest a pragmatic, as opposed to an apologetic,
approach. Inspired by John Dewey’s pragmatism, Eddie Glaude wants us
to consider that “sometimes our habits and beliefs fail us. In the course of
our transactions with our environment—transactions that result in the irri-
tation of doubt—our experiences may lead us to conclude that some of our
inherited beliefs are not for us. We then tinker and experiment and, as we
grope for resolution, we determine, as best as we can, when it is appropriate
to forget and when to remember.”30 For Cleage, the idea of “making Jesus
black” gestures toward such theological experimentation. His efforts to
restructure the black church, and construct a new black theology informed
by a pragmatic methodology, is an admission of the failure of the black
church and specific inherited beliefs. Undoubtedly, the black church was
vital in sustaining black existence and ensuring survival in a hostile white
supremacist culture, but the black church, as constituted, is inadequate as a
sufficient tool for black liberation in the revolutionary context of the Black
Power movement in America. Glaude, however, is critical of many pro-
ponents of black power for “looking to the past in search of greatness, or
venerating all that is old to the detriment of the new or attempting, a pos-
teriori, to invent a past for themselves—one they would prefer to the past
from which they actually are descended.”31 While it is true that the early
Cleage touted the mythic glories of black people’s African past and such
an invention makes him susceptible to this critique, Cleage also creates a
framework through which we can judge the truthfulness of our claims by
what we are able to build in the present and future. And his view of the
black church is certainly not retrospective but prospective. How can this
institution best serve the needs of a people currently involved in a struggle
for freedom in this specific sociohistorical moment?
In this way, Cleage parted ways with other black theologians of his gen-
eration, since he is not motivated by a need to defend the black church or
make the case that black theology derives from black church theology or
even is consistent with the historical black religious experience in America.
Cleage subverts the problem with history that Glaude contends plagues
black theology. Dwight Hopkins, for example, makes the case that there is
a theological bridge or link between Africa, slave theology or bush arbor
theology, and black theology. The argument that black theology and slave
theology contain African remains suggests a theological and cultural line
of continuity between black theology and the ways in which black people
in America have always practiced Christianity in America. Victor Anderson
calls this a “hermeneutics of return” that he implies is really just an effort
to legitimize black theology as not just academic theology but consistent
with black religious experiences in America. “In other words, the return
to black sources is attributive to an ideological function that is culturally
apologetic.”32 Thus, Hopkins’ work essentially is an exercise in seeking
legitimation, not with the white academy but with the guardians of black
religious history.
Recall that Gayraud Wilmore earlier raised questions about James
Cone’s own efforts at seeking validation from white systematic theology.
The universal imperative implicit in ontological blackness was necessary,
Wilmore claims, in order “for any systematic theology to be taken seri-
ously.”33 We could ask: taken seriously by whom? Who is the intended
audience? Wilmore goes on, “The question subsequently raised in this
discussion, however, was whether the black religious experience requires
such a validation by white systematic theology before it can be com-
mended to African Americans who are being socialized away from their
traditions, and whether the strain toward universality does not ipso facto
rob black religion of the freedom to be one approach to God’s revela-
tion in Scripture.”34 Perhaps responsive to this criticism, Hopkins’ project
attempts to justify black theology within African American religious history
by drawing from sources that are consistent with the religious experiences
of black people in America. However, whether the audience is academic
white systematic theologians or the black church tradition and/or African
American public life, both Cone and Hopkins pursue projects whose
goal is to validate, defend, and render legitimate the project itself, black
theology as valid theological engagement. What undergirds the efforts
of both is to authenticate black theology as valid discourse within the
scope of what counts as acceptable. This is to be lauded, not condemned,
yet the black theology project ultimately can only maintain its vitality by
encouraging a diversity of theological and methodological approaches and
theological alternatives. Cleage’s thought is of urgent necessity, primarily
because the experiences of everyday black people are the sole criterion and
50 J.E. CLARK
judge of the validity and relevancy of the project or movement. He shifts

the locus of concern by asking: Can we actually get the black church to
work for black liberation? It is an approach that is forward-looking and
shows a willingness to engage in the experimental. Validating the project
as academic discourse is a professional, intellectual pursuit that fails to cen-
tralize the demands of everyday black people struggling in the street for
social and even revolutionary change. These everyday black people need
the institutional power, support, and resources that only the black church
can provide. Wilmore suggests that legitimacy efforts by black theology
require conforming to the mandates of an already established discourse in
a way that is restrictive and “robs,” or takes something away from black
religion. This cultural and spiritual robbery is what makes black opaque
theology. Something is missing, denied, rejected. What is needed is impro-
visational theological construction and experimentation that can adapt,
adjust, scrutinize, and reconstruct in response to failure. From Cleage’s
perspective, black theology could be “one approach to God’s revelation in
scripture” or perhaps it should not be one approach to God’s revelation
in scripture. The existential and practical demands of the movement itself,
the new ecclesia, determine the ultimate usefulness even of the category
revelation and scripture.
Cleage’s willingness to foreground the stated objective of black lib-
eration makes him less defensive about the black church, black Christian
experiences in America, and ultimately black theology itself. It reflects an
openness and ability to be responsive to new challenges, for example, what
lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, questioning or queer (LGBTQ) people
might add to the notion of “black” people. Cleage’s project is not apolo-
getic, because there is no theological idea or construct that is inviolate, and
his is not a project about historical recovery or discovery. Cleage explicitly
states that his goal is to reconstruct the black church. He initiated practical
theological, liturgical, and structural innovation. It is truly a work of con-
structive theology that situates him as a type of renegade theologian, since
he is not bound by the same rules of engagement established by those
accomplished and sanctioned by the field. Cleage becomes subversive and
in fact a threat, because his approach calls into question the “authenticity”
of all black theology. “Theologies are about the power of specific forms
of discourse about power.” His theology therefore is reduced to a type of
“subjugated knowledge” within the field, and he risks erasure, his thought
subject to historical amnesia, even within the project and subdiscipline
that he helped to establish.
The traditional black church has failed black people by being more a
mechanism of their oppression than an instrument of liberation. Cleage’s
desire then is to transform it into an instrument of liberation; thus even the
Christian faith itself is potentially subject to radical revision and reconstruc-
tion, because what matters most is not some idyllic theological past or invio-
late view of God but black people’s present pursuit of freedom. His method
is symbolized in the renaming of the church from Central United Church of
Christ to The Shrines of the Black Madonna and recasting the church as the
BCN Movement (later renamed Pan African Orthodox Christian Church).
My contention is that Cleage’s efforts to situate his theological and
ecclesiological project based solely on the guiding principle that nothing
is more sacred than the liberation of black people remains an unfulfilled
theological paradigm shift that deserves renewed engagement. He is the
one black theologian that sought to truly prioritize the objective of lib-
eration for black people in a way that incorporates a pragmatic approach
attentive to present human experiences instead of a reified theological and
mythological past. The fact that he was a pastor and community organizer
attentive to a specific sociohistoric context (1960s and 1970s Detroit)
and not a professional academic theologian is emblematic of his emphasis
on a radically different methodology because of his audience and prac-
tical objectives. Cleage’s approach remains unfulfilled, however, for two
reasons. First, as has already been stated, black theology as academic dis-
course tacitly determined Cleage’s theology unfit, since it fails to conform
to the mandates outlined by the discourse itself. Second, Cleage and his
community, his church, failed to continuously subject this protean theo-
logical posture to examination and scrutiny.
As stated previously, Eddie Glaude argues that black theology has a
problem with history. He uses John Dewey and Friedrich Nietzsche to help
him argue that “with such a pragmatic conception of experience, the black
theological project can escape the problem of history.”35 This problem is
derived from a conception of history as monumental, which provides us
with “models of excellence” that inhibits our acting in the present. When
one adds the tendency to view African American history through the lens
of biblical history the problem becomes even more entrenched. The prag-
matic approach that Glaude offers however allows us to take the current
experiences of African Americans seriously and make them the priority
over a reified past. What is instructive about Glaude, however, is the way
in which he rightly identifies that what undergirds this fixation with the
past is a longing for “permanence, totality, the real essence, and God.”36
52 J.E. CLARK
In other words, he calls our attention to our inclination toward static

existence, or the delusion of permanence, because of “the fear of contin-
gency and its tragic implications.”37 Cleage’s pragmatic approach evokes
this fear. His approach is Dewey like, yet it remains unfulfilled because of
his (and perhaps more importantly his community’s) inability to overcome
this fear of contingency and constantly revise and adapt this theology in
response to the changing existential realities.
The claim “Nothing is more sacred than the liberation of black people”
demands continuous examination and interrogation of what these con-
cepts, “sacred,” “liberation,” and “black people,” mean in new situations
of concern. In 1967, liberation was conceived in a particular way by Black
Nationalist groups. Cleage defined liberation as building “a nation within
a nation.” He prioritized building, and maintaining control of, the various
institutions upon which black life depends. Liberation is a state in which
black people, in America and throughout the Diaspora, are truly a self-
determining people. Yet, how has the idea of liberation evolved in the
last 50 years? Has BCN theology continually updated itself in order to be
responsive to changing existential realities or did this protean ethic become
calcified and entrenched in a way that made it obsolete and disconnected
from the everyday concerns of black people in post-revolutionary times?
Cleage’s Black Christian Nationalism assumes a black liberation strug-
gle, but how does it continue to remain relevant when there is no clear
movement or struggle? In the absence of a liberation struggle, did BCN
theology devolve into a rigid orthodoxy that belies its stated pragmatic
method? How does it respond to the emergence of womanist theology
and black feminist thought rooted as they are in the claim that black the-
ology is essentially male theology that is alienated from the experiences of
black women and their efforts to confront and resist, not only racism, but
black men’s sexism? How does it respond to the critique that the experi-
ences of all black people were conflated and made essential to suffering
derived from white racism? While Cleage jettisons ontological blackness,
is he not working from a similar definition of the black experience as James
Cone, a definition that reduces the black experience as perpetually reactive
and responsive to white racism? What room does this leave for discussion
of black women’s experiences, and black LGTBQ people? What about an
analysis of class and capitalism? The claim that BCN is the answer might
have failed to consider whether or not the questions black people are ask-
ing themselves have changed in the last 50 years.
That said, Cleage did demonstrate a clear openness to theological
innovation and change in significant ways. He certainly continued to
struggle to answer the question: how does God work in the world? And
he was not settled on this matter after the publication of Black Christian
Nationalism. One must read Cleage’s later writings to fully appreciate
the evolution of his doctrine of God from the belief that God was black
to a conception of God as cosmic energy and creative intelligence. This
evolution evinces the way his conception of God manifests his pragmatic
method since this new conception discloses a God that is useful to black
people in their search to attain power and overcome a pervasive and cor-
rosive black inferiority complex.
CLEAGE’S DOCTRINE OF GOD—COSMIC ENERGY

AND CREATIVE INTELLIGENCE
When Albert B. Cleage initiated the BCN Movement, he articulated a

doctrine of God that explicitly affirmed the blackness of God. In a sermon
preached in 1967, “An Epistle to Stokely,” Cleage expounds on the bib-
lical claim that “God made man in his own image.” He points out that
if indeed God made humans in God’s own image then the fact that the
majority of the people on the planet are people of color is relevant to the
image of God. It means that God is non-white, which Cleage often con-
flates with black; thus God is black.
“If God created man in his own image, then we must look at man to see
what God looks like. There are black men, there are yellow men, there are
red men, and there are a few, a mighty few, white men in the world. If God
created man in his image, then God must be some combination of this
black, red, yellow and white. In no other way could God have created man
in his own image.”38
This quote has often been used by other black religious scholars as an
articulation of Cleage’s doctrine of God. While this is unfair since this
excerpt from one sermon was not necessarily intended to be a developed
doctrine of God, it is also true that Cleage never wrote a systematic or
constructive theology. It is true, however, that his theology evolved as
the needs and existential realities of his community evolved; thus, all his
sermons were articulations of his theology in process, his theology to that
point. Black and womanist theologians, however, in works published in the
last 20 years, continue to use the aforementioned quote as representative
of Cleage’s thought and fail to acknowledge the evolution of his doctrine
of God, which began as early as 1979. In fact, Cleage was responsive to
54 J.E. CLARK
William Jones’ critique of him. Jones described Cleage’s doctrine of God

as “the combination approach” and declared it self-refuting.39 Jones points
out as problematic Cleage’s attempt to combine all the races of the world
to determine the image of God. He notes that doing so focuses exclu-
sively on race and ignores the other particularities of human beings. If, for
example, one applied that logic to gender or sex, would Cleage then say
God is androgynous or hermaphroditic? Is God a combination of all the
heights and weights of human beings? Do we apply this logic to figure out
God’s eye color and the width and shape of God’s nose and face? When
one endeavors to discern other specific human characteristics of God, the
“combination approach” is difficult to rationally defend.
As early as 1979, however, Albert Cleage evolved and developed a doc-
trine of God that was consistent with modern physics and African and
many Eastern religious traditions. Cleage began to articulate a concep-
tion of God as cosmic energy and creative intelligence. He developed this
concept based on his awareness of the paradigm shift that had taken place
in modern physics; thus in his new conception of God he shows his will-
ingness to develop theology in a way that is responsive to new scientific
discoveries and advances. Physicist Fritjof Capra makes clear that the uni-
verse is not comprised of separate building blocks but is a unified whole.
“Gradually, physicists began to realize that nature, at the atomic level, does
not appear as a mechanical universe composed of fundamental building
blocks, but rather as a network of relations, and that, ultimately, there are
no parts at all in this interconnected web.”40 This interconnected web is
not comprised of matter or independently existing particles, but is network
of energy patterns and processes. Thus, on a subatomic level, all things are
comprised of the same energy, but the energy processes and patterns differ.
The recognition that mass is a form of energy eliminated the concept of

a material substance from science and with it also that of a fundamental
structure. Subatomic particles are not made of any material stuff; they are
patterns of energy. Energy, however, is associated with activity, with pro-
cesses, and this implies that the nature of subatomic particles is intrinsi-
cally dynamic. When we observe them, we never see any substance, nor any
fundamental structure. What we observe are dynamic patterns continually
changing into one another—a continuous dance of energy.41
Such a “dance of energy,” led Cleage to conclude that all that is in the
universe is connected to, and exists within, a field of energy. This energy
field then is synonymous with God; thus, as human beings we actually
“live, move, and have our being in God (Acts 17:28).” For Cleage, “God
continues to be the energy field in which all the forces of nature are
united… All the forces of nature are united in one single energy field. The
energy field is God which permeates everything, the spiritual foundation
of the universe.”42 We are energy beings and if we could open up our
energy pathways, we might be able to access more energy at greater levels
of intensity. In theological terms, this means the human beings possess an
inner divinity, the God incarnate. The point of religion and spirituality is
to activate that inner divinity and have it connect with external divinity, the
God transcendent. Consequently, Cleage began to muse that the worship
of God, the experience of God, is an effort to open the seeker, and increase
his/her access, to more energy and power (intelligence) unavailable to
him/her otherwise. Worship is not performed then to please, pacify, or
ingratiate oneself to a Supreme Being, but worship serves a practical func-
tion for human beings: to increase the community’s collective access to
divine power, or higher levels of energy and consciousness. Cleage argued
that this was in fact what Jesus was trying to teach his disciples and would
often quote the words ascribed to Jesus in the gospel of John 14:12, “The
one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will
do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father.” Cleage
formulated a doctrine of God that merged the insights of modern science,
with the description of the creation of the world in the book of Genesis.
In the beginning nothing existed but the power and creative intelligence of
God. Out of a mystical explosion of divine energy, the cosmos and every-
thing in it was created. This act of creation provided an orderly unification
of the four fundamental forces of nature in a Unified Field controlling the
functions and interaction of all things. It took some 15 billion years from
the moment of divine creation for mankind to evolve into a recognizable
human form on the continent of Africa. Whether or not a similar evolution-
ary process produced human beings on other planets or in other galaxies we
have no way of knowing.43
Such a pantheistic conception of God is a conception unlike those artic-

ulated by other black theologians and makes a unique contribution to the
black theology project. My contention is that the evolution of his doctrine
of God was made possible by a pragmatic theological method, one that
promises to add vitality to a black theology project that is in earnest need
of revitalization.
56 J.E. CLARK
NOTES
1. Albert B. Cleage Jr., “The Black Christian Nationalist Manifesto,” Church
document.
2. Albert B. Cleage Jr., Black Christian Nationalism (New York: William
Morrow and Company, 1972), p. xviii.
3. Ibid., p. xv.
4. Ibid., p. xvi.
5. Albert B. Cleage Jr., “An Introduction to Black Christian Nationalism,”
unpublished essay.
6. Albert B. Cleage, Black Christian Nationalism, p. xvii.
7. James Cone, A Black theology of Liberation (New York: Orbis Books,
1970), p. 7.
8. Ibid., p. 23.
9. Ibid., p. 38.
10. Ibid., p. 38.
11. Victor Anderson, “Ontological Blackness in Theology,” in African
American Religious Thought, eds. Cornel West and Eddie S. Glaude Jr.
(Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2003), p. 894.
12. Ibid., p. 898.
13. Ibid., p. 907.
14. Ibid., p. 917.
15. Anthony B. Pinn, “Black theology,” in Liberation Theologies in the United
States (New York: New York University Press, 2010), p. 24.
16. Eddie Glaude, In a Shade of Blue: Pragmatism and the Politics of Black
America (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2007), p. 72.
17. Albert B. Cleage, Black Christian Nationalism, p. xvi.
18. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Letters and Papers from Prison, ed. Eberhard Bethge
(New York: Simon and Schuster, 1953), p. 280.
19. J. Kameron Carter, Race: A Theological Account (New York: Oxford
University Press, 2008), p. 191.
20. Ibid., 190.
21. Ibid., 192.
22. Ibid., 192.
23. Michel Foucault.
24. Charles Long, Significations: Signs, Symbols, and Images in the Interpretation
of Religion (Aurora: The Davies Group, 1986), p. 187.
25. Ibid., p. 207.
26. Ibid., p. 208.
27. Ibid., p. 209.
28. Ibid., p. 210.
29. Albert B. Cleage, Black Christian Nationalism, p. xvii.
30. Eddie Glaude, In a Shade of Blue: Pragmatism and the Politics of Black
America, p. 86.
31. Ibid., p. 83.
32. Victor Anderson, “Ontological Blackness in Black theology,” in African
American Religious Thought, ed. Cornel West and Eddie Glaude, p. 903.
33. Gayraud Wilmore, Black Religion and Black Radicalism (New York: Orbis
Books, 1972), p. 250.
34. Ibid., p. 250.
35. Eddie Glaude, In a Shade of Blue, p. 87.
36. Ibid., p. 87.
37. Ibid., p. 87.
38. Albert B. Cleage Jr., The black Messiah (Trenton: Africa World Press,
1989), p. 42.
39. 1973, p. 125.
40. Fritjof Capra, The Tao of Physics (Boston: Shambhala Publications, 1975),
p. 330.
41. Ibid., p. 330.
42. Albert B. Cleage Jr., “The Divine Reality,” a sermon, preached June 30,
1991.
43. Albert B. Cleage Jr., “Introduction to BCN Theology,” unpublished essay,
1984.
CHAPTER 4
“We Needed Both of Them”:

The Continuing Relevance of Rev. Albert
B. Cleage Jr.’s (Jaramogi Abebe Agyeman’s)
Radical Interpretations of Martin Luther
King Jr. and Malcolm X in Scholarship
and Black Protest Thought
Stephen C. Finley
INTRODUCTION
The Reverend Albert B. Cleage Jr. (Jaramogi Abebe Agyeman) was one
of the first black religious leaders (perhaps the first) to offer an interpreta-
tion of Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X in relation to one another,
as complementary rather than as oppositional, which was the prevailing
metanarrative of his day. Therefore, it is no coincidence that his sermons
on Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr. are arranged successively in
Cleage’s collection, The black Messiah.1 Their close proximity symbolizes
how important they were in Cleage’s religious thought and how insight-
ful his radical interpretations of them were. Through a textual analytical
S.C. Finley ()

Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies, Louisiana State University,
Baton Rouge, LA, USA

DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54689-0_4
60 S.C. FINLEY
approach to primary literature on the subject, this essay argues that—guided

by a form of pragmatic realism—Cleage’s iconoclastic approach to black
religious, theological, and intellectual thought sought to destroy “myths”
about these two eminent figures, and in so doing, he was able to offer the
world a radical interpretation of Martin and Malcolm that has remained
relevant and far-reaching in contemporary African American thought.
That is, Martin and Malcolm were both necessary religious leaders for
African Americans, and Rev. Cleage offered an insightful interpretation
that continues to be relevant today and perhaps more so than in his own
time. What I am arguing, here, is that Cleage’s perspective challenged the
public to consider both Martin and Malcolm together, and, while James
H. Cone’s Martin and Malcolm and America: A Dream or A Nightmare
(1991)2 is a more well-known reference on the subject, it was Cleage who
announced via the sermons in his The black Messiah, the paradigm that
continues to be normative in public and academic discourses to this day.
To be sure, although Cleage privileges Malcolm, in part, due to his per-
sonal relationship with him, he, nevertheless, understood the ideological
and practical relationship between them to be of utter importance to black
radical and religious thought, and he sought to de-mystify the public’s
thinking on both of them. Furthermore, Cone’s discussion of Martin and
Malcolm are much more hagiographic in the sense that, for him, these
men function as paradigmatic sources and models out of which a black
theology of liberation emerges, while, on the other hand, Cleage’s prag-
matic realism deconstructs the myths that surround them in order that
their ideas and activities might be seen for their concrete and earthly con-
sequences for a politics of black radicalism. In other words, while this
essay focuses on the enduring relevance of Cleage’s perspective—a view-
point that is rooted in the earlier Cleage writings—he continues to unpack
and give substance to these ideas throughout his corpus. Therefore, his
work deserves and requires much more critical attention to the subject of
Martin and Malcolm than it is presently given.
MARTIN AND MALCOLM IN CLEAGE’S RADICAL

HOMILETICS
The thrust of Cleage’s thesis on Martin and Malcolm is to be found in
the sermons that he delivered on both men, and these sources should
not be overlooked, for they are, it seems to me, the archetype for one
“WE NEEDED BOTH OF THEM”: THE CONTINUING RELEVANCE OF REV.... 61
of the dominant ways that Martin and Malcolm have come to be viewed
presently in academic (and popular) black religious thought. I disagree
at points with Cleage’s conclusions, which I will discuss at the end of
the essay, but, here, he lays the foundation for how he interprets Martin
and Malcolm—ways that I understand to be salient presently, especially in
the imperative that they should be read together in order to glean their
impact. Particularly in the sermons “Dr. King and Black Power”3 and to
a lesser extent “Brother Malcolm,”4 Cleage contends that King has to be
read as dichotomous: on the one hand, for the things he said, much of
which Cleage rejects, and, on the other hand, for the things he did, which
Cleage celebrates, almost reveres, and views as essential for the existence
of radical black politics that are not dependent on white people and which
help to shape a radical black theo-political entity that he calls “The Black
Nation.” And it is in this discursive space that he sees King and Malcolm
as complementary.
“Dr. King and Black Power” is arguably Cleage’s most important ser-
mon—at least with respect to the current subject—and perhaps beyond.
Delivered on the Sunday after Dr. King was assassinated (Thursday, April
4, 1968), Cleage makes a genius (but flawed, at times) distinction between
the King of public pronouncement and the King of public action. He sees
a contradiction in the two that he is able to reconcile masterfully. Cleage
notes, “I never agreed with most of the things he said, but I have loved
everything he did because the things he did had no relationship to the
things he said.”5 This trope, “it had no relationship to the things he said,”
reappears multiple times in Cleage’s sermon. I would disagree, here, that
King was completely dichotomous and contradictory. The ever-evolving
King was complex, much more so than any binary view of him would
capture, and I would argue that at times what King was saying was just as
radical as some of what Malcolm was saying. The problem is, I think, that
Cleage reduced King’s thought to three categories: integration, redemp-
tive suffering, and nonviolence. This reification of King does a disservice
to the radical trajectory of his complex thought and ignores what James
Cone observes as the complementary and corrective nature of the religio-
political thought that Martin and Malcolm exchanged.6 I will return to
this idea later. Notwithstanding my modest difference in his interpretation
of Martin and the relationship to and influence on Malcolm, that he privi-
leged Martin’s actions should be clear. He “loved” the courageous King,
62 S.C. FINLEY
whose public activities contributed much to African Americans’ sense of

being and social vision.
In Martin’s sermons and public addresses, Cleage disagrees vocifer-
ously with King, whom he sees as a black “leader” who was supported
by the system of white supremacy and white power. He expressed par-
ticular disdain for what he understood as Martin’s notions of integration,
redemptive suffering, and nonviolence. Cleage saw Malcolm as much
more commensurate with the goals of black liberation. Nevertheless, the
progress that African Americans made in the 1960s with respect to his rad-
ical vision of a Black Nation, which was necessary for Black Power, would
not have existed were it not for King’s radical public activities, which con-
fronted white power structures. One of the greatest accomplishments of
King, according to Cleage, is that he helped to transform every day black
people—men, women, and children—into actors in their own liberation
struggle. Martin gave them the courage to fight, which resulted in the
appearance of a coherent peoplehood that he had not witnessed before.
The value and strength of Cleage’s interpretation of Dr. King are best said
in Cleage’s own words at length:
Dr. King was saying one thing and [black people] were learning another.
He set up the situation, he set up the confrontation, and black folks, as they
stood up against white people, saw that these people were not invincible.
These were no super-beings… This was a movement inside black people.
It had no relationship to what Dr. King was saying, either in his speeches
or in his books. It was something that black people were learning. They
were learning that they could stand up against the white man, that black
people could come together as a group, that they could find unity in their
struggle against oppression, and in their desire for justice. We were discover-
ing something, and it had no relationship with what he was saying. White
folks remember what he said, his words. But we remember where we were
thirteen years ago, and where we are today. Not that he did it by himself, but
he created the confrontation situations in which we could learn, in which we
could work, and which Brother Malcolm could interpret.7
This may be the most critical statement on the relationship between

Martin and Malcolm. Martin was courageous and confrontational, and
in that context, African Americans were learning to be a people, and
they were learning the limits of white power. This learning, of course,
was greatly advanced by Malcolm, he suggests, who interpreted for black
people what was going on in these situations in which black desire for
freedom was met with white resistance. Therefore, both Martin and
Malcolm were necessary for black progress. Martin took action (some-
thing that he fails to critique Malcolm for not doing), and Malcolm
told black people what the response of white people and the action of
black people meant. Black liberatory praxis, for Cleage, was one in which
action and reflection, political agitation and theory, were necessary com-
ponents. Seen together, Martin and Malcolm were exemplars of black
radical praxis in the religious thought of Cleage.
Most important for my purposes, however, is to emphasize this con-
nection between what Martin was doing and what Malcolm was saying.
Which is to say, what Martin was doing was necessary so that “Brother
Malcolm could interpret” it. The “doing” and “saying” was not that clear,
of course. But what Cleage wanted to emphasize was that Malcolm used
the confrontational tactics of Martin’s “nonviolent” movement in order to
make it clear that African Americans were dealing with systems of power.
White supremacy was a system of power, and it was going to take the
development of power in order to defeat it. Black people needed power,
and, according to Malcolm, it would not be given by attempting to appeal
to white people, who showed themselves, in their responses to Martin and
nonviolent African Americans, to be the enemy. These are the main ideas
of the sermon, “Brother Malcolm,” and Cleage posits that Malcolm’s pro-
nouncements about the nature of white racial animus were made possible
by Martin’s work. The two go together. They are intertwined.
I want to return for a moment to Cleage’s sermon on Dr. King
within the context of his social philosophy that he sees as consistent with
Malcolm’s, and to reflect on a few of Cleage’s responses to King that have
currency in our present moment in the USA. The first is relevant to some
public criticisms of the Black Lives Matter8 protests, which have been over-
whelmingly peaceful and not destructive. Black Lives Matter is a loosely
organized group of young, primarily African American, women and men,
who have led marches and disruptions of political events in order to bring
attention to the human rights violations by an increasing American police
state that disproportionately commits violence against African American
men and women, especially—but not limited to—police brutality and the
killing of black people for which police officers or those functioning in
the modality of policing, such as George Zimmerman, are rarely arrested
or charged with a crime, and when they are, they are seldom convicted.9
Cleage lodges three critiques of King that are important for our con-
temporary socio-political context in America, which speak to the protest
64 S.C. FINLEY
methods of African Americans (and others), who are involved with Black
Lives Matter and other black dissent movements. I mention them, here,
because they are utilizing many of the same methods and discourses as
Martin did that Cleage found untenable and because they demonstrate
the continuing relevance of his social and religio-political thought. First,
Cleage thought marching as a primary response to injustice was futile.
Marches, he intimated, were simply opportunities for white power to exert
itself through violence against peaceful protesters, and the same could
be said of protest marches in Ferguson, Missouri, Baltimore, Maryland,
and all over the country. He also thought that marching was a symbol
of asking the system for something—a request that indicated a sense of
belief in America that did not make sense for black people. And march-
ing also represented a certain misunderstanding of America, that it signi-
fied a belief that America was good. “The mass demonstrations were very
simple,” Cleage said, “he [Dr. King] just asked all black people to come
out to march, to protest, until white folk did something. You know what
the white folks did? They beat them, they locked them up, they did every
cruel, inhuman, bestial, barbaric thing that white folks could think of.
They did it day after day, because day after day black folks would come
out of their little hovels and shacks and march.”10 Cleage intimated that
marching was antithetical to the goals of black liberation because what
was needed was power, and one cannot ask one’s enemy for power. People
must organize to build power.11 Hence, marching was a flawed method.12
Eddie Glaude echoes Cleage in terms of the problems inherent in
marching, although Glaude was much more generous with Dr. King’s
marches, since he sees them as purposeful. Quite often, African Americans
were marching in direct violation of laws and norms that discriminated
against them, so marching, in particular places and ways (such as with-
out permits), itself was meant to challenge unjust laws that structured
where and when black bodies could be present. Thus, the march itself
was subversive.13 Glaude, like Cleage, also wants to see marches as coura-
geous.14 Nevertheless, Glaude channels Martin and Malcolm in his dis-
cussion of Black Nationalism, Black Power, and marches, and he tries
to reconcile them. That is, his discussion mirrors those of Martin and
Malcolm and the debates about ideologies and methods among their sup-
porters and detractors.
Marches as a primary method of protest remain a problem for Glaude,
however. Not only does marching as a default method keep African
Americans wedded to the past in unhealthful ways, it stymies intellectual
and creative thinking about the possibilities of present methods. Martin’s

ghost continues to hover over contemporary black movements, which
serve to structure African American responses to terror in ways that may
not be the most effective. Glaude notes:
The sight of black bodies marching in Washington, D. C., or in communities

across the country, does not jolt the imagination as it once did. Were large
number of young black males in baggy jeans and long white T-shirts with
platinum grills to march through communities’ business districts demand-
ing employment, they might unsettle some. But they would challenge black
and white alike. I am not suggesting that marching ought no longer be
a mode of political action. I simply insist that when we do march, we do
so because it presents the most efficacious means of redressing a particular
problem. We must not march simply because some black leader has declared
the moment consonant with the struggles of the 1960s.15
To be sure, varying the aesthetics that get represented in marches may be

one way to infuse them with a new sense of subversion, as Glaude men-
tions, by adorning black bodies with attire that violates the respectability
politics of King’s marches and Black Lives Matter. Again, Glaude sees sim-
ilar problems with marching as a primary method of social change as does
Cleage, and this is a reminder to us of the importance of Cleage’s message
of organizing for power as an effective means of addressing state violence
against African Americans. Marching implies a desire for co-optation,
which is implied in Cleage’s critique of Martin. This, he concludes, is
futile.
A second constructive note that may be worth Black Lives Matter’s
attention that grows out of Cleage’s sermonic critique of Martin, as he leans
more toward Malcolm’s methods, is the notion that property destruction
is unproductive and even counterproductive. This is a common argument
that can be heard directed toward Black Lives Matter, though members of
the movement are rarely, if ever, involved in such property damage. After
King’s assassination, many young people of the day were engaged in the
same practices, and Cleage notes that they were also criticized for destroy-
ing property. Cleage does not assent to such respectability politics that
seeks to limit the forms of protest to those that are acceptable to whites,
which maintain the status quo. Quite the opposite, in fact. He rejected
calls for decorum. Cleage celebrated young people who engaged in such
activities.
66 S.C. FINLEY
Property destruction makes perfect sense to him in a capitalistic society

in which things are more important than human beings, at least more
important than African Americans. Cleage declares, “We live in a mate-
rialistic society. You actually hit the white man hardest when you tear up
his property. Perhaps those who loot and burn don’t have any real revo-
lutionary philosophy, but they know one simple thing: tear up the white
man’s property, and you hurt him where it hurts the most.”16 Such a
perspective resonates today when oppressed people, who rebel, are criti-
cized for “destroying their own communities.” Cleage refutes that logic
as informed by white people who have something to lose, namely, their
material wealth. Cleage posits a mystical connection between black youth
who loot without conscious awareness and politics and socio-economic
implications of their (and) iconoclastic behavior. He concludes, “Much of
this looting is a mystical kind of thing. People loot stuff they don’t even
want. You saw the picture of the black man in Washington, sitting there
trying on a pair of old work shoes. He had money enough to buy work
shoes, he didn’t need to steal them, but there was a sense of defiance in the
very nature of the retaliation.”17 This idea also cuts across the trope that
declares youthful looters as “criminals and thugs” as if their behavior is
driven simply by criminal instincts. Even President Obama deployed these
tropes in reference to protesters in Baltimore. Not so, says Cleage. African
American youth act against the system of white privileges instinctively,
perceiving their behavior vis-à-vis white-owned property to affect their
quests to be seen as human and to disrupt systems that treat black people
as less than human. In this sense, he would see economic boycotts of white
businesses as a good thing and as an important partner with looting and
property destruction.
Finally, and related to the conversation above, Cleage views nonvio-
lence as an untenable proposition for people whose existences are struc-
tured by violence. Following Malcolm, Cleage understands structural
violence, that is, those policies, practices, discourses, and institutions that
de-humanize black people, and physical violence against black bodies
as a matter of official and unofficial policies.18 He concludes, “Brother
Malcolm explained the whole thing. It is not accidental that black peo-
ple everywhere are poor, that black people everywhere are uneducated,
that black people everywhere live in slums, that black people everywhere
are exploited. It didn’t just happen, it’s a system. It’s set up that way.”
Sounding like the revolutionary theorist Franz Fanon,19 Cleage under-
stood white violence is deep-seated and psycho-sexual, suggesting that
Freudian psychoanalysis may help to make sense of it. “I’m sure Freud
could have explained it.”20 Violent rebellion is a natural response to the
ongoing systematic violence committed against African Americans. Look
at what happened to Dr. King, the prince of nonviolence, Cleage notes.
He was killed by a white man and a white system, despite his pronounce-
ments that African Americans should be nonviolent toward white people.
Accordingly, it makes sense, then, that African American youth retaliated
against symbols of white oppression for the murder of Dr. King, he con-
tends, intimating that black people should not be ashamed of violence,
especially in retaliation for the murder of one of its beloved figures.21
Hence, Cleage remains a relevant critical and constructive voice to this
day. His sermons on Martin and Malcolm continue to offer perspectives
that could potentially inform religious and youthful movements such as
Black Lives Matter, and his work may have been the first to elucidate
the significance—for black religious thought and black radical politics—
why Martin and Malcolm had to be interpreted in relationship to one
another. He does not dismiss Dr. King as irrelevant, as some youthful
radicals might do. Indeed, he says, Dr. King made a genuine contribution
that “militants” should acknowledge.22 What’s more, he gives—locates—
the major weight of why African Americans needed both men, not with
Malcolm, but with Martin:
We needed both of them. It wasn’t enough to say, “We’ve got our enemy.
We’ve got to fight” [Malcolm]. No one would have listened to Brother
Malcolm until Dr. King had created the confrontation situations in which
we began to learn, step by step, that black people can unite, black people
can fight, black people can die for the things they believe in. This is the kind
of thing that Dr. King actually accomplished. I criticized the things he said,
but I have only admiration for the things he did.23
It is clear that he felt much more intimacy with the ideas of Malcolm and
in his relationship with him, which is why Malcolm was “Brother,” while
Martin was “Doctor,” but what we glean from Cleage is the insight that
they were both important and necessary. The significance of one might
have been diminished without the other, and this is not to say that they
were not relevant as individuals. They were, indeed. But the strength of
this conclusion is something that cannot be denied, and it continues to
inform popular movements and academic discourses. What Cleage also
bequeathed was a pragmatic realism that was interested first and foremost
68 S.C. FINLEY
in how the two men informed work in the real world that had concrete
effects on African American religion, politics, and scholarship on Martin
and Malcolm.
ENDURING SCHOLARSHIP ON MARTIN AND MALCOLM:

REV. CLEAGE’S POLITICO-THEOLOGICAL
AND INTELLECTUAL LEGACY?
Given the section above, one could argue, as I would, that the enduring
scholarship on Martin and Malcolm, seen as complementary rather than as
antagonistic, may represent the legacy of Rev. Albert Cleage’s early rumi-
nations on the matter. I make this point seriously but modestly, as I attempt
to demonstrate this possibility. It seems to me that the most likely point of
departure, to begin this mapping, is with the work of James H. Cone, the
putative “Father of Black Theology.” Cone was inspired to develop Black
Theology in the late 1960s, he reports, in response to the Black Power
Movement and to Malcolm X. But his Christian inspiration came from
the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and the Civil Rights Movement. His
Black Theology & Black Power appeared in 1969.24 Cone clearly states that
this initial attempt to articulate in Christian faith as a black man in America
was, in part, a remonstrance to white people, but more importantly, an
account of his wrestling with how to reconcile his commitments to Martin
and Malcolm as a Christian minister. In his own words:
Since I was, like many African American ministers, a devout follower of

Martin King, I tried initially to ignore Malcolm’s cogent cultural critique of
the Christianity as it was taught and practices in black and white churches. I
did not want him to disturb the theological certainties that I had learned in
graduate school. But with the urban unrest in the cities and the rise of Black
Power during the James Meredith March in Mississippi (June 1966), I could
no longer ignore Malcolm’s devastating criticisms of Christianity… For me,
the burning theological question was, how can I reconcile Christianity and
Black Power, Martin Luther King, Jr.’s idea of nonviolence and Malcolm
X’s ‘by any means necessary’ philosophy? The writing of Black Theology
and Black Power was the beginning of my search for a resolution of that
dilemma.25
Note that these issues and the matter of how Martin and Malcolm fit
together, how to “reconcile” them, parallel and, at times, mirror Cleage’s
sermons on Martin and Malcolm in The black Messiah. I am not arguing
absolutely that Cone was listening to or reading Cleage, whose work

appeared in 1968 (Recall that Black Theology & Black Power was first
published in 1969). Rather, I want to draw attention to the strong the-
matic similarities, the wrestling with the ideas and activities of Martin and
Malcolm, and how they both talk about the need to view them together,
for Cone, to “reconcile” them.
Cone was, no doubt, aware of Cleage’s work by this time, since he
mentions him in the book.26 Cone mentions him several times in his A
Black Theology of Liberation (1970) as well.27 Cleage was also aware of and
friendly toward Cone. In the first footnote in his book, Black Christian
Nationalism: New Directions for the Black Church (1972), he called28
Cone “our apostle to the Gentiles,” intimating that Cone translates Black
Theology for a white and academic audience: “My very good friend Dr.
James H. Cone is undoubtedly a most interesting and meaningful Black
theologian. His task is certainly not an easy one. He is our apostle to the
Gentiles. He drags white Christians as far as they are able to go (and then
some) in interpreting Black theology within the established framework
which they can accept and understand.” These thematic similarities, the
comparative modalities that they both employ, as well as their mutual con-
geniality and familiarity are also strongly suggestive of the importance of
revisiting Cleage when it comes to interpretations of Martin and Malcolm.
The quintessential textbook on the subject, however, is Cone’s Martin
& Malcolm & America: Dream or Nightmare, published in 1991. Cone
notes that he conducted research for the book for ten years.29 Cone argues
that Martin and Malcolm were not adversaries. Indeed, the two had much
in common in their thinking on social issues. In fact, Cone paints a pic-
ture of two men, who constantly critiqued one another in their speeches
and interviews, albeit they corrected one another as well. This is to say,
as Cone does explicitly, that Martin and Malcolm moved more in the
direction toward the other, not the reverse, this, despite some historical
factors and intentional efforts to characterize them as opposites and as
antagonistic. It is no wonder, then, that Cone frames the book as a “meet-
ing,” that is symbolized by the only public meeting on March 26, 1964,
in Washington, DC, at the U S Senate debates on the Civil Rights Bill.30
To this end, Cone pays close attention to the history of African American
social thought that he frames along a continuum of “integrationism” and
“black nationalism,” which are “broad streams” of thought in response
to a history of white supremacy that are not discrete categories, since
they are often blended in parts or aggregated.31 This history includes
70 S.C. FINLEY
often vociferous debates between Martin Delany and Frederick Douglass,

W.E.B. Du Bois and Marcus Garvey, and yes, Martin and Malcolm, and
others. Differences in black responses to slavery, Jim Crow, and other
forms of racial terror are often framed along these lines.32 Although both
of these streams of thought are often constituted as opposites, Cone
reminds us that they are, in fact, what Vincent Harding views as two
perspectives in a singular tradition that he called “The Great Tradition
of Black protest.”33 Cone remarks that “Although the media portrayed
them as adversaries, Martin and Malcolm were actually fond of each other.
There was no animosity between them. They saw each other as a fellow
justice-fighter, struggling against the same evil—racism—and for the same
goal—freedom for African Americans.”34 This strikes me as a fair assess-
ment, although it may seem counterintuitive to some.
Images of the two as polar opposites abound, to some extent, due to
the mythologies that surround both men since their deaths. No doubt,
The Autobiography of Malcolm X contributes much to the wave of mythol-
ogies and legends: highly edited by conservative writer, Alex Haley, in
a hyperbolic account of Malcolm’s criminal past in order to highlight a
redemption narrative that reads less like an autobiography, at times, and
more like a highly constructed literary text.35 Cleage addressed some of
these myths, and attempted to counter them as a pragmatic realist who
wanted to de-mystify Malcolm. For instance, rumors circulated, especially
after he died, that Malcolm had become an integrationist and that racism
was no longer important to him after his religious pilgrimage to Mecca.
Cleage disputed these claims in his popular debates with Communist activ-
ist, George Breitman.36 So, too, does Cone. To a certain extent, Cone’s
framing of his perspective on Martin and Malcolm as a both/and proposi-
tion echoes Cleage’s. Cone says, for instance:
We should never pit them against each other. Anyone, therefore, who claims
to be for one and not the other does not understand their significance for
the black community, for America, or for the world. We need both of them
and we need them together. Malcolm keeps Martin from being turned into
a harmless American hero. Martin keeps Malcolm from being an ostracized
black hero. Both leaders make important contributions to the identity
of African Americans and also, just as importantly, to white America and
Americans in general.37
Yet, in another regard, Cone’s perspective implicitly critiques Cleage,

since it is much more generous with respect to Martin’s radical public
pronouncements, about which Cleage seemed unaware in his critiques of

Martin. Furthermore, Wilson Jeremiah Moses, author of black Messiahs
and Uncle Toms: Social and Literary Manipulations of a Religious Myth,
spends considerable time discussing Cleage’s comparison of Martin and
Malcolm in his chapter, “Martin, Muhammad, and Malcolm: Political
Revivalism in the Sixties.”38
Reporting having met Cleage as a teenager and having listened to his
theological musings, Moses argues for much more robust similarities
between Martin and Malcolm and that “What Cleage does not admit is
that King, during his last years, moved steadily towards a greater tolerance
for the black-power ideology advanced by Malcolm.”39 His contention
is consonant with that of Cone, and I concur, with one caveat: I admit
that Martin became increasing militant, particularly after the Watts Riot of
1965, but I would argue that his speeches, sermons, and writings contain
radical and prophetic elements prior to his “last years.” King had consis-
tently critiqued racism, condemned American capitalism for how it struc-
tured poverty in the ghettos, talked about “riots” as a symptom of racism
and poverty without condemning rioters, condemned white Christianity
for being part of the system that maintained oppression, and so many
more ideas that put him at odds with mainstream America.40 Moreover,
Moses indicates that King moved away from one of the major points of
contention with Cleage—integration as a “panacea.”41 More strongly,
King actually considered that integration may not be helpful, advocat-
ing instead a “temporary segregation,” at least until African Americans
developed sufficient power necessary for a balance of power.42 This was
actually very close to what Cleage himself suggested, and black protest
movements, like Black Lives Matter, should proceed with caution when
the establishment, including the Democratic Party, seeks to embrace them
as they did recently when they voted to support the movement by adding
it to their platform.43 Martin and Malcolm cautioned us of the danger of
liberal co-optation of African American social movements.
Paucity of space will not allow me to engage all of the scholarly
texts that offer comparisons of Martin and Malcolm for their relevance
to black religious thought and radical black politics and protest move-
ments. Gayraud Wilmore’s Black Religion and Black Radicalism: An
Interpretation of the Religious History of African Americans, for exam-
ple, surmises that Martin and Malcolm are necessary to understand the
black protest movements of the 1960s.44 In addition, true to its title,
Louis Lomax’s To Kill a Black Man: The Shocking Parallel in the Lives of
72 S.C. FINLEY
Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr. argues that Martin and Malcolm
were incredibly alike biographically, except, oddly enough, in their dis-
parate deaths—one having been killed by white people and the other by
the black people “he loved.”45 Yet, one literary work has to be addressed
because of its unequivocal germaneness to the topic at hand, that is,
James Baldwin’s essay, “Malcolm and Martin.”
First published in Esquire magazine in April 1972, Baldwin’s “Malcolm
and Martin” was reprinted in Malcolm X: As They Knew Him, edited by
David Gallen.46 The brilliantly creative essay recounts his experiences with
Martin and Malcolm, how he knew them, and some of the momentous
occasions about which he reminisced. Baldwin’s candor is astounding, as
he spoke of his past as a Christian minister and his present militant social
vision. He used the stories of a suit that he had purchased to wear for
Martin’s funeral and a play about Malcolm’s life that—with Alex Haley
and others was slated to be turned into a “Hollywood” movie that he ulti-
mately declined, due to his perception that it would ultimately do injustice
to the depth and complexity of Malcolm’s life—would make a controver-
sial claim about the two men’s lives in relation to one another.
Reading these excursuses about a suit and a Hollywood movie had me
glued to the pages, to every word, with the anticipation of what this had
to do with Martin and Malcolm. All of this was an elaborate way to sug-
gest that Martin and Malcolm did not fit in this world, how they both saw
America as a great hoax in a manner that white people could not, would
not. He lamented the grief, the deep sense of loss, a mourning that he
felt personally, and a mourning for African Americans. We needed both of
them. We still do. Baldwin’s conclusion? The same as mine. Namely, that
at their deaths, there was little difference between them. In his own words:
Malcolm and Martin, beginning at what seemed to be very different points—

for brevity’s sake, we can say North and South, though for Malcolm, South
of south of the Canadian border—and espousing, or representing, very dif-
ferent philosophies, found that their common situation (south of the bor-
der!) so thoroughly devastated what had seemed to be mutually exclusive
points of view that, by the time each met his death there was practically no
difference between them. Before either had a chance to think their new
positions through, or, indeed, to do more than articulate them, they were
murdered.47
Baldwin wrote with a sense of melancholy. He wanted Martin and Malcolm

to be here. They still were here in a way, and he felt obligated to speak
with candor and to live with integrity in order to be trustworthy to the
lives they lived. Why are Martin and Malcolm no longer here? Because
our children needed them, Baldwin retorted. And because black children
needed them, America killed them. “America has always done everything
in its power to destroy our children’s heroes.”48
Consistent with a great deal of scholarship on Martin and Malcolm,
Baldwin sees much more intimate ideological resonances between the two
men than does Cleage. His voice is but one of many that offers a corrective
to Cleage’s early perspective on the relationship to Martin and Malcolm.
Some responses, like Moses’, were explicitly written to address Cleage’s
position, while others, like Cone’s, acknowledge Cleage, and their words
speak directly to matters that he raised, without directing their rejoin-
ders to him overtly. Another group, like Wilmore, Lomax, and more, is
but a chorus that proclaims “we need them both.” And yet, Rev. Cleage
and his work may be an important reason why these conversations exist,
why we talk about Martin AND Malcolm. Again, in some cases, this is
more than an inference. In other cases, it may be modest speculation.
Without a doubt, Cleage was insightful when he offered his interpretation
of them together and the necessity of the aggregation, even if scholarship
debated some of the particulars of the nature of the meaning of Martin
and Malcolm. Because of their importance, their keen and prophetic dis-
cernment, and their utter significance to ongoing scholarship, black pro-
test movements, and black religious thought, we might surmise and glean
in all of it a trace of Cleage’s initial formulations. A legacy, perhaps.
CONCLUDING REFLECTIONS
I first learned of Rev. Albert Cleage, the Holy Patriarch of the Pan African
Orthodox Christian Church, more than a few decades ago. I saw him only
once in my life, at the Shrine of the black Madonna in Houston, Texas,
one Sunday morning in the early 1990s. He was an old man, then, in his
80s. I was not able to meet him, though I desired to, but I remember it
like it was yesterday, how excited I was, how influential he had been to
me. I had read his two major publications: The black Messiah and Black
Christian Nationalism. The sermons published in the former stuck with
me. Maybe they are still with me. Perchance his interpretation of Martin
and Malcolm, which I recall reading then, principally found in “Dr. King
and Black Power,” still resonates. I am now a tenured university professor
at Louisiana State University, where I teach my own course called “The
Religious Thought of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X.” My course
is based on a PhD seminar in the Department of Religious Studies at Rice
74 S.C. FINLEY
University. Anthony Pinn is the professor. I know of other courses. Father

Bryan Massingale teaches a course on “Martin, Malcolm and Baldwin”
at Marquette University, and Professor Jonathan Walton offers “Martin,
Malcolm, and Masculinity” at Harvard Divinity School. I have been care-
ful not to make any absolute claims about the lineage and legacy of such
courses and thought to Cleage, but the implication intrigues me.
I differ, of course, with how Rev. Cleage interpreted the relationship
between Martin and Malcolm, at least with some aspects of it, certainly
not all of them. I remain indebted to his claim that we needed to see one
in light of the other, while not losing the significance of either, albeit he
was partial to Malcolm. They were friends. Nonetheless, he offered us
perspectives on Martin, too, that was significant, if fractional.
NOTES
1. Albert B. Cleage Jr., The black Messiah (New York: Sheed and Ward, Inc.,
1968).
2. James H. Cone, Martin & Malcolm & America: A Dream or a Nightmare
(Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1991).
3. Cleage, The black Messiah, 201–213.
5. Cleage, The black Messiah, 207.
6. Cone, Martin & Malcolm & America, 246–271.
8. http://blacklivesmatter.com/. Accessed August 31, 2015.
9. See, Stephen C. Finley, and Biko Mandela Gray, “God is a White Racist:
Immanent Atheism as a Religious Response to #Blacklivesmatter and
State-sanctioned Anti-Black Violence,” Journal of Africana Religions
(Forthcoming, Oct. 2015). This article offers a discussion of potential
African American responses and solutions to state-sanctioned anti-black
violence and an analysis of Black Lives Matter.
11. See, Albert B. Cleage Jr, “A Black Man’s View of Authority,” in Erosion of
Authority, ed. Clyde L. Manschreck (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1971),
pp. 59–91.
12. For major studies on the history of Black Power, in general, and black radical
politics in Detroit in the 1960s, which give major attention to Cleage, see
Angela D. Dillard, Faith in the City: Preaching Radical Social Change in
Detroit (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2010); Peniel
E. Joseph, Waiting ‘Til the Midnight Hour: A Narrative History of Black
Power in America (New York: Henry Holt and Co., 2006).
13. Eddie S. Glaude Jr., In a Shade of Blue: Pragmatism and the Politics of Black
America (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2007), p. 137.
14. Glaude, In a Shade of Blue, 113.
15. Glaude, In a Shade of Blue, 137.
19. Franz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks (New York: Grove Press, 1967),
pp. 155–159. Utilizing psychoanalysis himself, Fanon contended that rac-
ism eroticized and sexualized black people, particularly African American
men vis-à-vis white men. This is why Fanon argued racism and white racial
violence were homoerotic, and that racism was suggestive of a sense of
white sexual inferiority.
24. James H. Cone, Black Theology & Black Power (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis
Books, 1997).
25. Cone, Black Theology & Black Power, viii.
26. Cone, Black Theology & Black Power, 116.
27. James H. Cone, A Black Theology of Liberation. Twentieth Anniversary
Edition (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1986, 1990), pp. 38, 114, 123,
134, 210n7.
28. Albert B. Cleage Jr., Black Christian Nationalism: New Directions for the
Black Church (Detroit, MI: Luxor Publishers of the Pan African Orthodox
Christian Church, 1987), p. xvii.
29. Cone, Martin & Malcolm & America, xiii.
30. Cone, Martin & Malcolm & America, 2.
32. Cone’s Martin & Malcolm & America, 3–17.
33. Cone’s Martin & Malcolm & America, 16; Vincent Harding, There is a
River: The Black Struggle for Freedom in America (New York: Harcourt
Brace Jovanovich, 1981), p. 83.
34. Cone’s Martin & Malcolm & America, 2.
35. Malcolm X with Alex Haley, The Autobiography of Malcolm X (New York:
Ballantine Books, 1964); See also, Wilson Jeremiah Moses, black Messiahs
and Uncle Toms: Social and Literary Manipulations of a Religious Myth.
Rev. Ed. (University Park, PA: The Pennsylvania State University Press,
1993), p. 210.
36. Rev. Albert Cleage and George Breitman, Myths About Malcolm X: Two
Views (New York: Merit Publishers, 1968). These debates were published
in a number of other places and texts. See, for example, Rev. Albert Cleage,
76 S.C. FINLEY
“Myths About Malcolm X,” in John Henrik Clarke, ed. Malcolm X: The
Man and His Times (Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press, 1990), pp. 13–26;
International Socialist Review 28/5 (Sept.–Oct. 1967): 33–60; https://
www.marxists.org/history/etol/newspape/isr/vol28/no05/cleage.htm.
Accessed August 31, 2015; https://www.marxists.org/history/etol/writ-
ers/breitman/1967/03/speech.htm. Accessed August 31, 2015.
38. Moses, black Messiahs and Uncle Toms, 209–225.
39. Moses, black Messiahs and Uncle Toms, 224.
40. See, for example, Martin Luther King Jr., Strength to Love (Philadelphia:
Fortress Press, 1963); Martin Luther King Jr., Why We Can’t Wait (New
York: Signet Classics, 2000). Originally published in 1963.
41. Moses, black Messiahs and Uncle Toms, 224.
42. Clayborne Carson, ed., The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr.
(New York: Grand Central Publishing, 1998), p. 325.
43. See, for example, Lauren Gambino, “Black Lives Matter Network Disavows
Political Ties after DNC Backs Movement.” http://www.theguardian.
com/us-news/2015/aug/31/black-lives-matter-democratic-national-
committee. Accessed August 31, 2015.
44. Gayraud S. Wilmore, Black Religion and Black Radicalism: An
Interpretation of the Religious History of African Americans, 3rd ed.
(Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1998).
45. Louis E. Lomax, To Kill a Black Man: The Shocking Parallel in the Lives of
Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, Jr. (Los Angeles: Holloway House
Publishing Co., 1968, 1987), p. 9.
46. James Baldwin, “Malcolm and Martin,” in Malcolm X: As They Knew Him,
ed. David Gallen (New York: Ballatine Books, 1992), pp. 283–311.
47. Baldwin, “Malcolm and Martin,” 308.
48. Baldwin, “Malcolm and Martin,” 308.
CHAPTER 5
The Black Messiah and Black Suffering
Torin Dru Alexander
INTRODUCTION
The role of theodicy is central to African American religion and African
American religious thought. Since the Africans first encounter with the
absurdity of chattel slavery, they have been confronted with the challenge
of finding meaning for the situation in which they found themselves. In
this chapter, the author explores the efficacy of the theodicean teachings
and practices of Reverend Albert B. Cleage Jr. (Jaramogi Abebe Agyeman)
and the Shrine of the Black Madonna (Pan African Orthodox Christian
Church [PAOCC]) in light of their commitment to the liberation and the
flourishing of Black people.
THEODICY
The existence of evil has been and continues to be a challenge to numer-
ous theological and philosophical traditions. As the theologian Terrence
Tilley notes in his influential text The Evils of Theodicy,1 it is particu-
larly a problem of monotheistic traditions; indeed, Tilley maintains that
T.D. Alexander ()

Visiting Assistant Professor of Liberal Studies
Winston-Salem State University, Winston-Salem, North Carolina

DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54689-0_5
78 T.D. ALEXANDER
the persistence of evil in the world is incompatible with monotheism.

Similarly, others characterize the problem of evil as the most serious
threat to religious faith. For example, the religious scholar Hans Kung
has called the problem of evil, “the rock of atheism.”2
In the classical monotheistic articulation, the compatibility of the problem
of evil with the existence of God is usually stated along the following lines:
• Firstly, God is understood to be all loving and all good, thus God
would not want there to be evil and suffering in the world
• Simultaneously, God is also understood to be all-powerful, and thus
be able to prevent evil and suffering from occurring; evil and suffer-
ing are present and persist
• Subsequently, God is able to prevent evil and suffering and does not,
and is thus not all good and loving or God desires to prevent evil and
suffering but is unable to do so, and is thus impotent (or at least not
all-powerful).
In the Western theological and philosophical tradition, the attempt to jus-

tify the goodness and omnipotence of the Divine in the face of evil in the
world bears the name theodicy. The term is derived from the Greek words
for the deity (Theos) and justice (dike).
As humanity has wrestled with the seeming paradox presented by the
problem of evil, certain arguments and approaches have prevailed. One
approach, simply, is to assert that there is no problem, since there is no
God. In other words, as suggested by the earlier quotation of Kung, the
existence of evil precludes the existence of a benevolent, omnipotent
God. However, for committed theists, such recourse is unpalatable, if
not untenable. Thus, those who strive to resolve God’s existence with an
understanding of God’s goodness and power tend to invoke one of four
theodicean variants:
1. The evil in the world is to be attributed to sin or rebellion against God

by another deity (henotheistic or polytheistic traditions) or by a
creature.
2. Evil is a necessary aspect of any finite order in which there are free
beings.
3. Evil is really a cognitive illusion of human finitude, it evaporates sub
specie aeternitatis.
THE BLACK MESSIAH AND BLACK SUFFERING 79
4. Evil is a mystery and as such simply provides an opportunity to trust

in God, in spite of what one encounters in the world.
With respect to the latter position, while some might deem it as lack-
ing intellectual integrity, as I will later proffer, many who subscribe to
it would argue that the effort expended in the pursuit of comprehen-
sion might better be spent actively preventing and resisting evil, alle-
viating suffering, and striving to see justice carried out in the world.
It is my contention that a robust theodicy should—dare I say must—
be a part of a total theological position that is intended to be more
consistent, adequate, and illuminating of our experience.
BLACK SUFFERING
How have African Americans theologically engaged the problems that
have plagued their communities in the past and in marked ways persist
to this day? How have and do African Americans steel themselves against
aggressive and invidious assaults on their persons; their families; and their
social and cultural institutions, traditions, and faith? Further, how do
African Americans, as a people for whom religion has played a significant
role in the constitution of their identity and their understanding of the
world, maintain a belief in a beneficent Deity as they experience oppres-
sion in its innumerable incarnations?
With respect to the latter contention, an assessment of African American
theodicean strategies and tactics is significant. In keeping with a conviction
perpetuated by generations of African Americans, the foremost enemy of
Black survival in America has never been simply physical oppression or
exploitation, but rather the nihilistic threat manifest in the loss of hope,
the loss of a sense of identity, and the loss of purpose. Thus, in the words
of the late African American church historian James Melvin Washington,
Black folk have been “stalkers after meaning.” Consequently, in an effort
to try to make sense of their suffering, African American religious adher-
ents, particularly those who identify as Christians, have deployed various
theodicean strategies.
According to Anthony Pinn in his monograph Why Lord?: Suffering
and Evil in Black Theology, in African American religious liturgy, hymnody,
prayers, and sermons, one finds records of African Americans wrestling
with the issues of evil and suffering, with some the earliest theological
80 T.D. ALEXANDER
reflections evinced in Negro spirituals. Pinn notes that while other scholars
have turned to the spirituals as a source for theological reflection, most,
if not all, have ignored the degree to which a number of them point to a
paradox of God’s benevolence and Black suffering. Indeed, Pinn asserts
that the spirituals represent a complete, although nascent, Black theology.3
In an examination of nineteenth-century African American religious
thought expressed by the likes of Richard Allen, Daniel Payne, David
Walker, Maria Stewart, Frances Harper, Anna Julia Cooper, Absalom
Jones, and Henry McNeal Turner, Pinn asserts that these Black ances-
tors developed an extensive theodicy of redemptive suffering to address
the evil manifest in the oppressive institution of chattel slavery. The clas-
sic articulation of the doctrine of redemptive suffering, in addition to a
particular understanding of atonement, frequently invoked the story of
Joseph in Genesis 50. Invoking this tradition, the African American divine
Alexander Crummell comments:
But when Joseph told his brethren – “it was not you that sent me hither, but
God,” he did not mean that they had not acted brutally toward him; but
only that, in all the dark deeds of men, there is a higher, mightier, and more
masterful hand than theirs, although unseen – distracting their evil counsels,
and directing them to goodly issues. God, although not the author of sin, is
nevertheless, the omnipotent and gracious disposer of it.4
According to Pinn, this theodicy of redemptive suffering remains the

dominant theodicean paradigm in African American religious thought
through the twentieth century. To make his case, Pinn turns to the work
African American figures such as Reverdy C. Ransom, Ida B. Wells-
Barnett, Martin Luther King Jr., Joseph Washington, and Albert Cleage.5
ALBERT CLEAGE AND THE PAN AFRICAN ORTHODOX

CHURCH OF CHRIST
The question I proffer is whether the theodicean constructs of Albert
Cleage and the PAOCC differ or improve on classic theodicies. It is my
contention that there is nothing new in the theodicy of Cleage. Moreover,
though characterized by members of the PAOCC, as the true father of a
radical Black liberative theology, his theodicean strategies and tactics are
entrenched in anthropological and pedagogically redemptive schematiza-
tions. An examination of Cleage’s oeuvre subsequently absolves God of
all responsibility for suffering and evil. In his early writings, God is not
equanimous, but God is expressly on the side of Black people. God is
Black and Jesus is the revolutionary Black Messiah. As God empowered
Jesus in the struggle for the liberation of the Black Nation Israel, God can
empower Black people today in their collective struggle against exploita-
tion, marginalization, powerlessness, cultural imperialism, and violence. In
the later theology of Cleage and the PAOCC, in which God is construed
as cosmic energy, theodicean strategy appears to be that suffering, includ-
ing Black suffering, is the result of apathy at best and resistance to the will
of the Divine at its worst.
MAJOR BELIEFS AND RITUALS

As to liturgical structure or form, a PAOCC congregation differs little
from that of most African American congregations. Traditional hymns and
gospel songs are played and sung, and prayers are offered up that would
be in place in any historically Black church. This is not to say that there are
not substantive distinctives.
At the time of the first Pan African Synod in 1978, the PAOCC, the
liturgy, and ritual of the PAOCC promoted the doctrine of Black Christian
Nationalism. For example, instead of the conventional renderings of the
Lord’s Prayer, the following would be heard:
Almighty GOD who called together the Black Nation Israel, through Thy
son, the revolutionary Black Messiah, Jesus, hallowed be Thy name. May
Thy Black Nation speedily come and they will be done on earth as we accept
a commitment to daily sacrifice and struggle. Give us this day, our daily
bread and forgive our trespasses, as we forgive Black brothers and sisters
who trespass against us. Help us to resist temptation, as we struggle against
individualism, and may the Black Nation stand, as a living witness to Thy
power and Thy glory, forever and ever. AMEN
Since the death of Cleage, select Black Christian Nationalist (BCN)

practices have been displaced by practices that emphasize the churches’
teaching on inner transformation. This is not to say that Black Christian
Nationalism, as such, has been expunged from Church liturgy, but rather,
amended. An examination of church bulletins from the Shrine of the Black
Madonna of the PAOCC of Atlanta, Georgia, from October 2011 still fea-
tures the BCN prayer above, along with an order of service which includes
82 T.D. ALEXANDER
a devotional, a welcome, the Negro National Anthem, “Lift Every Voice

and Sing,” congregational hymns, altar call, sermon, church offerings,
announcements, and as a recessional hymn “Rise Nation, Rise.”6
Starting in the 1970s Jaramogi Agyeman would exhort the member-
ship to turn inward, a move that was reflected in the establishment of the
Shrine’s KUA Centers. The church teaches that the KUA Transformational
System has its roots in the spiritual disciplines brought together in the
African Mystery Temples. Jaramogi Agyeman is credited with put-
ting the African system back together in the KUA practices. The KUA
Transformational System is made up of several processes, rituals, and reli-
gious therapies. KUA Small Group Devotionals, Group Encounters, ritu-
als, worship services, KAZI, Classes, and Fellowships together make up
the KUA Transformational System. KUA is understood to be a science of
“becoming what you already are.” Members are taught that human beings
are created out of God. However, we have been blocked to the powers
that are available to us, inwardly and outwardly. KUA is the process that
helps one to remove the energy blockages. If one participates regularly in
the different therapies offered over the course of a week, healing will take
place in one’s mind, body, and spirit.7
A responsive meditation that nurtures one’s attunement with respect to
God is often a part of the contemporary liturgy:
(We Seek the Experience of God)

Leader: KUTAFUTA means that we have entered the
sacred circle and we seek the experience God.
Response: We open ourselves to receive the power of God.
Leader: KUTAMUNGU means that we can come upon
God, here where we are.
Response: If we seek, we will find.
Leader: When we are open, our inner divinity can be
touched by the cosmic power of God and
KUGASANA will come like a mystical
explosion.
Response: The overwhelming power of God enters into us.
The Creative Intelligence of God directs us, we
become one with God and with our people
everywhere.
Leader: When our inner divinity comes into contact with
the higher power out of which it was created, we
are born again in the fullness of life.
Response: The sacred triangles, the mystical sacraments,

and the disciplines of the Transforming
Community open us to receive the power of
God.
Leader: In our surrender to God, KUJITOA, we have
new strength for our earthly battles.
Response: We share a sacred trust, with those who have
gone before and with those who will come
after, we are in total submission to the will of
God, KUJITOA.
Chant together (at least three times)
KUTAFUTA, KUTAMUNGU, KUGASANA, KUJITOA8
According to the contemporary PAOCC doctrine, God is cosmic

energy and creative intelligence. God is in us and all around us. Moreover,
each person has an inner energy or Jesus potential, which he or she can
access. As for Jesus, he is a man [sic], a Messiah, and a Black revolutionary
leader. In the words of Jaramogi Agyeman,
In the Old Testament and in the Synoptic Gospels, God is concerned with a
people, not with individuals. Yet, the slave Christianity that we were taught
told us that God is concerned with each individual. And the master told
each slave, “If you are a good slave, God is going to take care of you and you
will be saved.” He didn’t tell them that if all you Black people love God and
fight together; God is going to help you get free from slavery. The group
concept is historic Christianity. Individualism is slave Christianity… This
was the emphasis that the slave master wanted to make so that he could use
religion to control his slaves.9
Continuing, Agyeman goes on to say that
our religion is something different. The Black man’s religion is essentially

based on the Old Testament concepts of the Nation Israel, God’s chosen
people, and our knowledge that the problems of the Black Israelites were
the same as ours. When we read the Old Testament, we can identify with
a Black people who were guided and loved by God. Everything in the Old
Testament speaks directly to our problem.
Jesus was a Black Messiah. He came to free a Black people from the
oppression of white Gentiles. We know this now to be a fact. Our religion,
our preaching, our teachings all come from the Old Testament, for we are
God’s chosen people. God is working with us every day, helping us find a
84 T.D. ALEXANDER
way to freedom. Jesus tried to teach the Nation Israel how to come together
as a Black people, to be brothers, one with another and to stand against their
white oppressors.10
For Cleage, however, the Black nation is not a place, and yet it is tan-
gible—it is real, it exists. As such, the commitment of PAOCC was to
pursue the health and happiness of Black people.
In his message for Synod 2000, the new patriarch of the PAOCC stated
that Cleage’s vision emerged out of Black people’s historic struggle to be
restored to our original place of power and dignity in the world. Further,
the vision was rooted in the apocalyptic prophesy of a Kingdom of God
on earth preached by Jesus and taught by the first Christian church of
the Disciples. Finally, the objective of the vision was a communal social
order governed by love. This vision reflects “the will of God for the world
and the desired goal of all human strivings… The Pan African Orthodox
Christian Church is the tangible manifestation of this comprehensive
vision.”11
It is a vision vouchsafed to him by God and bequeathed to the Pan African

Orthodox Christian Church as a covenant promise. We accept the struggle
to realize this vision as our primary divine obligation and the basis of all our
efforts.12
Jaramogi Kimathi went on to note that though governed by the

vision, the passing of Agyeman was one of many transitions for the
PAOCC. Noteworthy was the philosophical transition in Black Christian
Nationalism that expanded the primary paradigm of struggle from simply
Black versus white to good versus evil. “For we wrestle not against flesh
and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of
the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.”
(Ephesians 6:12)13 Alluding to a world growing in complexity,
good vs. evil gives us a more accurate basis of judgement for doing the will
of GOD, a more understandable position on the great issues of our time,
and a paradigm that arms us with an intelligent and sophisticated analysis of
our condition at the beginning of this new millennium. We are no longer
fooled by those who exploit the blackness as a means to an evil and indi-
vidualistic end. We are free to judge all of human existence in light of the
eternal struggle between good and evil. The past, present, and future come
together in light of this continuing struggle between good and evil and the
will of GOD is easily discernable.
Continuing, Kimathi states,
Our struggle is not simply for Black power, but also for righteousness, jus-
tice, communalism, and goodness – power that is used in compatibility with
the will of GOD. We seek always to do the greatest good for the greatest
number of people. The good – evil paradigm gives us the means to make our
church universally and eternally relevant to the human struggle to do the
will of GOD in the world. This is the evolution of Black theology!14
Thus, Jaramogi Kimathi asserts that such transitions represent the fru-
ition of the original vision while making the PAOCC a more effective
instrument for realizing God’s will on earth.
SIN, EVIL, AND SUFFERING

According to the original teachings of Cleage, the most basic expression of
evil, the biggest sin, is that of individualism, for example, looking out only
for oneself. One controls a people by destroying their sense of community,
by getting them to care for themselves alone. However, freedom comes
through adherence to divine principles, one of which is communalism.
Unlike the conventional American evangelical Protestant understanding of
salvation, for Cleage, salvation is a corporate and shared experience. Thus,
no matter how good any one person may have it, if other Black people,
individually or corporately, are powerless or oppressed, all are hurting and
living in a situation beneath where God would have God’s people living.
Moreover, salvation was not understood to be the exclusive property
of members of the Shrine, but rather the possession of those who used
the principles of communalism and self-determination to build a self-
determining, righteousness-focused existence. This was the heart of what
members meant by the words, “Black Christian Nationalism (BCN) is the
Answer.”
As such, salvation is fundamentally not about the soul or spirit after
death. Because they understand God to be cosmic energy, and because
human beings are in their very essence energy beings, after death one’s
energy returns to the source, that is, God. This theological move, how-
ever, does not discount the existence of heaven or hell. Rather, what one
does while they are alive determines whether they live in heaven or hell
now. However, if such places as heaven or hell exist in some great beyond,
those who gave their lives trying to make this world a better place have
nothing to worry about with regard to where their soul will rest.
86 T.D. ALEXANDER
Thus, members of the Shrine strive to adhere to a system of living that

meets the needs of the group, that invites cooperation, and that demands
respect of and for all humanity. The Shrine teaches that what the world
lacks at present is a dynamic, viable, working alternative to life as usual.
They seek to offer people a way to live that will meet their present unmet
needs, and that this way will win over all those who are on the short end
of the present economic, social, and political stick. As God empowered
Jesus in the struggle for the liberation of the Black Nation Israel, God can
empower Black people today in their collective struggle for freedom and
liberation.15
CRITIQUE AND ANALYSIS OF CLEAGE’S AND PAOCC

THEODICY
In attempting to access Cleage’s theology, one is immediately confronted
with the reality that his writings are not systematic expositions on Christian
dogma. The first of the seminal texts in his oeuvre, The Black Messiah, is
a collection of sermons given over the course of several years, and as he
notes in the introduction of the 1989 republished edition,
The sermons included in this volume were preached to Black people. They
are published in the hope that they may help other Black people find their
way back to the historic Black Messiah, and at the request of many Black
preachers who are earnestly seeking ways to make their preaching relevant
to the complex and urgent needs of the Black community. White people
who read these pages are permitted to listen to a Black man talking to Black
people.16
The other work, Black Christian Nationalism: New Directions for the Black
Church, is a manifesto aimed at radicalizing the Black Church against white
oppression. It is for this reason that William R. Jones, in his seminal text
Is God a White Racist? A Preamble to Black Theology, asserts that Cleage is
best interpreted as a theological pragmatist as opposed to a systematician.
His system is advanced as the quickest and most viable way of leading blacks
to authentic blackness. This is accomplished primarily by simply transvaluing
what blacks already accept as true. They believe in God, but a white God; so
the pragmatic strategy here is to color God Black. As a pragmatic theology,
what is most important? What is the criteria for pragmatism. Does it work?17
As such, one does not find in Cleage a concise, coherent, account of

the doctrines of God, creation, soteriology, eschatology. In my opinion,
however, Cleage’s early writing might better be characterized as polemi-
cal and prophetic as opposed to pragmatic. A pragmatic approach would
most likely be designed to facilitate progressive melioration rather than
liberation.
Once more, the objective of Cleage’s early theology is to be a corrective
to the white Christianity that justified and perpetuated Black oppression.
The key themes for Cleage are that God is Black and Jesus is the Black
Messiah.
We know that Israel was a Black nation, and that the descendants of the
original Black Jews are in Israel, Africa and the Mediterranean area today.
The Bible was written by Black Jews. The Old Testament is the history of
Black Jews… Jesus was a Black Messiah. He came to free a Black people
from the oppression of the white Gentiles. We know this to be a fact.18
When we talk about the Black Nation, we have got to remember that
the Black Nation, Israel, was chosen by God. Out of the whole world, God
chose Israel to covenant with, to say, “You will be my people, and I will be
your God.19
The ascription of literal blackness to the nation Israel, Jesus, and God is
integral to Cleage’s nascent theodicy as it seemingly allows him to embrace
the Exodus or the Christ event as definitively exaltative and liberative for
Black people, evincing that God is on the side of the poor and oppressed.
Thus, God wishes to bring about the liberation of Black people today, just
as God did thousands of years ago.
Because God has made the goal of Black people his own goal, Black
Theology believes that it is not only appropriate but necessary to begin the
doctrine of God with an insistence on his blackness. The blackness of God
means that God has made the oppressed condition his own condition ….
The blackness of God then means that the essence of the nature of God is to
be found in the concept of liberation.20
In addition to Cleage’s theology being a repudiation of white

Christianity in terms of the rendering of the Divine, ancient Israel, and the
Messiah as Black, there is the fallacy and the chief evil of individualism. At
the center of Cleage’s teaching is that salvation/liberation is communal.
88 T.D. ALEXANDER
God is concerned with a people, not with individuals. Yet, the slave
Christianity that we were taught told us that God is concerned with each
individual. And the master told each slave, “If you are a good slave, God
is going to take care of you and you will be saved.” He didn’t tell them
that if all you Black people love God and fight together, God is going to
help you get free from slavery. The group concept is historic Christianity.
Individualism is slave Christianity.21
Jesus was the non-white leader of a non-white people struggling for
national liberation against the rule of a white nation. Jesus was a revolution-
ary Black leader, a Zealot, seeking to lead a Black nation to freedom.22
While taking into consideration the limitations of Cleage’s theological

schematization, it is nevertheless sufficient to deem his theodicean strate-
gies as markedly inadequate.
In making this assertion, I am indebted to Jones’ argumentation.
Deploying Sartre’s definition of the human—the human is the sum of
their actions, which is an extension of his assertion that existence pre-
cedes essence—to God, one must at the very least reject the notion of a
beneficent Deity. In other words, if God is the sum of God’s acts or if God
is what God does, according to Jones, one must seriously entertain the
notion of a capricious, malevolent, and racist God. Jones’ argument is bol-
stered by the cogency of multievidentiality of historical events such that
“signs of God’s goodness” are shown to be subject to antithetical interpre-
tations. Likewise, appeals to eschatology must also be rejected. Thus, any
theology that purports to be about liberation with respect to the plight of
Black people, as is the case with Cleage and all Black liberation theology,
must entertain the question of divine racism. It is Jones’ contention, how-
ever, that the inability or unwillingness to examine this presupposition,
results in flawed and deleterious Black theology. Black theologians, such
as Cleage, “beg the question” by asserting that God is on the side of Black
people without substantiating this assertion. Vindicating God cannot be a
central aim of Black theology.
Of the theologians examined by Jones, it might be said that Cleage’s
theology implicitly attempts to address the problem of divine racism.
Indeed, this seems to be Jones’ reading of Cleage’s literal interpreta-
tion of the imago dei, God is a Black God for Black people. However,
God’s blackness is not a guarantee that God is on the side of Black peo-
ple. Blackness does not translate into opposition to racism. Indeed, this is
something that Cleage acknowledges in his criticism of the Black Church
and members of the Black community that he calls Uncle Toms.
One thing that might dispel the charge of divine racism would be a
definitively exaltative and liberative event. In the case of Black people,
however, the reality of such an event having transpired would seem moot
given what Jones calls the maldistribution of evil manifest in ethnic suffer-
ing, that is, the continued and disproportionate suffering of Black people.
Even more disturbing, however, is that Cleage does not seem averse
to a theodicy of deserved punishment. This is most clearly manifest in
Cleage’s sermon, “Come in out of the wilderness.”23 Here Cleage draws
upon the Numbers 14:33 narrative that recounts the faithlessness of Israel,
the fears of Israel, the lack of courage of Israel, and God’s punishment.
Subsequently, Cleage asserts that the fault of Black suffering rests on Black
people.
You could have fought your way through, if you had had the courage … the
people who accept oppression, who permit themselves to be downtrodden,
those people are faithless because Gods did not make men to be oppressed
and to be downtrodden. And many times a man faces the choice between
living as a slave and dying as a man. And when we choose to live as slaves, we
are faithless and our children will be shepherds in the wilderness.24
Until we make amends, we are not fit for a Promised Land. Don’t ask,
“When is the Kingdom coming?” Ask, “What can I do to wipe out one
hundred years of self-hatred, cowardice, and betrayal? What can I do now in
my lifetime to wipe out those years of which I am ashamed, those years in
which I was afraid to defend my brothers and sisters.”25
Quite unexpectedly, Cleage even makes allusion to the classic text of

redemptive suffering, the story of Joseph.
Even though Joseph had been sold into bondage by his brothers, he main-
tained his sense of identity with the Nation Israel. It was as though God had
used the hatred of his brothers to save Israel.26
If one chooses the tact of Cleage, one seems compelled to raise ques-
tions of proportionality, that is, the punishment proportionate to the
offense. Moreover, one must be willing to vindicate the corresponding
prosperity of non-black persons.
As noted above, Cleage’s theology changes over time, notably an
“inward turn” and the conceptualization of God as cosmic energy and
creative intelligence with the primary paradigm of struggle evolving from
simply Black versus white to good versus evil. Regarding the current
90 T.D. ALEXANDER
presentment of the PAOCC, as noted earlier, Jaramogi Kimathi explicitly

invokes the language of good and evil in articulating the mission of the
church. In the 2003 Jubilee celebration publication, Kimathi recalls the
words of Cleage stating that the church is immersed in an eternal struggle
between good and evil, to which he adds
The restoration of divine order in our lives and in our world is a constant
struggle. In this struggle, let us be guided by God’s promise spoken through
the Prophet Isaiah, “If my people who are called by My name will humble
themselves and return to Me, I will return to you and heal the land.”27
Whether or not such a move might be attributable to critiques such as

Jones, as a theodicean stratagem, I maintain that such a posture remains
entrenched in anthropological and pedagogically redemptive schematiza-
tions. In other words, Black suffering is the fault of Black people, and
Black people will continue to suffer until they reach attunement with the
Divine.
One possible area of theodicean innovation found amidst the con-
temporary articulations of PAOCC teaching has to do with the con-
cept of development and process. According to Kimathi, the PAOCC is
developmental. Beginning with the inward turn introduced by Cleage,
the PAOCC believes that inner evolution is the key to outer revolution.
Cleage’s teaching in the form of the KUA transformation systems repre-
sented a return to a truth taught in the African Mystery Temples as well
as in the teachings of Jesus. The truth is that religion is fundamentally
developmental. Referencing the work of George G.M. James in Stolen
Legacy, Kimathi asserts,
The Mystery Temples taught that personal development was a primary reli-
gious obligation and that through development of our potential we could
rise from our lower animal nature to full expression of our higher divine
nature. The Egyptian system regarded the development of one’s potential as
the greatest and highest good and the fulfillment of human destiny.28
Further, Kimathi contends that “the way” of Jesus was a way of trans-
formation, a way of enlightenment, and a way that leads to a higher
consciousness. Such developmental faith is built on an energetic under-
standing of reality.
We are energy beings in an energy universe. Energy activity (the transmis-

sion and reception of energy) is the basis of all life. The energy is part of
the Divine System that emanates from GOD. Health, happiness, prosper-

ity, and abundant life and the earthly Kingdom of God that is promised in
all religion are only possible through an expansion of our energy capacity.
Salvation is an energy function. We have rediscovered how GOD works in
the world.29
In the most recent iteration, these ideas are constitutive of PAOCC’s

Best Self Theology. As represented on the church’s website, Best Self Theology
is not so much a set of specific practices, but involves one changing from a
static mindset to a development mindset, able to conceive that God wishes
to be expressed through us and that we possess the power to aid the real-
ization of this manifestation.
Once more, as mentioned in the critique of Cleage proffered by Jones,
Pinn, and others, when engaging the teachings of the PAOCC, one is not
dealing with a systematic constructive or dogmatic theology. Most of the
material produced might best be characterized as aesthetically pragmatic
in nature. Subsequently, a major challenge for the church to the extent
that it embraces the lived experience of Black people is to explicate a doc-
trine of God as the God of all creation and a doctrine of God as the God
of the oppressed. In other words, an assertion of such a God requires a
robust metaphysics that is difficult to discern from extant productions of
the PAOCC.
Perhaps a starting point for such reflection might be the scholarship
of Theodore Walker Jr. in his work, Mothership Connections: A Black
Atlantic Synthesis of Neoclassical Metaphysics and Black Theology.30 In this
work, Walker offers a synthesis of neoclassical metaphysics and Black the-
ology. Neoclassical metaphysics, Walker’s preferred nomenclature for the
process metaphysics based on the philosophical writings of Alfred North
Whitehead and articulated by scholars such as Charles Hartshorne, John
Cobb, and David Ray Griffin, asserts a metaphysical necessity of creative
process and social relation that leads to a reinterpretation of classic the-
ism and the Divine. Concomitantly, Black theology offers a critique of
tradition by asserting that the God of all creation is also the God of the
oppressed, working in history to bring about their liberation. Walker
asserts that the God of the Oppressed is a hypothetical or conditional
necessity, and that God understood as omnipotent and all-embracing
love—the historical theodicean problematic—are “emphatically distinct
ways of speaking about the same ultimate reality,” and a coherent moral
theory requires God as the locus of the good as such.31
In my opinion, Walker’s work is itself best read as a kind of prolegom-
ena as opposed to the robust synthesis that he expresses as his intention.
92 T.D. ALEXANDER
The central failing of the work is again, theodicean. In spite of invoking

the likes of scholars such as W.E.B. Du Bois, Paul Gilroy, and Charles
Long, Walker’s neoclassical synthesis gives short shrift to the reality that
African diasporic people’s encounter with modernity can be characterized
by dread, anxiety, and terror.
I contend that a process/emergentist panentheism that asserts the radi-
cal immanence of the Divine in the world would seem to necessitate a
God that participates fully in all that transpires, including evil. It is true
that such a deity means a radical break with classical theism, although
I believe that it leads to a more coherent metaphysic. This has been a
move, however, that the tradition of Whitehead, Hartshorne, Cobb, and
Griffin have been unwilling to make, and Walker is a true adherent to this
legacy. As with the progenitors of neoclassical/process thought, Walker
asserts God’s divine goodness or omnibenevolence. Yet, it is unclear to
me the metaphysical necessity of such a claim. Conceptually, it seems to
be predicated more on assumptions one associates with the classical the-
istic understanding of God as perfect being which would have as a cor-
relate moral perfection. Alternatively, it may be some remaining specter
of Kant’s understanding of God as moral guarantor. Whatever the case, I
believe that further work toward a Black Atlantic synthesis of neoclassical
metaphysics and Black theology must make theodicean issues of evil and
suffering a primary focus.
Returning to the contemporary, the PAOCC, their concept of God,
seems to share commonalities with New Thought teachings. References to
transformation, evolution, will, intention, and development is associated
with New Thought in its various iterations. However, the communal sense
of the self emphasized by Cleage and noted by scholars such as Peter Paris
as being intrinsic to the spirituality of African peoples would seem to be
at odds with the nineteenth-century modernist crèche of New Thought.32
CONCLUSION: WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?

The problem of theodicy can only render faith more difficult, that is, ren-
der it more certain that faithfulness cannot be gained through reason, but
only through faith.33
One of the challenges of a theodicy is to give an accounting of the
problem of evil, while not obfuscating the impact of human suffering.
Indeed, one of the classic theodicies, that of Leibniz “the best of all
possible worlds,” would seem to necessitate the claim, as noted by
James E. Faulconer, “if there were more or less evil in the world, the
world would be defective.”34
As mentioned earlier, Terence Tilley has written extensively on the
problematic nature of theodicies. In The Evils of Theodicy, it is his asser-
tion that theoretical theodicies “disguise real evils,” indeed, in this sense,
theodicy “creates evil.”35 Tilley asserts that such rational discourse is a
post-Leibniz phenomenon. Further, such theoretical contentions obfus-
cate real evil rather than facilitating substantive intentional responses to
human suffering. Utilizing the speech-act theories of Searle and Austin,
Tilley asserts that theodicy is a “destructive discourse” and thus should
be “abandoned.”36 Moreover, Tilley is not alone in this regard. No less a
theologian than Jürgen Moltmann has asserted that one should be con-
cerned more with the proper response to human suffering than with a
defense of the Divine. Moltmann says, “The question of theodicy is not a
speculative question: it is a critical one.” The question “is the open wound
of life in this world.” Those who are truly persons of faith will not rest
content with any slickly explanatory answer to the theodicy question. And
he or she will also resist any attempts to soften the question down. The
more a person believes, the more deeply he experiences pain over the suf-
fering in the world, and the more passionately he asks about God and the
new creation.37
Theologian Thomas Billing posits that a theoretical account of the
problem of suffering—even if it has great explanatory power—should
be rejected as inadequate.38 Kenneth Surin, in Theology and the Problem
of Evil, has been critical of figures such as Richard Swinburne, Alvin
Plantinga, and John Hicks as offering an “overly abstract treatment of the
question.”39 Yet, I must ask is there really no place for critical and consci-
entious reflection on such matters. In the tradition of Pseudo Dionysus,
Kant, and Kierkegaard, perhaps evil should be seen as the limit case of
reason.
As mentioned in the overview of theodicy, for many individuals, the
existence of evil is sufficient to nullify the claims of God.40 For the likes of
Tilley and Moltmann, however, evil is a call to move beyond the efforts
of justification/defense, which is the quintessence of theodicy, and in its
stead to focus one’s attention on the appropriate moral or ethical response
to evil. In this way, the intractability of the problem of evil might func-
tion positively rather than negatively. In other words, the insufficiency of
reason to give an account might provide that space for faith to manifest
and to act.
94 T.D. ALEXANDER
Indeed, to look for a way to integrate evil into our understanding of the
world has a potential to be distracting and at worst, evil itself. There is a sense
in which for evil to be evil, it must not be explained away. “Evil is excessive of
the world. It cannot be an object of thought; it is transcendent, this is why
it is insoluble.”41 Evil and suffering, thus, remind us the transcendent, that
which is not given conceptually or through reason. It is experienced.
NOTES
1. Terrence W. Tilley, The Evils of Theodicy (Washington, DC: Georgetown
University Press, 1991).
2. Hans Kung, On Being a Christian, trans. E. Quinn (Garden City, NY:
Doubleday, 1976), p. 432.
3. Anthony B. Pinn, Why, Lord?: Suffering and Evil in Black Theology (New
York: Continuum, 1995), pp. 27, 35.
4. Alexander Crummell, The Future of Africa: Being Addresses, Sermons, etc.,
Delivered in the Republic of Liberia (New York: Schlein, 1862),
pp. 125–126, 122–123.
5. Pinn, Why, Lord?: Suffering and Evil in Black Theology, 89.
6. Bulletin of The Shrines of the Black Madonna of the Pan African Orthodox
Church 960 R.D. Abernathy Blvd., S.W. Atlanta, Georgia 30310, October
2, 2011 and October 9, 2011. The Hymn, “Rise Nation, Rise, One Nation,
One Race, One Destiny” is a traditional hymn of the Black Christian
Nationalist movement.
7. The elements of the KUA transformation system recounted here are
expressed in documents such as the Synod Pamphlet from 2003, by
Jaramogi Menelik Kimathi “Religion is Developmental” as well as what
appears to be a redacted version of the same text under the title “Religion
is Developmental” by Jaramogi Menelik Kimathi published on http://
www.theyearofrestoration.org site.
8. Bulletin of The Shrines of the Black Madonna of the Pan African Orthodox
Church 960 R.D. Abernathy Blvd., S.W. Atlanta, Georgia 30310, October
2, 2011.
9. Albert B. Cleage Jr., The Black Messiah, 43–44.
10. Albert B. Cleage Jr., The Black Messiah, 110–111.
11. Souvenir Booklet of the 4th Pan African Synod, August 4th–9th, 2000, 8.
12. Souvenir Booklet, 8.
15. Interview with Cardinal Aswad Ambidwile, Shrine of the Black Madonna,
Houston, TX, December 2003.
16. Cleage, The Black Messiah.
17. William R. Jones, Is God a White Racist? A Preamble to Black Theology, 1st
ed. C. Eric Lincoln Series on Black Religion (Garden City, NY: Anchor
Press, 1973), p. 235.
18. Cleage, The Black Messiah, 111.
22. Cleage, The Black Messiah, 3–4.
23. Cleage, The Black Messiah, chapter 20.
24. Cleage, The Black Messiah, 267–268.
27. Jubilee Celebration, August 1–3, 2003, Detroit, MI, 28.
28. “Religion is Developmental” PAOCC 2013 Jaramogi M. Kimathi Rev. 2014
An earlier version of this essay appears in Jubilee Celebration, August 1–3,
2003, 58–62. See also George G. M. James, Stolen Legacy: The Greeks Were
Not the Authors of Greek Philosophy, but the People of North Africa, Commonly
Called the Egyptians (New York: Philosophical Library, 1954), p. 1.
29. Jubilee Celebration, August 1–3, 2003, 60.
30. Theodore Walker, Mothership Connections: A Black Atlantic Synthesis of
Neoclassical Metaphysics and Black Theology, Suny Series in Constructive
Postmodern Thought (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2004).
31. Walker, Mothership Connections: A Black Atlantic Synthesis of Neoclassical
Metaphysics and Black Theology, 60.
32. Peter J. Paris, The Spirituality of African Peoples: The Search for a Common
Moral Discourse (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1995).
33. Martin Heidegger, Pathmarks, ed. William McNeill (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1998), p. 46.
34. James E. Faulconer, “Another Look at the Problem of Theodicy”—unpub-
lished (Provo, UT: Brigham Young University—Department of Philosophy,
2004), p. 7.
35. Terrence Tilley, The Evils of Theodicy (Washington: Georgetown University
Press, 1991), p. 3.
36. Tilley, 219.
37. Jürgen Moltmann, The Trinity and the Kingdom: The Doctrine of God,
trans. Margaret Kohl (New York: Harper & Row, 1981), p. 49.
38. Todd Billings, “Theodicy as a Lived Question,” Journal for Christian
Theological Research 5, no. 2 (2000).
39. Kenneth Surin, Theology and the Problem of Evil (Oxford: Basil Blackwell,
1986).
40. Anthony Pinn, Why Lord?: Suffering and Evil in Black Theology (Continuum,
1995).
41. Faulconer, 12.
CHAPTER 6
Politics Is Sacred: The Activism

of Albert B. Cleage Jr.
Aswad Walker
Describing Reverend Albert B. Cleage Jr.’s political impact is a daunting

task if for no other reason than Cleage’s definition of what constituted
the political. Cleage did not subscribe to the traditional, compartmental-
ized view of politics. Cleage’s interpretation of things that fell within the
purview of politics was similar to that of his views on what comprised the
religious. Here, Cleage fluidly moved between what he would assert was a
false binary of the secular and sacred, also discussed by countless scholars
from multiple fields, including social psychologist and priest Diarmuid
O’Murchu, whose entire body of work exists as an ongoing conversation
between religion and science. Of his work, O’Murchu said, “We live in a
unified world; it’s the connections rather than the divisions that engage
our wisdom and imagination.”1 Coming from a theological position
steeped in concepts, beliefs, and paradigms of traditional African religion-
ist origins, Cleage regularly asserted that any and all things that impact
life and humanity should be considered religious, as they enhanced or
impaired a person’s ability to express their God-self, and scientific because
they operated within the laws and processes of the universe. For Cleage,
then, the secular and the sacred were all one, and within the church he
A. Walker ()
Houston, TX, USA

DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54689-0_6
98 A. WALKER
ultimately founded (the Pan African Orthodox Christian Church, referred

to heretofore as the Shrine), there were no issues too political or too con-
troversial for committed Christian action.
Cleage’s expanded view of the political, which centered upon the pur-
suit of power for self-determination, influenced others, whether scholars,
activists, or some combination thereof. For example, Dr. Maulana Karenga,
professor of Africana Studies at California State University, Long Beach,
defines politics in his book, Introduction to Black Studies, as “the art and
process of gaining, maintaining and using power to create and sustain a
just and good society and world.”2 He goes on to define power, a concept
Karenga believes is critical to understanding the nature of black politics,
as “the social capacity of a group to realize its will, in spite of opposition
from others”.3 So all-encompassing is the concept of power to Cleage’s
theological praxis that no conversation about him can be authentic with-
out honoring his assertions about power, and the pursuit and possession
thereof, as foundational to all of existence. Moreover, Cleage contends
that “power lies in institutions” rather than in the accumulation of wealth,
status, or positions. These beliefs led Cleage to see politics and the pursuit
of power in every aspect of life.
Cleage’s views were molded in large part by a confluence of influences,
including his parents who fearlessly engaged in what was known in the
1920s and 1930s as “uplift work”, preceding Black Nationalists whose
works were informed greatly by their faith,4 and ongoing life experiences.
With Cleage there weren’t separate political, economic, religious, and
educational compartments. Everything was a reflection of a group’s power
or lack thereof. Hence, with Cleage everything was political, just as every-
thing was spiritual. This was particularly true in his efforts to merge the
sacred and the secular, youth ministry, and institution building. Each of
these aspects deserves their own study regarding Cleage’s political impact.
This work, however, will stay focused on what are considered more tradi-
tionally political activities.
TRADITIONAL POLITICAL IMPACT

The most foundational political work involves organizing ordinary citi-
zens around a specific issue that impacts their quality of life. Cleage sought
to do just that during his interim pastoring of Dr. Howard Thurman’s
Church for the Fellowship of All Peoples in San Francisco in the early
1940s. There, Cleage called upon his congregation to support the city’s
POLITICS IS SACRED: THE ACTIVISM OF ALBERT B. CLEAGE JR. 99
dock workers’ efforts to unionize, and to speak out in protest of the

internment of thousands of Japanese Americans during World War II.5
Though Cleage failed to rally that congregation to take action, their
lack of response did not dissuade him from believing such work was a
tangible expression of living one’s faith. Hence, Cleage’s active participa-
tion in the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People
(NAACP), the nation’s oldest and largest civil rights organization, begin-
ning in the 1940s, came as no surprise to those who knew him. While at St.
John’s, Cleage served as chairman of the NAACP’s Housing Committee,
where he was pitted against segregation-minded new home developers
while working to secure decent housing for Black New Englanders. There,
he also advocated for black youth who were victims of police violence, and
chaired the organization’s Redress Committee. Cleage’s NAACP work
continued upon his move to Detroit’s St. Mark’s Presbyterian Church,
serving as leader of the Detroit chapter’s membership campaign, helping
make it the organization’s largest and most well-funded. Still, his most
memorable NAACP contribution, arguably, was his work on the 1963
Detroit Freedom March.6
The same year Cleage was voted the city’s most influential minister
in a Detroit newspaper poll and named “Man of the Year” by Liberator
Magazine, he was busy envisioning a march with both political symbol-
ism and substance. The symbolism involved a show of solidarity from
northern blacks with the efforts of the Civil Rights Movement that
were primarily focused in the south, led predominantly by the Southern
Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and the Student Non-violent
Coordinating Committee (SNCC). Substantively, Cleage wanted to raise
the consciousness of Detroiters regarding the services and treatment they
should expect as tax-paying citizens from their elected officials.
Fittingly, it was at an NAACP banquet held in his honor that Cleage
announced the “walk to freedom”, its headline speaker—Dr. Martin Luther
King Jr.—and attendance prediction of 100,000 persons. That July, the
march drew over 300,000 participants by some estimates who heard King’s
“I Have a Dream Speech”, which he presented again later that year during
the March on Washington. Still, it was Cleage’s speech that day which was
said by attendees to have “radicalized the masses of the Detroit Black com-
munity by speaking to the issues burning on the hearts of Black Detroiters”.7
As Cleage’s socio-political influence grew, and his conception of Black
Nationalism evolved, his participation in the NAACP waned, yet increased
through other venues.
100 A. WALKER
To coordinate the Detroit Freedom March, Cleage founded the

Detroit Council on Human Relations. After the success of the march,
the Council sought to formally organize a Northern Christian Leadership
Conference (NCLC) to mirror rather than compete with the efforts of the
SCLC. Cleage strategized that the black cause for empowerment would
be better served if the NCLC provided a more radical alternative to the
SCLC, forcing national power brokers to choose with which organization
to negotiate.8 Cleage saw the strategy as a win-win, with blacks impacting
social change one way or the other. However, the coalition of ministers that
made up the Council disintegrated while the city’s other nationally known
pastor—Reverend C.L. Franklin—refused to work with Black Nationalists
and barred them from NCLC organizing activities. In response, Cleage
called for and organized the now famous Grassroots Conference, where
fellow Detroit religious leader, Malcolm X, gave the keynote address for-
mally known as the “Message to the Grassroots”.9
One of Cleage’s most effective political organizing tools was the
Illustrated News, a modern albeit local version of Garvey’s Negro World
which was international in its circulation. Cleage sought a vehicle for
politicizing blacks with articles on black history and social analysis from
a black perspective. Cleage, along with his brothers, Hugh and Henry
Cleage, founded the Illustrated News, a weekly newspaper distributed by
church members, and reaching a circulation high of 65,000 per week.
The paper’s editorials and investigative articles on topics like the hiring
and promotional policies of Sears, Chrysler, and others, inspired tangible
change. Moreover, Cleage rubbed raw the sores of discontent through
another weekly column he penned; this one for the Michigan Chronicle.
In August 1964, Cleage sought to add electoral politics to his methods
for affecting change by working with Grace Lee Boggs, Henry Cleage,
and others to found the Michigan branch of an independent, all-black
political party—the Freedom Now Party (FNP).
A draft of the preamble to the FNP platform states:
We, the black people of the State of Michigan, and of these United States,
in this historic period of worldwide revolutionary change, recognizing our
desire to achieve our own destiny through our own efforts; recognizing
our desire for independent black political action after 188 years of political
subservience; recognizing that our struggle for freedom and equality can
issue, meaningfully, only from our own leadership and candidates, do estab-
lish the only independent political movement dedicated to the unity and
liberation of all black people – the FREEDOM NOW PARTY.10
The party’s national ambitions were curtailed, however, when it was only
able to secure a place on the ballot in Michigan. There, the party ran sev-
eral candidates during the 1964 election, including Loy Cohen, secretary
of state; James Jackson, lieutenant governor; Milton Henry, representative
of the 14th Congressional District; and Cleage, governor. In doing so,
Cleage became the first black man to run for governor in the USA since
Reconstruction. Freedom Now Party candidates ran not to win but to
expand the political dialogue to include issues of importance to blacks.
Still, Cleage’s involvement with the FNP, according to some Detroit his-
torians, was not all positive. It is asserted that Cleage was initially reluctant
to get involved with the FNP, though no specific evidence of this nor any
such statements by Cleage have surfaced. Moreover, there is no indication
that Cleage had any other dealings with the FNP after the election leaving
some to conclude he was disappointed with the group, or saw no long-
term viability to future FNP efforts.11
From 1963 to the mid-1970s, Cleage was involved in a flurry of
other traditionally political activities including creating the Inner City
Organizing Committee (ICOC), an umbrella organization that attracted
progressives to exchange ideas about community development and con-
trol. Under the ICOC tent was the Inner City Housing Conference, Black
Retail Employees Association, Inner City Parents Council, Black Teachers
Workshop, Inner City Students Organization, Afro-American Committee
Against Racist Wars, and Michigan Inner City Organizing Committee.12
As “the titular head of the 700,000-member Detroit Black Church com-
munity”, according to the Detroit Free Press in 1967, just after the Detroit
Rebellion, Cleage continued his faith-driven efforts to affect political
change. In hopes of rebuilding Detroit in an image reflecting the chang-
ing demographics of the city due to a combination of black population
growth and white flight, Cleage founded the City-wide Citizens Action
Committee (CCAC), a federation of black organizations that promoted
economic self-determination through cooperative economics and busi-
ness/service ventures.13
The CCAC initiative gave birth to more ventures founded by Cleage
aimed at helping the black community gain control of its economic destiny.
Among these were the Black Star Co-op Market (grocery store), Black
Star Co-op Housing, Black Star Service Center, and Black Star Clothing
Company, which later gave birth to the Sudan Import and Specialty Shop,
that ultimately transformed into the Shrine of the black Madonna Cultural
Center and Bookstore—one of the Shrine’s premier institutions, run for
decades by Cleage’s sister Barbara “Nandi” Martin.
102 A. WALKER
Cleage became part folk hero in the midst of the CCAC’s work of
rebuilding Detroit after returning $100,000 given to the group by the
New Detroit Committee (NDC), a white business organization designed
to oversee the rebuilding of the city. Cleage accepted the money offered
by the NDC, formed by Henry Ford II and others, to fund CCAC efforts,
but was adamant that the NDC have no say over CCAC decisions. When
the NDC attempted to assert control, Cleage returned the money on the
basis of principle. Still, not all were in support of Cleage’s decision. Certain
activists viewed the move as a foolish waste of capital that could have been
used to rebuild Detroit in a more racially diverse image. Some have sug-
gested that Cleage’s popularity as a leader in the black community and his
influence upon the city’s white power brokers waned as a consequence.14
However, such claims are difficult to fully substantiate. For, during this
period, Cleage used what others defined as his growing celebrity to push
for political power in additional ways, one of which included joining the
college lecture circuit in hopes of politicizing young adults while calling
them to join the movement in general, and his church more specifically.
From 1970 to 1972, Cleage addressed over 80 colleges across the nation.15
Moreover, Cleage participated in national organizations focused on
changing the country’s existing power realities. Cleage was a member of the
National Committee of Negro Churchmen (NCNC), an ad hoc collective
of 51 black pastors who collaborated to support young Civil Rights work-
ers who had begun to publically call for “Black Power” during the1966
“March Against Fear” just outside Greenwood, Mississippi. The call was
made by SNCC leaders Stokely Carmichael, who later joined the Black
Panther Party, and Willie Ricks. Many white liberal clergy denounced
“Black Power”, arguing it was inconsistent with the movement’s principles
and Jesus’ teachings. On July 31, 1966, the NCNC purchased a full-page
ad in the New York Times publishing their statement of support for “Black
Power”, arguing that the call was in fact consistent with the movement’s
principles and the teachings of Jesus.16
Cleage was also part of Operation Connection, a New York-based orga-
nization consisting of roughly 20 Protestant denominations, the Catholic
Church, and Jewish groups. He was also a member of the Inter-religious
Federation for Community Organization and the Commission on Racial
Justice. During this period, Cleage acted as a diplomat representing the
interests of black people, sitting on numerous boards and commissions.
Of this work Cleage stated, according to historian Paul Lee, “Since it is
obvious, even to white people, that black people mean to have power, I
am participating in these meetings and organizations only to facilitate the

transfer of power from white people to black people.”17
Cleage further spoke to the inherent conflict and political nature that
existed during this transfer process in a sermon entitled “Fear is Gone”,
stating, “Conflict is inevitable unless the white man agrees to transfer
power. We say that to him and he looks the other way. He sets up a New
Detroit Committee to rebuild Detroit. He gives it all kinds of money, but
the Committee refuses to realize that its one function is to preside at the
transference of power.”18 According to Randy “Mwenda” Brown, “It is
critical to note that all of Jaramogi’s [Cleage] actions were driven by his
Christian faith. He saw no separation between his faith walk and his politi-
cal actions.”19
Between 1968 and 1972, Cleage began making another transition in
strategies to gain black political power. With the publishing of his first
book, The black Messiah (1968), and a rising black consciousness, Cleage
grew in popularity and demand,20 which pulled him away from the church
he sought to grow. His sermons during that period reflected his long-held
conclusions that integration was not the answer for black empowerment,
and that whites were by no means going to voluntarily transfer any real
power to blacks. Cleage’s sermons also reflected a certainty that blacks
were wasting an opportunity to seize upon the times to affect substantive
change. In religious vernacular, Cleage believed blacks were wasting the
Holy Spirit.
Cleage’s next book, Black Christian Nationalism: New Directions for
the Black Church, reflected his dismay over the lack of organizations pro-
viding blacks with a process for achieving concrete goals. Theologically,
Cleage believed the church’s role was to fill that void, though he saw no
churches up to the task, due to their commitment, according to Cleage, to
“Slave Theology/Christianity”, a body of religious beliefs originally forced
upon blacks during their enslavement for the purpose of convincing them
their inferior social and political status was divinely ordained and to be
accepted.21 Cleage then made the conscious decision to forgo becoming
a national spokesperson, and instead concentrate his efforts on building a
church that could provide the organization, leadership, and direction he
believed blacks needed if self-determination was to be realized.
This decision brought to a close Cleage’s public ministry. But that
assessment is only partially true. Cleage dedicated the rest of his years
to training and developing a cadre of young adults to lead the church he
founded with a theology of liberation committed to the full empowerment
104 A. WALKER
of black people as an expression of God’s will. Thus, it can be argued that

Cleage, though outside the public eye, was busier theologically and politi-
cally during these last decades of his life, which ended February 20, 2000.
It was this decision to channel his energy and focus inwardly upon
the development of his church, that many argue not only abruptly ended
Cleage’s public ministry, but also brought to a halt his national influ-
ence. Though specific attendance numbers are not available, according to
Shrine member testimonies, the height of the Shrine’s numbers coincided
with the transition of the Civil Rights Movement to the more progressive
Black Power Movement during the late 1960s through the first years of
the next decade. Attendance numbers declined sharply after 1972, the
year Cleage made the development of his church his focus. Though, as
has been asserted by some sociologists and historians, the emergence of
Affirmative Action laws and policies that accompanied the early 1970s,
along with the government-sanctioned program to discredit, detain, and/
or destroy progressive black leadership (the FBI’s Counter Intelligence
Program, or COINTELPRO)22 facilitated the weakening of the Black
Power Movement, and certainly impacted the appeal or lack thereof of
Cleage’s Black Christian Nationalist call, his disappearance from public
view as the face of the movement certainly played a role as well. No longer
participating on national boards and coalitions as a diplomat representing
the interests of black people, or publishing additional works to be debated
and discussed by a new generation of seminarians and social activists did
much to remove Cleage from the conversation and consciousness of the
people he worked to empower.
With the advantage of hindsight, I believe Cleage could have handled
the transition differently, in a way that would have allowed him to main-
tain his public influence, which had been so critical to his work, while
gradually investing more time to the development of young leaders in his
church. Cleage, however, believed the times demanded he change strate-
gies with a sense of urgency.
I assert Cleage underestimated the importance and impact of his voice
on setting the parameters of race-related social and political discourse, and
ultimately, organizational programs and policy. It is difficult to imagine
that the grouping of black churchmen who came together in 1966 to sup-
port calls for Black Power would have happened without Cleage’s inces-
sant urging and challenging of black preachers, congregants, and activists
to wrestle with and embrace an unapologetic black theology. Cleage’s
impact as a public theologian made his church the unofficial spiritual
home of numerous people involved in black empowerment, and attracted

national figures like Abbey Lincoln, H. Rap Brown, Stokely Carmichael,
Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones), Haki Madhubuti (Don Lee), and others to
the Detroit church to address and interact with other movement partic-
ipants. It is no stretch to imagine that the progressive Cleage and his
ideas played a part in radicalizing members of SNCC who have been cred-
ited with transforming the Civil Rights Movement into the Black Power
Movement. The loss of such a profound national voice certainly retarded
the growth of progressive ideas and actions. For, it disappeared during a
time when such ideas and actions were being attacked by the anti-black
empowerment efforts of the FBI (COINTELPRO) and the promotion of
Affirmative Action gains as the ultimate victory for which blacks had been
striving.
With that said, Cleage’s political work did not come to a complete
halt. One example of the political work in which Cleage engaged during
this period has already been discussed—the institution building that trans-
pired at the Shrine. Another is his work “directly” in the political process
through his efforts to help elect Coleman Young as the first black mayor
of Detroit, which gave birth to arguably Cleage’s most influential political
vehicle, the Black Slate, Inc.
Coleman Young, a union leader, former Tuskegee Airman, World War II
veteran who served in the 477th Medium-Bomber Group of the US Army
Air Forces as a bombardier and navigator, and long-time supporter of
progressive causes, desired to become mayor of Detroit, a city with a long
history of repressive activities targeting the black community. Recognizing
Cleage as arguably the most respected black leader in Detroit, Young
requested an audience with his friend. “They met for what seemed like
forever,” said D. Kimathi Nelson, recalling that evening. “When the two
emerged, they were laughing and boisterous, and Cleage declared, ‘We’ve
got a mayor to elect.’”23 According to Nelson, Young asked Cleage exactly
what type of on-the-ground organization did he need to win. Cleage’s
response was the program he put into place, with campaign volunteers
calling, visiting homes, and leafleting to explain to Black Detroiters what
was at stake in the 1973 mayoral election, and the process to ensure their
votes counted. On election day, volunteers provided transportation to the
polls for those in need, while others stationed outside voting locations
passed out a slate of candidates approved as having the black community’s
interests at heart. Young’s victory—he served as Detroit’s mayor from
1974 to 1994—was a beginning of sorts for Cleage, as the experience gave
birth to the Black Slate, Inc.24
106 A. WALKER
Years before Cleage worked with Young, Cleage organized the black
community attempting to increase their voting power and maximize black
representation in city, county, and state politics. Cleage did this by pro-
moting a strategy called “plunking”, leveraging votes by voting only for
a select few candidates in voting areas that had a multi-seat election pro-
cess as did Detroit’s City Council. The Cleage-led “Three Plus One” and
“Four and No More” campaigns founded upon this strategy were suc-
cessful. Black votes were concentrated, allowing them to gain significant
political power and moved the city toward a body of elected officials more
representative of the city’s racial reality. This history of organizing the
black community to achieve political success, along with Young’s victory
helped, in 1973, to found the Black Slate, Inc. as an independent political
lobby organization, recognizing and honoring the law of the land—sepa-
ration of church and state.25
The Black Slate, Inc., operating with volunteers from all over Detroit,
began what became a long-standing tradition of publishing a list of Black
Slate interviewed and endorsed candidates for each election. The Black
Slate’s success was profound. Thanks to the Black Slate, black candi-
dates were getting elected to city council, county and state offices, and
federal positions. An entire generation of successful politicians point to
the Black Slate as the launching point of their careers. Some of these
include Mary Blackmon (Detroit Board of Education), Barbara-Rose
Collins (Michigan and US House of Representatives and Detroit City
Council), Bernard Kilpatrick (Wayne County Commission, Wayne County
Executive’s Office), Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick (Michigan and US House
of Representatives and former Congressional Black Caucus chairperson),
Kwame Kilpatrick (former mayor of Detroit), Ada Edwards (Houston
City Council), and Judge Cynthia D. Stephens (State Bar of Michigan
Board of Commissioners, Wayne County Circuit Court), among others.
The impact of Cleage’s Black Slate was not confined to Michigan. As
the Shrine opened churches in Atlanta, Georgia, and Houston, Texas,
the Black Slate began operations in those cities as well. When the Shrine
officially opened the doors of its Atlanta church in 1975, Black Slate orga-
nizers participated in various political initiatives that strengthened and
supported Atlanta’s first black mayor, Maynard Jackson, elected in 1974.
In Houston, a city not known to be as socially or politically progressive as
Detroit or Atlanta, the Black Slate was still able to participate in the elec-
tion of Houston’s first waves of black elected officials as the Shrine and the
Black Slate began operations there in 1977.26 In Princes Shall Come Out
of Egypt: A Comparative Study of the Theological and Ecclesiological Views

of Marcus Garvey and Albert B. Cleage Jr., I argued, “The story of the
political gains of blacks during the 1970s and 1980s cannot accurately be
told without deference and homage being paid to the work of the Black
Slate, Inc. Even where the Black Slate did not operate and slates were not
published, other organizations followed the lead of the Black Slate in cities
across the country including Chicago and Newark, and other, predomi-
nantly Northern cities, producing impressive victories for black candidates
and/or candidates of other races who were deemed to have the best inter-
ests of the black community as central to their platforms.”27 Though sepa-
rate and apart from the Shrine, the Black Slate’s success revived for some
and solidified for others the reputation of Albert Cleage and the church he
founded as entities capable of helping blacks achieve political access, and
an improved quality of life.
Cleage’s Atlanta church, Shrine #9, has been active politically at the
Neighborhood Planning Unit (NPU) level. Atlanta is divided into 25
NPUs, or citizen advisory councils that make recommendations to the
mayor and city council on issues relevant to city planning. Established in
1974, the NPU system provides citizens greater levels of participation and
community control. Shrine #9 resides in Atlanta’s historic West End, as is
part of NPU-T. NPU-T had as its chair, a member of Shrine #9 for close
to 30 years. The late Dr. Woodrow Smith (Cardinal Aminifu) served the
majority of those years. His successor was Jerry Tacuma Brown. Both men
served with distinction, according to multiple NPU-T members, earning
the NPU-T regular awards as the most politically effective and profession-
ally run of all 25 NPUs, assisting greatly with the growth of the West End
in the image desired by its residents.28
As the decade of the 1970s neared its end, it became clear to Cleage
that blacks in high political offices alone were not enough to wrestle power
and institutional say-so away from whites, even in predominantly black
cities. Concomitantly, Cleage again concluded the key to lasting social
change was more an internal rather than external matter. The notion that
a changed society demands changed people appears to have then taken
hold on a more profound theological level for Cleage, and was voiced
by him in the Shrine’s Black Christian Nationalism (BCN) Message and
Mission when he said, “We will never free ourselves from oppression until
each Black person is willing to commit himself to self-transformation,
rejecting his niggerized mind and its acceptance of the declaration of the
myth of Black inferiority.”29 The result was Cleage focusing his energy on
108 A. WALKER
affecting social change by working to affect personal transformation. For

Cleage, that meant moving blacks from a commitment to individualism
(defined by Cleage as the ultimate sin, and means for destroying a people
by keeping them divided and powerless) to the group orientation of com-
munalism. Though this period (the late 1970s through the mid-1990s)
found Cleage seeking to perfect religious processes aimed at facilitating
this transformation, from his perspective, this was probably the most pro-
found political work of his life.
In BCN Message and Mission, Cleage contends that all black efforts to
end oppression failed because they did not offer a process to change and
transform black peoples’ niggerized minds.30 Thus, neither mass action,
blind faith in an all-powerful anthropomorphic God, efforts at escape (via
alcohol, drugs, sex, or religious emotionalism), nor self-help (Buy Black)
initiatives have worked because, without a process to “de-niggerize”
blacks, their actions remained stymied by their acceptance of the myth of
black inferiority.31
Like Cleage’s decision to end his public ministry around 1972, the
move to make the focus of his ministry even more internal around 1978
resulted in a loss of membership, and increased alienation from many in
the black community. Cleage instituted a rigid set of membership criteria
while promoting a message that for many blacks was so radically differ-
ent than the traditional “Christian” discourse to which they had grown
accustomed, many did not consider Cleage or his church Christian at all.
Though this reality hurt Shrine recruitment efforts in terms of numbers,
D. Kimathi Nelson argues that the structure Cleage put in place allowed
the Shrine to survive to present day while other black self-determination
organizations and movements born between the 1950s and 1970s ceased
to exist.32 Between 1977 and the early 1990s, Cleage’s Houston church
participated in grassroots social action by shutting down three of Texas’
most notorious drug havens—apartment complexes located on the same
street as the Shrine #10 sanctuary. All three complexes, one of which
being so dangerous it was labeled the “Bucket of Blood” by community
members, were eventually purchased by the Shrine and converted into
residential living spaces available to church members.33
The Republican Party’s “Contract with America” (1994) and the sub-
sequent legal attacks on Affirmative Action were viewed by large numbers
of blacks as detrimental to their present and future quality of life pros-
pects. In response, Cleage held discussions with Shrine leadership urging
actions that countered potential negative outcomes from these initiatives.
“During one of the weekly sermon discussion meetings, Reverend Cleage

discussed the issue of affirmative action being rescinded and how the
church must take an active role in preparing our children for academic
success,” recalled Shelley McIntosh, a former minister, youth program
coordinator, and Bible Class Instructor in the PAOCC.34 McIntosh shared
in her book, Mtoto House: Vision to Victory: Raising African American
Children Communally, Cleage’s forward to the subsequent Bible Class
lesson, “Beyond Affirmative Action”.
In addition to the accumulative disadvantages of second class citizen-

ship, we do not realize how much black students are being educationally
handicapped, even now by the black condition (poverty, unemployment,
segregated schools, lack of devoted teachers, lack of school funding, and
undisciplined and uninterested students). Affirmative Action added what
was necessary to bring us up to competitive equality. We must understand
the nature of our present handicap without Affirmative Action. If we are
to re-establish a competitive position for black students, we can no longer
depend entirely on the educational system to bring us up to competitive
equality.35
McIntosh, following Cleage’s lead and relying upon his counsel, coordi-
nated and launched the New Affirmative Action After-School Program
in 1997 aimed at providing black students with instruction and activities
to bring them up to competitive equality. The effort’s impact was felt
predominantly by youth who were members of the church, and thus did
not have the broader, citywide impact hoped for. With that said, the vast
majority of participants in that program went on to graduate from college
and become productive citizens.
At Cleage’s behest, Houston’s Shrine was part of the city’s Operation
Unity, a coalition of ten progressive organizations that collaborate reg-
ularly on various issues. One such issue was coordinating Houston’s
response to man-made disasters that befell Rwanda and Haiti in the early
1990s. Shrine #10 served as ground zero for collecting aid sent to these
nations. America’s governmental responses to these incidents were part
of a growing national conversation on race-based inequality, making the
response by Cleage’s church equal parts political statement and ministry.
Similarly, Houston’s Shrine, with the support of its sister churches, came
to the aid of those displaced by hurricanes Katrina and Rita (August and
September, 2005, respectively). Shrine #10 housed more than 200 people
110 A. WALKER
in its Missionary Training Institutes (MTIs) without receiving monetary

support from the Red Cross or governmental agencies. In light of the
political maelstrom that befell President George W. Bush due to his slow
response to these hurricane victims, the Shrine’s efforts provided a power-
ful political statement about the need for independent, black institutions.36
Cleage’s legacy of political action has continued long after his passing.
His 1997 charge to fight efforts to dismantle affirmative action found
tangible expression in 2003 as Shrine #10 teen group leader Anthony
Baker coordinated citywide efforts to send youth to Washington, DC,
for a national march supporting affirmative action as the US Supreme
Court prepared to hear two cases filed against University of Michigan’s
law school attempting to dismantle the policy.
In 2010, the Shrine reflected Cleage’s penchant for finding new
ways to seek community control. Desiring to impact Houston’s Upper
Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd. (MLK) section of Third Ward, the Shrine’s
Presiding Bishop, D. Kimathi Nelson, exerted the church’s influence and
political capital to invite investment into the community. The effort gar-
nered Metro’s rail-line expansion choosing MLK Blvd. as its newest cor-
ridor; the Tierwester YMCA choosing the Upper MLK area to relocate;
Houston Independent School District (HISD) reversing its plans to close
nearby Peck Elementary School, and instead construct a new campus;
the emergence of a condominium development, Oasis Intown; and the
city’s repurposing of Palm Center, a once thriving neighborhood mall that
had fallen into disrepair. Jumpstarting the process was the Shrine facili-
tating the building of a permanent campus for KIPP Liberation College
Preparatory Academy by providing the land which formerly housed two of
the church’s MTIs. The move afforded the community its first new school
construction in over 30 years.37 Though Nelson and the Shrine were not
architects of this conglomeration of projects, the church’s work facilitated
many of the decisions that led to the overall revitalization of the area,
according to residents. In this way, the Shrine helped secure a higher level
of community control.
Cleage’s political impact can also be felt in the work of theologians,
activists, and educators influenced by his writings and/or personal dealings
with Cleage. Certainly, his contemporaries, especially black theologians of
the 1960s and 1970s searching for meaning in the scriptures compatible
with the movement for black equality, were impacted by Cleage, whose
voice on the matter was considered quite radical. For, “No minister was
more vocal about the need for black Christians to advocate black power
than Albert Cleage Jr.”38 A partial listing of these individuals include Paul
Robeson, Abbey Lincoln, Malcolm X, H. Rap Brown, Haki Madhubuti
(Don Lee), Bobby Seale, Huey P. Newton, Angela Davis, James Cones,
Gayraud Wilmore, Jeremiah Wright, and Frank Reid III. Additionally,
Maulana Karenga, founder of Kwanzaa, the seven-day, African-American
holiday celebrating principles basic for self-determination, was a regular
visitor at Cleage’s church and participated in his ministerial training pro-
gram along with Dr. Yosef ben-Jochannan, Egyptologist, and ex-NAACP
chief executive Benjamin Chavis.39 The political impact of the aforemen-
tioned individuals can at least be partially attributed to Cleage’s influ-
ence, just as the work of Black Nationalists who preceded Cleage can be
credited with impacting his theology and political ideology. Cleage can
also take partial credit for whatever political impact has been rendered
by those outside US borders who have professed to have been inspired
by Cleage. For example, many of the leadership of South Africa’s anti-
apartheid movement found solace in Cleage’s written words. Strinivasa
“Strini” Moodley, one of the founding members of South Africa’s Black
Consciousness Movement of the 1960s, stated while speaking at the Shrine
Cultural Center in Houston in the early 1990s, “While we [Oliver Tambo,
Walter Sisulu, Nelson Mandela, and others] were imprisoned on Robben
Island, we kept our spirits up by reading under candlelight, a smuggled
in copy of Reverend Cleage’s The black Messiah. His words helped us to
keep the faith in the righteousness of our cause. Because when we felt
like we couldn’t go on we’d read the tattered pages of The black Messiah
and find the strength to hold on.”40 Moreover, practitioners of liberation
theologies in Latin America and Africa, including Gustavo Gutierrez and
Allen Boesak, have confirmed the profound influence the black theologi-
cal movement of the 1960s had upon their own theological growth.
A large part of political impact is disseminating one’s message. To
do this, Cleage used the aforementioned Illustrated News and Michigan
Chronicle. Moreover, in addition to the hundreds, if not thousands, of
sermons preached over the course of his career (Cleage preached into
the early 1990s), Cleage published The black Messiah (1968) and Black
Christian Nationalism: New Directions for the Black Church (1972). His
writing continued into the 1990s as well, though the works have not yet
been published nationally. This fact has hampered scholars from obtain-
ing a full grasp of Cleage’s continued theological evolution from 1940s
112 A. WALKER
advocate of integration, to 1960s Black Nationalist, to a theological

position in the 1990s until his death in 2000 that traveled far beyond
the strictures of a black/white dichotomy or the description of God in
anthropomorphic and racial terms. Because Cleage believed all things
fell within the purview of politics, his entire ministerial career was dedi-
cated to pursuing power for self-determination, a pursuit that influenced
scholars, activists, and church members alike to believe as Cleage did, or
at least wrestle with the notion, that there exists no issues too political or
too controversial for committed Christian action.
NOTES
1. Diarmuid O’Murchu, Quantum Theology: Spiritual Implications of the New
Physics (New York: Crossroads Publishing Company, 2004), p. 6.
2. Karenga, Maulana, Introduction to Black Studies, 4th ed. (Los Angeles:
University of Sankore Press, 2010). p. 294.
3. Ibid., pp. 294–295.
4. These include Bishop Henry McNeal Turner, Edward Wilmot Blyden,
David Walker, and insurrection leaders Gabriel Prosser, Denmark Vesey,
and Nat Turner.
5. Juan Williams and Quinton Dixie, This Far by Faith: Stories From the
African American Religious Experience (New York: HarperCollins, 2003),
pp. 268–270.
6. Paul Lee, “The Early Outreach Ministry of Jaramogi Abebe Agyeman
(Rev. Albert B. Cleage, Jr.): 1950–1972,” PAOCC Jubilee Celebration
Booklet (Detroit, August 2003), pp. 40–41.
7. Interview with the Shrine’s Cardinal Woodrow “Aminifu” Smith, May 1995.
8. Lee, “The Early Outreach Ministry of Jaramogi Abebe Agyeman (Rev. Albert
B. Cleage, Jr.): 1950–1972,” PAOCC Jubilee Celebration Booklet, p. 41.
9. Interview with the Shrine’s current Presiding Bishop, D. Kimathi Nelson.
September 2010.
10. Posted March 15, 2013 at http://findingeliza.com, administered by
Cleage’s daughter, Kristin Cleage.
11. Interview with Black Slate, Inc. director, Frank “Baye” Landy. October
2010.
13. Ibid., p. 41.
14. Interview with Black Slate, Inc. director, Frank “Baye” Landy. October
2010.
15. Aswad Walker, Princes Shall Come Out of Egypt: A Comparative Study of the
Theological and Ecclesiological Views of Marcus Garvey and Albert B. Cleage
Jr. (Dubuque: Kendall Hunt Publishing, 2012). p. 99.
16. Ibid., p. 100.
18. Albert B. Cleage Jr., The black Messiah (Trenton: Africa World Press,
1989), pp. 19–20.
19. Interview with Shrine #9 pastor, Randy “Mwenda” Brown. April 2015.
20. Based on college speaking invitations, requests for participation in national
organizations, and interview requests via TV, newspaper, and radio.
21. Cleage explains “Slave Theology/Christianity” throughout his book Black
Christian Nationalism: New Directions for the Black Church, but does so in
more detail in chapter 2, entitled “The Black Church.”
22. Nelson Blackstock, Cointelpro: The FBI’s Secret War on Political Freedom
(New York: Pathfinder Press, 1988).
23. Interview with the Shrine’s current Presiding Bishop, D. Kimathi Nelson.
January 2014.
24. Interview with Black Slate, Inc. director, Frank “Baye” Landy. October 2010.
25. Ibid.
26. Interview with Shrine Christian Center of Houston’s Chief Operating
Officer, Loretta Green. January 2014.
27. Walker, Princes Shall Come Out of Egypt, p. 107.
28. Interview with Atlanta NPU-T members, Jerry “Tacuma” Brown, Asha
Hill, and Milton Fann. September 2013.
29. Albert B. Cleage Jr., The BCN Message and Mission (Houston: Pha Green
Printing, 1987), p. 5.
30. Ibid., p. 6.
31. Ibid., p. 6.
32. D. Kimathi Nelson outlined this argument throughout the entirety of ser-
mons preached during the Shrine’s Anniversary Month 2014.
33. Interview with members of the Shrine’s Holy Order of the Maccabees,
Andrew Seegars, Fabian Green, and Robert Stubbs. August 2013.
34. Shelley McIntosh, Mtoto House: Vision to Victory: Raising African American
Children Communally (Lanham: Hamilton Books, 2005), p. 42.
35. Ibid., pp. 42–43.
36. Houston’s Shrine was celebrated for their relief efforts surrounding hurri-
canes Katrina and Rita by several organizations, including the New Orleans
Association of Houston (NOAH), which honored the congregation dur-
ing its observance of the tenth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina on
September 4, 2015.
114 A. WALKER
37. Monica Coleman, “Revitalization to Upper MLK Corridor,” www.defend-

ernetwork.com. June 6, 2010.
38. Williams and Dixie, This Far by Faith: Stories From the African American
Religious Experience, p. 267.
39. Interview with the Shrine’s Cardinal Woodrow “Aminifu” Smith, May 1995.
40. Walker, Princes Shall Come Out of Egypt, p. 156.
PART II
Representations of the Black

Madonna and Child, Christian
Education, and Pastoral Care
CHAPTER 7
The Black Madonna and the Role of Women
Velma Maia Thomas
Albert B. Cleage Jr. founded the Shrines of the Black Madonna of the Pan
African Orthodox Christian Church following his unveiling of a mural of
a Black Madonna and Child in 1967. His decision to feature and prioritize
the Black Madonna in the title of the church instead of Jesus, the revolu-
tionary Black Messiah, invites a discussion about the role of women and
mothers in the Black Christian Nationalist movement. Cleage explained
his choice to name the church after the Black Madonna as being motivated
by his contention that the church is supposed to represent the ideals of
a “good” mother. The church should be nurturing and is responsible for
the physical, psychological, and spiritual growth of God’s children. But
what of the Madonna herself? Does the church have a developed doctrine
or theological posture on her? And how is womanhood and motherhood
lived out in the experiences of Black women in this church? If the church
itself signifies motherhood, then what does it mean for individual moth-
ers who have to raise children in this movement? Did the church manifest
traditional Protestant notions of motherhood and womanhood or dis-
rupt these notions yet still pressure women to conform to a masculinist
V.M. Thomas ()

Atlanta, GA, USA

DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54689-0_7
118 V.M. THOMAS
conception of commitment to the church? These are just a few of the

questions I hope to interrogate in the lived experiences of Black women
in this church.
Albert B. Cleage, in consultation with specific ministers, created the
Mtoto House community. This was a communal child-rearing structure
where children were raised together and led by house parents from 1981 to
2001. Mtoto House was said to be based on the Kibbutz community in Israel
and derived from the traditional African notion that the community actively
participates in the raising of children as well as the traditional West African
idea that each child is a member of an initiate grouped together by age.1 The
Mtoto house community was a mechanism by which the church quite liter-
ally mothered two generations of children in the Shrine over a 20-year period.
Some have argued that this communal mothering structure freed women of
the primary responsibility of child rearing thus enabling them to assume roles
that have been traditionally understood as masculine (i.e. group leaders, min-
isters, and Maccabees—a Holy Order in charge of security). Was this a femi-
nist move? And if so, what were the consequences of such a structure? How
did the children feel about being raised in such a structure? This chapter seeks
to examine the ways in which womanhood and motherhood are manifest in
the lives of Black women members of the Shrine of the Black Madonna. My
goal is to interrogate the concept of the Black Madonna through an examina-
tion of what womanhood and motherhood mean to Black women who have
been committed members of this church for at least 20 years. In so doing, I
allow them to speak for themselves about what the Black Madonna means as
longtime members of the Shrines of the Black Madonna.
In Fighting Words, Black feminist sociologist Patricia Hills Collins offers
a gendered analysis of Black Nationalist ideology and Afrocentricism. She
maintains that the concept of nationhood within Black Nationalist rheto-
ric is rooted in the notion of racial solidarity “grounded in the distinctive
notion of the Black community. Race became family, racial family meant
community, and Black community symbolized the ‘imagined commu-
nity’ of nation.”2 Thus it is common to incorporate the term “brother”
in reference to Black men in this community and “sister” in reference to
Black women. Collins makes clear that key ideas about gender framed
subsequent assumptions about Afrocentrism/Black Nationalism. “They
are the importance attached to controlling Black women’s reproduction
and sexuality; the significance of Black mothers in passing on Black cul-
ture; the notion of complementary gender roles as points of departure
in constructing Black masculinity and Black femininity; and the symbolic
association of Black women with the nation.”3
THE BLACK MADONNA AND THE ROLE OF WOMEN 119
In analyzing the role of women and constructions of motherhood in

the Shrines of the Black Madonna, it seems the church both conformed
to and traversed gendered constructions of Afrocentric/Black Nationalist
ideology as defined by Collins. Some of the women interviewed discuss
ways in which their reproduction and sexuality were controlled. And it
is clear that the Black Madonna functions as a symbolic association of
Black women with the community, or the growing Black nation. In this
way, the Black Madonna served as a sociological rather than a theological
construct. She represents the church, or the nation itself, whose responsi-
bility it is to cultivate Black Messiahs, both males and females. Communal
living and communal responsibility became the hallmarks of a movement
devoted to nurturing and developing both adults and child members. The
idea of the church as mother is particularly poignant when considering the
communal structure for child rearing, Mtoto House.
For 20 years, the children of full-time members of the Shrine of the
Black Madonna were not raised by their individual parents but partici-
pated in a structure of shared child rearing. Children would go to pub-
lic school during the day, but would spend evenings and overnight with
other children, divided by age groups, in houses, or apartments, run by a
house parent, another full-time member. Thus, the church quite literally
raised the children of full-time members. Did this structure enable the
Shrine community to traverse the notion of complementary gender roles,
which is also a feature of Black Nationalist ideology? Since women were
traditionally saddled with the responsibilities of child care and the house-
hold, to what extent did Mtoto House create a structure through which
women could assume roles that might have otherwise been reserved for
men or subsumed within constructions of Black masculinity? Some of the
women interviewed have been preachers, group leaders, ministers, and
Bible class instructors. Did Mtoto House enable a gender-neutral concep-
tion of devoted participation in the Black nation or were women, even
with the time to pursue and encroach on male space, still made to conform
to a masculinist conception of leadership? And how has the gendered reali-
ties of this church culture changed now that Mtoto House is no longer in
practice? Have complementary gender roles reemerged? The reader might
consider these questions are these women speak their truths.
In 1970, The Shrine of Black Madonna as the Black Christian
Nationalist movement began a period of expansion to other cities in the
USA. This required a cadre of full-time members willing to devote their
lives to the Nation and “the struggle” and go wherever they were asked
by Albert Cleage Jr., the presiding Bishop of the church. Particular cadres
120 V.M. THOMAS
left Detroit and eventually founded churches in Atlanta, Georgia, Houston,

Texas, and Kalamazoo, Michigan, among other locations. Over time, all
regions closed except Detroit, Atlanta, and Houston (the church added a
region in Calhoun Falls, South Carolina—The Beulah Land farm). These
remaining regions are classified as the central region (Detroit, Michigan),
the southern region (Atlanta, Georgia), and the southwest region
(Houston, Texas). As these women speak, the reader should keep in mind
that they represent women from various regions which might account
for subtle differences in their gendered experiences. For example, does
Texas, in the Bible belt, constitute an environment that is more staunchly
patriarchal than urban Detroit and did this impact gendered experiences
within those regions? It should also be noted that members of the cadre
lived on a communally constituted budget based on shared incomes and
fundraising mechanisms instituted to support full-time commitment to
Nation building. The necessity to raise capital was in fact one factor that
contributed to the need for the communal child-rearing structure.
MAIA
Maia joined the church in 1980. She is the chief information officer and
a former manager of the Shrines of the Black Madonna Cultural Center
and Bookstore in Atlanta. She speaks of her experiences and those shared
by others.
We were young. We lived in a communal setting. We believed in libera-
tion. We dropped everything, traveled across the country to begin new
churches. We were led by Rev. Albert B. Cleage, who realized he had hun-
dreds of young people in his church and had to devise a program to keep
us focused, challenged and engaged. Reverend Cleage was unique in his
vision and openness to women as leaders. He saw potential in everyone,
regardless of gender.
In the 1980s we became more spiritual, less “revolutionary.” Were
women finally allowed to show their softer side? Could we lower the Black
power fist and maybe hug ourselves and others. Could we openly express a
desire to marry and raise a family? For some women, then in their late 20s
or early 30s, motherhood became more important. And some believed
they had to choose, become a mother, cuddle your Black Messiah, or drop
your child in a bulrush basket as did Jochebed, the mother of Moses, and
allow someone else to raise him or her. Some women chose motherhood,
and stepped down from leadership levels of the church. Others chose dif-
ferently, and perhaps to this day wonder if they made the right decision.
To care for the children, the church established a communal system for
raising children. Women and men, not necessarily birthparents, became
house parents, freeing mothers to continue with “the struggle.” Did these
women see their child’s first step? I didn’t. Did they hear his or her first
words? Not I. Did they wrestle with potty training? Breast feed at will?
Tickle chubby toes, kiss skinned knees, read bedtime stories? Not always,
some would say rarely. Did sisters want to? Most assuredly, but so did
women in the working world. Moms who had to drop their kids off at day
cares and hoped they were being taught and cared for and not left in the
crib to stare in the air. At least in the nation we knew our children were
loved, educated and immersed in Christian values. We waved at them,
hugged them, and anxiously waited when we could spend time with them,
as did moms in the outside world who juggled family and jobs. We knew
those caring for our children held the same values as we did and loved
them as deeply as we did.
As adults, we sat in the meetings at the same table as the men. Some
of us had no trouble expressing our thoughts or going toe to toe; others
grew weary of crude remarks, the constant battle, the loudest voice win-
ning. We didn’t speak up when we should have, or we spoke as callously
as they, wondering if this was the only way to be heard. Was I being silly,
sensitive? Did I dare cry or let my emotions lead? No, too risky. We did
not want to be marked as being a “woman.” As if that were bad, as if the
Madonna were a mask, as if truly men ruled here as in the wider culture.
Some of us donned hobnailed boots and took on a swagger. And we cor-
rected our fellow sisters, those whom we saw as “weak,” those who gave
the Black Madonna a bad name. Can’t I lead without acting like a man? Is
there room for compassion and quiet strength?
Many of us who joined in the 70s are in our 60s, now. We have chil-
dren, grandchildren. Some of us altered our total commitment to com-
plete college, focus on family, chase dreams, and follow careers. Some of
us made the church our career. It is where we spend 80 percent or more or
our time. We looked at the Black Madonna in our mature years and close
our eyes to hold back tears. We’ve talked to her, even when we couldn’t
talk to Jesus. We know what she knows, that life can be difficult for Black
women. We find ourselves holding babies, loving them, but wondering if
we could ever hold true positions of power. At this, the 50th anniversary
of the unveiling of the Black Madonna and Child, we are still wonder-
ing if we will ever wear the title “pastor,” or if there will ever be a “Holy
Matriarch?”
122 V.M. THOMAS
Have women’s voices been heard in this church? Are we more than the
silent, resilient, go it alone if we must Black women who embrace a child
and guide a nation? Can I speak? Will I be heard? Can I say “no?” Can I
be sassy, classy, brilliant, naïve, mothering, powerful, determined, stub-
born, giving, disagreeable, caring and still be a Black Madonna? Can I be
Martha and Mary? Can I be Deborah and Miriam? Can I be more than a
chancel mural?
JENDAI
Jendai is a leader in the church, and is one of the founding members of the
Shrines of the Black Madonna church in Atlanta.
I joined in 1973. To me the Shrine of the Black Madonna affirmed what my

grandmother told me when I was a child. I asked her what Jesus looked like.
She pointed to my feet and said, “He had feet like bronze.” She touched
my hair and said, “He had hair like lamb’s wool.” I explain the name of
the church this way: The Black Madonna is a Black woman, the mother
of Jesus. I tell people we are unashamed of our blackness and unashamed of
being Christian. Jesus was born of an African woman and a Black man. It’s
that simple.
She looks back on her tenure, the role of women, the conversations about
women and assesses the good and the bad.
As a womanist, as a champion of women, I believe a woman’s role would be

without boundaries. I didn’t need the church to define me or grant a role
for me. I was going to do what I was going to do. In my family household,
women had no barriers. I was drawn to the church because of the word
Black, not so much the word Madonna. At that time “Black” was enough. I
saw a flier from the church. On the flier was a woman in long dress, big afro
and an ankh, and I was curious.
This has been a religious experience. I saw women in leadership posi-
tions in the church—as group leaders and ministers—but not ultimately in
charge. There were no female lead pastors or presiding bishops. Not even
today.
Jendai recalls that discussions about women that were not always flat-
tering. She notes men felt they didn’t have to temper their conversation in
the presence of sisters.
At times I got tired of being the firebrand or bringing up sensitive topics.

I’d look to the younger women, those who had completed seminary, and
often they would say nothing. I was very disappointed that they would not
speak up.
On paper we revered Black women. On the human dynamic, we failed
in some regards. Jaramogi Abebe Agyeman (A.K.A Rev. Albert. B. Cleage),
tried, but it didn’t translate to all regions. Our personal relationships were
not what they should have been. We were all young and in the vein of
the sexual healing–the period (1970s and 1980s) we engaged in misguided
attempts to disregard tradition. We viewed things and managed relation-
ships as temporary. Intimate relationships changed. Marriages were short-
lived. Others determined the right time for motherhood. I didn’t like that.
No one should decide that for anyone! We didn’t revere women as much as
we could have or should have. There were not enough building blocks of
self esteem, no matter how educated you were. You still didn’t feel “good
enough”.
For a short time, our liturgy did embrace the Black Madonna. In our
group, Nzinga, we prayed in the name of Mary, pretty much as is done in
the Catholic Church. But it was never embraced church wide. People began
to ask, “What are we, Catholic or something?”We didn’t do everything
right, but we were in the forefront. Because of us, it is now socially accept-
able to see Black images of the Divine, Black Christmas cards, paintings of
Black disciples, a Black Christ. That’s our contribution.
DEBORAH
Deborah is an ordained minister who has served in each region, yet served
the majority of her years in Houston, Texas. She is well respected and
although not as active, remains beloved and faithful. Hers has not been an
easy path. Coming of age under the Shrine’s founder, she was a contem-
porary of its current leader and did not always agree with his leadership
style. She continued her education, worked professionally, married, and
had a child. After nearly 30 years, she resigned her leadership position, but
holds membership in the church.
I joined because Black women at the church seemed so together. Young

Black women had a voice. We were group leaders, missionaries for the
church, organizers, and administrators.
We had roles but men still had the dominant roles. Men were the deci-
sion makers. There were meetings after the meetings (of which I didn’t
124 V.M. THOMAS
know about until later), where the final decisions were made or where talk
continued. There came a time when we openly expressed the need for men
to have more leadership roles. We saw other “intelligent, good looking
men” leading other churches and pushed for the same.
It was said of my region, “We need to have men at the forefront. The
church is not growing because women are running things.” That was the
perception. The brothers went to Yale Divinity School. A few sisters went
to seminary but most of those who went were men. You would find the
sisters working with the youth or in the kitchen. At one conference, it was
determined that no one was going to be ordained unless more men were
going to be ordained.
Deborah says it was difficult being a mother—a parent—in the church.

Many sisters didn’t experience the opportunity to bond with their children
because they were raised in Mtoto House. Breast feeding was not encour-
aged. Women stood on their feet long hours well into their pregnancy.
Women didn’t own their reproductive rights. If a woman was a full-time
member, living within the communal church structure, bringing a child
into the world was not her decision. Parenthood came second, mother-
hood came second. The struggle came first.
I often silenced my voice. Because I spoke up so often, I was branded. I

could see the reaction: “Oh, there she goes again.” And then there were
times I should have spoken up … for other women in the church … but I
didn’t, and that bothers me to this day. When I became a mother, I under-
stood what sisters were going through, trying to be a mother and a revolu-
tionary, and sometimes having to choose one over the other.
I believe the church meant well. I believe we wanted to uplift the Black
woman, but in reality, in the day-to-day, we could have done better. Women
had to make difficult decisions. It wasn’t always easy. It wasn’t always fair.
REHEMA
Rehema joined in August 1965. She holds a wealth of memories and
knowledge. She sat in meetings with the founder and saw young women
develop into leadership.
When I joined, the church wasn’t the Shrine of the Black Madonna. It was
Central Congregational Church of Christ. I was there before the changes
started coming around. I worked on the committee for the painting of the
Black Madonna with quite a few sisters and some brothers as well. We gave
money, held fashions shows, and different Black events for the commission
of the painting. I was a part of the whole thing.
She understands the impact of the image of the Black Madonna, how it
changed her and why it is so powerful. That’s why the image had to be
authentic. It had to be African. She had to be powerfully Black.
When you think about what you’ve been taught about who Jesus was and
to learn that all that was false, and you have evidence to back it up. To show
that Jesus’ mother was not a white woman. She was a Black woman. It’s
hard to explain. It’s a different kind of energy and a different kind of feeling
you get knowing that you have a chance to really let the world see the truth.
Jaramogi (Cleage) spoke with the painter of how she would look. That was
not the first copy of the Madonna. The first copy was modeled by someone
with real keen features. She was Black, but she had real keen features. Some
of the members thought she did not completely represent Black women as a
whole. If you look at her, everybody would think Black women had to have
a straight nose, keen features, something like that. So he went back and
redid it in terms of incorporating Black women as a whole. What is there
now is not the first. That was the second portrait.
Rehema is loyal to the church and to the memory of the founder.
Women’s role as far as I know was not different from the men’s. Jaramogi
ordained women as much as he ordained men. All had to go through train-
ing, and all had to learn to preach. You get to go on the pulpit and preach.
Some women did not want to be preachers. They wanted other roles in the
church, including myself. I preached, but I never wanted to be a preacher.
I see myself doing other things. Working with groups is a passion for me.
That’s where I put my energy. Women could do whatever they had the abil-
ity to do.
If women felt their voices were not heard, Rehema didn’t hear about it or
experience it. At the time that decisions were made, she and other women
were sitting right there in the meetings.
I’ve never seen it that way, that women weren’t heard, not in the Central
Region. As a matter of fact, it seems like lot of the important responsibilities
in terms of running the church, women had those. I can only speak of the
Central Region. I can’t speak for the other Shrines.
126 V.M. THOMAS
Rehema later expressed her views on motherhood.
That came up later on. One thing that was important to us was that children
would be taken care of, if you were doing something else. That was devel-
oped in terms of Alkebulan (the church youth program), after Alkebulan
then there was Mtoto House. I never thought my children were not being
cared for. The children had problems with it though. They never said that
much at the time. But when they were older, they said they felt their par-
ents were not around enough for them. They felt they were raised by other
sisters. At the time, we didn’t see it that way, but it did come up after the
kids got older.
Unlike some younger women who joined later, Rehema disagrees that
women had to be tough or masculine to survive or to be taken seriously.
Everybody has to have his or her own personality. I didn’t see that you
had to be tough. Being a group leader, we were taught the foundation of
the church was groups. If you don’t have strong groups, you don’t have a
strong congregation. We had brothers as group leaders but the majority of
group leaders in the Central Region were women. You developed your way
with what you were taught.
Now, some brothers did have trouble taking orders from women. You’d
have to be real careful about the way you talked to them or approached
them. Once you became confident in what you were doing, that became
different. You were not driven by your ego, but your spirituality.
Rehema concluded with final words regarding Mtoto House.
At that time I didn’t see it, but this time around we would set up the Mtoto
House differently. The parents could have been more involved than just
having a certain group of sisters who take care of the children. It was fash-
ioned off the Kibbutz in Israel so they could lead after the parents got older.
Those children had more commitment than our children. It didn’t work as
well as we thought it would. If I had to do something different, that’s what
I would have done different.
MAXINE
Maxine joined as a teenager. She has spent her adult life in the church,
grew up with many of the leaders and has served in just about every capac-
ity—except that of pastor.
I have asked, ‘Why not me?’ And people have asked me, ‘Why aren’t you
the pastor?’ Maxine continues, “I find myself thinking, if I had been male, I
would have been by now. It’s an internal struggle. I ask myself is this true or
it this just my particular thought?
Maxine, like many sisters in the church, was raised in a traditional Baptist
church. In her Baptist experience, women had assigned roles. They served
on the Mother Board on the Nurse Board, or taught Vacation Bible
School. At the Shrines, she saw women in the pulpit. They were leaders,
not just followers.
It was intriguing. As I advanced in the church, I never felt there was any goal
outside my reach as a woman. It was more my age than gender. As I got
older and was given ministerial duties, I began to feel some limitations. Yet
that may have come more from outside the church than in our own culture.
When I joined, and would invite other people out, they would say, “Oh,
you’re one of those Black Madonnas.” But we didn’t see ourselves as role
models. As a teen or a young adult, you didn’t look at it with the magnitude
you do today.
We’re in the Bible belt and when I would represent the church at the
funeral of family members, I could see the surprised look on their faces
when I processed to the front. I could almost hear a gasp! Their looks said,
“Where is she going? I know she’s not going to the pulpit! Oh yes she is!”
I understood, but I would ignore the stares and keep on walking. I heard a
member of this church say the Black community isn’t ready for women pas-
tors. When I heard that, I wondered if that were true from within.
I’ve never been told I couldn’t do something. I see myself as a servant of
the Lord, and didn’t seek any position within the church. But sometimes I
do ask myself, “Are their limits for women in BCN?” My answer depends on
the time of day, on how I’m feeling and what’s going on inside. I could be a
pastor, but I must be careful of what I ask for. Being a pastor is an immense
responsibility. Am I ready for such a task?
The question of motherhood arises. Maxine offers her opinion. Her chil-
dren were raised in the communal setting. To her it was a blessing.
Motherhood in the church required personal choices. For sisters who were
more active in the church, it left less time for mothering. We had communal
childrearing. There were a group of sisters helping. I didn’t feel as though I
was being denied. I thought this was more ideal. I helped sisters with their
children and they helped me with mine. Babies were with their mothers
128 V.M. THOMAS
when I joined. I never saw it as a church policy where you had to decide that
being committed to the church was more important that rearing your child.
She has seen changes over time, but credits the foundation that Jaramogi
Abebe laid that allowed sisters to reach their potential.
Jaramogi would say that sisters could do anything better than men. Security.
Preaching. He would say that women are more focused. He was a champion
of women. He dispelled any doubts about what women could do. However,
I do think it is time for a female pastor. I think now it would be accepted.
ANGELA
It was her traditional southern Baptist background that grounded her, and
eventually led her to seek elsewhere. She has found the truth in the Shrine
of the Black Madonna. She joined in the early 1990s.
When I visited, I heard everything that was in my head. It answered who we

were and our relationship with God. I visited for a while and then joined.
When I look at the image of the Black Madonna, I think of all Black women
and deeply wish we all knew the power we held as women, as women of
African descent, as mothers of messiahs. I think my first thought or impres-
sion of the Black Madonna, upon seeing depictions of her, was how open
she had to be, how courageous, how steadfast and full of faith.
While the Shrine answered some of her questions, it raised others—such as

why no women were in the highest levels of leadership, or why their ideas
are sometimes dismissed and even why there is so little homage paid to the
Black Madonna, for whom the church is named. Although the church is
named the Shrine of the Black Madonna, Angela notes the church rarely
makes reference to her.
For an institution whose name implies that there must be some major sig-
nificance, relevance, and importance of the Black Madonna, the church has
not done a good job in revering the mother of Jesus. In fact, I have only
on few occasions heard a word spoken of the mother of Jesus. Even when
various women have preached on Mother’s Day, in my experience, they
have only casually mentioned the mother of Jesus while mentioning other
women of the Bible. Women in the church receive their due on Mother’s
Day and, now, during Women’s History Month, and the establishment of a
National Women’s Ministry. Perhaps, the respect of women in the church is
a matter of course, but I cannot say that such reverence is overtly obvious.
Angela, too, had a child in Mtoto House. She acknowledges children were
well cared for, but wished there had been more parental involvement,
more openness to suggestions and individual and unique needs of parent
and child. She and others circumvented rules to meet what they saw as
their child’s needs. It left her feeling guilty. It left her miffed as to why
she had been placed or allowed herself to be placed in a position where
such guilt was experienced. Couldn’t leadership be more open? Why not
change a meeting place to better accommodate women with young chil-
dren? What about different activities for teenagers? Did we not know that
not all children have the same needs; not all mothers and parents have the
need to parent in the same way?
Angela also shared her experiences living on church property (a church-
owned apartment complex) while being in a long-term, committed, same-
gender relationship.
We asked our Confirmation Training Group Leader, just before Rights of

Passage, what the position of the church was [on same gender relation-
ships], before we would go any further into membership. She spoke with
Jaramogi Abebe whose response was, “What does anybody’s sexuality have
to do with the liberation struggle of Black people.” Our relationship has
always been known; we lived in the Missionary Training Institute (MTI);
our daughter lived in Mtoto House. We have never worn our sexuality as a
banner; we have simply lived as a Black family dedicated to liberation. I can
say that has, for the most part, been respected in the Shrines of the Black
Madonna.
MICHELLE
Michelle wishes we had focused on the feminine energy of the Creator
and that we had paid more homage to Mary, the mother of Jesus. Because
the church didn’t, she believes we missed a lot of the mystical and the
unknown.
We need a more balanced approach to the feminine aspect of God. The male
energy still dominates. We lose a lot of the power of feminine energy. We
130 V.M. THOMAS
are trying but usually the female aspect is an aside. We might catch ourselves
and say God, She. But that’s about as far as it goes. The female energy is
intuitive, vase, secretive, mysterious. It focuses less on what you can see. It’s
more in tuned with nature, flow of seasons.
There was a heavy Catholic influence in her background. As a child, she

was of the Catholic faith, so she held the nuns in highest regard.
I admired them for giving their lives to this highest calling. I thought about
being a nun for a long time. I admired their sense of service of working in
rural areas.
When the church began to reflect a more Catholic spirituality, when we

began using the Rosary and reciting the Hail Mary prayer, Michelle felt
at home. It was what she knew and had practiced in her childhood faith.
Saying the prayer was so comforting to me. It shifted my energy. I knew

more was possible when I focused on Mary, on her being a mother and a
follower of Jesus. We could learn a lot if we emphasized women and Mary
more. When I saw the image of the Madonna, I couldn’t take my eyes off
her. She was striking. She had strong features. Strength is the word I would
use to describe her.
Michelle echoes that marriage and motherhood seemed secondary to the

mission of Black liberation. Motherhood was not promoted. It wasn’t dis-
couraged but sisters weren’t given a lot of time to be mothers.
You had your baby and were quickly moved to getting back to assignments.
Spending time with your child was not encouraged. I tried to follow along,
but found myself feeling resentful and rebellious. I didn’t question the way
things were, but I said to myself, if it doesn’t work for me I’ll leave the
church. Soon, I decided to put my child first, no matter what.
Also, relationships were confusing. Who was dating? Who was married?
Who was no longer married? It didn’t seem like a show of affection between
couples was encouraged. Marriage was like the lesser of the sacraments. We
should have had counseling, so we could enter marriage in the right frame
of mind, so we could work on our marriages. We were not very skilled at
keeping marriages intact.
BINAH
Binah has held every leadership role in the church: minister, Shrine
Administrator, finance officer, group leader of children and adults, educa-
tor, youth minister. She soared to the top, but knew something was miss-
ing. She joined in the midst of the Civil Rights Movement, 1971. Binah
is the daughter of a Baptist minister. She became familiar with the church
through her sister, who purchased a copy of the Black Messiah. She read
the book in about three days, and decided to go to the church. On that
particular Sunday, Rev. Albert B. Cleage was preaching. She joined that
morning.
She remembers the chancel mural in Detroit. She describes the Black
Madonna as definitely a dark skin woman with African features. The
woman held a baby in her arms, her baby, a Black baby who represented
Jesus, and he was Black, too.
There was no mistake that she was of African descent. I realized that I had
not been told the truth. I asked my father if he knew people in Bible were
Black, were African. He said he did, but he couldn’t do anything about it.
Binah states firmly that when she joined the church, she didn’t come
empty-handed. She brought skills with her.
There were certain qualities, behaviors and disciplines my parents taught me

and nurtured in me. I had organizational skills, and Jaramogi recognized
them. Reverend Albert Cleage stated that whoever brings their talent and
commitment to the church could be ordained, whether they be male or
female. Not all of them had to preach, not all of them had to be pastors.
The Shrines of the Black Madonna became her family and her home. The
nuclear family structure was not emphasized enough, however.
Responsibilities of church often pulled a husband away from his wife. You
participated in missionary outreach, and on that weekend you were not with
your spouse. There was also a guideline at that time. Within our nation, no
one said you could not have a baby. It was stated you could not have a baby
on the expansion cadre, not until the cadre had become well established.
My experience was I was pregnant with my son. His dad was in Houston,
and he was not there when I had my son. My husband couldn’t get permis-
sion to come back. To me, that was not productive and did not contribute
132 V.M. THOMAS
to the longevity or maintenance of a relationship. I believe we needed coun-

seling and guidance in terms of marriages. It was a prime time for us, being
in our early 20s and late teens. We needed guidance as to what marriage
and matrimony and building a nation were all about, and that was lacking.
Many couples fell out of a relationship, wanting to maintain one but not
knowing how to keep one together. We had a flux of people getting married
and then getting out of that marriage. So that structure would have been
very beneficial to women in the church.
BCN philosophy stated the family was central, but the family was not
central. The mission of building the nation, of acquiring funds for the
church, of expanding the church was number one. Where marriages, where
children fit in, that really needed to be restructured for the spouses and for
the children.
She speaks passionately about educating the children.

Jaramogi told me, “You need to go back to school and take up elemen-
tary education.”
We developed practices and structures. Communal meals, dormitory living,

after school programs, eight-week summer camps, and academic support
such that our children were reading before they went to kindergarten. Many
were reading on the 11th grade level by the third grade. We created rituals,
history lessons so they would have a rounded experience in terms of who
they were. Their connection with God through the Covenant was essential,
allowing them to feel they were responsible to the Covenant by the way they
treated each other.
Our children didn’t understand that. They felt they were being separated
from their parents. They felt abandoned. We did not explore and we were
not equipped to reflect on this. That was a structural problem. It was a lack
of knowledge.
While youth may have felt separated from their parents, they developed
strong ties with each other. Even now, when her grandchildren celebrate
birthdays, she knows they are going to have 60 or 70 people over. They
are her children’s Mtoto House friends and their children. And they are
always there for each other.
As they grew up and became teenagers and young adults, we didn’t make
room for them in the church. There was a vast difference when I came up
young in the church, and when they came up in the church. When they
graduated from high school, they did not have the support to assist them
in the next phase where they could become the leadership. Jaramogi Abebe
passed away. There was no consensus on what the young adults should be
doing.
Binah is no longer a member, but maintains ties and decades-long

friendships.
ANDRETTA
Andretta joined the church in the early 1990s. She is a college graduate
and also graduated from seminary.
There are several challenges to being a woman in the church. It is difficult

to be a woman in the church when you do not ascribe to commonly held
beliefs about how women show up in the world – a nurturing, selfless, self-
sacrificing, and sassy for no reason, prayer warrior who can cook and clean
with the best of them. If you find yourself outside of those ideals, then there
really is no place for you unless you create one, and this usually takes a lot
of pushing boundaries, talks, and time spent at the margins. Women can
speak freely, but that does not necessarily mean what they say will be taken
seriously or even respected in a way that carries any weight. There’s always
the space for talk and the illusion of dialogue, but at the end of the day, the
decision making and power still rested/rests with the men.
JARIBU
When Jaribu was a young child, she joined the church with her mother.
She remembers Rev. Olubayo was her primary caregiver in the nursery
where she was taught to be proud of who she was. Olubayo pulled her first
two teeth and she remembers the excitement she felt upon accomplishing
the feat of spelling her name.
Jaribu is now an adult and has been encouraged to pursue leadership
roles in the church. Men and women have encouraged her to preach and
pray publically. She feels empowered to represent Black women. She has
noticed however that there has not been much church discourse on Mary.
The Black Messiah Jesus is heavily emphasized and Black males by exten-
sion. But other than giving birth to Jesus, who is the Black Madonna really?
134 V.M. THOMAS
Fifty years after Cleage’s historic unveiling there appears to continue to be

mystery surrounding the Madonna and her theological and sociological
role in the context of the Shrines of the Black Madonna.
Maia returns to offer her conclusion:
After purchasing Beulah Land, our 2,600 acre farm and establishing the
Shrine Christian Center in South Carolina, the church placed less emphasis
on its expansion program. We still have full-time missionaries whom we sup-
port. Marriage counseling is available. Marriages last longer. Parents now
take full responsibility for raising their children. We haven’t abandoned our
youth program. We educate our children and children in the community
with the same stellar results. Women strengthen bonds through the wom-
en’s ministry. Yet as one young leader stated, there is still a glass ceiling for
women. Women lead our legal team and our Information Technology min-
istry. Women serve as the National Chief Executive Officer and as National
Chief Information Officer. Sisters continue to preach, pray, lead groups,
work in the finance office, and sit at the tables of decision. Is the Shrines
of the Black Madonna a utopia for Black women? No. But perhaps we will
get there.
NOTES
1. Shelly McIntosh, Mtoto House: Vision to Victory: Raising African American
Children Communally (Maryland: Hamilton Book, 2005).
2. Patricia Hill Collin, Fighting Words: Black Women and the Search for Justice
(Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1998), p. 167.
3. Ibid., p. 169.
CHAPTER 8
Black Power and Black Madonna: Charting

the Aesthetic Influence of Rev. Albert
Cleage, Glanton Dowdell & the Shrine
of the Black Madonna, #1
Melanee Harvey
A version of this chapter was presented at the Smithsonian American Art

Museum’s Fellows Lectures in American Art, at McEnvoy Auditorium,
Smithsonian American Art Museum and National Portrait Gallery,
Washington, DC, Thursday, 8 May 2014.
In a 1967 sermon entitled “An Epistle to Stokely,” Rev. Albert Cleage

Jr. addressed the art historical debate concerning the existence of black
Madonna statues found throughout Europe, by asserting, “Jesus was a
black Messiah born to a black woman. The pictures of the black Madonna
which are all over the world did not all turn black through some mysteri-
ous accident. Portraits of the black Madonna are historic, and today in
many countries they are afraid to take the ancient pictures of the black
Madonna out of storage so that people can see them … because they
feared it might have political implications.”1 This statement exemplifies the
aesthetic perspective Pastor Cleage actively promoted during the 1960s
and 1970s. Furthermore, it marks one aspect of his contribution to the
M. Harvey ()
Art Department, Howard University, Washington, DC, USA

DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54689-0_8
136 M. HARVEY
Black Arts Movement: his success in establishing a Christian icon as visual

symbol for Black Power. During the 1960s, Cleage and the congregation
which would later be renamed the Shrine of the black Madonna, #1, were
active participants on the Midwestern front in dialoging with Black Art
Movement figures such as Amiri Baraka and Elridge Cleaver. Although
Cleage and the Shrine of the black Madonna remain absent from domi-
nant Black Art Movement art historical narratives that typically feature
the Organization of Black American Culture, Faith Ringgold, and Emory
Douglas, it is important to recognize this Detroit community as active
participants in shaping this Black Arts Movement.2 Although Cleage is
recognized as one of the early voices of Black Liberation Theology, he is
rarely recognized for his role in influencing the visual culture of the Black
Arts Movement.
Through sermons, creative collaboration, and artistic patronage, Rev.
Albert Cleage Jr. and the Shrine of the black Madonna, #1, promoted a
Black Power visual program that revolutionized American Christian ico-
nography. In the early months of 1967, Cleage’s aesthetic philosophy was
materialized in the eighteen-by-nine-foot oil on canvas The black Madonna
chancel mural, executed by artist-activist Glanton V. Dowdell and General
George Baker as his assistant (Fig. 8.1).
Interpreting this mural project as a collective vision developed from
Cleage’s aesthetic and theological views, I will argue that this project
served as a catalyst for Black Nationalist art production that would influ-
ence artists, both locally and nationally. The first portion of this chap-
ter will explore the philosophical frameworks behind The black Madonna
chancel mural by examining the lives of the artist and patron, particu-
larly highlighting visual precedents Cleage and Dowdell may have experi-
enced. I will then move to analyzing the cultural work this mural engages
in promoting a Christian icon as a visible symbol of a Black Nationalist
Movement.
A COLLECTIVE VISION: THE BLACK MADONNA CHANCEL

MURAL
The black Madonna chancel mural is the product of a collaborative
effort to create and visualize an empowering racialized Christian icon,
informed by Cleage’s early ruminations on Black Liberation Theology
that would take on symbolic import for the Midwestern iterations of the
Black Power movement. Pastor Cleage and the newly organized Heritage
BLACK POWER AND BLACK MADONNA: CHARTING THE AESTHETIC... 137
Fig. 8.1 Glanton V. Dowdell, black Madonna chancel mural, sanctuary of the
Shrine of the black Madonna, #1, Detroit, 1967, oil on canvas. Photography by
James Ribbron, 2016
138 M. HARVEY
Committee, under the direction of Edward Vaughn, were instrumental in

commissioning, constructing, and circulating the cultural narrative of this
artwork. The oil on canvas mural, depicting the Madonna in traditional
shrouds of cloth in variations of whites and pastel blues, replaced a stained
glass window that featured an image of a pilgrim landing on a rocky New
England shore. The black Madonna’s deep skin, often rendered in black
tones in photographic reproductions, contrasts with lighter colors used
throughout the composition. Black hues are also used to outline the city
behind the Madonna, chromatically linking her and the Christ child to
the Black Nation He will work to liberate. Swaddled in a golden cloth,
the infant Christ is painted in profile and thus visual protected by the
Madonna. An undated photograph included in a 1969 edition of Ebony
magazine, shows the dialog and collaboration of ideas behind this mural,
stemming from the experience of these two men, Pastor Albert Cleage Jr.
and artist-activist Glanton V. Dowdell.3
By the 1960s, Rev. Albert Cleage Jr. had established himself as a leader
in Detroit, dedicated to improving the social condition and public image
of the African American community. Throughout his childhood, he was
involved in church life as a member of the African American congregation,
Plymouth Congregational. In addition to maintaining church obligations,
Cleage began his college education in 1929 at Wayne State University in
Detroit, majoring in sociology and psychology.4 He spent the 1931–1932
academic year at Fisk University which means he may have seen the
renowned Harlem Renaissance artist, Aaron Douglas, painting his library
murals. Although Cleage finished his undergraduate studies over the
course of 13 years, he graduated from Oberlin College where he earned a
Bachelor of Divinity degree with a major in Religious Education.5 While
serving as interim pastor of the interracial San Francisco congregation,
Church for the Fellowship of All Peoples, Cleage developed an interest
in film and visual communication. From 1943 to 1945, he was enrolled
at the University of Southern California’s Cinema Department, where
he pursued a doctorate in Visual Education.6 According to a biographi-
cal timeline published by the Pan African Orthodox Christian Church,
he aimed “to learn how to produce films to reach the masses of black
people with his message of social activism.”7 Cleage’s interest in visual
culture and film developed during a time where several movies featuring
all-African American casts were released, such as Spencer William’s The
Blood of Jesus. Characteristic of mid-twentieth century, widely distributed
“race films,” The Blood of Jesus made a visual argument for the accepted
notion of Christ’s whiteness by featuring repetitive scenes of a faithful

African American Christian demonstrating the visual adoration the image
of Christ requires. Cleage left California disillusioned by his experience
at the Church for the Fellowship of All People and equipped with a new
language of visual communication that would frame his art activities of
the 1960s.
In November 1966, Pastor Cleage called for the formation of The
Heritage Committee at Central Congregational United Church of Christ
(would later be renamed Shrine of the black Madonna, #1). This group
was created to address “a need to recapture record and relate the history
and culture of black people in a positive manner.”8 In the 1968 draft of
the membership text, Welcome to the Black Nation!: A Guide for Members
of Central United Church of Christ, The Shrine of the black Madonna, the
black Madonna chancel mural project is cited as the inaugural task of the
committee. In this document, Committee Chairman, Edward Vaughn
writes,
We have been told and shown through Italian Renaissance painters that
Jesus was Aryan with blonde hair and blue eyes. We were also led to believe
that Christianity called on black people to do nothing about oppression…
We reject these distorted teachings. Therefore, the Heritage Committee has
embarked on the noble task of setting the record straight. That is showing
the real meaning of our religion. Our first project was to commission a black
artist to paint a picture of Mary, the mother of Jesus—our black Madonna.
We have also placed pictures of famous black heroes in the Fellowship Hall
and Nursery.9
This radical declaration situates this mural in a larger art historical dis-
course concerning the denial of African presence in Western Christian
art. Furthermore, this inaugural commission offers an example of African
Americans participating as a communal body in the art production process.
This act and the circulation of the history of this artwork is an empower-
ing example of how a community can actively redefine their visual identity.
Detroit-born artist-activist Glanton V. Dowdell received the commis-
sion to paint a large-scale mural in the Shrine of the black Madonna, #1,
sanctuary at the age of 44. The majority of his biographical facts come
from newspaper articles as well as Detroit Police and Federal Bureau of
Investigation observation records as very few art historians have engaged
his art production beyond bibliographic citation. Press coverage of Dowdell
begins in the late 1950s, presenting him as a prison artist. By the 1970s,
140 M. HARVEY
both the Detroit Free Press and national African American media outlets
such as Jet magazine covered the USA’s extradition efforts to retrieve him
from Stockholm, Sweden, where he sought political asylum after painting
the mural. In Dowdell’s accounts of his teenage years, he recalls, “When
I was 16[…] I was sent to reform school for armed robbery. I was in
the low income bracket and full of the devil.”10 In this newspaper article,
where this recollection was published, the unidentified writer then goes
on to narrate Dowdell’s life: “Instead of being reformed, however, he
later plunged deeper in trouble and was sent to prison.”11 In fact, Dowdell
served twelve years and ten months in Michigan’s Jackson State Prison
for what one newspaper account described as “a slaying growing out of a
street argument.”12 While incarcerated, Glanton Dowdell was introduced
to oil painting and gained a criticality that led him toward activism.13
A few years before his release, Dowdell earned honorable mention in
the 1958 state-wide juried exhibition, “Michigan Artists Show” for one
of his two accepted submissions, entitled, Southeast Corner of My Cell.14
When asked about this artwork during an interview, Dowdell offered
this interpretation of this painting: “That picture was probably the most
damaging indictment of prison life that ever went out of [that prison]…
The critics fully understood the message of futility.”15 In December 1959,
The Pittsburgh Courier featured the artist in an article entitled, “Glanton
Dowdell… Artist and Ten-Year Prisoner!” This article illustrates how his
ideas concerning visual expression and social consciousness coalesced for
the artist. Explaining his views on the role of the artist in society, Dowdell
reflects:
The artist as a mutation on the social body has no will. His function is
to absorb, synthesize and eject. The compulsion to place within the range
of perception the heretofore unperceived is almost libidinal in nature—the
ultimate purpose of which is to further the evolutionary process… I think
each man having suffered long is entitled to a message to future generations.
My function then is to send that message. Perhaps, I remember too well the
prayers of a nine-year-old boy who looked at empty skies and begged, “Help
us, please, God, sir.”16
At this point of my research, this is one of the few written accounts I have
found of Dowdell referring to himself as an artist and outlining his artis-
tic philosophy. Considering this position, Dowdell had a strong interest
in formulating a visual vocabulary that would communicate ideas about
improving humanity’s plight.
Following his release in 1962, Glanton Dowdell pursued several outlets

that allowed him to contribute his art and social activist skills toward causes
targeted at the massed of black workers in Detroit. By 1966, Glanton
Dowdell is listed as a member of the League of Black Revolutionary
Workers and opens his own art exhibition space, the Easel Gallery.17 In
fact, that same year, he received the Trade Union Leadership Council
Award for Excellence in Art, signaling the community’s recognition of his
visual activism.18 In the fall, Dowdell and fellow activist General George
Baker were arrested by police on a FBI tip that they were carrying several
weapons, including a loaded 1.45 Caliber Colt Auto pistol.19 The follow-
ing year as he waited for sentencing, Dowdell began The black Madonna
mural project with General George Baker as his assistant. During this
period, Dowdell was an activist peer of Pastor Albert Cleage as they were
elected co-chair of Citywide Citizen Action Committee.20 After being sen-
tenced to five years probation, Dowdell and other black activists continued
to be intensely monitored by the Detroit Police and the Federal Bureau
of Investigation. Fearing government-fabricated forgery charges and an
assassination attempt, Dowdell fled the USA for Stockholm, Sweden, in
1970, where he lived the remainder of his life as an activist working toward
the mission of the League of Black Revolutionary Workers.21
During the 1950s and 1960s, Glanton Dowdell developed a visual
vocabulary that employed figuration and explorations in color and value as
a means to critically engage and confront the visual mishistories embedded
in American Christian visual culture. All newspaper entries on the artist,
state that he studied at Detroit’s Society of Arts and Craft.22 In 1959, it
was reported that “some 35 [of his] paintings were owned privately” and
included in the collection of a local Detroit gallery, the Grand River Art
Gallery.23 The Pittsburgh Courier feature on the artist offered a rich descrip-
tion of his body of work at the close of the 1950s. In addition to describing
the prison imagery Dowdell was recognized for, the author offered this
description of his painting depicting a lynching: “Here he could, but does
not, make the picture’s contents gory and brutal. But Dowdell intricately
displays the stark, bare tree; on it hangs a man; a little boy has climbed the
tree to cut the rope, two black figures stand below holding a sheet to catch
the body. By the tree is a cluster of three people, perhaps a mother, wife
and child, their heads in sorrow.”24 Although no illustration was included,
this description reveals the artist’s interest in design and composition and
also identifies religious and familial subjects as embodied in the mother
and child, as a minor motif in his work. An undated newspaper article on
142 M. HARVEY
Dowdell included in the Black Power Movement Collection microfilm

reveals photographs that show his explorations in portraiture and Negro
types.25 The detail of a composition described in the caption as a repre-
sentation of an Arab woman seems to be consistent with the tradition
of Negro types promoted by African American artists and art historians
such as James A. Porter.26 In the aforementioned Dowdell composition,
a shrouded woman in rendered in a deep tenebristic tones that allow dark
hues to dominate the palette. This artwork also suggests the black female
figure served as an iconic symbol across his body of art. Finally, this image
is evidence of Dowdell refining the formal characteristics such as color
and tonal value; design elements that would come to define The black
Madonna mural.
The aesthetic development of The black Madonna mural is evident in
the design stages. A photograph of a sketch aptly titled “The Spacial Face
of God Memory (a crude replica)” is included among the archival pho-
tographs of Dowdell painting the mural. The artist and/or author of this
document are/is not indicated on the object or in the record. In this
drawing, possibly authored by Cleage or Dowdell, the divine is visually
represented by an abstracted dark human, mask-like face that is bilaterally
organized as a site of thought and a site of communication. The form is
also designed according to light and value. The forehead eyes and nose
are highlighted with a lighter gray shading. The majority of the facial form
is comprised of a darker gray that obscured sketch details around the cir-
cular void which represents the mouth. The upper portion of the form is
described in terms of light and space. The annotation states, “a front light
was physically visible more in the upper part of space…being God’s con-
sciousness—energy concentrations.”27 In the mural, the intellectual com-
ponent is conveyed though the faint placement of white and blue hues
that creates a luminous effect, further emphasizing the divine pair. In the
drawing, an arrow points to where the mouth would be and describes the
area as a space vacuum, 12 blocks in circumference. This infinite voided
is labeled “Soul Consciousness.” What separates these two regions—the
brain and the mouth—are the eyes. In the sketch, one arrow points to the
eyes and an additional arrow directs the viewer’s attention to the space in
between the eyes where intellectual capacities are housed. These points of
vision, intellect, and perception are used as an opportunity to articulate
facial distinctions of the Divine. It reads: “The features of God were visible
as lighted outlines of contrast within black physical space vacume’s begin-
ning of soul-consciousness manifestation.”28 This document explicitly
states how light, spatial voids and tonal contrast functions to convey God
as a figure of infinite consciousness. Furthermore, this design aesthetically
and formally corresponds with the large-scale chancel mural in the Shrine
of the black Madonna, #1.
I believe this interpretive sketch, characterized by a flattening of form
articulated though tonal value variations, guided the artist’s rendering of
a young mother from the local neighborhood. In Rev. Albert Cleage’s
papers at the University of Michigan’s Bentley Library, this portrait of the
mural’s model, Rose Waldon, is filed alongside the first newspaper article
on the commission. The three-quarter length photographic portrait pres-
ents Waldon, gazing upward, maximizing the almond-like shape of her
eyes. The light emphasizes the strong sharp line of her nose, balanced by
the horizontal orientation of her mouth. The sitter wears a tooth hound
pattern jacket, spherical hanging earrings, and a shortly cropped afro. It is
unclear whether this photograph was taken for Dowdell to paint from or
if it was captured for promotion purposes by a Detroit Free Press photo-
journalist. This photograph of Rose Waldon demonstrates an attention to
the ability of light and value to convey the depth and spectrum of African
American skin tones. In The Detroit Free Press article, Dowdell contextual-
izes this mural in his personal experiences, stating, “[The black Madonna
mural] is me…I can’t divorce the Madonna from black women. I don’t
think that any of the experiences of the Madonna were more poignant
or dramatic than those of any Negro Mother.”29 The artist’s reference to
Negro mother signals an iconography prominent in the history of African
American art. Although Marcus Garvey commissioned portraits of the
black Madonna and the Black Man of Sorrows, those original artworks
have not been located.30 In 1941, Opportunity published James Allen
Latimer’s 1930s photograph, Madonna and Child, on the cover of the
widely circulated periodical.31
By the 1950s, black artists such as Selma Burke featured mother child
iconography in their oeuvre.32 Burke’s untitled painted red oak statue,
which stands about 47 inches tall, depicts a mother clutching a nude
child to her chest. Whereas the mother’s face remains fully visible, the
child’s face is only partially in view. This iconography of the protective
mother, guarding her child directly informs Dowdell’s black Madonna
design. It is important to consider this imagery in the context of pub-
licized instances of African American mothers advocating for justice for
children. From the mothers of the Scottsboro Boys from the 1930s to
Mamie Till in the 1950s, the visible images of black mothers confronting
144 M. HARVEY
social injustice represented numerous local instances. African American

artists documented this experience in their art. Five years before the black
Madonna chancel mural was painted, Negro Digest published a repro-
duction of Florence Pate Sampson’s large-scale sculpture, Yom.33 The
sculpture, described as “an African Madonna” in the caption, may have
influenced Dowdell.34 Sampson’s Yom represents Mary, nude and with
child, evoking the art historical tradition of fertility figures. The artist puts
forth a strong precedent for the rendering of a voluminous, illuminated
yet tonally deep black Madonna with imposing scale.
MAKING THE BLACK MADONNA VISIBLE: CRITICAL

RECEPTION AND THE CIRCULATION OF THE IMAGE
On Easter Sunday, 26 March 1967, The black Madonna mural was unveiled.
Pastor Albert Cleage delivered a sermon entitled “The Resurrection of a
Nation.” He opened the sermon by referring to the mural as a “visual
sermon” that represents the “historic truth” of Christ’s experience as a
black man fighting oppression. Using Dowdell’s mural as a point of depar-
ture for describing the visual potential of representing the black Messiah,
Cleage states,
On either side of the black Madonna, I would like to see a picture of Jesus,
done by a black artist. I would like one to be of the Crucifixion with the
white Romans at the feet of the black Messiah, the jeers and mockery upon
their faces and the hatred in their eyes. Only a black artist could paint that
picture. On the other side, I would like to see a picture of Jesus driving
the money changers out of the Temple, a powerful black man supplanting
the weak little mamby pamby white Jesus. The money changers would be
depicted just as they were, Uncle Toms, exploiting their own people with
the connivance and support of the white Gentile oppressors.35
Reinforcing the act of envisioning and materializing empowering images

of African Americans, Cleage illustrates the critical nature required when
encountering images of African Americans in American popular culture.
After recalling his emotional childhood response to an encounter with
a lynching photograph in the Crisis, Cleage drew a direct correlation
between images and self-perception.36
This sermon which complimented this congregation’s “visual ser-
mon” activated this space as the home of a new aesthetic movement that
correctively reinterpreted a spiritual legacy informed by Black Liberation
Theology. Cleage asserts,
So, as we unveil our black Madonna, it symbolizes for us an important

accomplishment. We now understand that Christianity is our religion, that
Israel was a Black Nation. Go back and read your own history in Dubois’
book, The World & Africa. All of the people in that part of the world were
black… We issue a call to all black churches. Put down this white Jesus who
has been tearing you to pieces… Remember that we are worshipping a Black
Jesus who was a black Messiah. Certainly God must be black if he created
us in his own image.37
Stemming from Cleage’s desire to correct art historical assumptions con-

cerning the racial representation of Christian iconography, he promoted
critical cultural engagement by encouraging art patronage.
Pastor Albert Cleage Jr. and the Heritage Committee ensured the cre-
ation of this mural was highly publicized in the press. In addition to a
brief announcement in the Negro Digest, in the weeks leading up to the
unveiling, The Detroit Free Press featured a photograph of the artist on a
ladder next to the mural in progress, thus inaugurating a photographic
circulation of the artwork that would persist through the 1970s (Fig. 8.2).
In this photograph, the use of light to express facial characteristics
is similar to that in his 1950s (Untitled) Arab Woman composition.
Inverting the approach of sketching an image out of a dark, void space,
Dowdell uses two shades of white to frame the face of Madonna. The
artists renders the Madonna’s face, hands, and Christ child as dark voids,
thus bearing compositional similarities to the representation of God
found in the Shrine of the black Madonna archives. The compositional
approach to rendering the Madonna and Child characterized by two fig-
ures merged into a stable pyramidal form demonstrates Dowdell’s famil-
iarity with a prevalent motif in the history of Western art.38 Hovering over
a stony shore, a conceptual reference to terrain represented in the preced-
ing stained glass window, Dowdell’s monumental icon is presented in
an imposing scale which shows little regard for scientific naturalistic per-
spective systems (Fig. 8.1). In the same way that Pre-Italian Renaissance
Christian iconography was concerned with presenting symbolic visual
details of Christian icons, Dowdell uses the black Madonna’s body, spe-
cifically his variation of dark tones to represent the spectrum of African
American appearance, visualizing the slogan “Black is Beautiful.”
Glanton Dowdell’s chancel mural engages two artistic precedents in
twentieth-century American mural traditions: the murals of Aaron Douglas
and Diego Rivera. By the 1970s, Aaron Douglas was renowned for his
modern style, of fracturing of color, and value to convey light. It is plau-
sible that Pastor Albert Cleage could have encountered Aaron Douglas’s
146 M. HARVEY
Fig. 8.2 Glanton V. Dowdell, detail of black Madonna chancel mural, sanctuary
of the Shrine of the black Madonna, #1, Detroit, 1967, oil on canvas. Photography
by James Ribbron, 2016
murals at Fisk University completed during his studies at Fisk University.

The other mural that may have informed Dowdell’s Madonna is Diego
Rivera’s Detroit Industry frescos, completed in 1931–1932. Considering
the labor iconography and the modernist nod to representing the indig-
enous presence in American industry, Dowdell may have been inclined
to see the mural cycle in person or in reproductions. Evoking the image
of divine figures in the upper register of Rivera’s Detroit Industry (north
wall), The Detroit Free Press debut article described The black Madonna
as a “weary Earth mother, protecting a young child in her arms.”39 The
reception of The black Madonna mural acknowledged iconographic simi-
larities of Detroit’s large-scale brown and black maternal icons.
The aesthetic influence and cultural work of this mural can be seen in
the circulation of reproductions found in local and national press cover-
age. Cleage and the Heritage Committee orchestrated the campaign to
ensure The black Madonna mural would remain visible and present in
symbolic terrain during the tumultuous years of the late 1960s and early
1970s. Edward Vaughn, head of the Heritage Committee, arranged for
The Shrine of the black Madonna, #1 to serve as host to the first and
second annual Black Arts Convention of 1966 and 1967.40 The Negro
Digest reported on the Second Black Arts Festival of 1967 and included
a photographic reproduction of the mural.41 In the years following the
unveiling, the Heritage Committee would capitalize on the potential

of visually proselytizing for the Black Nation by selling color Christmas
Cards that featured a photograph of the pulpit and the chancel mural with
a Christian greeting promoting the Black Nation.42
In November 1968, local Detroit artist DeVon Cunningham’s Black
Christ mural cycle in St. Cecilia’s Catholic Church in Detroit was completed.
Although Cunningham claims he influenced Dowdell’s black Madonna,
Glanton Dowdell’s biographical chronology does not support that claim,
considering Cunningham’s mural was dedicated almost 20 months after
The black Madonna.43 The same month that Cunningham’s mural was
unveiled, The New York Times featured Cleage and the black Madonna
mural in the first of several articles. In the photograph that accompanied
the article, Pastor Cleage stands in the pews diagonally parallel to the
mural. Reinforcing the direct gaze of the mural, Cleage leans forward,
assertively looking ahead at the photographer and viewer. The pairing of
the black Madonna mural and Cleage ushered in a formula of male activ-
ists standing before the black Christian icons. Rev. Albert Cleage, Glanton
Dowdell, and later LeRoi Amiri Baraka would be photographed along-
side the mural.44 The cultural significance of this project may have also
influenced Midwestern muralist William Walker’s decision to include Rev.
Albert Cleage Jr. in Chicago’s Wall of Respect, painted on the side of Grace
Episcopal Church, during late spring through the summer of 1967.45
The circulation of the black Madonna mural in the New York Times may
have also influenced artists interested in Black Liberation. For instance,
in 1969, Romare Bearden, one of the leading African American artists in
New York during the second half of the twentieth century, completed his
Madonna and Child¸ collage, representing the pair with brown skin and
the traditional compositional features.46
The African American press was particularly instrumental in circulating
the image of The black Madonna chancel mural. The March 1969 edition of
Ebony magazine, entitled, “Quest for Black Christ” features photographs
of the mural and documentation of the design stages.47The article closes
with a photograph that shows Cleage as Black Arts patron and aesthetic
collaborator as he discusses preliminary sketches of the monumental figure
with the artist.48 This same photograph, introduced a national audience to
Glanton Dowdell as one of the artist shaping black Christian iconography.
In fact, he is the only artist whose portrait is reproduced in this article.
That fall, the August 1969 “Black Power” edition of Ebony featured what
can be considered the visual coronation of the Shrine’s black Madonna
mural. The feature article concludes with a photograph of Amiri Baraka at
148 M. HARVEY
the pulpit lectern with the iconic black Madonna mural in the backdrop.49
This inclusion visually confirms the Shrine of the black Madonna as one
of the foremost religious Black Power spaces in the nation. Examining
these images collectively, the visible pairing of the black Madonna mural
and a male figurehead of the movement becomes a recurring iconography
that frames the circulation of the mural reproductions, revealing the gen-
der dynamics within both the Black Arts Movement and the Black Power
Movement. The photograph of Baraka compliments the Cleage/black
Madonna formula that undergirds how the mural and black Madonna
imagery became a symbol of liberation.
CONCLUSION
Rev. Albert Cleage and the Shrine of the black Madonna, #1 bridged two
important developments in African American thought: the revolutionary
advancement in how one interprets the African American experience with
Christianity as represented in Black Liberation Theology and the aesthetic
revolution of the Black Arts movement, committed to the visual redefini-
tion of black culture by artists-activist. Cleage, Dowdell and the Shrine
community invented and cultivated a new symbol to project the pride
of black consciousness and social revolution. This chapter has been con-
cerned with how The black Madonna chancel mural, in artistic produc-
tion and through circulation in reproduction, visually conveys ideas at
the heart of the Black Arts Movement and Cleage’s conception of Black
Liberation Theology. This commission also inaugurated a mural tradition
across the Pan African Orthodox Christian Community. Shrine of the
black Madonna sanctuaries in Detroit, Atlanta, and Houston all feature
large-scale murals executed by artists of African descent.50 These three
murals only represent a larger tradition as the Shrine of the black Madonna
community often maintained cultural centers where art exhibitions were
held and in the case of Atlanta, art is still available for sell. This cultural
work of cultivating a culturally conscious aesthetics was typified in the
public life of Pastor Albert Cleage.
In 1962, The Negro Digest published a 17-page article that assessed that
state of the fine arts in Detroit.51 Celebrating the trend of artists groups
establishing gallery space, Alma Forest Parks highlights 1958 as the year
that “signaled the beginning of a revolutionary era for art in Detroit.”52
African American artists claimed space for cultural and artistic production
and self-definition. I would argue that the aesthetic thought associated
with the black Madonna chancel mural represents an important moment

in Detroit’s revolutionary era for art. Cleage, Edward Vaughn, and the
community at the Shrine of the black Madonna, #1, ensured that African
American Christians were active participants in shaping the icons that
would represent the intersection of Black Art Movement ideals and Black
Liberation Theology. Almost one year after the black Madonna chancel
mural was dedicated, Detroit artist Jon Oyne Lockard, authored an essay
about his body of Black Art. In this instance, Rev. Cleage acts as an art
critic by deeming Lockard’s black Messiah as a culturally and aesthetically
legible artwork that conveys Christ’s oppression.53 In the April 1971 edi-
tion of Ebony, the magazine highlighted African American artists creating
images of black Christ.54 The layout included 11 two-dimensional art-
works by nine male artists.55 The text that accompanied the art offered the
reader a brief introduction to black Christ iconography within the context
of Black Liberation Theology. Placing Cleage’s preaching and publica-
tions in conversation with academic pioneer James Cone, this article sug-
gests the Shrine’s Heritage Committee accomplished its goal of bringing
about an iconographic shift that reflected ideologies of self-determination
at the core of Black Liberation Theology and the Black Arts Movement.
Here, in the twenty-first century, contemporary African American con-
gregations continue to show evidence of this iconographic shift. One could
say that the example of The black Madonna chancel mural paved the way
for contemporary ministers, such as DC metropolitan area pastor, Rev.
Dr. Lee P. Washington, to visualize the black Christ. In 2004, Washington
and his congregation, Reid Temple AME Church, completed a 28 million
dollar building project consisting of a “worship-education complex.”56
For the main foyer, the pastor commissioned local artist George Knox to
design and cast a bronze sculpture of a black Christ crucified (Fig. 8.3).
The artist presents an emaciated Christ figure suspended in a cruci-
fied pose without a cross. The suffering of Christ is emphasized in the
dynamic line of the sculpture. Differing from the tradition of black reli-
gious icons in twentieth-century African American art, the racial pheno-
typical characteristics of the black Christ sculpture is subordinated, but no
less recognizable and culturally transformative to the viewer. As a result of
the art activities of African American religious communities like the Shrine
of black Madonna, #1, the late 1960s and early 1970s furthered a visual
tradition reimagining Christ in the African American religious imagina-
tion, in ways that are intended to foster criticality and liberation.
150 M. HARVEY
Fig. 8.3 George Knox, Black Christ Crucified, 2004, bronze, Reid Temple AME
Church foyer, Glen Arden, Maryland, photograph by the author, 2014
NOTES
1. Rev. Albert Cleage Jr., “An Epistle to Stokely,” The black Messiah (New
York: Sheed and Ward, 1968), p. 42.
2. Lisa Gail Collins, “Activist that Yearn for Art that Transforms: Parallels
between the Black Arts and Feminist Art Movements in the United
States,” Signs 31, no. 3 (Fall 2006): 3. In this essay, the author established
the chronological perimeters of The Black Art Movement beginnings,
which is 21 February 1965, with the assassination of Malcolm X; the flight
of artists such as Amiri Baraka out of NYC the Village to Harlem.
3. Alex Poinsett “A Quest for a Black Christ,” Ebony (March 1969): 178.
<https://books.google.com/books?id=JeIDAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PA170&ots
=mL2MXz2lZo&dq=ebony%20A%20Quest%20for%20a%20Black%20Christ
%2C%E2%80%9D&pg=PA170#v=onepage&q=ebony%20A%20Quest%20
for%20a%20Black%20Christ,%E2%80%9D&f=false> (accessed 31 Oct. 2015)
All references to Johnson Publication magazine layouts, including Ebony and
Negro Digest/Black World, as well as artwork from the collections of the
Smithsonian Institute, will provide a URL that contains the digitized image
discussed in the text.
4. Pan African Orthodox Christian Church, “Sharing Our Founder’s Gifts:
Jaramogi Abebe Agyeman (Rev. Albert Cleage Jr.) (Chronology),” N.d.,
Albert Cleage Papers, Box 1, Bentley Historical Museum, University of
Michigan, 3.
5. Ibid., 3a.
6. Ibid.
7. Ibid.
8. Ed Vaughn and et al., Welcome to the Black Nation!: A Guide for Members
of Central United Church of Christ, The Shrine of the black Madonna,
Albert Cleage Papers, Box 9, Bentley Historical Library, University of
Michigan, 3.
9. Ibid.
10. “Prisoner Painter Teaches Art to Fellow Inmates,” unidentified newspaper
article, General George Baker Papers, Black Power Movement Collection,
Part 4: The League of Revolutionary Black Workers, 1965–1976, micro-
film collection, 3:0515, Library of Congress.
11. Ibid.
12. “2 Get Probation in Gun Arrests,” unidentified newspaper article, n.d.,
General George Baker Papers, Black Power Movement Collection, Part 4:
The League of Revolutionary Black Workers, 1965–1976, microfilm col-
lection, 3:0868, Library of Congress.
13. Ibid.
152 M. HARVEY
14. Joe Strickland, “Glanton Dowdell… Artists and Ten-Year Prisoner,”

Pittsburgh Courier, c1950s, General George Baker Papers, Black Power
Movement Collection, Part 4: The League of Revolutionary Black
Workers, 1965–1976, microfilm collection, 2:0409, Library of Congress
and Ellen Goodman, “black Madonna Stirs Empathy of Negros,” Detroit
Free Press, 25 Mar 1967, Albert Cleage Jr. Papers, Bentley Historical
Library, University of Michigan.
15. Ellen Goodman, “black Madonna Stirs Empathy of Negros,” Detroit Free
Press, 25 Mar 1967, Albert Cleage Jr. Papers, Box 3 & Box 11, Bentley
Historical Library, University of Michigan.
16. Ibid.
17. “2 Get Probation in Gun Arrests,” unidentified newspaper article, n.d.,
General George Baker Papers, Black Power Movement Collection, Part 4:
The League of Revolutionary Black Workers, 1965–1976.
18. Ibid.
19. Detroit Police Report, General George Baker Papers, Black Power
Movement Collection, and Part 4: The League of Revolutionary Black
Workers, 1965–1976, microfilm collection, 3:0606, Library of Congress.
20. CCAC Flyer, c 1966–1970, General George Baker Papers, Black Power
Movement Collection, and Part 4: The League of Revolutionary Black
Workers, 1965–1976, microfilm collection, 2: 0409, Library of Congress.
21. Memorial Service program, General George Baker Papers, Black Power
Movement Collection, Part 4: The League of Revolutionary Black
Workers, 1965–1976, microfilm collection, 3:0806, Library of Congress.
Dowdell lived in Sweden until 2000, when he died at the age of 77.
Press, 25 Mar 1967, Albert Cleage Jr. Papers. A few sources also state that
he spent time studying at the Chicago Art Institute, although the exact
dates of his affiliation have not been confirmed.
23. “Art on Display,” Unidentified Newspaper article, n.d., General George
Baker Papers, Black Power Movement Collection, Part 4: The League of
Revolutionary Black Workers, 1965–1976, microfilm collection, 2:0409,
Library of Congress.
24. Ibid.
25. Krista Thompson, “A Sidelong Glance: The Practice of African Diaspora
Art History in the United States,” Art Journal 70 (2011): 6–3.
26. Krista A. Thompson, “Preoccupied with Haiti The Dream of Diaspora in
African American Art, 1915–1942,” American Art 21, no. 3 (2007):
74–97.
27. Unidentified author, “The Spacial Face of God Memory,” Albert Cleage
Jr. Papers, Box 11, Bentley Historical Library, University of Michigan.
28. Ibid., I have transcribed the text as it appears on the archival document.
Press, 25 March 1967, Albert Cleage Jr. Papers.
30. While Garvey is acknowledged as the first to commission a black Madonna
in an African American community, both Robert Alexander Young
(“Ethiopian Manifesto,” 1829) and Henry McNeal Turner An Apology for
African Methodism (1867) laid the foundation for this motif of a black
Madonna and Christ. For more information, see Edward J Blum & Paul
Harvey, The Color of Christ: The Son of God and the Saga of Race in America
(Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina, 2012).
31. Camara Dia Holloway, “James Latimer Allen, Madonna and Child,”
Object Narrative, in Conversations: An Online Journal of the Center for the
Study of Material and Visual Cultures of Religion (2014) <http://mavcor.
yale.edu/conversations/object-narratives/james-latimer-allen-madonna-
and-child> (accessed 22 May 2014) and Deborah Willis, “Photography
(1900–1970s),” Image of the Black in Western Art, The Twentieth Century:
V, Part II, The Rise of Black Artists, David Bindman and Henry L. Gates,
eds. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2014), pp. 83–84.
32. By the mid-twentieth century, perhaps influenced by the subordination of
traditional religion in socialist ideologies, artists like Elizabeth Catlett
maintained compositional form in numerous interpretations on the theme.
Catlett’s Mother and Child (c.1956, terracotta, Philadelphia Museum of
Art) is representative of her contribution to the motif. Other examples of
this iconography include: Selma Burke, Untitled (Mother and Child), c.
1950, painted red oak, Smithsonian American Art Museum; Selma Burke,
Mother and Child, 1968, pink alabaster; Romare Bearden, Madonna and
Child, 1969, collage, Hirshhorn Museum, Smithsonian Institute. For a
photographic reproduction of Selma Burke’s Untitled, (Mother and Child,
<http://americanart.si.edu/collections/search/artwork/?id=71832>.
33. Alma F. Parks, “A City Survey: The arts in Detroit,” Negro Digest (Nov.
1962): 90. This article states that Sampson only practiced as a sculptor a
short period before dedicating his creative energy toward performing as an
actress, concert singer, and poet <https://books.google.com/books?id=
WToDAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PA90&dq=florence%20pate%20sampson&pg=
PA84#v=onepage&q&f=false>.
34. Ibid., 84.
35. Cleage, “The Resurrection of the Nation,” The black Messiah, 86.
36. Ibid., 97.
37. Cleage, “Resurrection of a Nation,” The black Messiah, 98.
38. William Seigmann “Figure of Mother and Child (Phemba): Unidentified
Kongo (Yombe Subgroup) Artist,” African Art: A Century at the Brooklyn
Museum, 2009, 194–195; Timothy Verdon, Melissa R. Katz, Amy
G. Remensnyder, and Miri Rubin. Picturing Mary: Woman, Mother, Idea
(Washington, DC: National Museum of Women in the Arts, 2014).
154 M. HARVEY
Press, 25 Mar. 1967, Albert Cleage Jr. Papers.
40. Dudley Randall, “Black Arts Convention,” Negro Digest XVII, no. 1 (Nov.
1967): 42–48 <https://books.google.com/books?id=xjkDAAAAMBAJ
& l p g = PA 4 2 & d q = s e c o n d % 2 0 b l a c k % 2 0 a r t s & p g = PA 4 2 # v =
onepage&q=second%20black%20arts&f=false>.
41. Ibid.
42. My analysis of the multitude of cultural work at play in the exchange of the
black Madonna Chancel mural is informed by Jerry Z. Park, and Joseph
Baker, “What Would Jesus Buy: American Consumption of Religious and
Spiritual Material Goods,” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 46,
no. 4 (2007): 501–517.
43. Jennifer L. Strychasz, “Jesus is Black”: Race and Christianity in African
American Church Art (PhD. Diss., University of Maryland at College
Park, 1996).
44. David Llorens, “Ameer (Leroi Jones) Baraka,” Ebony (August 1969): 83.
<https://books.google.com/books?id=AtsDAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PA75&dq=
David%20Llorens%2C%20%E2%80%9CAmeer%20(Leroi%20Jones)%20Bara
ka%2C%E2%80%9D&pg=PA83#v=onepage&q=David%20Llorens,%20
%E2%80%9CAmeer%20(Leroi%20Jones)%20Baraka,%E2%80%9D&f=false>.
This photograph featuring Amiri Baraka and The black Madonna chancel
mural was included in Ebony’s Black Power issue. Whereas the mural had
previously been photographed with the Shrine’s pastor and the mural’s artist,
this photograph amplified the narrative around the mural by reinforcing its
ties to the Black Arts Movement.
45. Michael Harris, “Urban Totems: The Communal Spirit of Black Murals:
1967–1975,” Walls of Heritage, Walls of Pride: African American Murals
and James Prigoff and Robin Dunitz (San Franscico: Pomegranate, 2000),
and Jennifer L. Strychasz, 1996. “Jesus is Black”: Race and Christianity in
African American Church Art (Ph.D. Diss., University of Maryland at
College Park, 1996).
46. Timothy Verdon, Picturing Mary: Woman, Mother, Idea (Washington,
DC: National Museum for Women in the Arts; Distributed in the book
trade by Antique Collectors’ Club Limited, 2014). Some traditional
approaches to rendering the Madonna and Child include rendering the
pair in a triangular compositional form and emphasizing the Madonna
with various hues of blue. Bearden’s collage is housed in the collection of
the Hirshhorn Museum, Smithsonian Institute. <http://hirshhorn.si.
edu/search-results/?edan_search_value=bearden&edan_search_button=S
earch+Collection#detail=http%3A//hirshhorn.si.edu/search-results/
search-result-details/%3Fedan_search_value%3Dhmsg_86.272>.
47. Alex Poinsett “A Quest for a Black Christ,” Ebony (March 1969): 178.
<https://books.google.com/books?id=JeIDAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PA170&
dq=quest%20for%20black%20christ&pg=PA170#v=onepage&q&f=false>.
48. Ibid.
49. David Llorens, “Ameer (Leroi Jones) Baraka,” Ebony (August 1969): 83.
<https://books.google.com/books?id=AtsDAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PA75&d
q=David%20Llor ens%2C%20%E2%80%9CAmeer%20(Ler oi%20
Jones)%20Baraka%2C%E2%80%9D&pg=PA83#v=onepage&q=David%20
Llorens,%20%E2%80%9CAmeer%20(Leroi%20Jones)%20Baraka,%E2%80
%9D&f=false>.
50. Flyer advertising the opening of Shrine of the black Madonna Cultural
Center (Detroit), featuring Carl Owens “Black Moods” exhibition, Albert
Cleage Jr. Papers, Box 8, Bentley Historical Library, University of
Michigan. Detroit-born artist Carl Owens was an artist promoted in this
religious community. I found several advertisement posters announcing
exhibitions for Owens hosted at the Shrine’s Cultural center. Owens’
Atlanta black Madonna is much brighter in palette but remains in the
Madonna and Child motif. The Houston sanctuary features a triptych
mural. During a period of expansion during the 1970, new Shrine congre-
gations emerged in the Detroit such as Shrine, #3—Wyoming Ave. By
1977. Shrine, #7 was opened in Kalamazoo, Michigan. The archive lists a
Shrine #2, Shrine #9, and Shrine, #10 (Houston).
51. Alma F. Parks, “A City Survey: The arts in Detroit, Negro Digest (Nov.
1962): 78–93. It is important to note that eight pages were dedicated to
the visual arts out of the sixteen-page feature article.
52. Ibid., 87.
53. Jon O. Lockard, “Black Art by Jon O. Lockard” Negro Digest (Mar. 1968):
94. <https://books.google.com/books?id=SDoDAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PA
1&pg=PA94#v=onepage&q&f=false>.
54. “Artists Portray a Black Christ,” Ebony (Apr. 1971): 177 <https://books.
google.com/books?id=FdsDAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PA176&ots=EU_
RqWtue1&dq=ebony%20artists%20portray%20black%20christ&pg=PA17
7#v=onepage&q&f=false>.
55. The artists included Keithen Carter, Alvin C. Hollinsworth, LeRoy Clark,
Douglas W. Williams, Otto Neals, Timothy Washington, Murray DePillars,
and Omar Lama.
56. Rev. Dr. Lee P. Washington, interview by author, digital recording, Reid
Temple AMEC, Glen Arden, Maryland, 19 Apr. 2014.
CHAPTER 9
The Power of a Black Christology: Africana

Pastoral Theology Reflects on Black Divinity
Lee H. Butler
INTRODUCTION
The biblical record declares that human beings have been created in the
image and likeness of God from dirt. Ideologies of race have resulted in
qualifying human existence by qualifying the dirt. Some bodies of dirt
have been declared clean and, therefore, human. While other bodies of
dirt have been declared unclean and, therefore, nonhuman. Black bodies,
although most resembling the dirt, have often been identified as dirty,
Godless and soulless. With this negative attribution upon black bodies,
how have African Americans been able to claim being created in the image
and likeness of God?
Affirming the biblical record means one makes the claim that human
beings have been formed from dirt to reflect the image of God, yet there
often seems to be a disconnect between the statement of the Imago Dei
and one’s self-perception. Present a mirror to most people, and ask, “Who
do you see?” Rarely will a person respond, “I see God.” Ask them to look
around and identify where they see God, their tendency will be to identify
the evidence of God in nature. Again, it is the rare person who identifies
seeing God in the people all around herself or himself. Nevertheless, there
L.H. Butler ()

Chicago Theological Seminary, Chicago, IL, USA

DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54689-0_9
158 L.H. BUTLER
is a tendency for people to show deference to some people more than

others. As one might assume, the deference is regularly associated with
age; but to what extent is that deference color-coded as white over black?
The world in which we live does not make it easy for most of us to see
the image and likeness of God in ourselves or in the face of another. To use
a colloquialism, African Americans have been called everything but chil-
dren of God. We have been associated with animals, declared 3/5 human,
described as soulless, and identified as commodified property. Because we
have such a long history of being seen as something other than the image
and likeness of God, we have found it difficult, if not impossible, to know
ourselves as divine beings. This chapter explores the psychological impli-
cations of imagining God looks different from African American selves.
Foregrounding my reflections using two articles from the March 1969
issue of Ebony magazine, I will suggest, as an Africana pastoral theologian,
a few psychological implications of the image of a black Christ for African
American people.
THE BLACK CONSCIOUSNESS MOVEMENT

Socially and culturally, the 1960s were a time of great social upheaval.
Civil unrest through protests met by armed resistance ruled the day.
America was in convulsions from competing norms on what democracy
should look like. While some whites were protesting the war in Vietnam
with slogans like, “Make love, not war,” some blacks were protesting the
fallacious American idea that “all men are created equal” by declaring, “I
AM A MAN.” Black popular culture also began to identify new images of
black humanity. Those black body images not only represented the power
of the body, intellect embodied in black, but also began to reframe the
consciousness of Black America.
Within the black consciousness movement, there were, predominantly,
two guiding ideas for the conscious change of Black America. One idea of
the 1960s marked it as an age of black militancy, black power and black
revolution. But the black community was not of one mind on how to
reform America. This was also the age of nonviolent civil disobedience
within the black community as well. These contrasting positions on civil
rights and human rights have often been described by contrasting lib-
eration with integration. Black theology became the fulcrum that moved
between these two perspectives. The acceptability and respectability of
black theology was determined by the position of the fulcrum and the
idea it sought leverage.
THE POWER OF A BLACK CHRISTOLOGY: AFRICANA PASTORAL THEOLOGY... 159
Whereas consciousness is a physical as well as a psychological term,

the black consciousness movement also saw the development of black
psychology. As a field and discourse, black psychology is devoted to black
mental health and addressing the social problems affecting the black com-
munity. To describe the psychosocial history of the black community dur-
ing the 1960s and not describe the black religious and psychospiritual
history of the 1960s is to misrepresent the climate and context that char-
acterized the 1960s. Due to the fact that black culture and black life have
been deeply implicated by bloodshed, both from suffering and sacrifice,
black spirituality and religiosity are critical for understanding the psychol-
ogy of black people in America. The lyrics of the black national anthem,
“Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing,” interprets African American suffering and
sacrifice through African American spirituality and religiosity. The hymn is
an abbreviated and moving depiction of African American hope and his-
tory. It describes the resilience of the people while inspiring the people to
keep the faith.
The fundamental symbols of black human dignity are family and com-
munality. They have equipped, guided and inspired generations of African
Americans to live above the dehumanizing and demoralizing circum-
stances that have sought to destroy our humanity.
Accompanying black consciousness were numerous outward symbols of
social change and transformation. The signs of the time were seen every-
where. Fashion, art, music, dance and home decor all pointed to honor-
ing what it meant “to be young, gifted, and Black.” Africa as a symbolic
homeland was reclaimed. Wearing Dashiki shirts, African jewelry, natu-
ral hairstyles and berets were all signs of the movement. Peacock wicker
chairs were the thrones that affirmed our royal stature for the movement.
Learning to speak Swahili became another sign of liberation. A clenched
black fist held high was the ultimate expression of claiming power.
The cultural icons of black humanity that emerged during the 1960s
tended to represent parts—the physical and psychological—and not the
whole of black humanity. Many of the black social icons represented the
body and the mind, as well the passion and vitality of humanity, but they
often lacked the Spirit. And if the black icons represented the Spirit, it was
often disembodied where spiritual power was disconnected from descrip-
tions of black humanity. This dualistic split of body and spirit is what
made the March 1969 issue of Ebony magazine so jarring. On the cover
of that issue was an image of a black Christ. What was it about a black
Christ, during the black consciousness movement, that made this image
so psychologically disturbing to many black people? What was the source
160 L.H. BUTLER
of the cognitive dissonance that did not allow many then (and sometimes
not even now) to see black humanity as the image and likeness of God?
A Vignette
In March 1969, I was 10 years old living in central Pennsylvania. Like
many households of that era, my mother had an Ebony magazine subscrip-
tion. On the day the March 1969 issue arrived, I sorted the mail for my
mother. I, therefore, was the first to view the bold, and for me startling,
black Jesus Christ on the cover of Ebony. My experience, however, was
anything but enthusiasm. I clearly remember my shock and disapproval as
I viewed what I should have experienced as a mirror of myself.
I was a “cradle” Missionary Baptist, meaning I was born attending
a Baptist church. Perhaps not in March, but at age ten, I was a baptized
believer and member of the Tabernacle Baptist Church. I knew what Jesus
looked like. The sanctuary of my church had a large wall mural of Jesus. He
was white with blonde hair and blue eyes. All the Sunday School materials,
the church fans and images in my Bible presented Jesus the same way, White!
Knowing what “my Lord and Savior” looked like, and knowing that the
cover of Ebony had desecrated his image, I exclaimed to my mother, “THEY
have gone too far now!” Who was the “they?” They were all the black mili-
tants. To my mind, they could work to transform our social realities, but they
could not, should not, change my God! That was just going too far!
Black Power and Black Theology

Now, more than 40 years later, I revisit that issue of Ebony magazine. As a
ten-year-old, I never looked beyond the cover of the black Christ. Even if
I had, I am not sure I would have understood the two critical articles that
I read today through my scholar’s lens. One article was an essay by Dr.
Alvin Poussaint that psychologically analyzed “Black Power,” and another
was an interview with Rev. Albert Cleage, who was a tributary voice of
black theology and a leading proponent of a black Christ. The combina-
tion of these two articles within the March 1969 issue present a whole
picture of black humanity by critiquing what it means to live in black bod-
ies, and how black bodies make meaning and spiritually orient themselves
in the world. Together, these two articles articulate why the inability for
African American Christians to accept a black Christ are psychologically
and religiously problematic.
Poussaint, an African American psychiatrist, examined the impact of

a shift from an integration-oriented civil rights struggle to the psycho-
logical emancipation of black humanity through a cultural and political
black consciousness revolution. Regarding the shift, he asked a series of
critical and insightful questions: “What could this new direction mean
to American Blacks who had spent much of their lives struggling to be
‘acceptable’ to whites and who felt integration was their only true salva-
tion? How were Blacks who had adopted as their own, white standards of
speech, beauty and manners suddenly going to change and sincerely feel
that ‘Black is beautiful?’ And, how were Black Americans who had been
indoctrinated with the capitalistic Protestant ethic of individual success
and ‘making it on your own’ going to be able to feel a new sense of com-
munity with their poorer Black brothers?”1
Alex Poinsett, author of the Ebony article, “The Quest for Black Christ,”
concluded from his interviews in Detroit, Michigan, that making such a
shift comes at a high price. He wrote, “57-year-old Rev. Albert B. Cleage
Jr., bantam-sized pastor of the 1000 member Shrine of the black Madonna
(formally Central United Church of Christ) in Detroit and foremost expo-
nent of a black Christology…Reportedly, a $100,000 assassination price
rides on his head and he travels in parts of Detroit with bodyguards. Yet
the threat of death apparently neither stays his hand nor his time.”2
Poinsett’s main question of research was direct and to the point, “Was
Jesus of Nazareth a black man? The audacious question comes out of
a recent convention of National Committee of Black (formally Negro)
Churchmen, seeking a Black theology tailored to the suffering, sorrow and
survival of black people.”3 Poussaint’s analysis did not contradict the need
for a new image of the divine. Although he identifies the need in terms of
“prestige,” what is more prestigious than an identification with the divine
image? Poussaint noted: “In order to overcome the stigma of being a
Negro it is psychologically very important for blacks to have ‘prestige.’…
Too many blacks have long worshiped big cars, fancy clothes, good liquor,
expensive weddings and elaborate funerals.”4 All these things being wor-
shiped by African Americans, Poussaint noted, are descriptive of a low self-
image. The “stigma of being a Negro” was always established upon being
separate and different from God. If we accept Poussaint’s contextual and
dated assessment, we would have to conclude that African Americans in
the 1960s were idolatrous. While I believe this would be an inappropriate
conclusion given his observations, I want to point to the emphasis upon
162 L.H. BUTLER
things external to the self as signs of self-worth as one of the consequences

of black people not seeing themselves in the image and likeness of God.
While many choose to identify racism as America’s original sin, it is,
perhaps, more accurate to identify chattel slavery as America’s original sin.
It was America’s efforts to justify and sustain chattel slavery that wove the
ideology of racism into the fabric of America. This is where the psycholog-
ical impact of the American religion on black and white lives is most criti-
cal. Because Africans were racialized and commodified, Africans became
“the stuff” that America is made of. “The Stuff” is the quintessential term
of Dr. Charles Long, who is the preeminent scholar on the history of
religions. Dr. Long says if you are going to understand religion—which
he defines as orientation—and the religion of any people, you must know
what their stuff is. Engaging him in conversation about religion or the his-
tory of religions in context, he will always ask, “What is their stuff?” The
essence of the question is to say that when you know the matter/material/
substance that orients the people’s religious passions, you not only know
what gives meaning to the lives of the people, you know how the people
orient themselves in the world. The Stuff is a focal point that gives human
beings the feeling of being in control in a world where power is elusive.
But even when you recognize their stuff, you cannot become fixed upon
their stuff as the center of their religion. Knowing the stuff helps you to
know what the religion is striving for and where the people of the religion
are moving from. Becoming fixated upon the stuff is the source of misin-
terpreting religions. The rise of scientific racism, as a way of defining and
talking about race, became a way for America to identify and sort its stuff.
Race, as a construct, always attends to questions regarding the origin of
humanity. In this exploration of “Where did I come from,” the questioner
always seeks to be connected to the divine essence. For the colonizer who
became an American, connecting to the divine essence always resulted
in God looking like their mirror image. Unfortunately, their process of
seeing God as their reflection was more like the experience of Narcissus,
who saw himself and was unable to see or experience life with another.
American life, therefore, was structured so that all would worship and
depend upon the narcissistic image of America. During chattel slavery,
America insisted that enslaved Africans should only find their being and
meaning in life by worshiping and serving a white God who was in the
image and likeness of white Americans. “Perhaps it really is contradictory
for black people oppressed by whites to worship a Christ created in their
oppressors’ image”;5 but when one has been psychologically conditioned
to behave in a particular way, radicalism is the only way to break those

psychological chains.
Rev. Cleage’s message was clear, the bondage must be broken by claim-
ing Jesus whom he proclaimed was black. Cleage explained, “When I say
that Jesus was black, that Jesus was the black Messiah, I’m not saying
‘Wouldn’t it be nice if Jesus was black?’ or ‘Let’s pretend that Jesus was
black’ or ‘It’s necessary psychologically for us to believe that Jesus was
black.’ I’m saying that Jesus WAS black. There never was a white Jesus.
Now if you’re white you can accept him if you want to, or you can go
through psychological gymnastics and pretend that he was white, but he
was black.”6 In the introduction of his book, The black Messiah, Cleage
notes “that Christians have been taught a false history, a false theology and
a false interpretation of the Bible. For nearly 500 years the illusion that
Jesus was a white man dominated the world only because white Europeans
dominated the world….The gospel according to Rev. Cleage is: Jesus was
the non-white leader of a non-white people who struggled for national
liberation against the rule of Rome, a white nation.”7 He further stated,
“Until black Christians are ready to challenge this lie (a white Christ), they
have not freed themselves from their spiritual bondage to the white man
nor establish in their minds their right to first-class citizenship in Christ’s
kingdom on earth. black people cannot build dignity on their knees wor-
shiping a white Christ. We must put down this white Jesus which the
white man gave us in slavery and which has been tearing us to pieces.”8
The black consciousness movement combined with Black Power reintro-
duced a black Christ who would affect total liberation of the black com-
munity—body, mind and spirit.
The need for African American liberation—body and soul together—is
not less necessary in the twenty-first century. When a Millennial Generation
Black American from the South claims alongside white supremacists that
he regards the Confederate flag to be a positive symbol of tradition, and
not a symbol of racism, at a historic moment when there was a groundswell
within states like South Carolina to remove the Confederate flag from
Capitol grounds, a different view of black humanity for all black people
is required. How different was this 20-year-old college student from my
10-year-old self? Developmentally, ten years is significant! Nevertheless,
looking at a 10-year-old in 1969 and a 20-year-old in 2015 illustrates the
enduring legacy of American culture’s formation of its black citizens. One
could argue that the 20-year-old Black American did what was charac-
teristic of the black consciousness movement. He took a negative image
164 L.H. BUTLER
and gave it positive meaning and thereby made it a symbol of pride. But
unless his ancestors fought for the Confederacy, I would be hard-pressed
to accept his attribution of the Confederacy or its battle flag. A more
important question: If the 20-year-old young man identified with a black
Christ, could he still identify positively with a Confederate flag?
Poussaint’s 1969 assessment of this millennial generation man would
likely not describe him as being confused about his identity as much as he
would identify him as someone seeking to distance himself from the shame
he associates with being black in America. Poussaint commented, “It is clear
that much of the passion by some Afro-Americans to be ‘integrated’ repre-
sents only a thinly disguised form of racial self-hatred.”9 Poussaint explained:
This self-hatred and rejection of other blacks is apparent among Negroes

who so treasure their role as “token blacks” that they are inclined to become
uncomfortable and upset if they are at a white business or social function
and other Negroes arrive… They may use some of the same shibboleths
as “good whites,” self-righteously mouthing such things as “we wouldn’t
mind a decent family moving in” or “we’re just looking for a black who is
qualified.” Even at present, there are many “mainstream” blacks who will
point an accusatory finger at their poor, oppressed black brother and say,
“I made it, why can’t you?” These Negro “achievers” may make public
utterances about “never experiencing any racial discrimination” and imply
that those Afro-Americans trapped in the ghetto are not victims of racial
prejudice but of laziness. Such self-satisfied blacks believe so strongly in the
Protestant ethic myth of hard work and individual success that they are blind
to the facts of institutionalized racism and oppression.10
Combining the 1969 thoughts and works of Poussaint and Cleage,

Africana pastoral theology seeks to speak to twenty-first-century realities
and experiences.
WHAT IS AFRICANA PASTORAL THEOLOGY?

Africana is the latest construct for researching and describing African cul-
ture and life in the Americas. The term Africana connotes an interroga-
tion of the lives of persons of African descent anywhere in the diaspora.
As an identification for inquiry and discourse, its languaging began, pri-
marily, among scholars in North America. Africana studies differs from
African studies in terms of focus. African studies tends to reflect upon the
lives and cultures located on the continent exclusively. Africana studies,
as an emerging discourse, moves from continent to the exploration of

the African Diaspora. As an evolutionary tributary to the development
of Africana studies, African studies does remain a part of the emerging
discourse. Africana, however, is concerned with people of African descent
wherever they are found within the diaspora. While Africana studies is
very close to another forerunner, Africentricity, Africana tends to be less
ideological. As a result, Africana studies, with its focus on honoring the
cultural nuances of African descended peoples throughout the Americas,
is a new and appropriate way of identifying the African origins and critical
constructions of the pastoral theology developed by African descended
people in the Americas.
Re-envisioning a Black God and Black Humanity

In 1990, Robert E. Hood, PhD, published a book entitled Must God
Remain Greek?: Afro Cultures and God-Talk. The book focused on the
Eurocentric theological categories that make theology and the Church
neo-colonial. Implicated in the title’s question is another question for the-
ology and religion, “Must God remain white?” This, however, was not
a new question for it was one that was asked years earlier and answered
by preachers and theologians alike as illustrated by the March 1969 issue
of Ebony magazine. For a black person to unquestionably embrace the
image of a white God, with long flowing white hair, a long white beard, all
dressed in white, seated upon a white throne, surrounded by white light,
with white angels, seraphim and cherubim flying around white splendor,
then that black person always sees herself or himself as a degraded being
who must become white in order to reflect the image of God. In a land
that perceives black as corrupted, bad, evil and problematic, psychologi-
cally black people become like Paul’s lament in Romans as he screamed:
“Who shall deliver me from this (black) body of death?”11
In 1987, Major J. Jones, PhD, published a book entitled, The Color
of God: The Concept of God in Afro-American Thought. In the Preface,
Jones articulates the significance of a racialized God. Because the norm in
America has been to see God as white, it is not only thought to be abnor-
mal to change the color of God, but it has been considered a blasphemous
desecration to imagine God as other than white. If African Americans,
however, are unable of developing a black God-concept, Jones, like
Cleage, contended that black people will continue to worship a white God
to the debasement of their own humanity.
166 L.H. BUTLER
To recognize the importance of this Black God-conceptual distinction, one

first must recognize and concede that the Afro-American religious experi-
ence itself is not clear or separate or even identifiable in the minds of many
well-intentioned, deeply religious, Black Christians from the mainly White
culture in which they live. This unclarity exists because black people too
often do not recognize that their white Christian brothers and sisters wor-
ship a God who is essentially White. This White God-concept has allowed
many White people to remain comfortably unconcerned about the oppres-
sion that black people and their God suffer from a racist society ordered and
determined by White people and their God. Black consciousness, indeed,
demands liberation and purification of the God-concept itself. We will free
it from the many alien connotations that deny the full affirmation of Black
humanity, merely because one is Black and not White. No Black person, I
hold, can see God in clear perspective and not eventually confront the deep
questions of personhood related to being Black and living in White America.
No one whatever their color–can see God authentically without facing the
deepest questions of personal humanity sooner or later.12
Cleage, who preceded both Jones and Hood, made foreground state-
ments that supported both of their perspectives. Poinsett paraphrased
Cleage: “What is needed, instead, is a black church with its own black
Messiah,” the minister contends, “a church preaching Black power,
Black unity and Black nationalism, a church moving beyond ‘black is
beautiful’—however wonderful that may be—to the building of black
political and economic power and black control over black cultural
institutions.”13 Interesting how Huey Newton enthroned on a peacock
wicker chair did not disrupt the black psyche in the same way the image
of the black Christ did.
“The Black Christ, painted on the dome of St. Cecilia Church in
Detroit by black artist Devon Cunningham, is a startling contrast to the
more traditional portrayal of Christ by (white) artist Warner Sallman.
Controversy over the Messiah’s color erupted (in Detroit) when the
gray stone Christ at the Sacred Heart Seminary was painted black during
Detroit riot.”14 While it is not necessary for the source of black humanity
to be the image of a black Christ, it is necessary for black Christians to
see their image and likeness of God represented in a black Christ. Father
Raymond Ellis, a first-generation Lebanese, rector of St. Cecelia Roman
Catholic Church, Detroit, Michigan, stated:
We make no claim that Christ is only black. We merely wish to affirm that
Christ today is also black. Rightly or wrongly, that affirmation had survived
centuries of Christian art in which Christ most often was portrayed as a long-
haired hippie. Hundreds of painted and sculptured black Madonna’s, cra-
dling their black baby Messiahs, had been patron saints in Poland, Austria,
Costa Rica, Portugal and numerous European, Central and South American
cities. Throughout Christian areas of Africa, Christ had been depicted as a
black man. In America, He had been a central figure in Marcus Garvey’s
Back-to-Africa movement in the 1920s. Members of his African Orthodox
Church were taught to tear down and burn any pictures in their homes of a
white Madonna and a white Christ and replaced them with black Madonnas
and black Christ’s for their children’s training. One of Garvey’s aged follow-
ers had gratefully offered her African Orthodox pastor five dollars for telling
her of the black Christ. It was clear to her that “no white man would ever
die on the cross for me.”15
AFRICANA AS LIBERATION
African American culture is the dynamic synthesis of an African past and
a reinterpreted and reframed American experiential present. Remaining
conscious and conscientious of the influence of African life in the diaspora
is what shapes an Africana understanding. Africana pastoral theology is a
liberation theology that has been developed and mobilized by the syn-
thesis of African healing traditions and African religions responding to
the traumas inflicted upon persons of African descent by America. The
praxis and practices of the field have evolved in response to the social
conditions of every historical period of American history. The story that
marks this land is a history of violence through massacres, chattel slav-
ery brutality, lynching nightriders and demoralizing segregation. African
Americans have resisted annihilation through the creative resourcefulness
of the spirit.16
Africana pastoral theology is a healing and liberating voice that has
been empowered by what Gayraud Wilmore identifies as black religion,
pragmatic spirituality and black radicalism. These three categories—reli-
gion, spirituality and radicalism—have inspired African American survival;
however, not just survival as a concept of subsistence, rather survival as an
overcoming and thriving in life. African American culture, as one of the
sources of Africana pastoral theology, is best understood for this work as a
“resistance culture.” The forces of death have been resisted and family and
communality have been celebrated as the highest joy and gifts from God.
Africana pastoral theology, guided by resistance and liberation, speaks out
168 L.H. BUTLER
in direct opposition to the dehumanizing, life-denying aggression persons

of African descent have experienced.
While communities of resistance can emerge as counter-cultural expres-
sions in the face of cultural hegemony, one should not assume all counter-
cultural expressions to be reactionary psychosocial phenomena. By way of
example: The Invisible Institution was an authentic expression of African/
American religiosity that should not be interpreted solely as a reaction to
being denied full fellowship within Christian churches in America. Black
life was hidden behind an epistemological veil that served as a screen upon
which white supremacy projected inferiority. “Veil,” as a metaphor, refers
to the African American folklore of babies born with a thin membrane
over their faces identified as “being born with a veil,” which becomes the
gift of psychic ability or second sight. It is an illusion to the thoughts of
W.E.B. DuBois: “After the Egyptian and Indian, the Greek and Roman,
the Teuton and Mongolian, the Negro is a sort of seventh son, born with
a veil, and gifted with second-sight in this American world,—a world
which yields him no true self-consciousness, but only lets him see himself
through the revelation of the other world.”17 My usage also references the
veil of the Temple as that which demarcated two spaces.
Again, resistance for African Americans has meant more than survival.
Resistance has represented a conscious choice to live in full humanity that
has been governed by the affectionate bonds of relationship. The African
American psyche has negotiated the social milieu and constructed mean-
ing in ways that support the essence of who Africana people have always
known themselves to be as Divinely created beings. Living within a world
that has historically distorted or denied Africana humanity, Africana pasto-
ral theology works to restore African Americans to our right mind.
CONCLUSION
These are reasons why the image of the black Christ became so vitally
important during the black consciousness movement. Seeing a black Jesus
provoked our belief (or disbelief) in our humanity being connected with
God’s divinity. Seeing a Jesus that looked like us declared that he knows all
about our struggle. The black Jesus for black people represented true soul
power! The point at which we fell short with our connection with Jesus as
the black Christ is while we recognize Jesus as the Son of God, we did not
accept that looking at the black Jesus was like looking in the mirror and
seeing ourselves as the children of God.
NOTES
1. Poussaint, “A Psychiatrist Looks at Black Power,” 142.
2. Poinsett, “The Quest for a Black Christ: Radical Clerics Reject ‘Honky
Christ’ Created by American Culture-Religion,” 172.
3. Ibid., 170.
4. Poussaint, 142.
5. Poinsett, 171.
6. Ibid., 174.
7. Ibid., 174.
8. Ibid., 176.
9. Poussaint, 144.
10. Ibid., 144–146.
11. Roman 7:24.
12. Jones, The Color of God, viii.
13. Poinsett, 178.
14. Ibid., 170.
15. Ibid., 171–172.
16. See Butler, Liberating Our Dignity, Saving Our Souls, 104–118.
17. DuBois, The Souls of Black Folks, 9.
CHAPTER 10
Image is Everything? The Significance

of the Imago Dei in the Development
of African American Youth
Almeda M. Wright
“We really don’t need a sermon this morning,” Jaramogi Agyeman began.
“We could just sit here and look at the black Madonna and marvel that
we’ve come so far…; that we can conceive of the possibility of the son of
God being born by a black woman.
“And that’s a long way for us ’cause it wasn’t so long ago when that
would’ve been an impossible … conception because our idea of ourselves
was so distorted. We didn’t believe that even God could use us for His pur-
pose because we were so low, so despised, because we despised ourselves.”1
Like the original mural unveiled in 1967 in Detroit, the mural by Carl
Owens in Shrine Nine in Atlanta is the centerpiece of the worship space.
It was there that I first fully experienced the power of an image of the
divine and understood Albert Cleage’s words that “today we don’t really
need a sermon” Upon entering, one immediately is drawn to the mural
that appears over 20 feet tall, covering the entire wall behind the pul-
pit. The young black Madonna’s brown skin is radiant, and light beams
A.M. Wright ()

Yale Divinity School, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA

DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54689-0_10
172 A.M. WRIGHT
from a halo around her head. The brown-skinned baby, also painted with
a halo of light emanating from his head, lies resting peacefully as his
mother looks on. Her hands are clasped in a sign expressing any possible
array of emotions, such as gratitude, hope, expectancy, and love. The
physical layout of the Shrine Nine all point to and center on this repre-
sentation of an African American young woman looking lovingly upon a
brown-skinned child.
***
My initial experience of visiting the Atlanta Shrine along with reading
Cleage’s work remains significant because of the relative absence of any
discussion of the color, ethnicity, and social location of Jesus, or even a
robust concept of the imago dei in my own Christian upbringing. As a
child of the late 1970s, I assumed that my faith communities reflected the
best that Cleage (and other black theologians) had to say about black reli-
gion and pride, but the truth is none of my congregations had advanced
beyond images of a white Jesus on church fans and stained-glass windows.
Thus, the discussion and role of the imago dei in my upbringing at best
was absent, at worst it continued the perpetuation of whiteness as the only
representation of the divine.
In conversation with Cleage’s work and my early experiences, in this
chapter I wrestle with the ongoing legacy of the imago dei for black young
people. In particular, I explore
• Where does the image of God show up for black youth and where is
it absent? and
• What does imago dei mean when the lives and bodies of African
American youth are regularly policed, destroyed, and defamed?
This chapter explores the complicated historical legacy of the doctrine

of Imago Dei within African American Christian communities, as well as
the complex role images and depictions of the divine have in the lives of
black youth. I also explore the development of African American adoles-
cents in light of prevailing systemic oppressions, which attempt to dehu-
manize black youth. I affirm with Cleage that seeing the image of the
divine, and seeing a black image, represents something truly transforma-
tive; however, I also lament the many black youth do not see themselves
in the image of God (or see God in themselves). The imago dei seems
IMAGE IS EVERYTHING? THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE IMAGO DEI... 173
irrelevant and ineffective in their current realities and attempts to counter

perpetual dehumanization (let alone seeing black youth as divine, like
God).
SEEING THE IMAGE OF GOD: IMAGO DEI AND BLACK

BODIES
Imago Dei is simply Latin for image of God. Within the wider Christian
tradition, there is no consensus on the significance and role of the imago
dei. Over the centuries there has been varied debates of how to interpret
the idea that God created humankind in their image (Genesis 1: 26–27).
In particular, questions abound of whether the image of God includes just
human reasoning, the spirit, the physical body, or all of these as reflective
of the image of God. There are also debates over the role of Jesus Christ
in the imago dei, such as whether he is the image of God, par excellence,
and whether humans reflected the image of God (past tense) and because
of evil now have to aspire to be like the image of God, in Jesus Christ. If
so, the imago dei becomes aspirational and not simply part of creation,
which carries forward.
While, many have resisted earlier disconnections between the physical
body and the spirit, arguing that these are erroneous disconnections, I
note the physical body in general, and the black physical body in particu-
lar, as a reflection or image of God has not been taken up with adequate
robustness in these conversations. In turn, issues of the ability to see one’s
physical body as part of the image of God persist; such as among feminist
theologians who have wrestled against the traditions, which would seek to
render women inferior given the maleness of Jesus, or to limit the ways
that women can connect with God, via the person of Jesus because of gen-
der differences. Feminist theologians, and others such as theologians who
reflect on the image of God in light of disabilities continue to wrestle with
the significance of embodiment in the likeness of God.2
Black liberation theologians and womanist theologians have contrib-
uted to the debate of the significance of the imago dei, by offering descrip-
tions of the black Christ as well as possible gendered and anthropocentric
limitations to constructions of the divine.3 For example, James Cone’s
recent text the Cross and the Lynching Tree, as well as his earlier work on
black liberation theology, draws direct connections between the bodies
and experiences of black people in America and the brutalization of Jesus.
Womanist theologians have discussed the significance of the black female
174 A.M. WRIGHT
body as a place of resistance and healing. Likewise, Jacquelyn Grant and

Kelly Brown Douglas have offered book length treaties on the significance
of the black Christ within black women’s experiences.
However, these discussions and works often remain on the periphery
of the lived religion and practices of African American religious practitio-
ners. In particular, among significant numbers of contemporary African
American Christian communities, the color of the divine seems less salient
and somewhat marginalized in favor of a colorless or multicultural mes-
siah. This does not represent an evolution beyond anthropomorphism
toward understandings of God as transcendent energy (as evidenced in
Cleage’s later writing). Often, these communities argue that the “color
of Jesus” does not matter, without ever refuting the erroneous claims and
images of a white Jesus.4 In embracing a colorless or disembodied image
of the divine, these communities have potentially missed vital opportuni-
ties to counter negative images of black bodies (and self-images) and to
affirm the totality of black people, including our racial selves. Furthermore
young people in African American Christian communities often voice frus-
trations regarding limited theological resources for reflecting on their cur-
rent realities of persistent racism—demonstrating a lack of access to or
disconnection from some of the larger historical narratives, debates, and
resources regarding the image of God and the possibility of God empow-
ering them in struggles regarding race and racism.5 Therefore, I start by
exploring where the imago dei “shows up” for black youth.
IMAGO DEI AND BLACK YOUTH

The 1960s and 1970s ushered in an era of Black Power, building on ear-
lier nationalist movements by Garvey and others, and opening space for
a variety of cultural aesthetics including increased visual representations
of the divine.6 Albert Cleage’s unveiling of the black Madonna and Child
in Detroit, Michigan, was part of a larger movement in which we see
examples in popular culture as well as in religious literature. The cover
of the March 1969 issue of Ebony magazine included an image of a black
Jesus and articles discussing the “quest for Black Christ.”7 A few years
later, in 1974, an episode of Good Times included a portrait of black Jesus
and depicts the family struggling to make sense of whether it is important
which image of Jesus they have in their house (and whether a string of
good events are connected to the arrival of the picture of black Jesus).
These popular media events occurred alongside of changes in religious

publishing houses that created educational curriculum featuring black
images of biblical characters, often including images of a black Jesus. In
line with other efforts of this era toward black empowerment and actual-
ization, these images attempted to make an explicit connection between
black bodies and the divine; however, the impact and relevance of these
connections requires further consideration.
In the last 50 years, images of a black Messiah have persisted. Some
youth have grown up with wider representations of the divine. While I will
not attempt to list them all, a few key examples from black Christian com-
munities and popular culture are helpful. Mainline and black independent
publishers of Christian education literature have continued to include
black images, of both people and biblical characters.8 Urban Ministry, Inc.,
which started in 1970 to create culturally relevant Christian education
materials for black youth, remains popular among many black churches.
Likewise, Abingdon Press, part of the United Methodist Church, contin-
ues a line of products specifically for African American churches. This is not
to say that all youth who participate in predominantly African American
Christian communities see black images. Often churches lack intention-
ality regarding any type of formal religious education. Other churches
reflect a continuation with educational resources, which do not include
any images or explicit connections to African American culture or history.
Given the proliferation of White evangelicalism through mass-produced
and pre-packaged curriculum, many black churches have given up any
attempt to include culturally relevant materials in lieu of buying what is
readily available.9 Other main line churches have moved to “ambiguously
ethnic” representations or graphic art designs and images (with no faces
or colors).10
Beyond the published curriculum, some young people have encoun-
tered images in the stained glass and murals with black people, a black
Messiah and representations of the brown hands for God’s hands. A 2001
New York Times article briefly explores a trend, which they noted taking
place since the early 1990s across the USA of African American churches
replacing white images with images of persons of African descent, and one
notable Christ figure depicted with a slave ship for a body. Included in
the reflections on the significance of these acts of re-presenting the imago
dei, pastors offered a need to remember the history and God’s preserving
power. While another stated that “the images of blacks as biblical fig-
ures, slaves and patriarchs in the church are ‘priceless in terms of letting
176 A.M. WRIGHT
young people look up and see themselves in roles that are positive and
affirming.’”11 Thus, there have persisted images within Christian com-
munities, which many see and name as significant for the lives of African
American young people.
Outside of Christian education literature and churches, images of a black
Messiah and references to the image of God have also become infused in
some interesting ways with the culture of black youth. For example, as recent
as 2014 neo-soul artist, D’Angelo released an album, black Messiah featuring
samples of Cleage’s sermon on a track entitled, “1000 Deaths.”12 In 2012,
rapper Kanye West produced his album, Yeezus, with no cover art, but which
featured a single “I am God.”13 Other artists, such as India Arie also created
songs such as “I see the God in you” in 2001.14 It is almost impossible to
capture all references to a black Messiah or the image of God in African
American music during the last 50 years. For many youth, they have listened
to (even if they have not critically reflected upon) myriad songs such as
these. While there is less diversity, images of God and a black Jesus have also
intersected with popular culture in mainstream movies and television.
black youth have been exposed to an array of images of the divine, which
have emerged during the 50 years since Cleage’s unveiling of the black
Madonna. I affirm this array as a wonderful demonstration of the agency
and creativity of black people. But it also speaks to the complexity of how
and where these images of God emerge. For example, it is not surprising
that black artists and musicians continue to serve as major producers of
black culture and images for black youth. Likewise, I am not surprised at
the range of representations within the physical buildings and educational
resources of predominantly African American churches. This variety, and
at times inconsistency, has also paralleled a persistent criticism of the irrel-
evance of the black church within the social movements and lives of black
youth. In other words, the images that made young people sit up and take
notice are not the ones in their Sunday school literature. I argue that this is
because the images have not been accompanied by a wider discourse which
challenges the prevalence of white Jesus alongside other representations
and the ongoing struggle to articulate why or how a black Messiah, or even
being created in the image of God, is significant in their lives.
Reflecting on the Imago Dei with Youth

The educational resources and popular representations bring to mind
numerous conversations with young people over the last few decades. I
remember the looks of shock as an ecumenical group of youth from several
different races and ethnicities asked me what I thought God looked like,
and I responded “If I had to offer an image, God is a fierce Black woman,
with a big afro who’s super efficient and resourceful.” One young man
voiced shock at the idea of God as anything beyond male, another youth
questioned if “we could just create God in our own image?” That con-
versation evolved into a larger discussion of contextual theology, gender
identities, anthropomorphism, and power in naming or defining what was
true. During this conversation, I could tell that these young people were
still processing visceral reactions to my response even as I tried to push
them to interrogate why an image of God (even if they purported to only
see God as spirit or a conscious) was important to them.
More recently, in a conversation with two young African American
women, who grew up in a theologically conservative rural black Baptist
church, I asked directly “what color is God?” One young woman answered,
without equivocation: “He’s black! Jesus was black and he created him in
his own image…so I’d say black.” The other young woman, somewhat
more inquisitive, wanted to know why I was asking, what I was work-
ing on? She even replied “Isn't that the name of a book?”15 But as she
reflected, she said that she did not think of color when it came to God, she
had never seen God and thought it was bold that humans would even dare
to create an image of God. In this exchange, her sister backed down a little
on her conviction that God was black, but she was very clear that Jesus
was not white and based on her understanding of Palestinian Jews, he was
brown skinned. Asking for clarity on the idea that God was “colorless,” I
asked the young women to do a quick experiment using Google images,
to look up images of God. The response of the younger, more inquisitive
woman (who affirmed a colorless God), was telling: “I Googled God and
I got white Jesus!” At that point, our conversation resolved in laughter;
but there was an undercurrent of frustration with the way Jesus and God
are represented, historically and now. This brief exchange pushed me to
reflect further on why or how they connected with this colorless or black
God? Of how God interacted with them or whether it helped them to see
or say that God was on their side.
However, more significant than the responses or reactions I receive
when I have pushed young people to reflect on the image of God, I always
get excited when young people initiate these discussions or allow me to
“eavesdrop” on their reflections. For example, a few years ago I got an
emphatic call from an African American young man, who grew up in an
urban area in the Southeast and had attended both conservative white
Evangelical and black churches. He also attended a predominately white
178 A.M. WRIGHT
Christian high school. He started the phone call: “Jesus smokes Black and
Milds.” After he calmed down, he explained that he was out with some
friends that night and they experienced car trouble. As they were on the
side of the street trying to figure out what to do, a middle-aged black man
appeared from seemingly nowhere. He was smoking a Black and Mild
cigar. He knew exactly how to fix their car issue. Once the engine cranked,
they asked the man if they could offer him something for his help. He
said “no” and hurried off. At first glance, this is not an unusual narrative;
the story takes on different dimensions when one recognizes that this
“stranger” decided to help a group of Black male teens. He did not see
them, with their sagging jeans and locs as thugs or criminals. He saw them
as fellow humans, somebody’s children even, and decided to help them.
Likewise the young men did not get paranoid and refuse the assistance
of this black man, who they did not know and who smoked cigars. In
this moment, they saw and experienced a bit of the divine and named it
as such. My gratitude for this unknown man is immense on many levels,
for not leaving these teens stranded and for serving as a catalyst for this
deeper reflection. I am grateful that the teens experienced this man in this
way. As a scholar of adolescent spirituality, I often criticize the individual-
ism of youth spirituality, in that they focus on God helping them in times
of personal need; however, it is also transformative that they experienced
God’s presence and that they both offered and received affirmation of
their humanity and image of God within them in this exchange.
Contemporary youth have been exposed to more history and conversa-
tions about the probability that the historical figure of Jesus looked noth-
ing like most of the popular representations of him. However, in the midst
of this expansion of the array of representations of and images of Jesus
available to black youth, the complexity of the discussion of the signifi-
cance of these images has not been fully explored. In particular, what does
it mean for “Black Jesus” to become a parody on Adult Swim (trafficking
in many stereotypes) and not an empowering or iconic figure in the major-
ity of black Christian communities? Also what does it mean for black male
teens to name an experience of kindness as Jesus? Is this a reflection of the
nascent theology of black youth or an indictment on the state of affairs
and attitudes toward black youth in the USA? In that same year, 2013,
there were numerous news stories of black youth stopped on the side of
the road or seeking help after a car accident, who did not get assistance,
but were murdered.16
HOW CAN I BE LIKE GOD, WHEN I’M NOT EVEN SEEN

AS HUMAN?
Youth Development in a Culture of Disposability
Reflecting on the image of God with black youth, in this historical moment
also requires a discussion of the places where the image of God does not
appear to show up and on the places where society fails to see the image
of God in black youth. Over the years of researching and working with
black youth, my heart seems to be in perpetual mourning over the ongo-
ing dehumanization of black youth and often the physical death, which
results from centuries of structural injustices. And even for young people
who are not the direct targets of violence or victims of a specific national
tragedy the effects on their development and well-being are still immense.
Thus part of the need to reflect on the image of God, internalized by black
youth, and the images of black youth portrayed in popular culture (which
they also internalize) rest in the fact that both have the power to contrib-
ute to their well-being and agency.
One of the recurring responses to the death of black young people is
to further oppress youth by erasing their humanity. black youth never get
to be children, even when they are victims of violent crimes. For example,
a careful review of the language used by journalist and reporters in the
wake of the shooting deaths of Trayvon Martin, Jordan Davis, Renisha
McBride, Tamir Rice, Michael Brown, and so many others (young and
old) demonstrates a general perception that these young people, by virtue
of how they dressed and behaved were criminal and therefore brought
their deaths on themselves. There are also countless examples of referring
to young black people protesting these injustices or voicing their rights as
thugs and criminals.
Cultural theorist Henry Giroux places these trends into a larger problem
of a culture of disposability which surrounds minority and poor youth—in
which their worth is never affirmed, either as children or as human.17 The
image of black youth begins as dangerous and criminal, subhuman. Thus,
we see ongoing responses of “fear” from police officers and community
members—which the wider society takes as “plausible.” These negative
images of black youth also reach into African American communities and
churches. There persist conversations regarding the need to “pull up ones
pants,” “not curse,” “cut ones hair,” or even rethink what we “name”
180 A.M. WRIGHT
black children in an effort to make them more respectable in a white

supremacist world.18
While black churches are not the only perpetuators of respectability
politics, many within black churches police the dress, behaviors, and even
attitudes of black youth such that youth often feel unwelcomed in these
spaces. One young woman summarizes this experience noting that: “Her
church was always begging for youth, but when youth came, the adults
were always like: ‘don’t do this, don’t say that!’” In other words, there
seems to be a prevailing thrust, under the guise of respectability to con-
form to the expectations and values of the dominant culture. It is hard not
to connect this sentiment with the ongoing resistance to see the image of
God in one’s own community and within black and brown youth. While
there is not a causal relationship between the ongoing politics of respecta-
bility and resistance to fully embracing an imago dei that affirms the divine
in black bodies, a larger set of issues persist. In the words of Cleage, when
“we despise ourselves” we are unable to even conceive of God as willing
to use black people for God’s purpose.19
Looking particularly, at the lives of black young people, the imago dei,
media representations of youth, and calls to “be more respectable” all
intersect in the developmental struggles of African American youth as
they attempt to create a healthy sense of self and identity. Alongside the
theological discussions of the image of God, is the social–psychological
discussion of the positive identity development for black youth. Instead
of simply attempting to make sense of who they are and what they want
to do with their lives (as all adolescents do), African American youth must
attend to the opinions of their peers, teachers, parents, as well as the com-
munal and societal stereotypes and expectations associated with being a
black person. Black teens struggle to come to terms with what they see
others believing and thinking about them—not personally but as a part
of a group. Educator Janie Ward points to the fact that identity develop-
ment involves more than coming to know one’s self, but is intricately
interwoven with learning what one believes about one’s self in an effort to
reject what others believe about you.
For black youth, moving beyond an internalization of racial subservience

to racial pride begins first with a conscious confrontation with one’s racial
identity. Resolution of this so-called identity crisis of youth requires that all
teenagers proclaim “I am not” as the first step to defining what “I am.” At
the threshold stage of the identity process, black teenagers…, who are all
too familiar with the demeaning stereotypes held about [them] and [their]
racial group, must add, “I am not what you believe black people to be, and
I am black.”20
Ward also points to the powerful role that churches and religious organi-
zations can have in helping adolescents shape their values and identity.21
Therefore, expanding upon Ward and others, I wrestle with how ideolo-
gies regarding the imago dei can also intersect with the development of
black youth. In other words, are religious organizations failing to offer
youth an essential resource for combating popular media images and
tropes which blame and dehumanize black youth, instead of affirming
their inherent worth and reflections of God?
WHEN IMAGES ARE NOT ENOUGH

As a practical theologian and religious educator, I am always attentive to
the places, intentional or unintentional, where young people learn and
develop. There is a strong connection between images of the divine (in
popular culture and religious materials) and the overarching education
program of religious communities. Cleage also attends to this connection
and began his “blueprint” for Black Christian Nationalism (1972) with a
powerful critique and discussion of the role of education in the nationalist
project. For example, Cleage fervently criticized the religious literature of
both black and white publishing companies, writing:
It’s become impossible for black people to use Sunday school literature from
white publishing houses. Literature from Black publishing houses is just as
bad because it is a copy of the same material. Such is the persistence of white
authority. When white publishing houses began to put Black pictures in
every quarterly just to make it “respectable,” this did not change the basic
white orientation of the literature. Black church-school literature must teach
Black children at all age levels that there is nothing more sacred than the
liberation of black people.22
Here, Cleage is pushing his readers beyond a simplistic unveiling of a black

Madonna and child, but he is revealing that the impetus of his work is not
that we need token images of black people, but black people of all ages
need to rethink the nature and project of the black church such that it
includes the well-being and liberation of black people. For Cleage seeing
182 A.M. WRIGHT
and representing Jesus as black was a matter of re-educating people in

the history of their tradition and offering historical accuracy as well as a
symbol of the wider transformations and empowerment of black people.23
In other words, today Cleage makes us look carefully at whether “more
images” have created the requisite changes in the lives of black people
(internally or externally). He makes us interrogate and nuance whether
replacing images has also empowered us to replace oppressive theology
and ways of being.
One interviewee, in the 1969 Ebony magazine article, argued that
Cleage’s most helpful contribution was to “dehonkify Christianity.”
And while I want to recognize the veracity of the statement, Eurocentric
Christianity is still pervasive and white supremacy is still entrenched.
Reflecting on the Cleage’s legacy in this current historical moment at first
made me think of the “timelessness” of Cleage’s writing, but in honesty,
his work is timeless because society has not advanced far beyond the rac-
ist constructs in which envisioning black people as sacred (or in any way
empowered to rise above oppressive forces) is easily dismissed by black and
white people, as fiction or sacrilege.
As noted above the images of divine have diversified, but the ubiqui-
tous nature of White Jesus has not been completely challenged and even
more significantly, most young people grow up with a generic Christian
narrative that does not attend to the social constructions of race, class, and
gender and the related oppressions. Even within more progressive or lib-
eral Christian traditions there persist violent silences around questions of
the interconnections of race and faith, or the places where our understand-
ings of God influence (or fail to influence) how we live with one another.
Echoing some of my own struggles, Womanist Scholar Dianne Stewart
Diakite, in the preface to her book Three Eyes for the Journey, speaks of
her struggle being raised as a United Methodist while experiencing racial
oppression in US Catholic schools. Stewart writes:
I was taught that I shared the same religion with the Whites who scorned me
daily. No one ever told me that my religion was different—that the White
Christian experience and the Black Christian experience were rooted in con-
tradictory ideas about God and humanity.
It was not until I read the works of James Cone … that I was able to
locate my questions about God and humanity within the larger tradition
of Black religion… I did not know that black people actually had a distinct
Black theology of liberation that reflected our historical collective social
experience of suffering, persecution, exile, and dislocation. I had always

been taught that all Christians, regardless of color, ethnicity, or social loca-
tion, adhere to a common orthodoxy as institutionalized with particular
denominational traditions.
However, Diakite notes that even as she eagerly pursued readings by black
Theologians and as she sought answers to her questions about God and
humanity within black Christianity:
a lot of damage had already been done. In the furthest reaches of my soul,
I realized that Cone’s books could not erase the ubiquitous Whiteness of
Jesus Christ, which was deeply embedded in my consciousness and sub-
consciousness. My intellect was loyal to the Black Christ, but nothing in
my social reality, including my black church community, reinforced Cone’s
Black Christ proclamation. I knew the Black Christ was the true Christ, but
I did not believe it.24
I quote Diakite at length because she forces us to wrestle with a ques-

tion of whether seeing the black Messiah, or reimagining the imago dei
is enough. On one level, she affirms my convictions (and Cleage’s overall
educational project) that “adding on” an understanding of a black Jesus
to a white ideology does not work. She also hints at the idea that devel-
opmentally the scars of interacting with and being socialized in a White
supremacist society, all under the umbrella of a common Christian faith
can be traumatic for children and youth and it is not something that a
philosophical re-education or reorientation will easily correct. In many
ways, her experience is a reminder that reimaging Christ as black and
my black self as divine must be completely infused within black religious
education, religious experiences, and wider culture/society, in order for it
to be effective.
In the black Messiah, in the sermon on “what can we give our youth?”
Cleage never argues that we need to simply offer young people an image
of the divine which looks like them, but Cleage wanted to offer young
people a nation. His nationalist idea was that he wanted black youth to
have a place where they were valued, loved and treated as human—with
high expectations and sense of pride in themselves and their people.
He saw this as a necessary corrective to the ongoing alienation, which
young people were feeling from the larger white society. However, he also
affirmed the leadership of young people and encouraged adults to be a
184 A.M. WRIGHT
nation, which supported youth in their efforts to effect change. Even as

nationalist language has been challenged, there is still a need for spaces
and resources to empower young people and offer young people opportu-
nities to contribute to something they believe in. The ongoing indictment
that black churches are irrelevant to the struggles and lives of black youth,
along with the relative absence of black religion in contemporary move-
ments for social change25 is a reminder that we did not fully heed Cleage’s
call to give youth a nation.
However, beyond black Christian communities, there is also a caution-
ary tell of whether reimagining the divine will help. Part of the caution is
that it is not simply a matter of black youth seeing themselves as made in
the image of God. We must vigilantly respond to this culture of dispos-
ability, in which black youth are systematically cut off from resources and
opportunities, because they are viewed as disposable.26 In other words,
self-esteem and communal affirmation are only part of the challenges
black youth are facing. Therefore, I argue that reimaging the imago dei
is a helpful and necessary corrective, but it is neither a fix-all nor some-
thing that can be accomplished apart from a larger comprehensive project
(which begins early and persist throughout every aspect of life) in which
black youth begin to see themselves as empowered and fully human; and
have opportunities to meaningful contribute.
CONCLUSION
My initial visit to the Shrine of the black Madonna included a baptism
ceremony. That Sunday, a young boy with a pacifier in his mouth, his par-
ents, and a host of extended family all joined together for the baptism of
another Black Christian Nationalist. The minister read briefly from Mark
10:13–16:
People were bringing little children to him in order that he might touch
them; and the disciples spoke sternly to them. But when Jesus saw this he
was indignant and said to them, “Let the little children come to me; do not
stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs… And
he took them up in his arms, laid his hands on them, and blessed them.
(NRSV)
She reminded the community “the kingdom of God is in the youth…so

every town and ghetto is a new Bethlehem, and every child born of a black
Madonna is a new Messiah.” As she finished her litany, she took the young
boy into her arms to be sprinkled with water. The ceremony ended as she
closed in prayer—reminding the parents and community to “renounce
the slave culture” and acknowledge the “revolutionary power of the black
Messiah Jesus that is born again in each generation.”
This practice is a reminder of Cleage’s call that we give young people a
nation. It affirms at birth that there is a community, which sees the imago
dei within this young person. And it is a reminder of the ongoing commu-
nal struggles to counter narratives which are not affirming to black youth
or that would not allow them to see God in themselves or each other.
Therefore, while image is not everything, affirming the imago dei within
black youth as a counter-narrative to a culture of disposability is a neces-
sary component in their ongoing development and well-being.
NOTES
1. Excerpts and paraphrase from Dr. Cleage’s sermon on March 26, 1967.
Transcript at http://www.theyearofrestoration.org/Jaramogi-Abebe-
Histor y.html . Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cb77s
UDHMh8 (Accessed June 20, 2015).
2. Michelle Gonzalez offers a good overview of the debate within feminist
theology in Created in God’s Image: An Introduction to Feminist Theological
Anthropology (Maryknoll: Orbis, 2007).
See also Nancy Eisland, Disabled God (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1994).
Or Thomas E. Reynolds, Vulnerable Communion: A Theology of Disability
and Hospitality, (Brazos), 2008 for a discussion of imago dei in conversa-
tion with disabilities studies.
3. Kelly Brown Douglas, The Black Christ (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1994), pp. 7–8.
In the introduction she discusses the ways that a black Christ is limited in
that in its current permutations it only empowered the black church to
deal with issues of race, but left it ill prepared to attend to ensuing gender
and other oppressions both within and outside of the church.
4. See a discussion of this trend in Edward J. Blum and Paul Harvey, The
Color of Christ (UNC Press, 2012), pp. 205–207 offers a telling exchange
with Martin L. King Jr. where he models this position of the refuting the
importance of the skin color of Jesus, but never challenging the historical
accuracy of these claims.
5. I include examples of interviews with black youth who express these senti-
ments in “Integrated-Integrating Pedagogy: A Practical Theological analy-
sis of fragmented spirituality among African American adolescents” (PhD
diss., Emory University, 2010). http://pid.emory.edu/ark:/25593/8kfj0
6. See also Evelyn Parker, Trouble Don’t Last Always (Cleveland, OH: Pilgrim
Press, 2001).
186 A.M. WRIGHT
I include images of the Madonna and Child, images of Jesus, angels, and
religious and Biblical figures. This does not reflect a robust and nuanced
definition of what is divine or makes something divine; however, I am
simply reflecting on the roles of black artist in creating art for religious and
cultural purposes during this era.
This is also not an attempt to say that this was the first time that images of
God or other divine figures were painted as black or of African descent.
There are black images of the divine pre-dating Christianity. However, part
of the Black Power movement included a unique aesthetic component.
7. Alex Poinsett, “The Quest for a Black Christ,” Ebony, March 1969.
8. Examples include: Urban Ministries, Inc., David C. Cook Publishers, and
Abingdon Press, among others.
9. Examples such as AWANA’s, Lifeway, Group Publishing, among others
come to mind here. I also argue that by embracing this pre-packaged cur-
riculum, black churches have short-circuited many opportunities to articu-
late a theology that affirms black lives, or black youth as human. To be
honest, this issue goes beyond educational resources. But black churches
have in many ways offered a curriculum as if black lives and culture do not
exist, let alone matter.
10. A quick review of the resources promoted on mainline denominational
websites clearly represents this phenomenon. For one example, see http://
www.uccresources.com/collections/summer-2015-vbs- and-camp-
resources (Accessed June 24, 2015).
11. John W. Fountain, “Church’s Window on the Past, and the Future,” New
York Times, February 9, 2001. http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/09/
us/church-s-window-on-the-past-and-the-future.html (Accessed June 24,
2015).
12. The official website of the album is available at http://blackmessiah.co/
The album was originally scheduled to be released in 2015, but D’Angelo’s
team says that he was frustrated by the events in Ferguson, MO, and the
murder of Eric Garner that he pushed the release date up to
mid-December.
13. Kanye West, “I am God,” Yeezus, CD Track 3, Def Jams, 2013. Lyrics
available at: http://genius.com/Kanye-west-i-am-a-god-lyrics (Accessed
June 24, 2015).
14. India Arie, “I see God in You,” Acoustic Soul, CD Track 11, Mowtown,
2001. Lyrics available at http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/indiaarie/isee-
godinyou.html (Accessed June 24, 2015).
15. Referring to the text by Blum and Harvey, The Color of Christ (Chapel
Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2012).
16. Renisha McBride was shot in the face as she sought her after a car
accident
(http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-24907851, accessed June

24, 2015) and Jonathan Ferell was shot ten times by a police officer after
stopping on the side of the road (http://www.huffingtonpost.
com/2013/09/16/jonathan-ferrell-shot_n_3937175.html, accessed June
24, 2015).
17. See Henry Giroux, Fugitive Cultures: Race, Violence, and Youth (New
York: Routledge, 1996) for a fuller discussion of this trend and Stealing
Innocence: Corporate Culture’s War on Children (New York: Palgrave,
2000), p. 8. See also Almeda Wright, “The Kids are Alright: Rethinking
Problem-based Approaches to Adolescent Spirituality,” Journal of Youth
and Theology 14, no. 1 (2015): 91–110.
18. Recent examples of this advice to black youth from within the African
American community includes: News segments from Don Lemon,
speeches by Bill Cosby, and even President Obama calling young people
rioting in Baltimore (over the murder of Freddie Grey) thugs.
19. Refers back to the opening quote of this paper.
20. Janie Victoria Ward, The Skin We’re In (New York: Fireside, 2000), p. 126.
21. In noting the role of ideology and identity she also opens the space to
make a harsh critique of what religious communities are not doing.
22. Albert Cleage Jr., Black Christian Nationalism (Detroit: Luxor Publishers,
1972), p. xxxv.
23. Cleage argues that the emphasis must be placed on the “hero motif” of the
Hebrew Bible and that through these stories of the Black Israelite Nation,
we can reshape the liberationist ethic of African American Christianity. I
agree in part, but in many ways the focus on singular, masculine heroes
remains problematic to me and seems contradictory to the communal
ethic that Cleage wants to espouse. In other words, one of the major cri-
tiques of the hero motif rests in the idea that the people will need one soli-
tary hero figure to emerge to rescue them; instead of demonstrating how
through their collective ingenuity they emerge empowered and free
together.
In reality, I believe that Cleage’s work pushed beyond some of this, as well
as the legacy of the Shrines of the Black Madonna also have nuanced the
claims made in Cleage’s earliest works. (See the narrative of the Baby bap-
tism from the Atlanta Shrine is 2006).
24. Dianne Stewart, Three Eyes for the Journey (New York: Oxford University
Press, 2005), p. xi.
25. Such as the #BlackLivesMatter movement.
26. See Henry Giroux, Fugitive Cultures: Race, Violence, and Youth (New
York: Routledge, 1996) for a fuller discussion of this trend and Stealing
Innocence: Corporate Culture’s War on Children (New York: Palgrave,
2000), p. 8.
CHAPTER 11
A Crucified Black Messiah, a Dead Black

Love
BaSean A. Jackson
INTRODUCTION
“We don’t want to offend anyone!” These were the words that haunted
and hurt me as I heard them read to me in the middle of a contentious
staff debate. This was the rationale of an anonymous member of the pre-
dominantly Black church I pastor, when articulating why we should not
use pictures of ourselves (our Black selves!) on a sign we were considering
posting on our newly acquired land.
In a previous staff meeting, we entertained the possibility of including
candid pictures of our members, worshippers, and leaders on our sign.
We quickly sensed that this was a deeply important decision not only
about who we were, but about who we could, would, and wanted to be.
Whether we wanted to or not, we knew that advertising our church with
Black faces would further entrench us as a Black church. Existentially, we
were a Black church, but some of our staff questioned should we want to
be just a Black church. One idea was to use pictures of people who did not
even belong to our church and did not look like people in our church to
broaden the appeal of our church beyond our race. The conversation took
several turns. Each saddening me more and making me more aware of the
B.A. Jackson ()

Fellowship of Love Church, Atlanta, GA, USA

DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54689-0_11
190 B.A. JACKSON
lamentable state of what it still means to be Black in America. So often we

are a people that do not know what to do with our blackness. This was
where the conversation had turned, and we too could not find consensus
on what to do about being Black.
We took the conversation to our congregation by giving them examples
of possible signs, some with pictures and some without, to see if we were
making much ado about nothing. This brought us back to the meeting to
hear the feedback, and this was when I heard those unforgettable words.
We began sifting through the choices, preferences, and rationales given by
our members for how we should represent ourselves to the community.
One of our members had decided against using a sign with our pictures on
it, and the reason was this: “We don’t want to offend anyone.”
My heart sank! My shoulders felt heavy! My eyes watered! All the Black,
womanist, and liberation theology I had read, been taught, believed and,
here I was pastoring a people who felt their own image was offensive. I
wanted to pastor a church that was individually and collectively strong
enough to say if people don’t want to be with us when they see us, then we
should be fine with that. I wanted to pastor a church that realized that we
should not want to try to trick people into worshipping with us by post-
ing pictures of strangers on a sign. I wanted to pastor a people who Loved
themselves enough to be unanimously proud of who we were no matter
who was attracted or repelled. However, I did not pastor such a church. I
do not pastor such a people. I pastor Black people. I pastor Black people
who, in too many cases, still wrestle with self-Love and what to do with
our blackness.
This “wrestling” is specifically seen in the everyday happenings, theolo-
gies, and philosophies expressed by Black people in the Christian church.
The Black church that I have experienced as a parishioner, as a preacher,
and now as a pastor, too often wants to divorce blackness from what it
means to be Christian, and Black people often have not been given the
Christian tools to connect their Christianity to what it means to be Black.
The legacy of slavery and the continued presence of white supremacy in
systemic, institutional, theological, ecclesiastical, cultural, and personal
forms all combine to teach Black people to hate themselves.
Albert Cleage knew that Christianity, as taught, preached, and prac-
ticed in America, serves as a key source of white supremacy and is a sig-
nificant culprit in the struggle Black people have in Loving themselves.
He believed that the western world had done a good job of erasing the
blackness of Jesus, and thus left us with a crippling religion that created
A CRUCIFIED BLACK MESSIAH, A DEAD BLACK LOVE 191
a rapacious individualism and a self-destructive Black church. He knew

that how we see God informs how we see ourselves, that theology shapes
much of our anthropology, and that one of the detrimental elements of
Christianity was that it had Black people serve and worship a white God
with a white Jesus.
As we approach the 50th year anniversary of the unveiling of the Black
Madonna, and Albert Cleage’s subsequent book, The Black Messiah,
what can his radical ideas about a Black Jesus attempting to build a Black
nation do for the perpetual problem of Black people struggling with self-
Love? There are many elements of our current conceptions of Christ and
Christianity that help us, in fact, teach us, not to Love ourselves as Black
people. Conversely, a critical consideration of Cleage’s Black Messiah will
reveal that there are ways in which his idea of Jesus can set the theo/
Christological framework to help Black people Love themselves. The
Black Messiah was more communal than individual, more existential than
eschatological, and literally, not metaphorically, Black. These three con-
ceptual features of Jesus can offer Christians a model of Christ that better
opposes oppression, withstands white supremacy, and produces self-Love.
However, if Cleage is even partially right, we must also ask the question,
where did this messiah that Cleage speaks of go? How did this idea, inter-
pretation, and understanding of Christ lose its way in the milieu of main-
stream Christianity? More pointedly, how did it die?
CLEAGE’S THEOLOGY AND THE BLACK MESSIAH

The Christian theology of Albert Cleage’s The Black Messiah can be sum-
marized in the idea that a Black God sent a Black Messiah to save a Black
people by building a Black nation.1 Unlike, many accounts of Christianity,
Christ was a figure specifically sent to organize, equip, and fight for a Black
people suffering from the oppression of a white Roman empire. Nation
is the guiding concept and the teleological compass that guides Jesus.
According to Cleage, “Every time he preached, every time he taught, he
was asking men to make one simple decision. Are you going to be in the
Nation or are you going to be outside the Nation?”2 Here we find a feature
that distinguishes Cleage’s Black Messiah from the contemporary Christ
of our Christian Culture. The Black Messiah’s mission is aimed at commu-
nal versus individual salvation. Today’s Christian, specifically Protestant,
is often singularly and simply taught to strive for a “personal relationship
with Jesus Christ,” whereas the Black Messiah asks us to join in a work
192 B.A. JACKSON
that lifts, galvanizes, and blesses a people. The centralizing importance of

“Nation” in Cleage’s theology bespeaks a communal framework that is
missing in so much of our current understanding of how God operates
in the world. The Black Messiah rests upon the idea that God views us
socially, as well as individually, and it then gives us theological license to
see ourselves, and our salvation, in relation to our community.
In part, Black Christians struggle to Love themselves as a Black people,
because their theology does not offer a communal framework that allows
them to consider, attend to, or honor their social selves. If God only deals
with us individually, then there is no theological impetus for us to deal
with ourselves in community. A solely individualistic God births an indi-
vidualism in people that shuns social solidarity and eschews social commit-
ment. In fact, when God is only concerned about personal sin, individual
morality, and singular salvation, it lends itself to the ideas that social soli-
darity is indeed an impediment to the gospel. For this reason, I have heard
Black peers of mine critique other Black pastors who openly and pointedly
preach on Black happenings, Black uplift, and Black theology as being
too focused on the “Black thing.” Once, in a casual conversation among
Black pastors where the subject was comparing and rating Black preach-
ers, a pastor, known for his tendentious attention on Black liberation, was
invoked to be considered by the group as one of the top preachers in
the nation. To this, one pastor retorted, “I like him, but he gets on my
nerves with all that Black theology stuff.” This statement alone does not
suggest this Black pastor has completely divorced himself from Blackness
in his theology. The sentiment, however, conveys the philosophy of many
Black Christians who believe the church is not the place to deal with Black
issues and Black preacher/pastors who believe the pulpit is not the place
to confront white supremacy. Much of the resistance to showing socio-
political solidarity with blackness in church is steeped in a provincially
informed idea of a God whose ultimate goal is to draw individuals back
into harmony with God. In this view, too much theological concern and
homiletical attention on our social selves is a distraction from God’s ulti-
mate desires for our lives.
Albert Cleage despised individualism and knew it was the enemy to
Black uplift. “Individualism merely means that each individual feels that
he is the most important thing in the world. Your whole life is built on
getting what you can for yourself as an individual and getting ahead as
an individual.”3 There are multiple matrices for the rise of individualism.
It can arise from the ashes of social demoralization as the harsh realities
of oppression suffocate the hope of a given people being able to rise as a

social group/nation.4 When this happens, individual accomplishment is
all that a person has left. Individualism is also a potentially unintended
theological consequence of the rise of Protestantism with its assertion of
individual freedom from the constraints of the church. Cleage believed
this eventually leads to the “slave Christianity” taught to Black people.
In the Old Testament and in the Synoptic Gospels, God is concerned with a
people, not with individuals. Yet, the slave Christianity that we were taught
told us that God is concerned with each individual. And the master told
each slave, “If you are a good slave, God is going to take care of you and you
will be saved.” He didn’t tell them that if all you Black people Love God and
fight together, God is going to help you get free from slavery. The group
concept is historic Christianity. Individualism is slave Christianity.5
His disdain for individualism was not only a result of its practical tendency
to stunt social solidarity, but it was a product of what he understood Jesus
to be fighting against in the world. Cleage paraphrases Jesus as telling his
disciples before he died: “You must serve the Nation because the Nation
is more important than you are. You must be willing to let your body be
broken, to suffer, and to shed your blood for the Nation.”6 In short, indi-
vidualism has no place in the mission of a messiah sent to save a nation.
Religion teaches us to be concerned with what concerns God.
Therefore, God’s soteriological intentions for humanity sets the tone for
the Christian’s greatest striving, at least in a perfect spiritual world. In far
too many places where Christianity’s sole salvific consumption is found in
saving individuals through a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, the
tone is set for an individual to be consumed with self. This kind of indi-
vidualism kills the possibility of a Black Love that claims, embraces, and
fights for our social selves. When one sees personal salvation as ultimate,
social solidarity is seen as an afterthought at best and a hindrance to spiri-
tuality at worst.
Another feature of the Black Messiah is that it understands Jesus as
being far more existentially focused than eschatologically concerned.
Like many liberation-minded critics of Christianity, in and outside of
the church, Cleage believed that Christianity’s focus on heaven did not
serve the socio-political purposes of an oppressed people. The dominant
soteriological end in many forms of Christianity is eternal life in heaven.
This idea is one of the few Christian “fundamentals” that transcends most
194 B.A. JACKSON
denominations, cultures, and theologies. Though Cleage is not interested

in denying the reality of heaven, he is equally uninterested in postulating
heaven as important to the mission and goal of Jesus. The “other worldly”
emphasis was a mechanism of oppression used to help control enslaved
Africans. If the best was yet to come, there was no need to engage in
life-risking struggle to ameliorate the current conditions of human domi-
nation and social evil. Eschatology is not heavily emphasized in the Old
Testament nor is it an overwhelming concern of Jesus as he and his minis-
try is presented in the synoptic gospels. An engorged focus on heaven, like
the imbalanced focus on the individual, is a feature of “slave Christianity.”
Slave Christianity deliberately emphasized the other world so that we
would not be concerned about the everyday problems of this world.7
Presently, Christian consumption with heaven can serve to hinder Black
people Loving themselves in two ways. The first is closely connected to
Cleage’s suspicion and accusation that slave Christianity was purposefully
taught to keep enslaved Black people’s eyes, efforts, and energies away
from their existential oppressed condition. Whether purposeful or not, the
mere concept that Jesus’ mission was to save us from death and our spiri-
tual goal is ultimately found outside of this life has dangerous implications.
It not only can, but often does, translate to a minimization of the effects of
worldly wrongs and the exigency in which present problems should claim
our attention. If life is lived just to conquer death and earth is inhabited
just as a means to heaven, then why give one’s life to restoring inequity
and reforming injustice? Why become bogged down by what ultimately
does not hinder the will of God for our lives? What does Loving Black
people do in terms of the ultimate purposes of a God who primarily wants
to get us to heaven? What spiritual stake ought the Christian have in the
plight of Black people? Just as our social selves and community become
a distraction to the personal relationship and individual salvation of God,
earthly equality and worldly justice don’t mean much if one is on their way
to heaven. Prioritizing the afterlife as what really matters, can and often
does promote a laissez-faire approach to social justice and to blackness.
Political dealings and social strivings become anti-spiritual, since spiritual
concerns itself with what concerns God. Admittedly, Loving Black people
and Black people Loving themselves is an existential affair. If our Jesus
prioritizes heaven, what on earth (pun intended) are we doing discuss-
ing Black Love in the church and devoting our church to Black Love?
Furthermore, if Black Love is in the end an ancillary, anti-spiritual project,
then what real claim should Black Love have in the life of a Christian?
Black Love becomes the equivalent to picking up a hobby.
Another way our understanding of a Christ, whose primary and

prioritized mission is to get us into heaven, underserves and undercuts
Black Love, is by using the afterlife as a model for our lives right now. The
idea that heaven should serve as a model for earth is a sexy and seductive
idea that can have deleterious and disastrous results. In a rush to realize
the fulfilled will of God and the ultimate purposes of Christ, many people
use the multicultural possibilities of heaven as a rationale for uncritical,
unsafe, and unhealthy forms of multiculturalism on earth. The argument
in the church often goes like this: “If there will not be any focus on race
in heaven, then why should we focus on race in our churches on earth.”
Another line of thought says, “ If there will be no separation of races in
heaven, then why are we not striving to have a church of all colors and
cultures in our church on earth.” This move is an understandable, even if
undesirable, step motivated by any good Christian’s desire to make what
is important to God important to them. This idea fits in the mold of want-
ing God’s will to manifest “on earth as it is in heaven.”8 It also, however,
is evident of a Christian understanding of a God and a Christ who is more
concerned with heaven than earth.
In our staff discussion about whether to put real pictures of our wor-
shippers, leaders, and members on a sign on our land, we encountered
this reality. We all agreed that putting pictures of all Black bodies on our
sign might deter people who were not Black from coming to our church.
In response to me highlighting the obvious fact that the pictures repre-
sented who we were, someone responded, “Yes, but is that all we want to
be?” The inference was, as children of God we should want our church
to transcend race. One of the matrices of this idea was revealed when
someone made the famous reference to the racial and cultural make up of
heaven. After acknowledging the validity of a multicultural church ulti-
mately being ideal, I then asked what it would take, more importantly,
what would it cost, for us to make others, particularly white people, feel
welcome. I asked if our staff thought white people would stay after they
came and heard me preach about racism and social justice. Unanimously,
the conjectured answer was that most would not. In that moment, we
recognized that for a predominantly Black church, with a Black pastor,
to become multicultural, we would most likely have to at least tweak our
image, sacrifice, and swallow speaking the truth of oppressive racial reali-
ties, and potentially consider toning down our worship style. Nevertheless,
the call of a “heavenly” multiculturalism was still strong enough for mem-
bers of our staff to weigh whether all of this was worth it. There are cer-
tainly examples of multicultural churches and communities that face social
196 B.A. JACKSON
justice and oppression head on and do the hard work of attempting to

both live in and transcend culture. However, so often multiculturalism
happens at the cost of real reconciliation work, honest acknowledgement
of where power, privilege, and inequity exist, and the ability of a given
people to be their authentic selves. In our case, as a Black church, we
sensed that achieving the eschatological ideal of race transcendence would
mean ignoring existential issues, denying our existential selves, and leaving
large existential realities that Black people face by the wayside.
Often, the multicultural desires of Black churches and Black church
people can be partially, if not mainly, rooted in a desire for white valida-
tion. Just like moving in a white neighborhood, being able to afford pre-
dominantly white private schools, or being educated in highbrow mostly
white institutions, white people in Black churches is a symbol for many of
having “arrived.” Whiteness is valorized in movies, culture, media, and
through the ways in which government, business, and educational institu-
tions are filled with white presence. More importantly, whiteness is the
face of power in our country, even in the midst of having a Black presi-
dent. Cleage picks up on the natural course of internalized oppression in
describing the state of Israel Jesus inherited and came to save:
The Black Nation of Israel had degenerated into total corruption and hope-
lessness. Black people no longer believed in themselves and Black people no lon-
ger loved each other (emphasis mine). Their lives were molded by what they
thought they could get out of the Romans. They loved their oppressors and
hated their brothers because their oppressors had power and their brothers
were powerless.
White validation is both a natural response to historical powerlessness and

oppression, and it is a factor in the struggle for Black people to Love
themselves. It is difficult to Love blackness when so many forces around
you tell you that Black is second class, less beautiful, criminal, and unintel-
ligent. It is difficult to Love blackness when the images, yes even Christian
images, tell you that the color of good, holy, and divine is white.
This brings us to a third, and the most obvious, feature of Albert Cleage’s
messiah—the claim that Jesus was Black. Black and womanist theologians
situated in the North American context have perceived the need to darken
a Christ figure that has often been inscribed as literally white in identity and
amenable to white supremacy in activity. The most noted theological figure
to engage the blackness of Jesus is the “father of Black theology.” In his
early systematic sketch of Black theology, James Cone, marks out what he
means by claiming that Jesus was Black. Yet, when reading Cone, he must
be distinguished from Cleage in how they articulate the blackness of Jesus.
On the one hand, I don’t believe Cone ever disagrees with Cleage that the
color of Jesus was Black. In fact, he even acknowledges the profound debt
he owes to Cleage when he asserts, “Black theology must show that the
Reverend Albert Cleage’s description of Jesus as the Black Messiah is not
the product of minds ‘distorted’ by their own oppressed condition, but is
rather the most meaningful Christological statement in our time.”9 Cone
goes further in a note at the end of the chapter to say that he and Cleage
share a belief that Christ is Black. However, Cleage and Cone describe
Jesus’ blackness in very different ways. Cleage’s idea of Jesus’ blackness is
deeply rooted in his understanding that the historical evidence points to
the fact that the color of Jesus is Black. The weight of Cone’s argument
for Jesus’ blackness heavily relies on the idea that blackness is a symbol for
oppression. Whereas, for Cleage, Black as color is ultimately important in
Jesus, Cone sees the condition of blackness as most important. We see this
clearly when Cone states, “Our being with him is dependent on his being
with us in the oppressed Black condition, revealing to us what is necessary
for our liberation.” This idea moves Cone to later suggest that the Black
Jesus is “an important theological symbol.”10
Two of Cone’s students, Jacquelyn Grant and Kelly Brown Douglas
engaged Jesus, Christology, and blackness as well. In, White Women’s Christ
and Black Women’s Jesus: Feminist Christology and Womanist’s Response,
Grant argued that the condition and experience of Black women serves
as a present and particular lens in which to understand the work of Jesus
Christ. Like Cone, she stressed the historical Jesus’ identification with “the
least” as a point of departure for understanding of Jesus Christ as cur-
rently manifest in the reality of Black women. Formulaically, however, she
adopted the same prioritization of the condition of Black people as the key
to understanding Jesus’ blackness. On the one hand, she quoted Cleage
by pointing out his conclusion that “To free (humans) from bondage was
Jesus’ own definition of his ministry.” Nevertheless, from here she comes
to more Coneian conclusions when she says, “This meant that as Jesus
identifies with the lowly of his day, he now identifies with the lowly of this
day, who in the American context are Black people. The identification is so
real that Jesus Christ in fact becomes Black.” For Cleage, there is no sense
of Jesus becoming Black through the current condition of Black people.
Better stated, there is no need for Jesus to become Black—he was Black.
Jesus Christ was a Black man sent to a Black people, even if by Black Cleage
simply, and loosely, means non-white.
198 B.A. JACKSON
Kelly Brown Douglas recognized the importance and veracity of

Cleage’s claim that Jesus was literally Black. Thought a student of Cone,
she critiques him for not taking “the risk of naming the historical Jesus
‘Black.’ While it (Cone’s version of the Black Christ) forthrightly empha-
sized Christ’s Black American identity, it avoided a discussion of Jesus’s
African identity.”11 For Douglas, “the most thorough and effective version
of the Black Chirst is one that confronts the Blackness of the historical
Jesus, as well as the Christ of faith.”12 In this line of thought, Cleage is
compelling, but incomplete. He is laudatory in his ability to take risks that
would rescue Jesus from racist theology and biblical scholarship, yet he
leaves something to be desired in his one-dimensional consumption with
white racism, provinciality of being too consumed with the socio-political
relevance of Jesus, and myopic sexism that excluded both the experience
and oppression of Black women. Still, Douglas, unlike Cone and Grant,
explicitly valued the importance of connecting Christ’s Black skin and fea-
tures to the Black community’s struggle for value, life, liberation, and
wholeness.
Yet, Cleage’s voice stands out among these theological voices as the
first and most passionate to acknowledge the revolutionary work of Jesus
and go beyond that to consistently claim that Jesus was literally and his-
torically Black. Until Douglas, Black theologians like Cone, Grant, and
the likes of J. Deotis Roberts can be seen as trying to wrestle with, if not
soften the blow of Cleage’s radical claim. Cleage was taken aghast by the
dominant illusion of a white Jesus that he accounted for by pointing to the
domination of the world by Europeans. He arrives at the fact that Jesus is
Black by taking into account what history tells us about the ethnic identity
of Israeli people with links to North, Western, and Central Africa. It was
necessary to establish the fact of Jesus being a “non-white leader of a non-
white people struggling for liberation against the rule of a white nation,”
to inspire Black Christians to free “themselves from their spiritual bond-
age” and establish “in their own minds their right to first-class citizenship
in Christ’s kingdom on earth.”13
I agree with Cleage about the psycho-social possibilities of a Black
Messiah. Black figures have always been a source of esteem and hope for
Black people in America. Consider the volumes of testimonies of Black
people giving an account of their nascent belief, that they could be a cer-
tain profession or take a given career path, being triggered by the sight
of a Black person blazing a trail. Parents, teachers, and mentors use Black
figures, Black accomplishment, and Black history as a pedagogical tool to
shape the minds of Black children and give them hope for their future. As
a parent with a child who attends a predominantly white public school in
Atlanta, I have been able to point to the blackness of our mayor and our
president to assure and reassure my child to have confidence in his race
and in himself. Black people seeing other Black people in places of social
esteem and consequence helps Black people to Love themselves. Even
though all Black people are not theists, formally religious, or Christians, a
panoramic view of the landscape of American Black culture quickly reveals
the magnanimous place of Christianity and the Black church. How could
the blackness of the central figure of the most dominant religion of North
American Black people not build, boost, and buttress the Love Black peo-
ple have for themselves? Just as Black people have identified with the tri-
als and tribulations, persecutions and problems of Jesus to maintain their
sanity and self-esteem through the journey of white racism and American
oppression in all of its varying forms, being able to identify their black-
ness in the person of Jesus would undoubtedly have a tremendous effect
in combatting the legacy of white supremacy in America and positively
impacting the Black self-image.
Sadly, too many Black Christians, Black preachers, and Black thinkers
are still afraid to commit to claiming Jesus as Black. Often, when white
Jesus’ are problematized and the blackness of Jesus is proclaimed, many
flee from Jesus’ particularity and historicity all together. Yet, we can dis-
cuss the value of recognizing Jesus as non-white without limiting him or
essentializing him to race. So often, the argument for a colorless Jesus is
only a response to the struggle of what to do or say about Jesus’ contrived
whiteness or historical color. Rather than confront the racist history and
oppressive possibilities of a white Jesus, and explore the liberative and
affirming potentialities of a Black Jesus, the insignificance of Jesus’ race
is espoused. Thus, the colorless Jesus, and all attempts to de-historicize
and de-particularize Jesus, speaks to the power of white supremacy not
to its protest. It is another attempt to avoid white supremacy and not
confront and combat it. Jesus’ race can and should matter! It should mat-
ter to progressive and conscious white people who recognize the need
to critique and deconstruct “whiteness” as a construct that propagates
and perpetuates white supremacy.14 The color of Jesus can and should
matter to Black children who rarely see people who look like them in
prominent places, positions, or power. It matters to little Black girls and
little Black boys who grow up in Sunday School, Children’s Church, and
Vacation Bible School with images that move them to envisioning Jesus as
200 B.A. JACKSON
white. Having a conversation about how it matters, and even how much it
matters, is more progressive and productive than running away from the
color of Jesus.
CRUCIFYING THE BLACK MESSIAH

The strength of Cleage’s Christianity and the Black Messiah it espoused is
found in how much of it is informed by the accounts given about Jesus’
life in the synoptic gospels and socio-political-religious worldview of the
Jewish people of the Hebrew Bible. A review of the Jesus presented in
Matthew, Mark, and Luke does reveal a Jesus that is more communal than
individual and more existential than eschatological. Taking stock of the
ethnic history of that time does make it difficult to refute the probability
that Jesus was non-white, particularly in the European manner in which he
is often depicted in America. One is hard pressed to hear Jesus discuss per-
sonal sin and individual salvation in the synoptic gospels. In one of the few
times Jesus initiates a discussion about eternal life in Matthew 25:31–46,
judgment hinges upon what one does in community and particularly for
the downtrodden.
Since the bulk of Jesus’ interaction, preaching, and teaching in the
gospels seems to prioritize community over individualism and existential
struggles more than eschatological strivings; since Jesus the messiah fig-
ure enters the world to a people with political expectations and is killed
by people based on political accusations; since somewhere in the middle
of his birth and death was socio-political teachings; since Jesus was more
historically Black than white; how did this understanding of the Black
Messiah die to the image of a white Jesus who seeks belief in his life, death,
and resurrection for humans to escape the punishment of sin and go to
heaven?
The crucifixion of the historical Jesus is said to take place at Golgotha.
Yet, the idea of a Black Messiah has also largely been killed in the minds,
theologies, and Christologies of many Christians and most mainstream
versions of Christianity. Here, Cleage pointed out something years ago
that I believe is glossed over, ignored, covered up, and simply masked
by traditional theology. Namely, there is great conflict between Jesus and
Paul, and this conflict can furnish a historical explanation for how a Jesus
that was amenable to white supremacy and largely unhelpful in building
Black Love arose. I am arguing, that part of Cleage’s genius is found in
his insistence that there is a huge distinction between the worldview and
theology of Jesus and that of Paul. Moreover, I believe this is the first real
death blow to the Black Messiah that Cleage unearths in his reading of
the gospels. In Paul, we see the beginning of eschatology eclipsing the
existential and of individualism overshadowing community. This is not to
say that Paul, alone, destroys the Black Messiah, rather he sets the founda-
tional framework for Christians to leave and lose some of the fundamental
commitments of Jesus as presented in the synoptic gospels.
Cleage credits Paul with the reconfiguring of who Jesus was and what
he meant, and the reshaping of Christianity. Against Jesus’ efforts at sav-
ing a people in this life, “Paul preached individual salvation and life after
death.”15 There are implicit and explicit reasons given for why Paul’s
Christianity and his version of Jesus and his purpose wins out. First, Paul’s
contact with the Greek and Roman world gave him ideas and philosophies
that he mixed and added to the teachings of the Hebrew Bible and Jesus
teachings. These ideas would have resonated more with a Roman world
that he was attempting to proselytize.16 Also, Cleage argues that Paul
wrote more and because the original disciples wrote less theology than
Paul, their theological understanding of Jesus died to Paul’s new recon-
struction.17 In short, Paul’s Greco-Roman infused rearticulation of Jesus
started an obfuscation of the Black Messiah that was completed in the
Middle Ages and given its most pernicious form in the slave Christianity
of America. In short, “The Christianity which we see in the world today
was not shaped by Jesus.”
The tension between ideas espoused by Jesus and ideas espoused by
Paul can be seen in several comparisons between Jesus as represented in
the synoptic gospels and the letters of Paul. For example, in Matthew 7,
Jesus hammers home the idea of bearing fruit and acting upon hearing
the message of Jesus. This is crystallized in the 21st verse when Jesus says,
“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, lord will enter the kingdom of
heaven but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven’” (empha-
sis mine). Paul, however, argues in Romans 5:1 that “we are justified by
faith.” This is one of the major tenets of Protestant Christian theology,
but it is absent in the words attributed to Jesus in the gospels. Paul and
Jesus even seem to have varying views on the cross. In Matthew 16, after
predicting to his disciples that he would die, Jesus says, “If any want to
become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and
follow me.” Here, it seems Jesus sees his cross as an example and a model
of living and sacrificing in a life of Love for God and people. His following
words that if one attempts to save their life they will lose it square with
202 B.A. JACKSON
Cleage’s claim that Jesus was anti-individualism. The cross, in this light,
could easily be seen as the ultimate symbol of individual sacrifice for the
community. Paul, on the other hand, in 1 Corinthians 15 believes that
Jesus died for sins. He makes the cross some cosmic tool that is needed to
repair the relationship between God and humanity, as if God’s forgiveness
and Love is not enough. Also, the synoptic gospels do not quote Jesus as
connecting the purpose of the cross with the sins of humanity.
In numerous Bible studies, I have attempted to highlight how much
of our Christianity is shaped by Paul and not Jesus. Many people in our
church are shocked to hear this, and are even more surprised when I give
weight to this claim by highlighting the fact that in the New Testament
there were multiple ideas pertaining to how one is saved. More point-
edly, there is an idea of salvation Jesus seems to proclaim and adhere to,
and an idea that Paul espouses. For most Christians, their doctrine of
salvation is primarily informed by Romans 10:9—“because if you confess
with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised
him from the dead, you will be saved.”18 To date, few Christians I know
disagree that this Pauline text properly articulates the process of salvation.
However, I use at least two texts to show that the gospels give an account
of Jesus having another idea of salvation.
In Matthew 22, after Jesus is asked what the greatest commandment
is, he responds in verses 37–40 by saying, “You shall Love the Lord your
God with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your mind.
This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You
shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang
all the law and the prophets.” This text, at the least, shows that Jesus felt
this was the centralizing ethical idea in Jewish law and in prophetic teach-
ing. However, another text, coupled with this answer Jesus gives, suggests
that Jesus thought this ethical prescription was salvific. In Luke 10:25–35,
we find the famous story of “The Good Samaritan.” This story begins as
a discussion about salvation. Jesus is asked about how to procure eternal
life, and he responds by asking the initial inquisitor what he thought in his
reading of the law. The lawyer answers, “You should love the Lord God
with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and
with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus responds, “You
have given the right answer; do this and you will live.” Jesus does not add,
edit, or expound on this answer. He simply tells the lawyer he is right. The
lawyer says nothing about “confess”-ing, “believe”-ing, or anyone being
raised from the dead, but Jesus, in a discussion about salvation, says you
are right. I ask my congregants and students, “What does it meant that
Jesus validates this formula for salvation?” The lawyer offers a version of
salvation that is more ethical (based on doing) than ideological (based on
belief), and Jesus affirms the veracity of this formula of salvation. Jesus
says, “You are right.” Of course, after pointing this out, my more theo-
logically ambitious congregants start doing theological gymnastics and
philosophical acrobatics to explain how what Paul says in Romans and
what Jesus affirms in Luke are really the same things.
Yet, in light of Cleage’s claims, let’s entertain the idea that these are dif-
ferent soteriological ideas. Confessing and believing that Jesus was raised
from the dead seems, at least on the surface, to make no social, com-
munal, or relational claim on our lives. This idea of salvation lends itself
to a very vertical, isolated, personal relationship with Jesus Christ that is
consumed and informed by belief in Jesus being raised from the dead. It
lays the foundation for how many Christians conceptualize their spiritual-
ity and prioritize what ultimately matters. However, Loving God and our
neighbor as ourselves deeply connects our salvation with how we live in
community and our existential relations with others. Of course, both Paul
and Jesus say other things that can give each of these scriptures greater
context and complexity. Still, one can see how these two starting points
can lend themselves to two totally different Christian trajectories. The
historical and quantitative victory that this Pauline theological trajectory
has seen in Christianity explains why Cleage’s Black Messiah seems alien,
even offensive, to so many. I have attempted to argue that the rejection of
Cleage, and refusal to take his portrait of Jesus seriously, is actually a rebuff
of a very viable portrait of Jesus found in the synoptic gospels.
CONCLUSION ON LOVE AND BLACKNESS

The most redeeming quality of the Black Messiah, for Black people, is
that it gives the Christological structure to build a spirituality that can
be a stronger force in the building of Black self-Love. I cannot help but
imagine how the conversation in our staff meeting, about whether to dis-
play our Black selves as representations of our Black church, would have
been shaped differently if all of us grew up believing the cornerstone of
our faith was Black. Unfortunately, the same hesitation about displaying
blackness on a sign is found in many Black communities about highlight-
ing the plight of the unfair persecution and oppression of Black lives in the
#blacklivesmatters movement. Just as members of our church were unsure
204 B.A. JACKSON
about exhibiting the Black make up of our church and Black Christians
are reticent to claim the Black make up of our Christ, members of the
Black community are too often ambivalent about publically professing
that Black lives do matter. The colorless, racially transcendent Jesus that so
many Black people believe must be maintained to be universally relevant,
is similar to the all lives matter response to the Black lives matter move-
ment. Humanity and universality, so often masks for the desire for white
comfort, are effectually trampling the life and self-esteem of Black people.
If the murder of unarmed Black children is not enough for us to pause
to specifically address the Black plight, then what will it take for us to
Love ourselves? Disproportionate realities call for disproportionate atten-
tion. Yet, so many Black people, even those with knowledge of the imbal-
anced statistics and inequitable realities of everyday Black people still want
to trivialize the importance of blackness in our social conversations and
political activism. When a people will not care for their wounds or speak
up for their wounded, what are we left to conclude, other than there is a
lack of self-Love. When the atrocities of Black life are so palpable, but the
attention to Black wellness is so paltry, we must investigate every potential
cause and recreate much of our understanding. As a Black pastor, Albert
Cleage knew that he must start this process by re-understanding, reimag-
ining, and rearticulating Christianity and Jesus. As a present Black pastor,
I agree. If we are intent on revitalizing Black Love, then a good start is in
resurrecting the Black Messiah.
NOTES
1. Cleage eventually evolved in his idea of God. He did not continue to
believe or espouse that God was actually Black. However, I am more con-
cerned with the Christology of the Black Messiah than I am with the theol-
ogy of his once held belief that God was Black.
2. (p. 94).
3. (p. 107).
4. (p. 73).
5. (p. 43).
6. (p. 82).
7. (44).
8. The Lord’s Prayer.
9. A Black theology of Liberation (Twentieth Anniversary Edition), p. 120.
10. (Cone, 120).
11. The Black Christ, Kelly Brown Douglas, p. 83.
12. (Douglas, 84).

13. (p. 3).
14. See scholars like Karen Teel, Laurie Cassidy, Jennifer Harvey, and Rosemary
Radford Ruether and their contributions in George Yancy’s Christology
and Whiteness: What Would Jesus Do?
15. (p. 4).
16. (p. 44).
17. (p. 89).
18. New Revised Standard Version.
PART III
The Legacy of the Black Messiah

in the African Diaspora
CHAPTER 12
The Crucified City: Detroit as a Black Christ

Figure
Kamasi C. Hill
There is a genealogy of black clergy, activists, and scholars who’ve drawn

parallels that notion of “Immanuel” or “God is with us” was incomplete
in many respects, because for some, “God is us” was a better descriptor.
Juxtaposing the historical Jesus and the plight of the African in America,
says God is black, Jesus is black, and because of this black people will be
vindicated both existentially and eschatologically.
Edward Wilmot Blyden, a nineteenth-century minister and theolo-
gian, was one of the first persons to articulate this relationship between
the suffering servant and the black masses. Blyden understood that there
was interconnectedness between the humanity and the divine in the his-
tory of the African. Paramount to Blyden’s philosophy of history and as a
Christian minister, he drew parallels between the trials and tribulations of
Jesus and that of the Africans. He writes, in the mid-nineteenth century,
“If service rendered to humanity is service rendered to God, then the
Negro and his country have been, during the ages, in spite of unwanted
influences, tending upward to the Divine.”1 In the latter part of the nine-
teenth century AME Bishop Henry McNeil Turner, building upon a
legacy of Pan-Africanism and Black Christian Nationalism, proclaims the
notion that “God is a Negro” as a protest against the prevailing view not
K.C. Hill ()

Chicago, IL, USA

DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54689-0_12
210 K.C. HILL
only that God/Jesus were white but that the power dynamic would not
always work in their favor.
These nineteenth-century stalwarts laid the groundwork for twentieth-
century historians, theologians, and practitioners to challenge the domi-
nant paradigms about the historical Jesus. These twentieth-century
scholars who examined the role of black Jesus painted various pictures
of a black Jesus that spanned the ideological/theological spectrum, from
radical revolutionary, to apocalyptic preacher, to spiritual sage. The vary-
ing interpretations of the role and function of Jesus both reflected a
continuum or rejection of previous narratives. This chapter takes on the
audacious task of utilizing the literary construct of the Christ figure as an
allegory for the realities of the twentieth-century Urban Detroit. While
examining two representative cases in early twentieth -century Detroit,
this chapter positions the city as text and not simply geography. This offers
further possibilities for examining the relationship between the role and
efficacy of the black Christ figure and the black experience.
CHRIST FIGURE/THE CITY AS TEXT METHODOLOGY

Cities are texts. Whether it’s the sprawling city neighborhood blocks, the
mosaic of graffiti art adorning an underpass, or the business district filled
with corporate insignias and mom and pop stores. Cities tell a story of
the complex matrix of markets, policy, human mobility, and architecture.
Cities also have their own set of particular narratives, informed by the spe-
cific contexts they are located. Such is the case with the city of Detroit. In
the early twentieth century, the central narratives that emerged in Detroit
that are germane to this discussion are the confluence of race, religion, and
radicalism. The intertextual relationships between the three demonstrate
both the power and the limitations that inform the allegorical relationship
between the city of Detroit and the symbol of the black Christ figure.
BLACK DETROIT
On paper, the city of Detroit resembled a beloved patriarch that provided
rewards to those who labored; in reality, blacks were treated as the ugly
stepchild of Detroit’s political and corporate fathers. What is also true
is that the city of Detroit can be described as a liminal space in relation-
ship to the black experience. This liminality was demonstrated many times
with enslaved Africans making their way from the South to the North,
THE CRUCIFIED CITY: DETROIT AS A BLACK CHRIST FIGURE 211
oftentimes, ending up in Detroit with only the Detroit River separating

them from Canada and freedom. Many blacks took up residence in Detroit,
while others crossed the waters to Canada. For many blacks, because of
Detroit’s northernmost location, the city became synonymous with free-
dom. Metaphorically speaking, Detroit, as liminal space, embodied both
the possibilities and limitations that the city has offered its sable citizens.
For black Detroiters, this liminality has represented both the hopes of
Southern migrants as well as the troubling social, economic, and political
realities that were present in the city. At best, the boom of industrialization
provided the sons and daughters of former slaves and sharecroppers an
opportunity to become part of the American middle class without having
to receive a formal education. Many blacks and whites participated in the
systems of sharecropping and tenant farming in the post-Civil War era.
While the Industrial Revolution eliminated the need for certain aspects of
farm labor, black farmers still numbered in the tens of thousands in the
South during this time. However, in the early part of the twentieth cen-
tury, insects called boll weevils infested the cotton crops in the South and
destroyed hundreds of thousands of acres of cotton. Cotton was known
as the “cash crop” because it brought in a substantial amount of return
and did not require much initial investment. This infestation prompted
an exodus of low-skilled and undereducated black men who traveled
northward to find work and provide for their families. Specifically, Detroit
attracted many Southerners because it not only presented opportunities
for economic progress, but Detroit was home to an industrial class of
black workers. Many blacks in the South looked to Detroit as a space that
provided communal and social cohesion and stability, but were unaware of
the institutional obstacles that impeded progress.2
Due to the growing demand for the Model T Ford automobile, Henry
Ford announced in 1913 that he would pay all of his workers five dollars
a day. This was enough to cause many black Southerners to drop their
plows and head to Detroit.3 However, Detroit was not immune to the
race and class politics that undergirded the American landscape. From its
inception, the black community in Detroit found itself operating in this
space of liminality.
At the turn of the twentieth century, Detroit began to mature within
the context of an emerging industrial revolution. The powerbase of the
USA was rapidly shifting from an agrarian southern economy to an urban
northern one. The change in the economic trajectory of this country was
more than geographic. As industries began to thrive, so did immigration
212 K.C. HILL
and migration, which opened the doors for racial and political strife as a
new urban proletariat began to emerge.4 Black Detroiters found respite
from the difficulties of their new transition in the faith community, the
same community that provided them solace when they lived in the South.
The black presence in Detroit before the twentieth century was
nominal at best. Although black settlement of Detroit began in the late
1760s, exact numbers are unclear because it was not until 1827 when
the Michigan legislature required that “all colored (free) persons should
be registered in the county clerk’s office.”5 Most black Detroiters in the
late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries were agrarian and domestic
workers. Black business ownership was formally documented by the early
1830s; barbershops, lunchrooms, and saloons were some of the initial ser-
vices offered in the black community.
Blacks who were able to depart from the South during this time were
members of a new generation. The elite of nineteenth-century black
Detroiters achieved a level of class clout as many of them obtained formal
education, exhibited entrepreneurial prowess, and carved a small slice of
the American dream for themselves in the post-Civil War North.6 This
group of blacks made their presence known by creating an institutional
presence that included but was not limited to mutual aid groups, cul-
tural organizations, lodges, and of course, churches.7 While institutions
like these articulated black, middle-class interests, unlike some black insti-
tutions of this time, many of them were created without the assistance
of white philanthropists. What distinguished the church from the other
institutions was its ability to serve as the nucleus for the black community.8
Many of the civic and social organizations evolved and disbanded over
the years and mainline denominational black churches became permanent
fixtures in the black communities of Detroit. Scholars of religion concur
that the church served as a central function for the black community;
however, it is important to note that this phenomenon was not exclusive
to the black religious community in Detroit. Many ethnic groups in the
city of Detroit found solace in their respective faith communities that were
generally located in an area on the east side of Detroit, commonly referred
to as Black Bottom.
RACE IN DETROIT
By the turn of the twentieth century, Detroit’s streets were stained
with the blood of a major race riot. In 1863, the front page of the
Detroit Free Press reported, “The bloodiest day that ever dawned upon
Detroit.”9 A black Detroiter named Thomas Faulkner was falsely accused

of molesting two nine-year-old girls—one white and one black. Faulkner
was convicted and found guilty of the crime, and as he was being trans-
ported from the courthouse to jail, an all-white mob set out with the
intent to lynch Faulkner. Unsuccessful in their attempts to kill the pris-
oner as the provost guards successfully escorted him away, the swelling
white mob proceeded to burn down 35 buildings they suspected were
inhabited by African-Americans. The casualties of the day included the
death of at least two innocent people and a multitude of others, mostly
African-American, mercilessly beaten. The early Detroit Free Press was
ideologically skewed and tended to advance the causes of a pro-white
supremacist agenda; this bias further fanned the flames of racial passion
in Detroit.10 While the race riot was a newsworthy event, many blacks
believed that the Free Press appeared more eager to place the blame on
Detroit’s small black community than to report on the rising tide of
racial animosity among Detroit’s pre-immigrant communities, migrants
from the South, and ethnic immigrants from across the Atlantic. While
primary sources about the actual riot are scant, this riot set the founda-
tion for understanding the complex racial dilemmas that beset Detroit
toward the close of the nineteenth century.11
If the Dubosian edict that the twentieth century would be marked by
the problem of the color line was true about any location, Detroit was a
quintessential example. In addition to the labor and class struggles, race
also shaped the character of the city unlike any other social reality. Detroit’s
migrants and immigrants found themselves enveloped in protracted fights
over low-skill jobs or available living space. While the 1931 Scottsboro
Trial received national recognition, the Ossian Sweet trial also involved
racial violence; however, it did not receive nearly the same national expo-
sure as the Scottsboro case.12 Ossian Sweet was a dentist and an African-
American resident of Detroit who attempted to purchase a home in a
predominately white area in Detroit in 1924. When a white mob formed
outside of his new house, Sweet and his family attempted to defend them-
selves, and a white person was killed. Sweet and members of his fam-
ily were arrested and subsequently tried for murder. During this time,
Detroit’s emerging black community so upset a great deal of the white
community that a prominent member of the Ku Klux Klan almost won
the year’s mayoral election as a write-in candidate. The Detroit Free Press
and other newspapers added to the racial conflict by painting young black
males as inherently deviant and prone to physical violence.13 In early 1921,
The Detroit Urban League, along with black clerical leaders at Bethel and
214 K.C. HILL
Second Baptist, wrote to the Detroit Free Press, complaining about their
portrayals of black men as hyper-violent criminals, and for the most part,
these complaints fell on deaf ears.14 Additionally, Rev. Joseph Gomez, pas-
tor of Detroit’s largest church, Bethel AME was one of the main fundrais-
ers for the Ossian Sweet defense fund, and Bethel AME served as one of
the main venues various leaders used to speak out against the injustice of
racial violence in Detroit.15 Famed civil rights attorney Clarence Darrow
became the lead defense attorney. Darrow and Gomez developed a friend-
ship during this time and this event further added to the efficacy of the
black pastor in using the institution and his leverage in the city to help
bring about justice.16
THE OSSIAN SWEET TRIAL

Dr. Ossian Sweet was a physician who worked at the all-black Dunbar
Hospital in Black Bottom. Sweet would graduate from Wilberforce and
attend Medical School at Howard University. While a student at Howard
during the Red Summer in 1919, Sweet witnessed a black man being
beaten by a white mob, and historian Kevin Boyle believed that this inci-
dent shaped Sweet’s worldview around race “until his death.”17 In June of
1925, Dr. Sweet and his wife purchased a bungalow on Garland Avenue,
which was a predominately white working-class area in Detroit. Real estate
documents note that the listing price of $6,000 was more than the house’s
fair market value. Boyle suggests that the white family who sold the Sweets
the house jumped at the opportunity to price gouge the Sweets because
they would not have the opportunity to do that to potential white buy-
ers.18 The Sweets moved into the home on September 8, 1925, fully aware
that capricious forces in the form of white mobs would seize the oppor-
tunity to intimidate them. For this reason, Sweet enlisted the help of nine
male family members to fend off any potential attacks on his property or
his family. As predicted, a white mob began to form outside of his newly
acquired bungalow, and on the second day, the mob grew restless and
began throwing rocks at the residence. One of Sweet’s relatives retaliated
with two gunshots, one delivering a fatal wound to Leon Brenier, who was
one of the mob participants. All persons in the house, including Sweet and
his wife, were arrested and subsequently charged with murder.19
The national office of the National Association for the Advancement
of Colored People (NAACP) hired noted civil rights attorney Clarence
Darrow to represent the Sweets. Under the leadership of James Weldon
Johnson and Walter White, the NAACP sought the opportunity to parlay
the case into a national exposé of racial discrimination and social inequality.
However, many blacks, including Gomez, felt that White’s and Johnson’s
focus on creating a national cause was designed to solicit funds from sym-
pathetic whites rather than achieving justice for the Sweets.
Prosecutor Robert Toms attempted to thwart Darrow’s masterful
defense of the Sweets in his closing argument. Toms told the all-white
jury, “It isn't your business to settle [the race problem].” He asked them
to remember that “this courtroom is just a tiny speck in the world,” and
that there “are other worlds to consider.” Furthermore, Toms disputed
Darrow’s claim that the people gathered outside the Sweet home had
malice in their hearts: “There is no scintilla of evidence to show that the
association banded together to drive Negroes out of the neighborhood.”20
In his instructions to the jury, Judge Murphy told the 12 men, “All
men are equal under the law, whether they be rich or poor, black or white,
humble or great. It is the duty of each of you to reach for justice.” On
November 25, 1925, the case went to the jury. The next day, the jury, after
deliberating for 46 hours, told Judge Murphy that they thought it would
be impossible to reach a verdict in the case. Murphy dismissed the jury and
declared a mistrial. According to reports, seven of the jurors had favored
conviction (for manslaughter) for Ossian and Henry Sweet; five favored
acquittal. For the other defendants, the vote was ten to two in favor of
acquittal. Darrow hoped that the hung jury would convince Robert Toms
to drop charges. However, much to Darrow’s dismay, Toms announced
plans to proceed with a second trial. After Darrow moved to have the
defendants tried separately, Toms decided to precede with a retrial of
Henry Sweet, Ossian Sweet’s younger brother, who had admitted to firing
shots out the front window in the direction of Leon Breiner. Released on
bail, the Sweets chose not to return to their Garland Avenue home. The
home was set on fire the winter of 1925–1926, but the blaze was extin-
guished quickly, and the house escaped serious damage. Upon Darrow’s
return to Detroit in April 1926, to prepare for the Henry Sweet trial, he
told reporters that he liked Detroit—especially because of its proximity
to Windsor, Ontario, where the prohibition amendment had no force.
Moreover, he looked forward to another trial before Judge Murphy, whom
he called “the kindliest and most understanding man I have ever happened
to meet on the bench.” Known for being a firebrand, Darrow even had
good things to say about the prosecutors. He described Toms as “one of
the fairest and most humane prosecutors I have ever met.” The second
216 K.C. HILL
trial proceeded much as the first, though “more smoothly,” according

to Darrow. The difference between the trials was the famous eight-hour
closing statement by Clarence Darrow. Darrow called his lengthy summa-
tion in the Henry Sweet trial “one of the strongest and most satisfactory
arguments that I have ever delivered.” He said, “I ask you, gentlemen,
on behalf of the progress and understanding of the human race, that you
return a verdict of ‘Not guilty.’” Robert Toms summed up for the pros-
ecution the next morning, and the jury was sent off to begin its delibera-
tions. Four hours after they began discussions, the jury door was unlocked
and the 12 white male jurors marched single file into the courtroom. The
judge addressed the jurors. “Have you gentlemen, in the course of your
deliberations, reached a verdict in the case of Henry Sweet? And if so,
who will answer for you?” The jury foreman, George Small, the young
Detroit manager of Cunard Anchor Lines, responded, “We have, and I
will.” Small cleared his throat. “Not guilty,” he said as his voice broke.
Tears rolled down the cheeks of Clarence Darrow and Henry Sweet.21 The
Sweet Trial in Detroit is an exemplar of the Black Christ Figure in both
tragic and triumphant ways. The city leaders attempting to bring charges
against the innocent, the metaphorical crucifixion of Sweet and his family
members, and the redemption of an acquittal is but one of many narra-
tives that speak to how the black Christ figure looms large in the shadow
of the city.
BLACK WOMEN, BLACK DETROIT, AND THE BLACK CHRIST

FIGURE
While men have long been credited with being the associated with the
Christ figure, women and in particular, black women have largely been
ignored or marginalized. Theologian Jacquelyn Grant, refers to the
“Christness” of Jesus of being gender non-specific. The black “Christness”
of the black Christ figure gives black women a rightful claim to be recipi-
ents of and participators in the Christ event.22 As such, their involvement
in the socio-political affairs of the city of Detroit is indicative of the actions
of championing the cause for the “least of these.” Fannie Peck, leader and
proponent of black economic nationalism and the black women associated
with the Housewives League of Detroit serve as a representative case.
Black women’s nationalistic impulses have received scant attention in
historical and theological literature. The commonly referenced inher-
ent patriarchy in black nationalism as some historians acknowledge have
also been negligent in their ability to include black nationalist activity

by women.23 On the other hand, in the Universal Negro Improvement
Association (UNIA), recent scholarship has focused on the contribu-
tions of black women as arbiters of Black Nationalist activity within the
UNIA. Black women were central to the success of the UNIA, and despite
the sexist sentiments, the UNIA incorporated women into the ranks of
leadership, and the UNIA’s Detroit branch had substantial female rep-
resentation.24 Yet, while some black women were involved in the UNIA,
their public profile was low, and many black female elites maintained their
distance from the UNIA and limited their nationalistic activities to other
venues, particularly the church.
Fannie Peck, Founder of the National Housewives League, and wife
of Rev. William Peck of Bethel AME Church in Detroit, supported a phi-
losophy of black Christian economic nationalism, where she advocated “a
pledge to support black businesses, buy black products, patronize black
professionals, and keep the money in the community.”25 On the surface, it
would appear that Peck’s edict was directly connected to Garvey’s brand
of Black Nationalism; however, this wasn’t the first time Fannie embraced
this notion of black self-determinism.
Fannie Peck’s nationalist and activist roots can be traced back to her
political activity in the League of Women Voters in St. Louis (LWVSL),
Missouri. In the early 1920s, most of Missouri’s neighboring states
enforced major Jim Crow laws. On the other hand, St. Louis, Missouri
was one of the few cities in the geographic South that had progressive
laws, particularly when it came to the rights of women and blacks. While
the Missouri chapters of the National Association of Colored Women
(NACW) and the NAACP were active, many black women felt that both
groups were committed to advocacy but wanted to steer clear of being
explicitly political. Margaret Bush Wilson, the first black woman to head
the board of the NAACP and a St. Louis native noted, “black people had
this thing about being non-partisan in a way that I never understood. Why
wouldn’t you want to get involved in politics?”26 This approach resulted
in many black women in St. Louis exploring alternative political outlets.
Edna Gellhorn, a white female leader of the LWVSL, advocated for the
inclusion of black women in the organization. As a result, the LWVSL
provided the space for partisan engagement for women of color.
Fannie Peck’s advocacy of black economic nationalism was not merely
an ideological phenomenon; it was undergirded by theological man-
dates rooted in Christian principles. Some historians tend to ignore the
218 K.C. HILL
centrality of Christian themes in the facilitation of the black women’s

club movement.27 This oversight tends to minimize the role of black
Protestantism and secularizes the work of many black women who didn’t
see any separation between public advocacy and private worship. Historian
Evelyn Higginbotham echoes this sentiment by noting, “More than mere
precursors to secular reform and women’s rights activism, black women’s
religious organizations undergirded and formed an identifiable part of
what is erroneously assumed to be ‘secular.’”28
Fundamentally, notions of self-help, uplift, thrift, labor, and agency were
qualities of the broader swath of Protestantism and black Protestantism,
in particular. Anne Knupfer notes that black clubwomen articulated their
own vision rooted in the community mores of mothering and a deep-
seated Christianity.29 While Fannie Peck rarely made explicit connections
between her nationalist activity and her religious allegiance, Protestant
themes served as the subtext behind many of her endeavors.30
Fannie’s belief that Christian principles and the church should inform
the activities of the HWLD was met with disdain by many established
national black female leaders in the clubwomen’s movement. Leaders like
Ida B. Wells and Margaret Murray Washington were very skeptical of many
black churches and black ministers. Washington often warned women that
black pastors were self-serving, often neglecting utilitarian ideals. She also
instructed them that they should limit their activity within the church
by not spending too much time going to Sunday services. Other female
leaders like Fannie Williams directed their ire at black male clerical leader-
ship in very strong terms. Williams once claimed that racial progress was
“more hindered by a large part of the ministry entrusted with leadership
than by any other single cause.”31 While many of these black female lead-
ers articulated a profound critique of black preachers, it didn’t prevent
Fannie Peck from articulating her brand of black Christianity, utilizing her
husband’s prominence as the pastor and her extensive religious network to
recruit members and build the Housewives League of Detroit (HWLD).
Furthermore, most black women who were otherwise supportive of the
clubwomen’s movement still attended services.32
Peck established in the Declaration of Purpose of the National Negro
Housewives’ League, that one of the objectives is to “instill in our chil-
dren that business and commerce are noble pursuits which offer lucrative
rewards for mastery of small beginnings, sacrifice, ambition, intelligence,
grit, and determination, and that these attributes, when blended with
race pride, are foundations which must be laid for a permanent economic
structure.”33 The mingling of the Protestant work ethic with racial pride
demonstrates a form of black religious nationalism that most historians
credit with being the domain of male agents. However, Fannie’s seemingly
effortless ability to combine religion, race, and economics and the massive
organizational movement she built suggests that it was black women who
played an indelible role in the development of black economic nationalism
in the city of Detroit.
Fannie Peck’s embrace of Black Nationalism occurred within the con-
text of a larger nationalistic movement. Marcus Garvey’s Black Nationalist
organization, the UNIA, had a clear presence in the City of Detroit. Many
blacks in Detroit’s elite circles supported the aims of Black Nationalism,
though Garvey’s incendiary statements about some of the black religious
leadership created a rift between the UNIA and many of the leaders in
Detroit’s middle-class black community.34 Ten years prior to the arrival
of the Pecks in Detroit, Bishop Charles A. Smith, wrote a letter to the
Michigan attorney general from his office at Bethel implying that Garvey’s
comments represented a communist threat and furthermore spread false-
hoods and threats.35 Smith also judged Garvey to be “an adventurer and
grafter, bent on exploiting his people to the utmost limit.”36
The Great Depression revealed to many uplift ideologues in Detroit
that the economic vitality of the black community was just as important
as public respectability. But the legacy of UNIA wasn’t merely one of
economic self-sufficiency. Garvey’s brand of nationalism was steeped in
Christian rhetoric and theology. The UNIA’s Detroit local chapter would
be open on Sunday mornings and would often open up meetings with
worship sessions. Many UNIA members in Detroit would skip their own
worship services and attend the UNIA sessions instead. It is important to
note that the UNIA services weren’t formal worship services, but rather
were political meetings that acknowledged the presence of a God who was
on their side. Garvey’s theology wasn’t a bifurcation of religion and eco-
nomics; rather, it was a well-thought-out, non-sectarian framework, which
drew upon Christian sources.37 Even though the UNIA was expressly
political, their services could sound very religious, but while members
attended the Sunday meetings, there is no evidence to suggest that there
was a mass exodus of members from mainline churches relinquishing their
membership on church rolls.38
Five months after Fannie Peck articulated her black Christian nation-
alist impulses, W.D. Fard founded the Nation of Islam (NOI), which
also espoused its own brand of black economic nationalism. Thus, by
220 K.C. HILL
the mid-1930s in Detroit, black religious and economic nationalism

was more than just echoes reverberating in fledging black organiza-
tions; it was emerging as one of the dominant voices in black Detroit.
During this time, women of the NOI in the city of Detroit had roles,
often being limited to domestic support and serving as a teacher or aide
in the NOI’s school, the University of Islam. One small exception was
Clara Muhammad, who was the wife of the leader of the NOI, Elijah
Muhammad. Clara and many of the wives in the NOI oversaw the opera-
tions of the school, instituted dress codes, and initiated dietary policies
for families who were part of the NOI. Under Clara’s leadership, they
would also proselytize the importance of health and self-knowledge to
black women they would come into contact with in the city.39
Peck introduced what would become one of the largest projects of
black economic nationalism in the USA. She organized the women of the
Housewives League into 16 groups and went through the Black Bottom
community, knocking on every door, discussing with people the impor-
tance of keeping their dollars in Detroit and supporting black businesses.40
The men at Bethel referred to HWLD members as “boosters.” Dr. Austin
Curtis, a former assistant to George Washington Carver, noted that he
came to Detroit because he heard of the Housewives League and its pro-
motion and development of black businesses. Curtis reflected, “These
women [of the Housewives League] would go to the merchants and ask
for products that were produced by blacks. If they wouldn’t carry them,
they would see that people wouldn’t buy there any longer. It was effec-
tive.”41 Furthermore, Peck and the Housewives created a newsletter to
promote black businesses and to assure that products manufactured by
blacks received proper exposure.
Helen Malloy joined the Housewives League when she moved to Detroit
in 1932. She noted that although the League was successful, the early years
were difficult because the mentality that existed among some blacks was
that of immense self-hatred and lack of trust. Malloy noted, “We would go
from house to house in every section of the city and people would shut their
doors in our faces, and we had a hard way to go.”42 Malloy insisted that the
goal of the Housewives League was not merely to facilitate Black Bottom
campaigns. She noted that there was a larger transcendent purpose—
black solidarity. Malloy would eventually become one of the leaders of the
Housewives League, and she embraced the mantle of Black Nationalism,
even to the point of influencing her surrogate daughter, a young lady by the
name of Betty Sanders. Sanders would eventually become Betty Shabazz,
the wife of noted Black Nationalist leader Malcolm X.43
One of the first acts of Fannie Peck was to issue a Declaration of

Purpose for the Housewives League. This Declaration offers an insight
into the League’s understanding the buying power evident in the black
community. In the preamble Fannie Peck offered an acute analysis of how
American society placed barriers to prevent blacks from having equal access
to employment and economic capital. Fannie’s critique was not limited to
the economic reality of blacks in Detroit. Rather Fannie frames her state-
ment by explicitly chiding small business communities in various cities and
implicitly indicting them for their exploitative practices. As black women
were the primary caregivers and consumers during this time, Fannie posits
that the only solution is for black women to initiate a mass movement of
racial and economic solidarity.
Twelve Million Negroes live in America. These citizens have been loyal
to this country’s traditions, speak its language, and obey its laws. These
Negroes spend their incomes, the same as other population groups, for
merchandise and products manufactured and sold in America. It is both
a custom and sound economics for all groups of consumers to receive cer-
tain recognition in the form of employment, proportionately and impartially
allocated. The Negro is not proportionately and impartially employed in
accordance with his purchasing power for the necessities of home and body.
A National Housewives League, representing the women of the 750,000
Negro homes, recognizing and deploring conditions, organized to conduct
an economic crusade on behalf of the employment of their children, and to
promote the progress of our race.44
Peck referred to blacks as victims of a “vicious economic system.” The

system that Peck refers to was also the economic exploitation Peck wit-
nessed as a relatively new resident to Detroit. Peck noticed Henry Ford’s
nefarious relationships with some clerical leaders in the black community.
She witnessed the preferential treatment of European immigrants cou-
pled with mass unemployment of black male workers. As president of
the Housewives League, she initiated a thorough program of canvassing
Detroit’s Black Bottom neighborhood and disseminating information
about black businesses, services, and products. With Bethel AME Church
serving as the base of operations, interested black women would meet
at the church and sign a pledge acknowledging their support of black
businesses. Peck’s advocacy, resistance, and assessment of the needs of
the black community demonstrates that Detroit as a black Christ figure,
figured prominently in the work and activity of Fannie Peck and the black
women associated with the Housewives League.
222 K.C. HILL
1967 REBELLION AND RESURRECTION

The 1967 Detroit Rebellion marked the third time black Detroiters had
taken to the streets to protest racial antagonism in 100 years. In 1863, the
rebellion results in over 35 deaths and the creation of a full-time police
force. In 1943, police brutality was one of the leading factors of the rebel-
lions and in 1967 the police raiding a blind pig and killing an unarmed
black man sparked the rebellion, which led to an even stronger police
force called STRESS (Stop the Robberies Enjoy Safe Streets). The con-
sistent variable of state sanctioned violence demonstrates that the city was
committed to adopting repressive measures against citizens in many ways
similar to the ancient Roman government. The 1967 Rebellion is also
important because it serves as a pivotal moment where Rev. Albert Cleage
emerged as a national figure in helping to shape and resurrect a new con-
sciousness among black Detroiters. As the New York Times reported, the
1967 rebellions were the result of “the long-simmering anger of black
residents at an abusive, mostly white police force.”45
The rebellion began early in the morning of July 23, 1967, and lasted
five days. By the time the smoke cleared almost a week later, 683 build-
ings across the city had been damaged or destroyed and tanks had rolled
through the streets. A total of 43 blacks died and the National Guard was
called out to quell the protest.
Rev. Albert Cleage, at the funeral of some of the protesters, stated that
“this (riot) is a racial incident … it represents one simple thing: black peo-
ple want control of black communities. We are engaged in a nationwide
rebellion, seeking to become what God intended that we should be—free
men with control of our own destiny, the destiny of black men.”46 In
the audience sat both the white mayor of Detroit and the white gover-
nor of Michigan. This act of militancy and prophetic energy resulted in
fearful reactions from white suburbanites and a resurrection of black self-
determination among many black citizens.47
CONCLUSION
Twentieth-century Detroit has produced its share of black religious leader-
ship. Religious leaders, who articulated and negotiated the black Christ in
Detroit such as Albert Cleage, Elijah Muhammad, and C.L. Franklin, not
only transformed their respective faith communities but also had a major
influence on the social and political culture of Detroit. While Detroit has
seen its share of black politicians, civic and business leaders, it is the leaders
from the religious community that were directly and indirectly involved
in almost every facet of social, cultural, economic, and political decisions
that effected the black community. Black religious leaders in Detroit were
at the table with the United Automobile Workers (UAW) and other labor
unions, supporters and developers of black businesses, housing projects,
educational policy, and the election of black politicians to local, state, and
national office. One example of political mobilization by clergy was the
development of the Black Slate by Rev. Albert Cleage, which was sup-
ported by other black church leaders like Rev. Charles Hill of Hartford
Memorial Baptist Church. The Black Slate was a vehicle first used to elect
Coleman Young, the first black mayor of Detroit. The slate was an organi-
zation that produced circular materials given to black voters that featured
the positions of black politicians whose goals were consistent with the aims
and goals that black religious and civic leaders articulated. Currently, the
Black Slate Inc., is in cities like Houston and Atlanta, and is well docu-
mented in assisting in the election of Atlanta’s first black mayor, Maynard
Jackson.48
Many leaders of faith communities in the USA were either forced to
address the existential crisis that plagued their communities by convic-
tion or circumstance. Those who responded found themselves engaging
in forces that appeared insurmountable with minimal resources at their
behest. Faith communities in varies cities and have always played a part
in shaping national discourse, provoking action, and summoning spiri-
tual truths within their respective epoch, often going against the grain,
and employing non-traditional methods and ideas. This is the true leg-
acy of cities such as Detroit serving allegorically as a Black Christ Figure;
agentive prophetic subjects, able to engage the political, economic, and
social milieu of their day and withstand the forces of dissent of resistance.
Detroit is going through its wilderness experience, but resurrection will
come.
NOTES
1. Teshale Tibebu, Edward Wilmont Blyden and the Racialist Imagination
(Rochester: University of Rochester Press, 2012), p. 21.
2. Forrester B. Washington, The Negro in Detroit: A Survey of a Negro Group
in a Northern Industrial Center During the War Prosperity Period (Detroit,
1920), p. 21.
224 K.C. HILL
3. August Meier and Elliott Rudwick, Black Detroit and the rise of the UAW
(Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1981), p. 28. Henry Ford’s
plan to pay workers five dollars a day resulted in higher worker productiv-
ity and made Ford the richest man in the USA. However, it also created
massive problems, with an influx of immigrants and migrants yearning for
jobs, that Ford couldn’t possibly provide. Additionally, Henry Ford’s pro-
clivity toward racism and anti-Semitism informed his exploitative
practices.
4. Julian E. Zelizer, Arsenal of Democracy: The Politics of National Security–
from World War Ii to the War On Terrorism (New York: Basic Books,
2010), pp. 4–5; Franklin D. Roosevelt had called Detroit, Michigan as the
“great arsenal of democracy” in one of his fireside chat radio reports in
1940. Roosevelt used the term in reference to the rapid transition of much
of the Detroit-area automotive industry’s conversion to produce weapons
during World War II.
5. Ibid., History of Detroit. MHC. p. 2, Feb. 8, 1928.
6. Historian William Cobb coined the term “Afrostacracy.” He describes the
Afrostocracy as the group of elite blacks who were able to achieve middle-
class status and recognition years before the beginning of the Great
Migration.
7. Thomas, Life for Us is What we Make it, 4.
8. Frazier, The Negro Church in America, 29.
9. Ibid.
10. Detroit Free Press, March 7, 8, 1863, morning eds., Detroit Advertiser and
Tribune, March 7, 1863, afternoon ed. John C Schneider, “Detroit and the
Problem of Disorder: The Riot of 1863,” Michigan History 58 (1974), 17.
11. John C. Schneider, Detroit and the Problem of Order, 1830–1880: A
Geography of Crime, Riot, and Policing (Lincoln: University of Nebraska
Press, 1980), p. 13 Schneider discusses the Free Press and its insistence on
reporting on black criminality.
12. The Scottsboro Trial was the trial of nine teenage boys who were arrested
and accused of raping two white young women in Alabama in 1931. Dan
T. Carter, Scottsboro: A Tragedy of the American South, Revised ed. (Baton
Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2007), p. 135.
13. Kevin Boyle, Arc of Justice: A Saga of Race, Civil Rights, and Murder in the
Jazz Age, Reprint ed. (New York: Holt Paperbacks, 2005), p. 33.
14. Detroit Urban League Papers, 1933, MHC, box 11 folder 1933–1940.
15. Boyle, Arc of Justice, 34.
16. Ibid., 194.
17. Boyle, The Arc of Justice, 24.
18. Ibid.
19. Ibid.
20. Ossian Sweet Trial Transcripts http://dar r ow.law.umn.edu/

documents/1st_Sweet_Trial_Combined.pdf
21. Clarence Darrow, The Story of My Life (New York: Da Capo Press, 1996),
p. 122.
22. Jacquelyn Grant, White Woman’s Christ, Black Woman’s Jesus (New York:
Scholars Press, 1989), p. 224.
23. Bettye Collier-Thomas and V.P. Franklin, eds., Sisters in the Struggle:
African American Women in the Civil Rights-Black Power Movement (New
York: NYU Press, 2001), p. 226.
24. Judith Stein, The World of Marcus Garvey: Race and Class in Modern
Society, Louisiana paperback ed. (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State Univ Pr,
1991), p. 229.
25. Ibid.
26. Priscilla A. Dowden-White, Groping Toward Democracy: African American
Social Welfare Reform in St. Louis, 1910–1949 (Columbia: University of
Missouri, 2011), p. 134.
27. Darlene Clark Hine in her book Hinesight, does a great job of exploring
the role of women during the interwar years but tends to ignore their
religious foundations.
28. Higganbotham, Righteous Discontent, 23.
29. Knupfer, Toward a Tenderer Humanity and a Nobler Womanhood, 7.
30. Three Questions About Housewives Leagues Pamphlet, Housewives
League Papers, MHC.
31. Edited with an introduction by Mary Jo Deegan, The New Woman of
Color: The Collected Writings of Fannie Barrier Williams, 1893–1918
(DeKalb, IL: Northern Illinois University Press, 2002), p. 269.
32. Nancy A Hewitt and Suzanne Lebsock, eds. Visible Women, 262.
33. Declaration of Purpose of the National Negro Housewives League. Fannie
Peck.
34. Amy Jacques-Garvey, ed. Philosophy and Opinions of Marcus Garvey
(Studies in American Negro Life), College ed. (New York: Atheneum,
1969), p. 123.
35. Marcus Garvey, The Marcus Garvey and Universal Negro Improvement
Association Papers, Volume Xi: The Caribbean Diaspora, 1910–1920
(Chapel Hill: Duke University Press Books, 2011), p. 446.
36. Bishop C. Smith to A. Mitchell Palmer, June 25, 1919 in Robert A. Hill,
ed., The Marcus Garvey and Universal Negro Improvement Association
Papers (10 vols. Projected; Berkeley, 1983-) I. 446, 447.
37. Randall K. Burkett, Garveyism as a Religious Movement: The
Institutionalization of a Black Civil Religion (Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow
Press, 1978), p. 17.
38. Ibid.
226 K.C. HILL
39. Rosetta Ross: Witnessing and Testifying: Black Women, Religion, and Civil
Rights (Philadelphia: Fortress Press), p. 150.
40. Detroit Housewives League Celebrates 51st. MHC.
41. Moon, Untold Tales, Unsung Heroes, 254.
42. History of Housewives League—Her Goal Black Solidarity. MHC.
43. Ibid.
44. Declaration of Purpose of National Housewives League. MHC.
45. New York Times, July 1997.
46. Ibid., Widick, 190.
47. Ibid., 191.
48. Dillard, Faith in the City, 304.
CHAPTER 13
Savior King: Re-reading the Gospels

as Greco-Africana Literature & Re-imaging
Christ as Messianic Pharaoh
Salim Faraji
THE NEW TESTAMENT AS GRECO-AFRICANA LITERATURE

Every single New Testament papyrus that has ever been discovered
was located in Egypt.1 The earliest evidence scholars possess of New
Testament texts are fragments written on papyri primarily uncovered in
Oxyrhynchus, Egypt, dated to 200 CE. The oldest full manuscripts of the
New Testament which are dated to the early fourth century CE are the
Codex Sinaiticus and the Codex Vaticanus, both of which carry the des-
ignation “Alexandrian” texts because they were written, copied, edited,
and circulated in Alexandria, Egypt. The singular significance of Egypt for
understanding the historical evolution of early Christian literature is made
evident by Harvard Divinity School’s New Testament scholar Helmut
Koester when he says “only Egypt has yielded manuscripts which can give
us direct evidence for the texts which were used in the early period of
Christianity.”2 He and other scholars, however, might take exception to my
premise by declaring that the New Testament was not written exclusively
S. Faraji ()
Africana Studies Department, California State University, Dominguez Hills,
Carson, CA, USA

DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54689-0_13
228 S. FARAJI
in Egypt, but the overwhelming evidence points to Egypt minimally being

a primary center of early Christian literary production.
By provenance alone, this fact suggests that the New Testament,
although written in the Greek language and emblematic of Hebrew
literature, is not simply a “Hellenistic” or Judaic text, but more accu-
rately a Greco-Egyptian or Greco-Africana text influenced by the literary
milieu of other Late Egyptian literature written between the third and
first century BCE. In this regard, what characterizes the New Testament
and even Late Egyptian prophetic texts as Greco-Egyptian and Greco-
Africana literature? The nomenclature Greco-Egyptian and Greco-Africana
actually deconstructs notions of “Hellenism” which obfuscate the real-
ity of cultural encounter between Greek and Egyptian and other African
civilizations. Greco-Africana points to the history of Greek relations with
Egypt and Nubia as well as Ethiopia and North Africa.3 It is a term that
prioritizes North African and Nile Valley civilizations as historical actors
in the encounter with Greek civilization and therefore gives primacy to
classical African cultural and literary productions during the Late and
Greco-Roman periods. In situating the origins of Nubian Christianity
in the context of Greco-Roman and Byzantine cultural influence, I have
argued that we must consider that the designations Hellenistic, Greek,
and Roman historically functioned not necessarily as essentialized ethnic
and racial markers that denoted homogenized, ancient “European” iden-
tities, but as expansive sociocultural, territorial taxonomies that comprised
of a diversity of ethnicities, cultures, and languages of which Africa was
central.4 The description “Greco-Egyptian” gives importance to the con-
tinuity of ancient Egyptian culture and history during the Ptolemaic inva-
sion without annulling Greek influence entirely and therefore is a more
appropriate and precise rubric to identify Demotic and Greek texts from
this period—notwithstanding that Demotic was an indigenous Egyptian
script that came to prominence during the Ptolemaic period.
I want to underscore a genre of Egyptian literature preserved in
Demotic5 and Greek, commonly referred to as ancient Egyptian pro-
phetic texts by Egyptologists and some classicists which includes the fol-
lowing: the Demotic Chronicle (246–207 BCE), the Oracle of the Potter
(130 BCE), and the Oracle of the Lamb (130 BCE–7 CE). These ancient
Egyptian prophetic texts have been described by Jan Assman as exam-
ples of Late Egyptian apocalyptic messianism because they convey “the
anticipation of the advent of a savior-king sent by god to drive out for-
eigners, punish wrongdoing, reestablish justice on earth, and bring peace
SAVIOR KING: RE-READING THE GOSPELS AS GRECO-AFRICANA LITERATURE... 229
and plenty, happiness, and the divine presence”6 to a land that has suf-
fered the calamity of foreign invasion rendered by the Persians, Greeks,
and Romans. These ancient Egyptian prophetic texts focus on the role
of divine kingship to address catastrophe and restore justice and there-
fore as “prophecy” they castigate the invaders of Egypt, the Persians and
Ptolemaic dynasties as illegitimate occupiers of the throne of Egypt. As
such these divine oracles announcing the triumph of a new savior-king
in defense of the sovereignty of Egypt actually functioned as “nationalist
propaganda” to motivate and justify resistance to what was perceived as an
interregnum of unjust and unholy reign.7
Even as the Hebrew prophetic books Ezra and Nehemiah addressed
Persian domination and Isaiah and Jeremiah spoke to the oppression of
Babylonian captivity, so too did the oracular prophetic texts of Late Egypt
confront the predicament of political subjugation. In fact, C.C. McCown
in his classic work “Hebrew and Egyptian Apocalyptic Literature” pro-
vides insight as to why Egyptian and Hebrew apocalyptic traditions are
extraordinarily comparable:
Yet there are remarkable similarities in both form and content … the use
of physical portents and disasters and of social disturbances, the bitter criti-
cisms of society and the passion for what was thought to be social righteous-
ness, and the expectation of the coming of a god-sent king exhibit such
unique likenesses to Hebrew ideas that the probability can hardly be denied
that the older Egyptian literature must have influenced the Hebrews.8
It is not my intent here to establish ancient Egyptian literary traditions

as anterior to Hebrew prophetic literature, although McCown’s argu-
ment represents the consensus of contemporary Egyptologists and biblical
archaeologists.9 My goal is to demonstrate that the authors of the New
Testament could have been as equally influenced by the Egyptian pro-
phetic tradition of divine kingship as they were by Hebrew prophetic ante-
cedents. McCown intimates that both Hebrew and Christian apocalyptic
proclamations owe their “originality” to Egypt since “Egyptian apoca-
lypticism is another item which assists in demonstrating … the Jews and
Christians did not bring to the world an absolutely new Gospel” in the
sense of introducing the concept of a messianic savior-king that comes to
deliver the oppressed from tyranny.
For example, scholars such as H. Gressman noted nearly a century ago
that The Demotic Tale of Setne Khamwas II, also known as Setne Khamwas
230 S. FARAJI
and Si-Osirie, dated to the third century BCE during the Ptolemaic era,10
provides a literary antecedent to the parable of Jesus in Luke 16: 19–31.11
The parable is often described as “The Rich Man and Lazarus.” In the
story, the rich man is subjected to the agony of fire in the afterlife and the
poor man who was ridiculed during his life was in death “carried by Angels
to the side of Abraham.” In ancient Egypt, Setne Khamwas was the fourth
son of the Pharaoh Ramses II (thirteenth century BCE), and he was her-
alded as a great and wise priest of the god Ptah. During the Ptolemaic
period, Demotic tales began to emerge about him as a result of his historic
legacy throughout ancient Egyptian history.
The Demotic Tale of Setne Khamwas and Si-Osirie is actually about the
son of Setne Khamwas, Si-Osirie. In the tale, Si-Osirie escorts his father
to the netherworld to show him a poor man who had been buried in a
mat with no one to mourn him, but in death was dressed in royal gar-
ments at the side of the god Osiris vindicated as just and righteous. His
counterpart, however, a rich man who had been buried in a coffin with
great honor and countless people mourning him was now in the spirit
world, imprisoned and denied recognition because his “misdeeds were
more numerous than his good deeds.”12
The birth of Si-Osirie in the tale is presented as an act of divine interven-
tion. Both his mother Mehusekhe and his father Setne Khamwas received
dreams announcing his conception. In fact, his father is told that his son
will be named Si-Osirie and “many are the wonders that he shall do in
Egypt.” This Demotic text which predates the Greek literature of the New
Testament is a literary forerunner to the description of Jesus’ divine birth
in Luke 1:26–38 and Matthew 1:18–25. Si-Osirie is also described as an
exceptional child in the tale who after being introduced to temple school
“he surpassed the scribe who had been given to him for instruction. The
boy Si-Osirie began to recite writings with the scribes of the House of Life
in the temple of Ptah.”13 The New Testament parallel of this Demotic lit-
erary trope is represented in Luke 2:41–52 where Jesus the boy amazes the
scribes and priests at the temple of Jerusalem. Although the representation
of Si-Osirie in The Demotic Tale of Setne Khamwas and Si-Osirie is not
identical in detail to the representations of Jesus in the books of Luke and
Matthew, the parallels suggest that these key Demotic literary themes were
widely circulated in Egypt and would have influenced the development
of early Christian literature. Consequently, the Demotic texts of ancient
Egyptian prophetic and apocalyptic literature would have also served as an
additional source for the development of New Testament motifs.
For McCown, the “naturalness and inevitableness” of the spread of

Christianity throughout the Greco-Roman world may “become clearer
also through the study of Egyptian apocalyptic literature.”14 This stance is
also echoed by the more contemporary scholarship of David Frankfurter
in his discussion of the production of oracular prophetic texts by the
Egyptian priestly scribal establishment:
This native Egyptian institution devoted to the copying and editing of reve-
latory texts … suggest a possible context for later Christian authorship of
apocalyptic literature. That is, it suggests that alongside the diverse Egyptian
Judaisms responsible for apocalypses and Sibylline Oracles one must con-
sider developments in the Egyptian priestly scribal institution as a source of
Egyptian Christian apocalypticism.15
Frankfurter’s earlier work Elijah in Upper Egypt certainly demonstrates

the continuity between the third century CE Egyptian Christian text,
Apocalypse of Elijah, and earlier Egyptian prophetic texts like the Oracle
of the Potter and the Oracle of the Lamb, but does this influence also
extend to the development of messianic kingship motifs in the New
Testament.
THE ANCIENT EGYPTIAN ROOTS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT:

A HISTORIOGRAPHICAL REVIEW
My inclination to situate the New Testament in the context of ancient
Egyptian prophetic texts did not emerge vacuously or independent of
a long established approach in New Testament scholarship. In 1996,
during a New Testament course I took as a Master of Divinity stu-
dent at Claremont School of Theology with Greg Riley entitled “The
Greco-Roman Background of the New Testament,” I wrote a brief
essay that focused on “Ancient Egyptian Cults” and their influence on
the development of “mystery religions” in the Roman Empire. In the
paper, I sought to position two classic works on ancient Egyptian myth
in Greco-Roman antiquity, Plutarch’s De Iside et Osiride (On Isis and
Osiris) and The Golden Ass also known as The Metamorphoses of Apuleius
as theological repositories for the development of early Christian
literature.16
Indeed, Plutarch who lived in the first century CE was a very influen-
tial Greek philosopher whose work attempted to reconcile an emerging
232 S. FARAJI
Christian theological tradition with Platonic philosophy. The popularity

of the De Iside et Osiride was indicative of how ancient Egyptian myth
and intellectual traditions were viewed as instrumental to the philosophi-
cal enterprise even before Plutarch’s exposition of ancient Egyptian ideas.
The Golden Ass with its emphasis on the “magic” and healing practices of
the ancient Egyptian cult of Isis further reinforced ideas circulating about
ancient Egyptian mysticism and initiation rites into historic and arcane
practices. Undoubtedly, the adoration of Isis had occurred in two Roman
cities since 100 BCE at the temple of Isis at Pompeii and at the nearby
town of Herculaneum where a beautifully preserved fresco was discovered,
depicting four black priests of Isis officiating an Isis religious ceremony.17
Plutarch’s De Iside et Osiride, Apuleius’ The Golden Ass, and the famous
Isis temples at Pompeii and Herculaneum attest to the admiration of Isis
and Osiris throughout Greco-Roman antiquity, and this was no less true
for their influence on the development of early Christianity.
Accordingly, I argued in my paper that ancient Egyptian cults provided
the essential foundation for early Christian theology and doctrinal for-
mulations. Namely, that the doctrines that make Christianity distinctively
“Christian” such as Trinitarian theology, postmortem resurrection, the
virgin birth, son of God traditions, and Mary as the theotokos all found
their inspiration in the ideology of divine kingship in the Nile Valley and
Sudanic Africa. My argument was further supported by the remarkable
similarity between the early Christianity iconography of Mary and Jesus
with the more ancient symbolism of Isis and Horus.18 Aside from my con-
tention regarding Mariology and Isis, my professor disagreed with the
proposal that the other doctrines I enumerated came from Egypt. Yet in
his commentary on my paper, he seemed to acknowledge the proposition
that the source of Christology was rooted in the ideology of pharaonic
kingship when he stated, “Think of the career of Jesus and the Pharaoh as
two parallels, and this idea of the Christ.” He was insinuating an analogous
relationship between Jesus and ancient Egyptian pharaohs—that is, New
Testament Christology was equivalent to the concept of divine kingship in
ancient Nubia and Egypt.
Burton Mack another New Testament scholar during my time at
Claremont School of Theology also provided direction in uncovering
the ancient Egyptian background of the New Testament. He recom-
mended the scholarship of Philipp Vielhauer, a German New Testament
scholar who proposed that the “Son of God” motifs in the Gospel of
Mark were arranged according to royal enthronement rituals of ancient
Egyptian literature.19 Vielhauer outlines a redactional structure in Mark

based upon three sequential stages of divine sonship: (1) adoption and
apotheosis—Mark 1:11, (2) presentation of the son of God—Mark 9:7,
and (3) enthronement of the son of God—Mark 15:39. Burton Mack
describes Vielhauer’s argument as “attractive” and useful for understand-
ing the framework of the Gospel of Mark and avers that “An Egyptian pat-
tern lying behind the myth of the Son of God is not at all unthinkable in
Jewish-Christian circles familiar with the Jewish wisdom thought.”20 The
allusion to Jewish wisdom literature is instructive because scholars have
long established the influence of Isis aretalogies on the books of Sirach and
the Wisdom of Solomon.
Joachim Kügler’s work is likely the most recent New Testament schol-
arship on the ancient Egyptian influence on the New Testament. This
German-language monograph entitled in English translation, Pharaoh
and Christ? Religious-Historical Investigation into the Question of a
Connection between Ancient Egyptian Kingship Theology and the New
Testament Christology in the Gospel of Luke is a comprehensive treatment of
the topic that positions ancient Egyptian kingship ideology as the source
of not only New Testament Christology, but also the font of Roman,
Hellenistic, and biblical conceptions of divine kingship. He aligns Luke’s
infancy narrative and Jesus’ divine birth announcement with the more
ancient divine birth motifs celebrated on behalf of Amenhotep III at the
Temple of Luxor in Egypt—a tradition that was maintained at Egyptian
temple “birth-houses” well into the Greco-Roman era by both Ptolemaic
kings and Roman Emperors.21
The German Egyptologist Siegfried Morenz demonstrates convincingly
that early Christianity theology was derivative of “Egypto-Hellenistic”
religious forms which although modified by Greek ideas were ultimately
of Egyptian origin. He argues that
this is the case with the acclamation εἷς Θεὸς (“God is One”), used by the
earliest Christian communities: this is derived from one employed in the
service of Sarapis (“One is Zeus-Sarapis”), and this in turn comes from the
early Egyptian theologians’ form (“One is Amon,” etc.)22
Morenz situates early Christianity within an ancient Egyptian lineage even

in the context of the “Hellenistic” world because for him “Egyptian reli-
gion passed on its forms to the Hellenistic world and so enlarged the
range of expression available to the latter.” Yet Morenz also established
234 S. FARAJI
a direct link between Alexandrian theology and ancient Egyptian religion

when he said “Without abandoning our principle that Egyptian influence
made itself felt as an undercurrent throughout Hellenism, we may nev-
ertheless claim a pride place for Alexandria and so consider Alexandrian
theology as the intermediary between the Egyptian religious heritage and
Christianity.”23 Even if Morenz’s assertions were not free of error, his posi-
tioning of ancient Egypt as the source of early Christian theology compels
us to revisit, reassess, and reinterpret Rev. Albert Cleage’s claim that Jesus
was a revolutionary black Messiah by relocating him within the ancient
Egyptian and Nubian divine kingship traditions.
This is a subject which has also been addressed in Africana historiogra-
phy in such works as Charles Finch’s Echoes of the Old Darkland: Themes
from the African Eden where he devotes a chapter entitled, “Osiris, the
Egyptian Funerary Ritual, and the Birth of Christianity,” contending that
“historical Christianity is largely a reworking of Afro-Kamitic religious
ideas”—and because Egyptian theologians and monks were seminal in
forging early Christian theology “early Christian teaching contained noth-
ing alien to Egyptians; Christianity was Egyptian in their eyes.”24
Contextualizing the New Testament and the evolution of early
Christian literature and theology within the milieu of ancient Nile Valley
divine kingship traditions is not a novel idea, and in fact has been a con-
sideration of some New Testament scholars, Egyptologists, and historians
of African and Africana studies for over 150 years.25 Yet it is inexplicable
that this perspective and approach to the New Testament are virtually
unknown to Protestant churches in the USA, especially black churches,
and entirely marginalized by conventional New Testament scholarship
and early Christian specialists at mainline and evangelical seminaries and
theological schools. My detractors may argue that the Greco-Roman
and Hebrew influence on the New Testament is the most obvious and
pronounced simply because early Christian literature as bequeathed to
Western Christianity was conveyed in the Greek language and the inter-
textuality between the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament is profusely
apparent. I certainly concur with this argument, and I recognize that
Greek literary and cultural conventions have shaped the presentation of
New Testament texts whether through mimetic display of Homeric motifs
or the recapitulation of Qumran apocalypticism. Nevertheless, in his very
important work Egyptian Light and Hebrew Fire, Karl Luckert, with the
methodological rigor of a history of religions of scholar, reminds us in
the language of familial metaphor that Christianity is heir to three tra-
ditions: Judaism its father, Hellenism its midwife, and ancient Egypt its
mother.26 Describing ancient Egyptian religion as the “Mother Religion”
of Christianity, Luckert asserts that “one now must also acknowledge the
fact that ancient Egyptian religion has been Christendom’s more quiet
mother.”27
The notion of ancient Egypt as the “quiet mother” of Christianity may
be only applicable to Western Christianity and to a lesser extent Eastern
Christian traditions outside of the Nile Valley. Historians and scholars in
the Coptic Orthodox Church have long affirmed the continuity between
ancient Egyptian religion and Egyptian Christianity. The Coptic priest and
historian Father Tadros Malaty described Christian Egypt as a land that
was heir to both ancient Egyptian civilization and Christianity.28 In an
article entitled “Sons of Pharaoh and Christianity,” Malaty articulates the
dual legacy of Coptic Egypt as being rooted in both ancient Egyptian
religion and culture and Christianity. Another Coptic scholar Boulos Ayad
in his article “The Influence of the Ancient Egyptian Civilization on the
Coptic Orthodox Church” identified over 20 areas of similarities between
ancient Egyptian religious concepts and the central tenets of the Coptic
Orthodox Church. Ayad clearly situates the Coptic Orthodox Church
within the religious history of ancient Egypt “There is a very clear and
strong relationship between the cultures of the ancient Egyptians and the
Coptic Church… The Copts and their church have preserved to a great
extent the ancient Egyptian legacy which, combined with the Coptic tra-
dition, has played a large role in developing and preserving the culture of
Egypt.”29 As late as the sixth century CE, Coptic magical texts reveal that
some Coptic Christians saw no conflict between invoking Jesus along-side
Horus and Isis for healing and the alleviation of sickness and pain.30 Might
not this suggest that at least within early Egyptian Christianity, Jesus
Christ was perceived as a new Horus and son of Isis—and if this tradition
persisted in Egypt well into late antiquity, could it not have also provided
the formative basis for the construction of New Testament Christology.
The central proclamation of the New Testament kerygma is that Jesus is
the messianic savior-king as described in Mark 15:32 and Luke 23:2, and
that he was crucified and executed as “King of the Jews,” a pretender-king
to the throne of Judea (John 19:19; Luke 23:38; Mark 15:26; Matthew
27:37). Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, all present diverse accounts of
Jesus. Yet they are all united in their representation of Jesus as savior-king,
and Mark and Luke specifically align the role of Jesus as messiah and king
together. Each book contains the “royal” triumphant entry of Jesus as
236 S. FARAJI
king into Jerusalem (John 12: 13–15; Luke 19:38; Mark 11:10; Matthew
21:5). Mark associates Jesus’ royal triumphant entry into Jerusalem as the
harbinger of the ancestral Davidic monarchy. For John, Jesus’ kingdom is
not of this world, yet he is also presented as a counter-king in opposition
to Caesar (John 19:12). We may pose the question what ancient kingship
traditions, motifs, narratives, and symbols informed the New Testament
author’s portrait of Jesus as the messianic savior-king. Jesus as the “King
of Jews” is the son of God (John 19:7; Mark 15:39; Matthew 16:16;
Luke 1:35). In Mark 15, Jesus is revealed to be the son of God, messiah,
and king, all at once. All four Gospels present Jesus as entering Jerusalem
as king, and each also presents his crucifixion and death as a result of his
pretention as “King of the Jews.” The “Kerygma of Messianic and Divine
Kingship” is the central claim of the four Gospels in the New Testament,
and it is because of this that these four books form the nucleus of the New
Testament canon.
ATHANASIUS AND THE EGYPTIAN REVOLUTION: FORGING

CHRISTOLOGY, CREED, AND CANON
It should not be discounted that the primary codifier of the New Testament
canon was the Egyptian Patriarch and theologian Athanasius who in 367
CE instituted the scriptural canon for all of Christendom in his renowned
39th Festal Letter to the church. Although exiled from Egypt numer-
ous times throughout his ecclesiastical career, Athanasius served as Bishop
of Alexandria for 45 years from 328 CE until his death in 373 CE. He
was a champion of the Nicene faith, confirmed in 325 CE, and unques-
tionably the most important and influential theological architect of this
position. Athanasius argued against the Antiochene presbyter Arius that
there was a time when the Son was not—a doctrine that framed Jesus
as ὁμοιούσιος or homoisia—meaning of similar substance as the Father.
Athanasius contended for a different ontological Christology that presup-
posed the essential unity of Jesus and the Father by emphasizing the doc-
trine of ὁμοούσιος or homousia, denoting that the Son was of the same
substance as the Father. Athanasius published a statement of faith upon his
accession to the Episcopate of Alexandria in 328 CE. He was unequivo-
cal that the ontological configuration of the “Trinity” did not constitute
three separate beings, but that the essential being of the Father passes into
the Son without division—they are in essence two hypostases of the same
substance:
For neither do we hold a Son-Father as do the Sabellians, calling Him of one

but not of the same essence, and thus destroying the existence of the Son.
Neither do we ascribe the passible body which He bore for the salvation of
the whole world to the Father. Neither can we imagine three Subsistences
separated from each other, as results from their bodily nature in the case of
men, lest we hold a plurality of gods like the heathens.31
Athanasius not only framed the homousia doctrine of the Nicene Creed
but he also authored perhaps most important theological treatise concern-
ing Christology, On the Incarnation, proclaiming that Jesus as the Son of
God was the Word of God made manifest among “men” because “He
gives them a share in His own Image, our Lord Jesus Christ, and makes
them after His own Image and after His Likeness, that is, the Word of the
Father, they may be able through Him to get an idea of the Father.” For
Athanasius Jesus, the Word of God became incarnate in order that human-
ity might become partakers of the divine nature:
By so ordinary a means things divine have been manifested to us, and that
by death immortality has reached to all, and that by the Word becoming
man, the universal Providence has been known, and its Giver and Artificer
the very Word of God. For He was made man that we might be made God.32
According to the Athanasius, the incarnation of Christ is the incarnation

of God because although Jesus becomes estranged from the Father in
human form, in his essential, ontological nature he remains the very being
of the Father—that is, he is not a separate being because the unity of
the Father’s being is undivided and impassable. Athanasius’ classic theo-
logical declaration that “He was made man that we might be made God”
reflects an immanent ontology whereby the Godhead is known by human-
ity through the incarnation of Christ for the purpose of becoming divine,
a process that is called theosis in Eastern Christian theology.
The emphasis on ontological unity in the Godhead and the incarna-
tion of divinity in humanity are doctrines that are particularly resonant
with the premise of ancient Egyptian metaphysics as expounded in the
neo-Egyptian philosophy of Plotinus or the more classical forms as expli-
cated in ancient Egyptian cosmology and temple cult. Indeed, Athanasius
acknowledged that the metaphysical language imported into the debate
over the nature of Jesus’ relationship to the Godhead was not based in
scripture.33 The opponents of the doctrine of homousia argued that this
238 S. FARAJI
notion was absent from the Bible. At first glance, it is expected to find the
source of Athanasian theology in Greek philosophy, but indeed he was
an Egyptian who lived among the indigenous Egyptian monks of Upper
Egypt and offered to the world the most famous biography of the premier
desert father, Antony in his classic work The Life of Antony.
Athanasius emerged as a Christian theologian and bishop in an Egyptian
tradition that had been shaped by Plotinian metaphysics—a philosophy
that proposed a metaphysical unity called the One that manifested itself
as three hypostases, the One, the Mind, and the Soul. The One through
emanation differentiates itself into a multiplicity of entities that are never
ontologically severed or separated from the One. In fact, the One becomes
the many that the many may “remember” or “regain” their true essence
and nature and return to the One. Clearly, Athanasius’ theology of the
incarnation positions Jesus Christ as both one with the One, that is the
Godhead and as the Godhead’s emanation that becomes humanity in
order for humanity to become God.
Plotinian thought since the nineteenth century has been categorized
as “Neo-Platonic,” but this classification is erroneous because the third
century CE Christian theologian and church doctor Hippolytus reiterated
what was common opinion in antiquity that “The origin, then from which
Plato derived his theory of the Timaeus, is the wisdom of the Egyptians.”
He further comments citing Plato that the Greeks were like children “and
were acquainted with no theological doctrine of greater antiquity.”34
Platonic metaphysics as postulated in the Timaeus at its core was a reca-
pitulation of Egyptian metaphysics, so it was not Plotinus who was inno-
vating Platonic thought but Plato who was reinventing ancient Egyptian
philosophy for a Greek audience. Hippolytus expresses this sentiment in
a discourse where he suggested that Valentinian Gnosticism was derived
from Egyptian philosophy via Plato and Pythagoras, and its knowledge
among the Greeks could be explained accordingly “For Pythagoras and
Plato derived these tenets originally from the Egyptians, and introduced
their novel opinions among the Greeks.”35
Hippolytus also provides an extensive discussion and interpretation of
ancient Egyptian cosmology and its relation to mathematics. A review of
this commentary demonstrates that Egyptian philosophy was central to
the intellectual culture that shaped early Christian theology:
Do not the Egyptians, however, who suppose themselves more ancient than
all, speak of the power of Deity?… they asserted that the Deity is an indivis-
ible monad, both itself generating itself, and that out of this were formed all
things. For this say they, being unbegotten produces the succeeding num-
bers; for instance the monad, superadded into itself, generates the duad; and
in like manner, when superadded into duad, triad and so forth, produces
the triad and tetrad, up to the decade, which is the beginning and end of
numbers. Wherefore it is that the first and the tenth monad is generated, on
account of the decade being equipollent, and being reckoned for a monad,
and because this multiplied tem times will become a hundred, and again
becomes a monad, and the hundred multiplied ten times will produce a
thousand, and this will be monad. In this manner also the thousand multi-
plied ten times makes up the full sum of a myriad, in like manner it will be
a monad.36
Hippolytus’ explanation is simply a presentation of ancient Egyptian

Heliopolitan cosmology in a manner that is commensurate with Greek
philosophical categories. This is a remarkable text because it reveals that
ancient Egyptian metaphysics continued to have currency far into the
Christian era and that the architects of early Christian theology such as
Athanasius dialogued with this philosophical tradition even if it was in the
context of disproving the legitimacy of “heretical” Christian doctrines.
Heliopolis known as the city of Ra in ancient Egypt produced one of
the most elaborate and influential cosmological schools in antiquity. The
creation account relates that Ra, the principle creator deity, emerges from
an undifferentiated, unconditioned primordiality (Nun) and then creates
from itself Shu (Air) and Tefnut (Moisture), and then Nut (Sky) and Geb
(Earth)—emanating from these five are Osiris (Ausar) and Isis (Auset),
Nephthys (Neb-Het), and Set who represent sovereign humanity. In
ancient Egypt, this system was referred to as the Psdjet and in the Greek
language it was called the Ennead, meaning the nine who emerged from
the one undifferentiated presence, the primordial waters of Nun. It was
a system that was easily transferable to mathematics, with Nun represent-
ing the monad and Ra initiating the creative process from within itself
to generate nine. In Egyptian mythology, the nine are also represented
as a family, connoting that they are related and all share in the essential
being of their progenitor Nun. The soteriological goal of this cosmology
was for humanity to return to the undifferentiated source from which
they descended and realize that their ultimate nature was divine. The
Heliopolitan cosmological system is identical to the philosophy described
by Hippolytus, and it is the basis for Athanasius’ theology of incarnation
and Plotinus’ metaphysics which he submitted in nine books called the
Enneads.
240 S. FARAJI
Clement of Alexandria another prominent early Christian theologian

who lived during the third century CE also reiterated the scholarly opin-
ion that Platonic philosophy derived from ancient Egypt when he com-
ments in the Stromata that “Plato does not deny that he procured all
that is most excellent in philosophy from the barbarians; and he admits
that he came into Egypt.”37 Clement also commented on how Egyptian
philosophy was distinctive from the philosophical traditions of the Greco-
Roman world since it was embodied and practiced in the temple cult. He
reaffirms the views of the first century CE Stoic philosopher Chaeremon
when he says “For the Egyptians pursue a philosophy of their own. This
is principally shown by their sacred ceremonial.”38 He then continues his
dialogue by describing a procession of Egyptian priests and the various
disciplines of knowledge that are contained in their sacred books such
as hymns, music, temple cult, astrology, kingship protocol, hieroglyph-
ics, geography, philosophy, medicine, law and economic administration.
Ancient Egyptian philosophy was practiced by priests and generationally
transmitted for three millennium through the culture, traditions, festivals,
and sacred rites institutionalized in Egyptian temples—and it was the ide-
ology of divine and triumphant kingship that sanctioned and patronized
this time-honored tradition.
Ancient Egyptian metaphysics was also exhibited in a vast and diverse
textual tradition, but it is in the cosmological and cosmogonical narratives
where we find the antecedents for both Plotinian thought and Athanasian
Christology. The Egyptologist James P. Allen in his exegesis of the New
Kingdom “Hymn to Amun” describes the Egyptian concept of “The
Creator,” “there is a notion of the creator as ‘self-developing’—a preex-
isting being in whom all existence was inherent and through whose self-
realization all creation evolved.” The creator variously described as Ra,
Amun, and Ptah transforms and transmutes its own being into a myriad
of beings and phenomenon. Therefore for the Egyptians, the eternal also
became “incarnate” in the world, and for Allen this concept derived “from
the preeminent Egyptian understanding of divinity as immanent in the
forces and elements of the created world.”39 Very similar to Hippolytus’
understanding of ancient Egyptian cosmology Allen characterizes Egyptian
metaphysics as a process of when the “One became the Many”:
Fundamental to Egyptian cosmogony at all periods is the notion of the primor-

dial Monad, a single source from which all existence derived conceptualized
in the god Atum. Before the creation the Monad existed as a single, undiffer-
entiated seed of potentiality, floating inert in the Primeval Waters. Creation is
the process by which the One became the Many—through which the Monad
developed into the Ennead, sum of all the diverse forces and elements that
constitute the biosphere.40
In ancient Egypt, the creator is both the source of all life and the sum of
all creation, and as Amun, Ra, and Ptah, its essential nature although hid-
den is made manifest to the world.The “300th Chapter” of the Hymn to
Amun communicates this theme:
All the gods are three:

Amun, Ra, and Ptah, without their seconds.
His identity is hidden in Amun,
His is the Ra as face, his body is Ptah41
Although the gods are three, they are one in nature and three in their man-
ifestations. The uncreated creator as Amun is eternal and unknowable, yet
as Ra its immanent luminosity is shown to its creation and through Ptah
its myriad forms give design and structure to the world. Allen contends
that the three are each “gods” in their own right, “yet each too is one
aspect of a broader, unified conception of the divine.”
It is reasonable to assert that Amunian theology, Heliopolitan cosmol-
ogy, and Plotinian metaphysics provided the philosophical background for
Athanasius’ On The Incarnation as well as his support for the doctrine of
homousia as a theological explanation for Jesus’ nature in relation to the
Godhead. It was only after these theological questions were settled in the
late fourth century CE that Athanasius could then suggest or reconfirm a
biblical canon that was in agreement with the notion of Jesus Christ as the
divine savior-king, the Son of God as the essence of God sent to the world
to announce a new order. Although Athanasius’ conception of the savior-
king was far more metaphysical than earlier apocalyptic renditions, this
was necessary because a post-Constantinian Christology required a strong
metaphysical and theological basis for its claims. The New Testament
canon could only be confirmed after the Council of Nicaea had declared
Egyptian metaphysics and divine kingship as its official doctrinal posi-
tion—then the books that conformed to this tradition were recognized
and authorized as canonical.
242 S. FARAJI
RISE OF THE NEW PHARAOH: THE NEW TESTAMENT

AS ANCIENT EGYPTIAN PROPHETIC TEXT
The metaphysics of divine kingship is evident in the literary tradition of

both ancient Egypt and Nubia. In the Pyramid Texts, the oldest corpus of
religious literature in the world, the king is depicted as the earthly exem-
plar of Ra. The king’s very nature was of the same essence of Ra, “Hear it,
O Ra, this word which I say to you; your nature is in me, O Ra and your
nature is nourished in me O Ra.”42 Given that the king’s nature was of Ra,
the king was also understood as the son of Ra. A king was well aware that
his kingship also meant that he was the divine son of god, “here am I, O
Ra; I am your son, I am a soul, I am strong, I am mighty, active of arms
and far-striding.”43 The king as the divine son of Ra was also represented
as being born for the exalted purpose of exemplifying Ra:
I am the companion of a god, the son of a god; I will ascend and rise up to
the sky. I am the well-beloved son of Ra; I will ascend and rise up to the sky.
I was begotten for Ra; I will ascend and rise up to the sky. I was conceived
for Ra; I will ascend and rise up to the sky. I was born for Ra.44
The king as the son of Ra was the establisher of Maat. Maat was the high-
est ideal of moral philosophy and ethical practice in ancient Nile Valley
civilization.45 Even as the creator-god Ra instituted Maat at the founding
of the universe, the king too was expected to do Maat and live by Maat,
thereby fulfilling his sacred charge as arit mi Ra, “acting like Ra.”46 The
Pyramid Texts advise the king to be like Ra, “May you shine as Ra; repress
wrongdoing, cause Maat to stand behind Ra.”47 The motif of the king as
the son of Ra also appears in the Oracle of the Potter as the “king from the
Sun,” demonstrating this aspect of divine kingship persisted from the Old
Kingdom (2649–2150 BCE) to the late period in Egyptian history. In the
Oracle of the Potter, the duty to bring Maat must be accomplished in the
midst of foreign occupation and in this role the king becomes a messianic
savior-king.
The most prominent example of this “prophetic” literary tradition from
classical Nile Valley history is the Prophecy of Neferti dated to 1938–1909
BCE during the reign of King Amenemhet I in the Middle Kingdom.48
The “prophecy” retrospectively recounts events from the fourth dynasty
in the court of King Snefru where a renowned priest Neferti informs
the king of future calamities that will fall upon Egypt. Neferti describes
a future of foreign invasion, civil war, religious impropriety, and social

decadence, but exclaims that a king from the south, an Amunian and son
of a Nubian woman, will rise and restore order in the Two Lands. The
Prophecy of Neferti is explicit in correlating the rise of restorative kingship
through Amun with Nubian ethnic origins.
Another pre-eminent aspect of divine kingship is the king as the son of
Amun, often given the epithet Meri Amun, or the “Beloved of Amun,”
in ancient Egyptian and Nubian literature. The Nubian Pharaoh Piankhi
(747 BCE–716 BCE) in his famous “Triumphal Stela” is represented as
the “son of Ra,” and “the beautiful god who is beloved of the gods.”49
He is fashioned in the image of Amun of Napata and Thebes and is
declared Meri Amun, the “Beloved Son of Amun.” In fact, his successor
and nephew king Taharqa (674 BCE) left a prayer to Amun at the tem-
ple of Karnak, a beautiful expression of Amunian kingship theology and
metaphysics. Amun is the one “whose manifestations are mighty, through
whose manifestations all manifestations manifest themselves.” Amun is the
life of all manifestations in the world “the elder who was first to come
into existence….father of fathers, mother of mothers.”50 Taharqa in his
petition to Amun declares his divine sonship because he shares the same
essence with the eternal hidden one, “I am your son, it being that you
have made my being in your being.”51
Jan Assman employs the term Chaosbeschreibung to describe the recur-
ring literary trope in ancient Egyptian and Nubian texts of triumphant
kingship prevailing over cosmic disorder and social cataclysm. Therefore,
in times of national torment such as foreign invasion and occupation, tri-
umphant and divine kingship was transformed into a messianic ideology
where the king was represented as a savior sent to alleviate the anxiety of
social mayhem. These Egyptian “prophetic texts” were essentially written
in ex eventu to the events they purportedly described and consequently
functioned as a political strategy to incite resistance to foreign invasion in
Egypt. We must raise the question to what extent were the authors of New
Testament and other early Christian literature shaped by the tradition of
triumphant kingship as constructed in ancient Egyptian and Nubian texts.
In other words, how does the Greek New Testament mimic the ancient
Nile Valley tradition of divine kingship? Was the imaging of Jesus as the
divine savior-king deployed as a literary device to disarm and neutralize
oppressive empire?
An examination of the Oracle of the Potter and the Oracle of the Lamb
provides a prototype of the messianic savior-king that arises not from
244 S. FARAJI
Judea or Israel but ancient Egypt. The Oracle of the Potter has survived in
fragments of three extant papyri dating from the second and third centu-
ries CE. The events described in the texts however, date from the second
century BCE (130 BCE) since the prophecies are aimed at Ptolemaic rule
as opposed to the Romans. All three fragments were written in Greek,
although the original language for these texts was Demotic. The Oracle of
the Lamb is preserved in extent Greek copy dated to the early first century
CE although the original was written in Demotic and dated to the second
century BCE. The two prophecies together not only announce a new pha-
raoh, but represent an inauguration of a new era of peace and prosperity.
The Potter and the Lamb were symbolic of the creator-god Khnum in
ancient Egypt and therefore these prophecies presage divine revelation
as mediated through the priesthood of Khnum—for the potter discloses
the future of Egypt before the legendary king Amenhotep I, stating that a
king from the Sun established by Isis will restore order and drive away the
Greeks who have contaminated and defiled Egypt. Those who have sur-
vived the traumatic period will share in the blessings of the new age. Those
who have died will rise from the dead to claim their rightful position under
the protection of the new “King from the Sun.” Conversely, the Oracle of
the Lamb which may be a forerunner to the Christian image of the “Lamb
of God,” prognosticates in service of king Bocchoris that Egypt will suffer
for 900 years at the hands of the Assyrians and Persians, but in the new
Sothic cycle the world will be renewed as it was at the first time.
A consideration of ancient Egyptian and Nubian textual sources may
confirm Albert Cleage’s representation of Jesus as a “Revolutionary black
Messiah,” but with the qualification that New Testament Christology
was categorically about the triumph of a royal messianic king, a counter-
pharaoh that reaffirmed the sovereignty of the downtrodden over and
against the global imperium of Rome. Hence, Jesus is the black Messiah
because the New Testament narrators invested in him the legacy of ancient
Egyptian and Nubian divine kingship traditions—an institution that is
indigenous and most ancient in Africa.
Although Cleage did not affirm the divinity of Jesus as suggested by
the category of “divine kingship” we must not confuse ancient Egyptian
communotheistic understandings of divinity with Western monotheistic
conceptions of divinity as singular and exclusive. Communotheism asserts
that the divine is a community of interdependent, interrelated “gods”
who are united by a common ontological source.52 In such a cosmol-
ogy, the king did not exclusively embody the divine but participated in
a communal divinity where he represented the pinnacle of the human

and divine relationship. Therefore, in ancient Egyptian communotheistic
thought Jesus is divine because he shares in the ontological unity of divin-
ity which encompasses all life and all humanity—and therefore his proc-
lamation of the divinity of the disinherited and dispossessed was indeed a
revolutionary stance.
We must pose the question, what is the significance of situating the
New Testament within the trajectory of classical Nile Valley civilizations?
How can this approach facilitate the development and advancement of
Christian communities in Africa and the African Diaspora? This question
beckons another equally important inquiry, can Cleage’s conception of
Jesus as a revolutionary black Messiah leading a black nation in resistance
to the “white” imperialist power Rome, provide an alternative Christology
and theology for an emerging, global African Christianity?
Black America is disproportionately Christian according to a recent
Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life Study where 83 % of African
Americans profess allegiance to some Christian denomination. Within
global Christianity, the fastest growth in the number of Christians over
the past century has been in sub-Saharan Africa from fewer than 9 million
in 1910 to more than 516 million in 2010. The demographics of reli-
gious adherents to Christianity in Africa and Black America speak to the
necessity of providing a relevant and empowering Christology that builds
on the tradition of the revolutionary black Messiah proposed by Cleage
nearly 50 years ago as well as African traditions of divine kingship as noted
in ancient Egypt, Nubia, and other regions in Africa. The former advances
a pan African nationalist theology that views the church as an organiza-
tional instrument in service of the development of nations in Africa and
the diaspora and the latter resituates early Christian history and theology
within the trajectory of African history and culture. Absent of these two
imperatives, the African church in Africa and the diaspora, including Black
America, will be rendered as an impotent, ineffective institution in the
twenty-first century, caught up in the mimicry of Western Christianity.
NOTES
1. Helmut Koester, Introduction to the New Testament: History and Literature
of Early Christianity (New York and Berlin: Walter De Gruyter, 1982),
pp. 15–16, 41.
2. Ibid., p. 42.
246 S. FARAJI
3. Stanley M. Burstein, Graeco-Africana: Studies in the History of Greek

Relations with Egypt and Nubia (New Rochelle, NY: Aristide D. Caratzas,
1995). Burstein a Classicist who also engages the discipline of Nubiology
first introduced the concept of “Graeco-Africana,” although his primary
interest was Egypt and Nubia I uses the term to also apply to North Africa
and African civilizations in the Horn of Africa.
4. Salim Faraji, The Roots of Nubian Christianity Uncovered: The Triumph of
the Last Pharaoh; Religious Encounters in Late Antique Africa (Africa
World Press, 2012), p. 100.
5. W. John Tait “Demotic Literature: Forms and Genres,” Ancient Egyptian
Literature: History and Forms (Probleme Der Agyptologie, Bd 10), ed.
Antonio Loprieno (Brill Academic Publishers, 1996), pp. 175–187.
Demotic was an ancient Egyptian “cursive script” that was adapted from
the Hieratic form of ancient Egyptian script in the seventh century BCE
primarily used initially by clerks and administrators of Egyptian temples. In
the fourth century BCE, the script became increasingly popular for writing
ancient Egyptian literature.
6. Jan Assman, The Mind of Egypt (Cambridge, MA and London, England:
Harvard University Press, 2003), p. 385.
7. Alan B. Lloyd, “Nationalist Propaganda in Ptolemaic Egypt,” Historia:
Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte, Bd. 31, H. 1 (1st Qtr., 1982), pp. 33–55.
8. C.C. McCown, “Hebrew and Egyptian Apocalyptic Literature,” Harvard
Theological Review 18, (1925): 405.
9. See Donald B. Redford, Egypt, Canaan and Israel in Ancient Times
(Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1992); Israel Finkelstein and Neil
Asher Silberman, The Bible Unearthed (New York: The Free Press, 2001).
10. Ian Rutherford, “Kalasiris and Setne Khamwas: A Greek Novel and Some
Egyptian Models,” Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 117 (1997),
pp. 203–209. The author also examines the influence of Demotic Egyptian
literary themes on the development of Greek novels.
11. Miriam Lichtheim, Ancient Egyptian Literature Volume III: The Late
Period (University of California Press, 1980), p. 126.
12. Ibid., pp. 140–141.
13. Ibid., p. 139.
14. McCown, 411.
15. David Frankfurter, “The Legacy of Jewish Apocalypses in Early Christianity:
Regional Trajectories,” The Jewish Apocalyptic Heritage in Early
Christianity, eds. James C. Vanderkam and William Adler (Brill Academic
Publishers, 1996), pp. 148–149.
16. Hans Dieter Betz, Plutarch’s Theological and Early Christian Literature
(Studia Ad Corpus Hellenisticum Novi Testamenti, No 3) Social, Economic
and Political Studies of the Middle East (Brill Academic Publishers, 1975).
17. David Bindman and Henry Louis Gates Jr., eds., The Image of the Black in
Western Art, Volume I: From the Pharaohs to the Fall of the Roman Empire
(Harvard University Press, 2010).
18. Sabrina Higgins, “The Influence of Isis on the Virgin Mary in Egyptian
Lactans-Iconography,” Journal of the Canadian Society for Coptic Studies,
Volumes 3–4 (2012): 71–91. Although Higgins argues that “there are clear
iconographic links” between Isis and Mary and that the image of Mary
“may well have been borrowed from the Isiac iconographic repertoire,”
she emphasizes the theological difference between the two in an attempt
to undermine the “cultic continuity” between Isis and Mary. In essence,
she does not dispute the fact of Isiac influence on Mary, but only that the
two divine mothers were distinct ideologically.
19. Burton L. Mack, A Myth of Innocence: Mark and Christian Origins
(Minneapolis: Fortress University Press, 1988), p. 285; Philpp Vielhauer,
“Erwägungen zur Christologie des Markusevangeliums,” Zeit und
Geschichte Erich Dinkier, ed. (Tubingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1964),
pp. 155–169.
20. Mack, A Myth of Innocence, p. 285.
21. Toby A. H. Wilkinson, Rise and Fall of Ancient Egypt: The History of a
Civilisation from 3000 BC to Cleopatra (Bloomsbury UK, 2011),
pp. 270–273; H. Brunner, Die Geburt des Gottkonigs (Wiesbaden, 1964).
22. Siegfried Morenz, Egyptian Religion, trans. Ann E. Keep (Ithaca, NY:
Cornell University Press, 1973), p. 254.
23. Ibid., p. 257.
24. Charles S. Finch III, Echoes of the Old Darkland: Themes from the African
Eden (Khenti Press, 1991), pp. 179–216.
25. Although not considered within the domain of modern Egyptology, the
pioneering and influential work of Samuel Sharpe, Egyptian Mythology and
Egyptian Christianity (London: John Russell Smith, 1863) and Gerald
Massy, Ancient Egypt Light of the World (London: T. Fisher Unwin, 1907)
focused on the Egyptian background of Christianity. See also E.A. Wallis
Budge, The Gods of the Egyptians: Studies in Egyptian Mythology Vol. 1
(New York: Dover Publications, 1969), pp. xiv–xvi; The Gods of the
Egyptians: Studies in Egyptian Mythology Vol. 2 (New York: Dover
Publications, 1969), pp. 220–221; Osiris and the Egyptian Resurrection
Vol. 2 (New York: Dover Publications, 1973), p. 306. Budge’s The Gods of
the Egyptians and Osiris and the Egyptian Resurrection were originally pub-
lished in 1907 and 1911 respectively. See also Cheik Anta Diop,
Civilization or Barbarism: An Authentic Anthropology (Lawrence Hill
Books, 1991), p. 336. Diop provided commentary on Ancient Egypt’s
relationship to Christianity and suggested further exploration on the
Egyptian roots of Christianity and a study on the parallels between ancient
Egyptian temple ritual and Roman Catholic liturgy.
248 S. FARAJI
26. Karl W. Luckert, Egyptian Light and Hebrew Fire: Theological and
Philosophical Roots of Christendom in Evolutionary Perspective (Albany:
State University of New York Press), pp. 28–29, 32.
27. Ibid.
28. Tadros Malaty, “Sons of Pharaohs and Christianity,” Coptic Church Review
1, no. 1 (Spring 1980): 18–21.
29. Boulos Ayad, “The Influence of the Ancient Egyptian Civilization on the
Coptic Orthodox Church,” Coptic Church Review 9, no. 4 (Winter 1988):
105–114.
30. For a discussion of Coptic magical texts, see Marvin Meyer and Richard
Smith, eds. Ancient Christian Magic: Coptic Texts of Ritual Power
(HarperSanFrancisco, 1994), pp. 95–97.
31. Athanasius, Exposito Fidei 2, eds. Philip Schaff and Henry Wace, Ante-
Nicene Fathers, Vol. 4 (Edinburgh: T & T Clark and Grand Rapids, MI:
Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1996), p. 84.
32. Athanasius, On the Incarnation 54, no. 3, p. 65.
33. Athanasius, Defense of the Nicene Definition 1, no. 1, p. 150.
34. Hippolytus, The Refutation of all Heresies 6.16, eds., Philip Schaff and
Henry Wace, Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 5 (Edinburgh: T & T Clark and
Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1996),
pp. 81–82.
35. Ibid.
36. Hippolytus, The Refutation of all Heresies 4, no. 43, pp. 40–41.
37. Clement of Alexandria, The Stromata 1.15, eds., Philip Schaff and Henry
Wace, Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 2 (Edinburgh: T & T Clark and Grand
Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1996), p. 315.
38. Clement of Alexandria, The Stromata 6, no. 4, p. 488.
39. James P. Allen, ed., Genesis in Egypt: The Philosophy of Ancient Egyptian
Creation Accounts Yale Egyptological Studies 2 (New Haven, CT: Yale
University, 1988), p. 48.
40. Ibid., p. 57.
41. Ibid., p. 62.
42. R. O. Faulkner, The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1969), p. 225, lines 1461–1462.
43. Faulkner, The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts, p. 156, line 887.
44. Faulkner, The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts, p. 207, lines 1316–1318.
45. Maulana Karenga, Maat: The Moral Ideal in Ancient Egypt; A Study in
Classical African Ethics (New York and London: Routledge, 2004).
46. Ibid., p. 32.
47. Faulkner, Pyramid Texts, p. 238, lines 1582–1583.
48. Erik Hornung, History of Ancient Egypt: An Introduction (Ithaca, NY:
Cornell University Press, 1999), p. 50.
49. Fontes Historiae Nubiorum: Textual Sources for the Middle Nile Region
Between the Eighth Century BC and the Sixth Century AD Vol. I, eds.,
Tormode Eide, Tomas Hagg, Richard Holton Pierce, and Laszlo Torok
(Bergen: Norway: University of Bergen Department of Classics, 1994),
no. 9, pp. 62–118. Hereafter, cited as FHN.
50. FHN I, no. 26, pp. 181–190.
51. Donald B. Redford, From Slave to Pharaoh: The Black Experience of Ancient
Egypt (Baltimore and London: John Hopkins University Press, 2004), p. 107.
52. A. Okechukwu Ogbonnaya, On Communitarian Divinity: An African
Interpretation of the Trinity (New York: Paragon House, 1994), pp. 33–49.
Ogbonnaya devotes a chapter to discussing the communotheistic elements
of ancient Egyptian conceptions of the divine and views it as the theoreti-
cal foundation of Tertullian’s Trinitarian thought. For a more recent dis-
cussion, see Monica A. Coleman, “From Models of God to a Model of
Gods: How Whiteheadian Metaphysics Facilitates Western Language
Discussion of Divine Multiplicity,” Philosophia 35, no. 3–4, (Dec. 2007),
pp. 329–340.
CHAPTER 14
He Is Black and We Are Queer: The Legacy

of the Black Messiah for Black LGBTQ
Christians
Pamela Lightsey
What can a reflection on the pastoral and political work of The Reverend
Albert B. Cleage Jr. contribute to queer theology? This chapter considers
that question putting Cleage’s work in conversation with womanist queer
theology. Admittedly, I balked at the very notion of writing about this
Black leader whose name brought to mind the imagery of Black national-
ism, a movement that I felt espoused a heavily patriarchal doctrine clothe
under the myth of a triumphant and separatist Black Nation.
It took a few days of going back to his written publications while at
the same time attending to my own anger with current acts of racism to
settle myself with the possibility that Cleage has left activists such as myself
a legacy upon which to build and yes, to problematize for the benefit of
the Black community, particularly Black lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender
and queer (LGBTQ) persons. Just as Cleage’s name invokes a pushback
P. Lightsey ()
Boston University School of Theology, Boston, MA, USA

DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54689-0_14
252 P. LIGHTSEY
against the patriarchy of Black nationalism, he should also be remembered

for his life’s work that embodied a commitment to the uplifting and safety
of Black people as well as having such political shrewdness as to create
Detroit’s Black Slate.
With all this in mind, as a critical appraisal, in this writing, I seek to
avoid that type of deconstruction that so heavily privileges the present
that it undermines one’s capacity to appreciate the era from which they
are studying. For example, while I have learned to appreciate inclusive
language, it would be a disservice to the work of Rev. Cleage for this
chapter to dissect his heavily patriarchal language when linguistic sexism
was not a major conversation until around the early 1970s. What one finds
deeply rooted in every sermon published and every article about Cleage is
a leader who desired that Black people love themselves and free themselves
from the sepulcher of oppression that betrayed them with false hopes of
equality through assimilation or accommodation. Therefore, this chapter
will both appreciate and problematize the powerful narratives we have
inherited from Rev. Cleage, accepting what is produced through his writ-
ings without excoriating his twentieth-century language to suit a twenty-
first-century epistemology.
Having committed to this writing I have a better appreciation for this
dynamo of a leader. Clearly the twentieth-century Black nationalism under
which Cleage was writing and preaching was and is now more complex and
varied than my knee-jerk response. From Garvey’s emigration sentiment
to Malcolm X’s more distinct exhortation to self-help and self-defense,
Black nationalism’s attractiveness has been its malleability and at the same
time the steadfastness of its overarching message of Black liberation made
possible by racial solidarity. In this era, when we are seeing what seems like
history repeating itself—white racists attacking and murdering Black peo-
ple, police brutality, and the rage of Southern Dixiecrats—I have found
myself revisiting the thundering voices of men like Cleage for strength to
endure and overcome the daily attacks of white supremacy.
Available research on Cleage’s work focus on his revolutionary depar-
ture from an exclusively white image and theological conceptualization
of the Black Madonna and child, his dynamic engagement of the politi-
cal sphere shaped within the context of Black culture, and his insistence
on what he foresaw as an emerging Black Nation. Since others in this
manuscript, particularly Bishop Nelson, have given a prodigious account
of life of Rev. Cleage, “protocol has been established” as is often heard
in Black churches, and this chapter will reflect more upon his writings
HE IS BLACK AND WE ARE QUEER: THE LEGACY OF THE BLACK MESSIAH... 253
than serve as a biography of sorts. As a queer lesbian ordained clergy and

womanist scholar, I am interested in exploring Cleage’s work, believing
there may be kernels of his assertions regarding the Black Messiah and his
exegesis of the gospel message that are consonant with a womanist queer-
ing of theology.
My first approach to Cleage’s work will be to explore the 1960s Black
nationalist movement and Cleage’s claim of a Black Messiah. I will con-
sider what, if any, are the implications of Cleage’s narrative of the revo-
lutionary Black Zealot not only for the Black community of his time but,
what it means to think of the incarnate body of God, for our time and
especially for today’s Black LGBTQ community.
Second, I will discuss how Cleage’s critique of individualism—largely
in keeping with the liberationist challenge against the oppressive status
quo—may resonate with queer womanist ideals. This may seem a step
too far for those who have a more Kantian perspective that casts free-
dom as the capacity to act autonomously. Nonetheless, I seek to uncover
the affects of Cleage’s perspective on building a collective Black Nation,
on a people for whom the focus of the Messiah’s ministry was to bring
them together as a united people. Has Black liberation theology been able
to borrow from the Black nationalism of Cleage and others of his time
any theological components that have proved helpful for today’s Black
LGBTQ Christian community?
Third, since the Supreme Court has ruled the constitutional right to
same-sex marriage, I can help but give in to the temptation of drawing
from Cleage’s thoughts to suggest how Black communities can “work
together” rather than be exploited by the politics of our time. If there is
any issue that so powerfully threatens the capacity of Black Christians to
live in unity with one another, it is the matter of human sexuality and par-
ticularly the nature of the relationship between the Messiah and persons
who self-identify as LGBTQ. I believe the clue to what may be understood
as a more healthier “co-laborer relationship” is found in the ministry of
Christ who lived among the entire community.
Finally, throughout this chapter, I endeavor to introduce the reader
to queer theology from a womanist perspective. As a theologian writing
about the Black Messiah, I am already thrust into a type of essentialism.
It positions me to take seriously the humanity of Jesus, not simply that he
was a man but that he was a man with biological sex organs of a man. This
is the type of theological inquiry, which queer scholars undertake with
sincerity and hope. The latter (hope), in the ability of the reader to see
254 P. LIGHTSEY
the Black Messiah’s nation building as inclusive of its Black LGBTQ fam-
ily and those who have given themselves to the call of God who is Black
because of God’s preferential option for the oppressed.
BLACK IS BEAUTIFUL
Cleage’s model of Jesus as Black Messiah extends from his context as a
Black Christian nationalist. The nationalists of his era argued that Black
people were an oppressed nation of people whose allegiance must be to
the uplifting of Black people. Self-determination, Black liberation, and
empowerment were key aims of this ideology. Black nationalists expressed
a growing discontent with the imposition of white supremacy by way of
societal racism against Black people and Black culture. Therefore, the work
of Black nationalists such as Cleage often focused on encouraging Black
solidarity against strategies of “co-existence” such as accommodation and
assimilation. What follows is an excellent description of nationalism:
Nationalist, by comparison, are determined skeptics. They are suspicious

of claims that radically divergent groups can live in peace and on a basis
of equality while inhabiting the same territory or participating in the same
societal institutions. Inevitably, they say – often from painful personal expe-
rience – one component of the social matrix comes to dominate and oppress
the others. In the process, important subgroup mores may be altered or
eradicated. To escape assimilation by fiat, nationalists seek to strengthen
in-group values while holding those promoted by the larger society at arm’s
length.1
It is true that Black nationalists of the late 1960s and early 1970s had
reason to be skeptical of messages of nonviolence and reconciliation. They
had witnessed too many Black leaders (including Dr. King) and innocent
citizens murdered despite preaching the very message of nonviolence. The
remnant Black leadership was left in the precarious position of encourag-
ing retaliation—and thereby betraying Dr. King’s memory—or continuing
nonviolent protest and collaborating with white political leaders, something
that would make them appear as weak sell-outs to the more militant nation-
alists. Disillusioned with what they felt was Black bourgeoisie status quo
leadership young Black nationalists, wanting to strengthen in-group values
picked up the rallying theme, “Black Power.” Their fists in air, Afrocentric
jargon, and exhortations to Black self-determination challenged the sense
of powerlessness and evoked a strong message of racial pride.2 Theirs was

not mere rhetoric. Leaders such as Stokely Carmichael, Huey Newton, and
Eldridge Cleaver galvanized the people by their arguments against colonial-
ism, white supremacy, and consciousness of African heritage all the while
forming organizations that put their teachings to practice such as the Black
Panther Party.
Consistent with the larger nationalists work, Cleage preached sermons
that displayed an unwavering race consciousness and pride. When Cleage
asserted the blackness of Jesus throughout both his works, The Black
Messiah and Black Christian Nationalism, he was not only preaching mes-
sages of hope but crafting out a theology about the divinity and human-
ity of Jesus that is able to free Black people from internalized oppression
and second-class citizenship. According to Cleage, this incarnate Son of
God “was a revolutionary Black leader, a Zealot, seeking to lead a Black
Nation to freedom.”3 The Black Messiah’s redemptive value was in “his”
ability to uncover the strategies of oppression and through revolutionary
practices help spur the building of a new Black Nation. Cleage’s exegesis
of the biblical text and his analysis of the personhood of Jesus were rooted
in Black nationalism and framed in the Black Power movement. Signaling
his belief in the urgency of the moment, Cleage critiqued individualism
and positioned the Black Revolutionary Messiah as leading a rising Black
populous to liberation and most importantly to being a powerfully politi-
cal and economically separate Black nation.
To a people who daily experienced subjugation and white terrorism, the
imagery of the Messiah and God the Creator as Black was and—still is—
profoundly appealing. Yet Cleage was not the first Black leader to preach
about God or Jesus using racial identity. For centuries prior to Cleage’s
sermonizing, Black leaders such as layman Martin R. Delany and Bishop
Henry M. Turner set forth a theology invoking Black liberation and the
blackness of God. Turner, an advocate of emigration, stunned the nation
when he argued that God was a Negro.
We have as much right biblically and otherwise to believe that God is a

Negroe, as you buckra or white people have to believe that God is a fine
looking, symmetrical and ornamented white man. For the bulk of you and
all the fool Negroes of the country believe that God is white-skinned, blue
eyed, straight-haired, projected nosed, compressed lipped and finely robed
white gentleman, sitting upon a throne somewhere in the heavens. Every
race of people who have attempted to describe their God by words, or by
256 P. LIGHTSEY
paintings, or by carvings, or any other form or figure, have conveyed the idea
that the God who made them and shaped their destinies was symbolized in
themselves, and why should not the Negroe believe that he resembles God.4
This insistence that God was Black was considered by nationalists such
as Turner as a theology essential to building an attitude of self-respect
among the newly freed people5 facing the rising terror of lynching and Jim
Crow laws. Perceiving God, almighty and revered, as Black was the key to
Black self-respect. To be the imago dei meant the dei must also be Black,
thus conferring dignity and value to their very being. Though his later
declarations about God differed from Turner, Cleage early on argued that
God was Black. He insisted, “Certainly God must be Black if he created
us in his own image.”6
As for Jesus, Cleage staunchly insisted: “Jesus was the non-white leader
of a non-white people.”7 The new theology which Cleage preached—that
which the Shrine of Madonna was predicated upon—needed to be “built
on the Black Nations’ conception of nation and God’s chosen people, and
the revolutionary teachings of the Black Messiah, Jesus. This alone trans-
forms the entire thought patterns of a people.”8
The Black Messiah, the Jesus, whom Cleage preached about to his con-
gregation was not only revolutionary, but human and not divine. He was
a “brother” who “stood up to the man.” This translated to the Black
Messiah’s teaching being able to influence Black people living under rac-
ist oppression to stand up to the ruling powers of their time. Jesus, in
Cleage’s vision, was a human transformative force by way of his revolu-
tionary practices.
Thus, Cleage’s sermonizing and activist leadership helped shift his fol-
lowers’ conceptualization of Jesus from the suffering servant and Lamb of
God motif to the Revolutionary Zealot. Abolitionists had often used the
suffering servant rhetoric and the imagery of Christ on the cross to uphold
a doctrine of redemptive suffering that influenced slaves to be obedient
to white masters and Black people of later generations to be religiously
patient with oppression.9 The faithful Black flock of Christ the Messiah
who was tortured on Calvary’s cross took comfort in bearing their crosses,
believing that just as Jesus ascended into power “after while by and by”
they would be rewarded “over in glory.” To be successful, Cleage would
need to disabuse Black people of the suffering servant and Lamb of God
motifs.
Race-ing Jesus was insufficient to this transformation. The character of

Jesus needed to be revisited and interpreted for a struggling people many
of who understood themselves as inferior to white America. Cleage had
the effrontery and theological acumen to do just that.
The white man is not going to admit that Jesus was Black. He is going to
twist history to make it fit the pattern of white supremacy. He will continue
to paint pictures of Jesus looking the way he wants him to look… Jesus was
Black, and he did not preach universal love. Remember the white Gentile
woman who came to Jesus asking him to heal her daughter? “I don’t have
time to waste with Gentile. I have come to the house of Israel,” Jesus said.10
If the Black Messiah did not preach universal love as Cleage stated, what
did he preach and what was his ministry? Without equivocation, Cleage
stressed, “Jesus was born to a Black Mary, that Jesus, the Messiah, was a
Black man who came to save a Black Nation.”11 However, he contends,
“The new Black Church will not ask for faith in Jesus, a mystical Savior,
but for faith in one another and commitment to walk in the struggle as
defined by the Black Christian Nationalist movement.”12
Predicting resistance to his theology by Black Christians who had been
nurtured in Sunday school and their churches by white Christian scholar-
ship and religious imagery, Cleage preached that Black people had been
miseducated about Jesus, and that the Black Nation needed to “reclaim”
its history, faith, religion, and Black Messiah as well as reinterpret such
doctrines as that of resurrection.13 To those who criticized his theology
and social activism as lacking an emphasis on love for humanity, Cleage
responded that members of the Black Nation needn’t concern themselves
with loving everyone especially not one’s enemy. In fact, love could be a
distraction.
We have to concern ourselves with justice, not love. We can’t go to the white
man and ask him to love us. We’ve done it too long. It’s futile… Love is only
something for inside the Nation… Jesus didn’t spend all of his time walking
around talking about love. He was trying to bring the Nation together.14
It would take justice not love to gain their liberation. Here Cleage’s
theology is markedly different than Black people had become accustomed
to hearing. Reading, The Black Messiah, you get a picture not only of what
Cleage thought but also the resistance of some Black people to his preach-
ing and teachings.
258 P. LIGHTSEY
Yet because of the nation’s racial history, Black nationalists like Cleage
refused to respond to the questions and concerns of anyone not commit-
ted to Black Nation building. They felt no need to give an account for their
commitment to love or to blackness, no need to fear as had their ances-
tors been compelled when asked by white oppressors, “Whose nigger are
you?” They perceived most Black people were free in body but opined that
too many acted out each day with a niggerized—Uncle Tom—mentality.
Because Black people were, and still remain such a religious people,15 there
was profound value in preaching about the beauty and power of blackness.
This Cleage and other Black nationalists did brilliantly. Afrocentric discus-
sions rose significantly in the 1960s and 1970s. The beauty of blackness
was declared in music, in the arts and in our fashion. Declaring the
blackness of Jesus or of God was a not a new paradigm for Black Christians
but it took on increased value during this time of rising Black nationalism.
Is there still value in asserting the blackness of Jesus and to what end?
What, if any, pitfalls lie in this claim of a cultural identity based on race?
Is there any value to the claim of the Black Messiah for Black LGBTQ
persons?
CAN I BE YOUR BABY?

In 1988, when Jesse Jackson announced the changing of the reference
from “Black” to the hyphenated “African-American” he was aiming to
shift our cultural identity from race to ethnicity.
The term has “cultural integrity,” Mr. Jackson said after a meeting with
other prominent African-Americans in Chicago on Monday. “Every ethnic
group in this country has a reference to some land base, some historical
cultural base. African-Americans have hit that level of cultural maturity.”16
Jackson’s assertion proved difficult to gain complete acceptance.

His argument seemed to suggest a push back against the political self-
determination ideology of leaders like Cleage who had worked so hard to
bring to fruition. This new name conveyed a determination to exert an
ancestral history rather than emphasis on skin pigmentation. The prob-
lem—and I think this is still the case—was that Black people struggled
against such a dichotomizing decision. It suggested a relationship to
a continent to which we had no ongoing familiarity. Black people had
learned to appreciate the continent that was the native land of their ances-
tors and their dark beauty. Yet, their connection as “African” was torn by
years of captivity. Indeed, when enslaved, they had no “naming” power.
Their identification was constructed by captors who named them Negro,
Negress, niggers, and colored. Centuries later, it was a political and cultur-
ally psychological triumph to identify us, our protest, our worship and our
Messiah as Black. It signaled a proud difference from white and established
a sense of esteem about darker skin pigmentation. Black was the baby and
no one dare call the baby ugly.
Cleage and others after him were not interested in what white people
thought of their blackness but what Black people thought of their Black
bodies. The Black Messiah resonated with their day-to-day experiences
and the story of his resurrection and power over death and dominion ush-
ered in an immense sense of self-worth. The Black Messiah as God in Black
flesh was a healing balm. God in despised skin. The Black Messiah as God
rejected by the power elite demonstrated the arrogance and foolishness
of racism. The image of the Messiah as a Black man, walking among the
Black outcasts of the world, healing them, partying with them, praying for
them, teaching them, and leading them to victory over oppressive ruling
authorities challenges racial stereotypes. This was, and is, a Jesusology not
easily dismissed now that it has taken root. It does have value for a group
of people who have had their liberties trammeled and social privileges
denied solely because they are regarded as Black and therefore inferior.
An artistic testament to the value of the Black Messiah paradigm can
still be seen across Black churches in America where stained glass images
of a white Christ have been replaced with that of a Black Christ. Further,
it is not uncommon to hear preachers interpret Revelation 1:14 to mean
the coming Messiah has physical characteristics (phenotype) to that of
a Black man or to hear them paraphrase the stories and sayings of Jesus
using cultural idioms.
Nonetheless, Cleage’s campaign of resistance against white hegemony
has also been rightly critiqued for its essentialist traits. Though promot-
ing the idea of group identity and self-determination has been a helpful
survival and resistance strategy there is no unique, inherent quality that is
true of all Black people. They (we) are not all the same and therefore to
suggest a Black groupthink is inaccurate and, what is more, problematic
because it too often rests on an ideology of victimization. The “we against
them” argument has limited mileage.
In addition, a careful analysis of Cleage’s publications reveals the tinge
of authoritarianism. Frankly, this does not, in my experience, appear to
260 P. LIGHTSEY
be at all uncommon among preachers, especially Black male preachers.

Womanist scholar, Jacquelyn Grant made the case in her hallmark work,
White Women’s Christ and Black Women’s Jesus, that
Both the Black nationalists movement and the Black Church are patriarchal
in nature… This meant, then, that the role presented for woman would be
subservient and private. For Black women, the affirmation of ‘Black pride’
meant acceptance of this role. Therefore, rather than serving as a solidifier
of the total Black community, both the Black nationalist movement and the
Black Church have relegated Black women to the lower level of citizenry.17
Focusing on the church, womanist scholar, Jacquelyn Grant made the

case in her hallmark work, White Women’s Christ and Black Women’s Jesus,
that Black women see Jesus as “the divine co-sufferer, who empowers
them in situations of oppression.”18 Black women identified with Jesus’
suffering which paralleled with theirs.
His suffering culminated in the crucifixion. Their crucifixion included rape,

and babies being sold. But Jesus’ suffering was not the suffering of a mere
human, for Jesus was understood to be God incarnate.19
Though Grant does not convey Jesus as the militant revolutionary

Zealot as did Cleage, the Messiah is still both politically radical and Black.
as Jesus identified with the lowly of his day, he now identifies with the lowly
of this day, who in American context are Black people. The identification is
so real that Jesus Christ in fact becomes Black. It is important to note the
Jesus’ blackness is not a result of ideological distortion of a few Black think-
ers, but a result of careful Christological investigation.20
Again, Grant envisions the Messiah as Black from her Christological

analysis. He identifies with the lowly and can do so because he is Black; a
Palestinian Jew—in James Cone’s argument—of the Israelites of Egypt
which is located in Africa.21
Ironically, for all the talk about solidarity among Black people and of
the Black Messiah who emboldens them to fight the common problem
of racism, heretofore there have been little cries for solidarity to fight
homophobia against Black LGBTQ people. This is true a fortiori when
same-sex marriage enters the discussion.
The common cultural identity of Black people takes a different turn in

discussions about the LGBTQ community. Homosexuality is decried as
the plague that “the white man brought” upon us. The plight of LGBTQ
persons is made subordinate to the “bigger problems” which true Black
people must handle. What is more, the Black Jesus is no longer the divine
co-sufferer but the harbinger of God’s justice against a “reprobate” sub-
community. Is there room in the Black Nation that Cleage foresaw for
Black LGBTQ persons who refuse to be subordinate to heterosexual
hegemony for the sake of being considered as a viable member of the
“Black race” rather than some mutant variation of blackness?
Perhaps it would be to our benefit as Black LGBTQ persons, during
this postmodern era of pushing back on race as a “socially constructed
category,” to join the bandwagon problematizing the “othered” status.
For all the fanfare about the beauty of blackness, it is true that race is a
category. It is a very real category though there is no biological blackness.
So, I yield to all that and admit that not only is the Black Nation which
Cleage envisioned not likely to take shape but it would not be attractive to
those of us who take joy in the freedom to live and love as same-gender-
loving persons.
What is not so easily dismissed is the reality of everyday life of people
identified as Black and the routinely vast range of common experiences of
Black people in America.22 Here we do not mean biological blackness but
shared blackness in idioms, shared stories of oppression, and shared hopes
for justice and equality. The experience of blackness is worth noting, not
as an emerging nation but as a group of people with commonalities of his-
tory and socio-political context.
Because being perceived as Black produces real consequences both good
and bad, the category itself influences Black people’s day-to-day exchanges
with others. Dr. Satya Mohanty, Cornell University professor in the area
of literary criticism, argues for what some may consider a middle ground.
instead of conceiving identities as self-evidently based on the authentic

experiences of members of a cultural or social group (the conception that
underlies identity politics) or as all equally unreal to the extent that they
lay any claim to the real experiences of real people because experience is a
radically mystifying term (this is the postmodernist alternative), we need to
explore the possibility of a theoretical understanding of social and cultural
identity in terms of objective social location.23 [italics mine]
262 P. LIGHTSEY
Rather than dismiss experience from the debate regarding identities,

Mohanty calls for the conceptualization of experience (legitimate and ille-
gitimate) as an epistemological source.24
Whether we inherit an identity – masculinity, being Black – or we actively

choose one on the basis of our political predilections – radical lesbianism,
Black nationalism, socialism – our identities are ways of making sense of our
experiences. Identities are theoretical constructions that enable us to read
the world in specific ways. It is in this sense that they are valuable, and their
epistemic status should be taken seriously.25
Womanist scholars for quite some time have celebrated the value of
using the experiences of women who identify as Black as legitimate epis-
temological source for doing theological investigation. They draw upon
Black women’s history, fiction, and nonfiction narratives as well as eth-
nographic research. Similar to Black nationalists, they are committed to
the self-determination of Black people but think more broadly about the
“survival and wholeness of entire people, male and female,” including the
“woman who loves other women sexually and/or nonsexually.”26 Though
not yet perfect, womanist theologians are mastering the nationalist ideal
that critiques individualism expanding it to a community that is intention-
ally made up of diverse persons.
In the case of the “woman who loves other women sexually” not only
have we benefited from the work of Alice Walker and other Black women’s
narratives, but poststructuralists—especially queer theorists—have done
extensive work, identifying the limits of identity categories and how the
way we understand ourselves is constituted through language. We speak of
ourselves and about others using referents that are created and used within
a particular social context. So, for example, to say that I am “a Black queer
lesbian” is a mouthful because it conveys not only my understanding of
myself, the history behind the terms but also for the hearer the meanings
and possibly the stereotypes associated with these categories. And because,
“Black queer, is an ambiguous statement, a vague identity category that is
often lost in translation I elected to add “lesbian” to the term. Are there
ways of doing Black as it has been socially constructed and continually
framed? Dare we womanist LGBTQ scholars, borrowing from Cleage’s
Black Messiah imagery privilege the Queer Black Messiah?
MY BODY BELONGS TO GOD

Owing largely to the work of queer theorist Judith Butler, particularly her
reflections on her own writing regarding the performativity, the doing of
gender, and whether it “can be transposed onto matters of race,”27 we
have come to the point of pondering if the Messiah whose blackness has
been attributed to his being a Palestinian Jew who did radical ministry with
the oppressed can also be said to be queer, the Queer Black Messiah. He
is Black, he is queer, and he is divine. In fact, what would be the efficacy
of any Christology that does not make apodictic certain that the ministry
and aim of Jesus were “to set the captive free,” meaning all captives from
hegemonic oppression?
The term “queer” similar to other once-articulated derogatory terms
has been appropriated with the awareness that categories of identity
are both socially constructed and have material effect. The meaning of
“queer” varies depending on the speaker and context. Some identify as
queer attributing its meaning as an umbrella term encompassing lesbian,
gay, bisexual, and transgender identity. Others use it to suggest their belief
that all human sexuality is fluid and ought not be relegated to the two
binary categories of heterosexual and homosexual. For a few, queer is
more politically radical with its countercultural flavor. In certain contexts,
queer is pejorative harkening back to its early usage and days when being
gay meant the constant threat of physical harm or arrest. The work of
queer theorists and theologians includes ongoing research to understand
how identity and its performativity shape our lived experiences.
Claiming “queer” as a movement against assimilation and fixed identi-
ties/stereotypes sounds similar to the self-determination of Black nation-
alists. When Cleage made this statement: "We say that we are created in
the image of God. He refuses to accept that. It is his fault, not ours...”28 he
was sounding out against a white racist theology of Creation that refused
to honor the Black body. In similar fashion, queer theologians say that we
too are created in God’s image. Our conceptualizations of God and the
Messiah are a rejection of the oppression so frequented upon us within
Christian churches (including Black) and the judicial systems of America
that are in cahoots with religious hierarchy. We too refuse assimilation and
accommodation with oppressive authority.
Saying God and Jesus are queer is indeed our rejection of
heteronormativity. Queer theologians dedicated to research about human
sexuality and to justice for all people are working diligently to provide
264 P. LIGHTSEY
publications that articulate our theories regarding God, the Church, and
Creation. Among the most provocative manuscripts to treat the queer-
ness of God is the late Marcella Althaus-Reed’s The Queer God, where
she uses “theological queering” to “mean the deliberate questioning of
heterosexual experience and thinking which has shaped our understanding
of theology, the role of the theologian and hermeneutics.”29 Addressing
God’s transcendence, Althaus-Reed states:
If God is manifested in history and more specifically in the events of libera-

tion in human history, then we need to find God’s face in loving relation-
ships outside the border of decent theology, and in the context of the Other
as the poor and excluded.30
As LGBTQ womanist scholars we affirm the queerness of God and

say, like the writer Ntozake Shange, “i found god in myself and loved
her fiercely.”31 Isn’t this after all the crux of what Cleage sought to do
by emphasizing the Black Messiah? That is, was not his ultimate aim to
get Black people to appreciate their own worth and being? In his minis-
try to help Black people unite against a common enemy, one of Cleage’s
greatest statements that is worth Black LGBTQ persons holding onto is:
“Oppression does not destroy a people. It is the acceptance of oppression
that destroys.”
Black LGBTQ persons can no more accept a divine being who pun-
ishes because they peaceably live, love, and breathe as queer citizens made
in that Divine One’s image than Black people ought to accept a brutal
god who hates their blackness and therefore has relegated them to a life
of servitude to white people. By rejecting the heteronormative theologi-
cal ideology and instead declaring the queerness of the godhead, queer
womanists are assiduously unpacking centuries of accepted doctrine and
provoking new conversation about the humanity (not nature) of Jesus.32
With the Supreme Court having ruled making same-sex marriage
legal across the nation, it is very important that Black people speak about
their religious conceptualizations of Jesus and how their way of think-
ing impacts one another. No sooner had the ruling been made public
than Black people mounted their social media pulpits to state their posi-
tions. Many Christians declared, “the Lord Jesus rebuke thee Satan,” and
some made themselves out to be the voice-piece of God “just telling you
what God says about this!” and others celebrated love summarily dismiss-
ing those who disagreed by saying, “the Lord Jesus never said one word
against homosexuality.”
With so many making theological claims about what Jesus (and God)
think about same-sex marriage and of course, human sexuality, it may be
that looking back at Cleage’s doctrine of the Black Messiah in particular
and Christianity in general is worth investigating. Though his assertions
against valuable relationship building between Black and white people are
untenable, his approach to the problem of oppression is helpful in that it
points scholars to re-examine the biblical text and what we have drawn and
continue to draw from the text about the Christ.
Avoiding separatism, Black LGBTQ persons ought never to declare as
Cleage that we are “God’s Chosen People.” Nevertheless, we must stead-
fastly demand recognition as God’s people. Black LGBTQ Christians do
well to embrace a theological ethic that commits to building God’s nation
though we must bristle with any talk of building a separate Black nation.
To be fair, Cleage’s vision for Black people was that of a “nation within
a nation” so as to allow for the liberation and independence of Black peo-
ple. Yet his idea of a “nation within a nation” would need to be nuanced
and held in tension with contemporary ideals of Black separatism. How
does his vision differ? How might his vision resonate with Black people
who longingly question why Black money can’t be primarily spent in Black
communities, “on our businesses and for our people”? Most importantly,
can we Black LGBTQ persons imagine our lives in Cleage’s quasi-self-
sufficient community of Black people and institutions?
As womanist, we diligently work for the folk because we are “commit-
ted to survival and wholeness of entire people, male and female.”33 I would
argue that the womanist ideal—vis-à-vis Black liberation—is best poised
to be the intellectual resource for social justice activism. As Christians, we
do hope that the time will come when racism and homophobia are eradi-
cated. It explores the complex lives of Black people in far more affirming
ways than people were willing or perhaps capable of doing during the days
of Cleage’s Black Messiah.
In the final analysis how we imagine the Jesus is subject to the teach-
ing we received and the contexts from which the teachers emerged. It is
worthwhile for Black LGBTQ Christians to affirm the Black Messiah has
entered the world, Son of the Queer God. Unlike Cleage, I argue that this
Black Messiah must be divine. When God took on flesh, Emanuel—God
With Us—in the person of Jesus came to seek and save those who were lost
(Luke 18:10). His sexed body with penis covered in loincloth walked the
dusty roads of Palestine and on the waters of the Sea of Galilee doing min-
istry consistent with that purpose. The performativity of his blackness was
266 P. LIGHTSEY
bequeath to us and seen whenever we imitate his work of speaking truth

to power, advancing the cause of justice and liberation.
Though the power of the Jesus is often framed within the story of his
death and resurrection, as womanist we argue that his power to transform
the world was largely contained in his ministry. It is the work of his min-
istry that reminds us of his love for all creation and his solidarity with the
oppressed. It is the truth of his encounters with humanity that gives some
Black LGBTQ Christians the courage to remain in Black churches and
communities despite the daily rejections. Christ was rejected too!
Cleage taught us, through the Black Messiah to love ourselves, and
our Black communities. In doing so, he taught us the value of continu-
ous struggle until full liberation. Black LGBTQ of this century must also
love ourselves and our Black communities. Now is not the time to believe
our liberation is achieved, and that therefore we can sing Jesus I Made It
Over. We have noted the election of Black President and within days rac-
ists called him a liar, wrote horrible things about his family, and pulled
out the monkey images and other racist stereotypes. We who are Black
LGBTQ could barely grieve the murder of the nine members of Emanuel
AME Church, including their pastor before having to face the onslaught
of homophobia, including that coming from people who identify as Black.
All these things are part and parcel of our continual caution and skepti-
cism. No, liberation has not been won. White racists, Black homopho-
bia—it seems we struggle on every hand.
And so we who are Black and queer must appropriate and continue
Cleage’s refrain with new imagination and intentionality: “We are the
Revolution.”34
NOTES
1. William L. Van Deburg, “Introduction,” in Modern Black nationalism
From Marcus Garvey to Louis Farrakhan, ed. William L. Van Deburg (New
York: New York University Press, 1997), p. 3.
2. The most notable artist articulation of that ideology was soul singer, James
Brown’s chart-breaking single, “Say It Loud—I’m Black and I’m Proud,”
a number one hit. It was Brown’s decision to follow through with his
appearance in Boston the day after King’s assassination that many attribute
to saving the city.
3. Albert Cleage, The Black Messiah (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1968),
p. 4.
4. Bishop Henry McNeal Turner, God is a Negro, Voice of Missions, 1898.

Accessed http://theforgottenprophet.blogspot.com online at
5. Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation abolishing slavery in 1863.
6. Back Messiah, 98.
7. Albert Cleage, Black Christian Nationalism (New York: William Morrow
and Company), p. 4.
8. Ibid., p. 64.
9. Suffice it to say, many Black people still hold onto the doctrine of redemp-
tive suffering. I was shocked to hear President Obama say during his
eulogy for Rev. Pinckney that “God works in mysterious ways. He didn’t
know he was being used God.”
10. The Black Messiah, 111–112.
11. Ibid., p. 85.
12. Black Christian Nationalism, p. 190.
13. Ibid., p. 86.
14. Ibid., pp. 97–98.
15. See Pew Forum demographic study, “America’s Changing Religious
Landscape,” May 12, 2015. Accessed online at http://www.pewforum.
org/2015/05/12/americas-changing-religious-landscape/
16. NY Times Opinion, accessed online at http://www.nytimes.com/1988/12/
22/opinion/negro-black-and-african-american.html, “Negro, Black and African-
American,” December 22, 1988.
17. Jacquelyn Grant, White Women’s Christ and Black Women’s Jesus (Atlanta:
Scholars Press, 1989), pp. 135–136.
18. Ibid., 212.
19. Ibid.
20. Ibid., 215.
21. Ibid.
22. Black is an identity that for some can be performed. That is to say that for
some there is unquestionably a way to be Black. The current headlines of a
woman who proclaims she is Black though both her parents identify as
white comes to mind. Once the president of Spokane, Washington
NAACP, Rachel Dolezal, began identifying and cosmetically portraying
herself in a way that was perceived as Black beginning in 2007. (See Ben
Brumfield and Greg Botelho, CNN online, “Race of Rachel Dolezal, head
of Spokane NAACP, comes under question”, June 15, 2015. Accessed at
http://www.cnn.com/2015/06/12/us/washington-spokane-naacp-rachel-
dolezal-identity/)
23. Satya P. Mohanty, “The Epistemic Status of Cultural Identity,” in
Reclaiming Identity: Realist Theory and the Predicament of Postmodernism,
Paula M. L. Moya and Michael R. Hames-Garcia (Los Angeles: University
of California Press, 2000), 42–43.
268 P. LIGHTSEY
24. Ibid., 43.

25. Ibid.
26. Alice Walker, In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens (San Diego: Harcourt
Brace, 1983), p. xi.
27. See Judith Butler’s Gender Trouble (New York: Routledge, 2010), p. xvi.
28. Black Messiah, p. 16.
29. Marcella Althaus-Reed, The Queer God (Abingdon: Routledge, 2003), p. 2.
30. Ibid., 4.
31. Ntozake Shange, “For Colored Girls who have considered suicide when
the rainbow is enuf” (New York: Schribner Poetry, 1975).
32. While I do not disagree with Church dogma regarding the Trinity, God as
three consubstantial entities has been a queer-ious idea since its inception. It
is frankly, difficult to understand and the homoousios of Jesus (being of the
same substance as and equal to God) is a Christological issue that caused
Church schism and has been debated by theologians up to this century.
33. Walker, ix.
34. Black Messiah, 15.
CHAPTER 15
The “Black Messiah” and African

Christologies: Pan-African Symbols
of Liberation
Josiah Ulysses Young
WESLEY THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY

Albert Cleage writes that the historical Jesus was a revolutionary person
of color who led the Jewish nation—a mixture of African and Semitic
folk—against the Roman imperialists.1 He refers to him as the “Black
Messiah,” noting that the Palestinian Jews of Jesus’s day resembled
African Americans of various skin tones. Cleage’s “Black Messiah” was
a nationalist who taught his people to purge themselves of the corrosive
effects of Greco-Roman civilization—a white civilization—and to solidify
their ancestral values traceable to the heyday of King David and the great
prophets from Moses to Isaiah. For Cleage, the three synoptic Gospels
best represent what the “Black Messiah” was all about; the writings of the
Apostle Paul, however, make use of the Hellenistic thought of the white
Gentiles, Europeanize the legacy of the Black Messiah, and obscure his
nation-building mission.2
J.U. Young ()

Wesley Theological Seminary, Washington, DC, USA

DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54689-0_15
270 J.U. YOUNG
In contrast to the white Christ produced by Paul’s legacy and the

fourth-century CE Christological dogma built upon his Hellenizing
agenda, Cleage’s “Black Messiah” is a Pan-African symbol of liberation.
He writes in his essay “The Black Messiah,”
The present crisis in America, involving as it does the Black man’s struggle
for survival in America, demands the resurrection of a Black church with its
own Black Messiah. Only this kind of a Black Christian Church can serve as
the unifying center for the totality of the Black man's life and struggle. Only
this kind of a Black Christian Church can force each individual Black man to
decide where he will stand—united with his own people and laboring and
sacrificing in the spirit of the Black Messiah, or individualistically seeking his
own advancement and maintaining his slave identification with the white
oppressor.3
According to Cleage, Pan-Africanist Marcus Garvey was one of the few

New World Blacks who sought to replace the white Christ with a Black one
by endorsing the iconography of the African Orthodox Church (AOC).
The AOC’s Jesus, Mary, and angelic hosts were all Black.4
Garvey’s legacy, “Garveyism,” moreover, played a role in the struggle
to decolonize Black Africa and found its African counterpart in ideologies
such as negritude. Championed by Léopold Senghor and Amié Césaire,
negritude—the notion that the Black world is one culturally played a
major role in the groundbreaking text Des prêtres noirs s’interrogent (DPN)
(which I translate as Inquisitive Black Priests).5 In his essay, “Liturgie
romaine négritude” (“Roman Liturgy and Negritude”), which is one of
the DPN essays, Robert Sastre thus asks whether Blacks (le Negre) can be
true Christians without giving up (renouncer) negritude? His answer is
yes.6Quotes have been removed around italics text across the chapter to
avoid double emphasis. However, around the essay titles they have been
retained.
I would like first to discuss the Pan-African implications of DPN by
focusing on its Christology. Second, I will examine the Christological
insights of Cameroonian theologian Engelbert Mveng and Congolese
theologian Kä Mana. Both Mveng and Mana are Pan-Africanists in that
their work focuses on the whole of Africa and, in Mveng’s case especially,
the Diaspora. Finally, I will offer concluding remarks on the Pan-African
implications of Cleage’s Black Messiah in relation to African Christologies.
Allow me to establish at the outset that the Christologies I will discuss
do not correspond exactly to Cleage’s position. The theologians I will
THE “BLACK MESSIAH” AND AFRICAN CHRISTOLOGIES: PAN-AFRICAN... 271
discuss have not emphasized the skin color of the historical Jesus (though
none seem to hold that he was white in the modern sense of the word);
they, rather, assume the Johannine principle of the Incarnation as system-
ized by fourth-century CE Alexandrians (Hellenized Egyptians) such as
Athanasius and Cyril. Their African messiah is, therefore, based on John
1:14: “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us” (“Kai ho logos
egeneto sarx kai eskēnōsen en hēmin”). Their premise is that the Christ
(Messiah)7 is the Creator’s eternal image (Word). What matters most for
them is their understanding of “God’s” humanity rather than the shade of
his flesh, which, one is to understand, is epiphenomenal to the universal
symbol of the Word. One might say that the Word here is as rooted in the
Hebrew notion of Wisdom, hokmah, as it is the Greek notion of the Logos
(ὁ λόγος). We are to understand that “God’s” Word has given all people
who set stock in the biblical narratives the freedom to symbolize God’s
image as their own both conceptually and iconographically. In discussing
their perspectives, I intend to demonstrate the diversity of the Pan-African
Messiah of liberation. In my view, Pan-Africanism, such as that cham-
pioned by Cleage, can never be reduced to any one of its proponents.
Its overriding trans-contextual purpose is to facilitate socio-economic and
political projects that improve the quality of life of African-descended peo-
ple all over the world.
I
The 1957 groundbreaking text, Des prêtres noirs interrogent (DPN), pres-
ents the views of West and Central African and Haitian Roman Catholic
priests who wonder how the salvific meaning of Christ can be conveyed
in the thought forms indigenous to African-descended people. They
thus wrestle with the problematic fact that outside of Ethiopia and the
Christian traditions of Nubia,8 Christianity came to Black Africa through
European missionaries. In service to the colonial project, most white mis-
sionaries devalued African traditional values. The African independent
churches—grassroots movements more beholden to African Traditional
Religions than Western interpretations of Christianity—rejected such
colonial missiology. For many, however, including a number of European-
trained African clergy, such as those who penned the DPN essays, the
independent churches were heterodox (sectes pagano-chrétiennes, as one
priest put it).9 Still, the DPN priests, trained by Europeans, began to won-
der how they could Africanize the Christian faith. Not unlike the leaders
272 J.U. YOUNG
of the independent churches, these African priests chaffed against colonial

ideology. Jesuit priest Engelbert Mveng, who I will talk more about a little
later, has gone so far as to argue that DPN is the first significant example
of modern African liberation theology (le premier grand manifeste de la
théologie africaine moderne de la libération), predating James Cone’s book
Black theology and Black Power and Gustavo Guttierez’s book A Theology
of Liberation.10
Most of the DPN essays are a bit too conservative and obedient to the
Vatican to be liberation theologies as I have come to understand them.
The chapter written by R. Dosseh and R. Sastre, however, “Propagande
et Vérité” (“Propaganda and Truth”), addresses political issues such as
the Partition of Africa, the olden colonialism it facilitated and the racist
propaganda that legitimatized the brutality of colonial systems. The essay,
in addition, addresses the cultural problematic each of the DPN essays
tackles: how can African and Haitian clergy indigenize the Christian faith
so that it becomes more meaningful to African-descended people?
According to Dosseh and Sastre, a number of European missionaries
mocked the praxis of the Messiah (the Nazaréen). According to these
priest, those missionaries lost sight of Paul’s avowal to “put no obstacle”
in the way of those who seek to know the Messiah (2 Cor 6:3).11 In deni-
grating African traditional cultures, the offending missionaries placed pro-
paganda in the way of truth: Africans’ God-given right to legitimate love
and respect for themselves. For Sastre and Dosseh, “God does not require
conversion at such a price; for such conversion sins (c’est pécher) against
what saint Paul calls the ‘Brotherhood of God our Savior.’”12 The racist
missionaries wanted to make Blacks their carbon copies and so distorted
(fausser) the meaning of the Incarnation—“the redemption of God made
man in order to save us.”13
Dosseh and Sastre argue that the Christian faith does not negate human
nature, as if faith were “a sort of metaphysically impossible kenosis.”14
Rather faith is about the potential of all people to become new creatures.
Here, the priests are signifying Paul’s assertion in 2 Corinthians 5:17–18.15
The Messiah (le Christ) has reconciled the faithful to “God” (le Père).16
By implication, the African in all of his or her integrity is a new creature in
the sense that he or she is free to paint Black icons of the Messiah and to
use African values to convey his redemptive mission. All the essays in DPN
make that point, though more conservatively than Propagande et Vérité.
Two other DPN essays written by the Congolese priest Vincent
Mulago also merit closer attention. Mulago is one of the better-known
African theologians of the period spanning from the 1950s to the 1970s.
Mulago’s “Nécessité de l’adaptation missionnaire chez les Bantu du Congo”
(“The Necessity of Inculturation among the Congolese Bantu”) argues
that Black Congolese priests must employ the thought forms and ritual
sensibilities of the Congolese people if their faith is to be more than a shal-
low assimilation of Euro-Christian symbols foreign to them. One calls this
missiology inculturation (i.e., adaptation) in the sense that the Christian
faith must be adapted to (i.e., sown deeply into the souls of) African peo-
ple if it is to become indigenous to the Continent over time (as it has in
Ethiopia, one might add).17 The Messiah must become Congolese on the
model of the Incarnation (as in John 1:14).
For Mulago, therefore, inculturation (i.e., l’adaptation) is the extension
(prolongement) of the Incarnation of the Word, “the adaptation of God
to humankind.”18 Mulago writes further, “The Logos, in assuming our
poor human nature, has not first stripped it of its properties; in bending
down to us, the [Messiah] lost nothing of who he was: perfect God, per-
fect Man, in a perfect unity; such is the mystery of the Incarnation, which
the Church has never ceased to reproduce in its missionary élan.”19 For
Mulago, the Incarnation undergirds Black people’s “right” to see “God”
in their own image. Mulago’s “Le Pacte du sang et la communion alimen-
taire: Pierres d’attente de la communion eucharistique” (“The Blood Pact
and the Communal Meal: Preparation for the Eucharist”) exemplifies how.
He writes of how Rwandans were often able to resolve precolonial
conflict in reminding one another of their commonality—a single lan-
guage, one king, and a common national ancestor cult (le génie cultuel)
Lyangombe. They drank an herbal, red-colored mixture from the same
vessel and then shared a meal, eating from the same plate. They shared,
as it were, the same blood.20 Mulago argues that the blood pact and the
common meal would be a fitting way to Rwanda-ize the Lord’s Supper
because the pact had already instilled in Rwandans the sense that they
were one people. The Christianization of le pacte du sang—a ritual that
was part of the culture before the coming of the Germans during the
colonial period—would thus fortify the pacific values within the culture.21
The generation of African theologians Vincent Mulago represented,
however, wrote little about neocolonialism and the millions of lives it has
consumed.22 They failed to address the ramifications of colonial rule, rami-
fications that made “independence” impossible. Europe’s imposition of
colonial borders, arrogant disregard for ethnic differences among African
people and brutal administration of European interests did not evaporate
274 J.U. YOUNG
when one African nation after the other became “independent” in the late
1950s and throughout the 1960s. (To borrow a line from Nigerian writer
Wole Soyinka, neocolonialism stems from the “tainted” seeds “sown at
the infamous Berlin Conference of 1884.” Now those seeds have devel-
oped into deadly conflicts.)23
In Rwanda, for instance, the German and the Belgian colonists exac-
erbated existing tensions between the Tutsi and Hutu. The Germans
encouraged the Tutsi to think of themselves as racially superior to the
Hutu. Later, after the First World War, the Belgians—to whom the League
of Nations gave the former German colony of Rwanda—“made this polar-
ization the cornerstone of their colonial policy.”24 The 1994 Rwandan
genocide in which the Hutu majority killed nearly a million Tutsi—an
event that many Westerners view as the outcome of tribalism unchecked
by European governance—was the tragic outcome of decades of colonial
rule. The apartheid-like system the Belgian colonialists set up and nur-
tured in large measure through the Roman Catholic Church in Rwanda
is partly responsible for the genocide.25 One wonders, in the spirit of the
inquisitive Black priests: Rwanda would have hacked itself apart so sav-
agely if it had remained true to the upward path of its own indigenous cul-
ture—held fast to a Rwandan Messiah, as it were, who helped the people
see the folly of shedding, as opposed to sharing, their blood? Although
most of the essays in DPN seem unaware of the impending neocolonial
disasters, their Christologies bring out the integrity of African traditional
values. These values alone are not sufficient for the upbuilding of a devas-
tated Africa, but they are necessary for that task.
II
One of the outstanding African theologians to take on neocolonialism was
Cameroonian Jesuit Engelbert Mveng, whom I have mentioned above.
He wrote compellingly of the inextricableness of the themes of incultura-
tion and liberation in Black African theology and was a central figure in
the l’Association Œcuménique des Théologiens Africains (AOTA)26 and
the Ecumenical Association of Third World Theologians (EATWOT).
He writes in Théologie libération et cultures africaines: Dialogue sur
l’anthropologie négro-africaine (Liberation Theology and African Cultures:
Dialogue on Black African Anthropology) that the first task of the Church
faced with neocolonialism and its aftermath (néocolonialisme et à séquelles)
is to be true to its call to salvation and truth. For Mveng, then, the Church
must denounce “the system of injustice and the structural domination that
weighs down (“pèsent sur”) humankind today.” Liberation theology in
Africa must radically denounce the world’s sin (has as its task la denuncia-
tion la plus radicale du péché du monde) qua neocolonialism.27
One of my favorite books of his is L’art d’Afrique noire: liturgies cos-
mique and langage religieux (Black African Art: Cosmic Liturgy and
Religious Language.)28 The book is a moving survey of Black African
art as gleaned from traditional Bantu cultures. The Bantu are a diverse
people—Zulu, !Xhosa, Shona, Kikuyu, BaKongo—who are dispersed
throughout Central, Southern, and East Africa. For Mveng, traditional
Bantu art—prayers, drumming, sculpture, masks, textiles—reveals that the
human being is divided. In the innermost being of himself or herself, one
is both free and determined by the world (Il est liberté créatrice assumant
le déterminisme du monde.). The African thus wages a constant struggle
within his or her soul to assert his or her freedom over what seems to
be fixed in the world. A fruit of this struggle is art, through which one
realizes “the triumph of Life over Death” (Le triomphe de la VIE sur la
MORT).29 A fortiori, life’s victory over death is for Mveng the meaning
of the Gospels’ Messiah, who took on the anti-life forces that spread cor-
ruption and death—“the problem of Evil” (du Mal)—and defeated them
in his Resurrection.
It bears repeating that for Mveng, the forces that spread death through-
out Black Africa are political and socio-economic. He thus writes in one of
his essays that I find to be seminal, “Récents développements de la théologie
africaine” (“Recent Developments of African Theology”), that the entire
continent has been struggling for liberation in ways that are devastatingly
acute—liberation from the Western powers and, at that time, the Soviets,
all of whom were using Africa to advance their geopolitical agendas. This
struggle over African resources and coastal areas of the Atlantic and the
Indian Oceans pulled Africa apart and promoted the death pangs (l’agonie)
of the Organization of African Unity (OAU). When Mveng penned this
essay apartheid was rampant in South Africa, tribalism (narrow nation-
alism, cronyism) undermined fair play and despots perpetrated crimes
against humanity in places such as Zaire, Equatorial Guinea, Guinea and
Uganda.
Mveng’s African Christology is summed up for me by his drawing of
the African Messiah depicted in his book L’art d’Afrique noire: liturgies
cosmique and langage religieux. His Black Messiah symbolizes the struggle
for the rights and dignity of African-descended people who have yet to
276 J.U. YOUNG
enjoy the fruits of political independence from their colonial and neoco-
lonial masters. Painted in shades of red and Black and surrounded by red
and Black patterns suggestive of a textile, Mveng’s Messiah’s hands are
raised, showing the nail marks. A halo featuring three cone-like shades
of red suggestive of light surround his mask-like face. His robe draped
around his body in the form of a chalice is awash with chevron patterns
and covers his body, except for his upraised hands and feet positioned in
what ballet dancers call “first.”30
According to Mveng, the Messiah symbolizes African theologians’
struggles with six critical issues. The first issue is the liberation from the
influence of the white West, which has complicity in Africa’s dysfunction.
The liberation from the hegemony of Western philosophical traditions
rooted in Aristotelian–Thomistic deduction or Hegelian dialectic (i.e., la
logique aristotélicothomiste ou la dialectique hégélienne) is the second issue;
and the third has to do with the struggle to explore the continuity between
YHWH-Elohim and the Father of Jesus Christ without privileging the
oppressive Western theologies and Christologies, which have undermined
the kerygma (la Bonne Nouvelle du Salut) for oppressed people.31
The fourth critical issue Mveng identifies is the one for which he is most
well-known—namely the problem of anthropological wretchedness (pau-
vreté anthropologique).32 (I translate pauvreté as wretchedness to allude
to Franz Fanon’s classic text, The Wretched of the Earth.) Pan-African in
implication, such wretchedness is linked to the exploitation of Black labor.
One thinks about the misery of Congolese workers whose back-breaking
labor supplies the world with the coltan indispensable to digital technol-
ogy (computers, iPhone, etc.). Inseparable from such wretchedness, more-
over, is spiritual deprivation that signifies anthropological wretchedness
proper. It is found among African-descended people all over the world and
is stoked by the principalities and powers with economic and geopolitical
interest in Africa. The diabolicalness of la pauvreté anthropologique is that
it has made Black people think that they are worthless.33
According to Mveng, this wretchedness must be countered by his
fifth critical concern—the development of liberating praxis that takes its
bearings from the Beatitudes. Finally, sixth, Mveng asserts that Africa,
especially the African churches, must counter the oppressive systems of
depersonalization and pauperization by taking its stand with the poor and
oppressed and thus embodying in every way it conceivably can hope for
the people. To quote him,
The Spirit of the Lord [i.e., the (Pan) African Messiah] works visibly through
the vitality of African Christian communities. Those of us moved by his
Spirit do not theorize but live out our African Christian experience in art,
liturgies, catechesis, the emergence of new societies and families, ecumenical
dialogue in Africa and outside of Africa and a more evangelical ecclesiology.
That is the true meaning of what one calls indigenization (inculturation).34
Mveng, who was savagely murdered in his home on April 23, 1995, has
left a great legacy of Pan-African Christology. His oeuvre is indispensable
for those who see the African Messiah as a symbol for Black liberation all
over the world.
Next, I would like to discuss Congolese Protestant theologian Kä
Mana. Of all the theologians I have read, Mana is the most critical; and I
would like briefly to discuss three of his books, beginning with L’Afrique:
va-t-elle mourir? Bousculer l’imaginaire africaine (Is Africa Going to Die?
Shaking up Africa’s Imagination). For Mana, the Black continent lan-
guishes at the very bottom of the world order and finds itself bereft of any
technological advancement to speak of. According to Mana, Africa, for
the most part, has not equipped itself with the inventiveness necessary for
scientific innovation.35 He discusses many reasons for this weakness: the
history of slavery, colonialism, neocolonialism, the cold war and corrupt
African leadership. He also thinks African intellectuals, theologians and
philosophers must stimulate Africans’ imagination in ways that promote
creativity and inventiveness for the sake of the future. For Mana, a number
of African scholars have focused on notions of the African past. He cites
as examples Senghor’s negritude and Cheik Anta Diop’s Pharaonic Egypt.
Mana is even critical of his teacher, Congolese priest and celebrated pro-
fessor Oscar Bimwenyi-Kweshi. While Mana thinks Bimwenyi-Kweshi’s
book, Discours théologique négro-africain, problèmes des fondements
(African Theological Discourse: Foundational Problems),36 is an indispens-
able discussion of African Christology, the text, according to Mana, will
not in itself equip Africans to forge a creative path to the future.
According to Mana, African intellectuals who focus on African tradi-
tions, especially their religious dimensions, make a great deal of myths
that are integral to African identities.37 For Mana, myths, “in the positive
sense of the word,” indicate the “pre-reflective” values “we confer on
things.”38 Without such spirituality (cette dimension d’intériorité), reality
itself would be opaque.39 Myths, however, should not chain people to
the past, for if they do they box them up in yesterday while today passes
278 J.U. YOUNG
them by. In the negative sense, myths can render them powerless to affect
the future constructively. In his book Christians and Churches of Africa:
Salvation in Christ and Building A New African Society, Mana elaborates
on the positive dimensions of myths in explaining that myth signifies a
“superabundance of meaning” that is an “important point of departure
for new possibilities of being and new prospects of self-creation in new contexts
of life.”40 Mana provides an example of what he means in his discussion of
the ancient Egyptian tale of Isis and Osiris.
Isis’s ingenuity in bringing forth life from the privates of the patched-
together corpse of her brother Osiris symbolizes that “Africa has in itself
the powers of rebirth, revitalization and resumption of its historical ini-
tiative.”41 Accordingly, “Isis appears as the one who gathers, integrates,
‘panafricanizes’ and, above all, gives new creative power through the sex
organ she herself makes.”42 In impregnating herself, she brings forth new
life (Horus). “Horus,” Mana writes, is “the symbol of a new Africa, one
which opens up a new destiny and wages a merciless, ruthless fight against
the forces of destruction and demolition.”43 The Isis and Osiris myth con-
veys the traditional African sense that life will triumph over death due to
Africa’s latent resourcefulness. The accent is on the future. Africa will not
die but forge new life from death. The Isis and Osiris myth confronts the
anthropological wretchedness (la pauvreté anthropologique), which Mana,
alluding to Mveng, describes as Africans’ sense “of how insignificant [they]
seem to be in today’s world,” a feeling that leads them to “debase [them-
selves] in [their] own eyes as individuals, as a culture and as a society.”44
As an African Christian theologian, Mana discusses the ancient Egyptian
myth in relation to Christ. He raises the question, How “does Christ’s
personality become important, useful, necessary and fruitful, in problems
related to the sense of worthlessness of our being, the inconsistency of
our action and the devaluation of our vital powers?”45 In answering those
questions, Mana reconceives the risen Messiah in terms of Isis symbols
of rebirth and renewal deeply rooted in African spirituality. More spe-
cifically, Mana argues that the Cross signifies “that unknown perspective”
that “opens new possibilities of understanding of the Isis-Osiris myth in
its manifold semantic senses.”46 When, therefore, the Messiah is Pan-
Africanized in terms of the ancient goddess, he “represents a revitalizing
power of our divided and dislocated Africa.” Mana’s Messiah thus symbol-
izes the continent’s “capacity to create a new life, out of all the sarcopha-
guses that suffocate and kill us.”47 Mana argues, furthermore, that when
the (Pan-African) Messiah is placed “at the mythological heart of African
existence, [he] acts as a force springing from the depths of our own African
cultural powers, to enrich creative intellect.” The African Messiah is “also
a force from the transcendent realm, as well as the historical trajectory of
the western world, that penetrates our minds and increases our resource-
fulness to liberate the future.”48
In his book on the Messiah, Christ d’ Afrique: Enjeux éthiques de la foi
africaine en Jésus-Christ (Africa’s Christ: Ethical Issues of Africa’s Faith in
Jesus Christ), the cover of which features Mveng’s African Messiah that I
have described above, Mana provides added insight into what he means by
the Messiah. He lifts up, as many African theologians do, John 1: 14. For
Mana, the enfleshed Word (le principe d’incarnation) signifies that “God”
is one with humankind—especially the anthropologically wretched.49 For
Mana, therefore, John 1:14 essentially means that the African churches
and African Christians must take the true measure of the Continent’s
dysfunctions and rise to the task of correcting them.50 The Word made
flesh thus empowers Africans to free themselves from “everything that
would chain them up and crush them: the gravity of evil, the exploit-
ative structures, the oppressive powers, the unbridled egoism (la pesanteur
du mal, les structures d’exploitation, les puissances d’oppression, les pouvoirs
d’égoïsme.) For Mana, the Word (le Verb) comes from “God” but does not
signify “an invisible exterior force”; instead, the Word signifies Africans
liberating self-transformation through the Spirit within them, who puts
them together and enables them to stand for a new destiny (Le principe de
libération est la transformation de nous-mêmes par l’Esprit qui est en nous et
qui nous met debout, nous met ensemble pour un nouveau destin.)51
Mana makes that same point in his book L’Afrique: va-t-elle mourir?
He argues that the enfleshed Word has nothing to do, really, with dogma.
The enfleshed Word has to do with humane projects that will bring about
livable lives for the masses of African people who have been reduced to
nothing.52 For Mana, moreover, the praxis of Jesus is not mythic. It fur-
nishes, rather, the ethics, the technique, that can help Africa live rather
than die.53 According to Mana, those who understand the Messiah’s mis-
sion create a salvific space in the world. Without this redemptive space
(i.e., brèche), the ethical life would be vaporous, dissipate into the intan-
gible (l’invisible) and imprison us in its psychedelic haze rather than help
us liberate ourselves from injustice.54 In his book, Christians and Churches
of Africa: Salvation in Christ and Building a New African Society, Mana
thus argues that the Messiah helps Africans see that “the issue of salva-
tion [is] the problem of the very meaning of life in Africa.”55 He writes,
280 J.U. YOUNG
moreover, that dogmatic quibbles are “inessential battles and often futile
conflicts in which nothing of the ‘essential of the essential’ of the Christian
faith … is involved.”56 For Mana, “the African Christ” symbolizes “a new
Christological norm, born of the dialogue of Christ with the depths of
Africa where we and our history meet as the home … of our creative force
and our understanding of the human.”57 Mana’s work powerfully exem-
plifies his view of how the Messiah is a Pan-African symbol of liberation.
CONCLUSION
The DPN Christology, the Christological insights of Engelbert Mveng
and Kä Mana and Cleage’s Black Messiah demonstrate the diversity of
Pan-Africanism. Cleage’s Black Messiah was a Jewish nationalist and nem-
esis of the Roman imperialists. The DPN’s Christ is the incarnate Word
who empowers Africans to indigenize Church traditions; and Mveng’s
and Mana’s Christ symbolizes both the indigenization of Christianity and
Africa’s struggle against neocolonialism. Although their Pan-African views
on the Messiah differ, each seeks to facilitate cultural, socio-economic,
and political projects that improve the quality of life of African-descended
people all over the world.
The ways in which African-descended people confront these problems
differ because the problems, though linked, are not the same. They stem,
however, from the same historic source, white supremacist ideology in
the world order. Albert Cleage challenges African American theologians
to confront racial injustice—police brutality, substandard housing, inad-
equate healthcare, inferior public education, the racist penal system and
more—passionately and relentlessly in the name of the Black Messiah.
Cleage suggests that resistance to such injustice should be the very voca-
tion of the Black church if it is to overcome the legacy of slavery. Dosseh’s
and Sastre’s DPN essay, “Propagande et Vérité,” alerts us to the racist pro-
paganda that has legitimized the abuse of African-descended people from
the time of the Middle Passage to the colonial eras. Those priests, and all
the DPN clergy, argue that the enfleshed Word is the antithesis of racist
propaganda. Mveng, in addition, has shown us that the Messiah opposes
both the premature death that lies in wait for African-descended people—
like slave catchers in the bush—and the pauvreté anthropologique (anthro-
pological wretchedness) that would make us surrender to death. Mana,
in addition, has helped us see that we have the wherewithal to rise above
our oppression in the name of the Messiah, who symbolizes la libération
anthropologique (anthropological liberation). This libération actualizes the

faith that “Christ is the incarnation of all the forces of life against the
powers of death.”58 Life in the spirit of the liberating Messiah (la vie selon
l’esprit du Messie libérateur) is thus oriented to a future in which African
people will hold their own by virtue of the actions we take to change our
societies—actions that first take shape in our own spirits, in our daring
subversively to imagine what freedom truly means.
Surely, freedom means that it will no longer be possible for humankind
to be enslaved by the West and other inhumane powers. One sees that this
freedom demands that we refuse to submit to injustice and resist it in the
name of the Black Messiah as a Pan-African symbol of liberation.59
NOTES
1. Albert B. Cleage, “The Black Messiah,” in Black theology a Documentary
History, Vol. I, eds., James Cone and Gayraud Wilmore (Maryknoll, NY:
Orbis Books), p. 102.
2. Cleage, 101.
3. Cleage, 105.
4. Cleage, 104.
5. A. Abble et al., Des prêtres noirs s’ interrogent (Paris: Les éditions du Cerf,
1957).
6. R. Sastre, “Liturgie romaine négritude,” in Des prêtres noirs s’interrogent,
154–155.
7. Although some scholars distinguish the word “Messiah” from the word
“Christ” in order to emphasize the Hebraic and Aramaic implications of
“Messiah” instead of the Hellenistic-metaphysical implications of “Christ,”
I am using the two terms interchangeably, thus setting stock in the well-
known view that “Christ” (Christós) translates the Hebrew HaMashiach
(the Messiah). Both words signify a person who has been anointed in
assuming a royal or priestly or prophetic office. Both words, moreover,
signify the historical Jesus, without whom Christology of any sort is
impossible.
8. See my book, African Theology: A Critical Examination with Annotated
Bibliography (Westport: Greenwood Press, 1993), 7–8.
9. Marcel Lefebvre, “Lettre-Préface,” in Des prêtres noirs s’interrogent, 12.
10. Engelbert Mveng and B.L. Lipawing, Théologie, libération et cultures afric-
aine: Dialogue sur l’anthropologie négro-africaine (Paris: Présence
Africaine, 1996), p. 30.
11. R. Dosseh and R. Sastre, “Propagande et vérité,” in Des prêtres noirs
s’interrogent, 137.
282 J.U. YOUNG
12. R. Dosseh and R. Sastre, 152: “Dieu ne demande pas la conversion à ce
prix; c’est pécher contre ce que saint Paul appellee ‘la Philanthropie’ de Dieu
notre Sauveur.’”
13. R. Dosseh and R. Sastre, 152 (my translation).
14. R. Dosseh and R. Sastre, 152 (i.e., “une sorte de kénose du reste métaphy-
siquement impossible”).
15. “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away;
behold, the new has come. All this is from God, who through Christ rec-
onciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation.”
16. R. Dosseh and R. Sastre, 148 (my translation).
17. See Ephraim Isaac, The Ethiopian Orthodox Täwahïdo Church (Trenton:
The Red Sea Press, 2013).
18. Vincent Mulago, Nécessité de l’adaptation missionnaire chez les Bantu du
Congo, in Des prêtres noirs s’interrogent, 33.
19. Mulago, 33, my translation.
20. Mulago, “Le Pacte Du Sang et la communion alimentaire: Pierres d’attente
de la communion eucharistique,” 176–177.
21. Mulago, 184.
22. See my book, African Theology: A Critical Analysis and Annotated
Bibliography (Westport: Greenwood Press, 1993).
23. Wole Soyinka, Of Africa (New Haven: Yale University, 2012), p. 10.
24. Philip Gourevitch, We Wish to Inform You that Tomorrow We Will Be Killed
with Our Families: Stories from Rwanda (New York: Farrar Straus and
Giroux, 1998), p. 54.
25. See Gérard Prunier, The Rwanda Crisis: History of a Genocide (New York:
Columbia University Press, 1995); Gourevitch; and Alain Destexhe,
Rwanda and Genocide in the Twentieth Century (New York: New York
University, 1996).
26. That is, the Ecumenical Association of African Theologians (EAAT).
27. Engelbert Mveng and B.L. Lipawing, 69.
28. Engelbert Mveng, L’art d’Afrique noire: liturgies cosmique and langage
religieux (Paris: Mame, 1964).
29. Mveng, 7.
30. Mveng, 123.
31. Mveng, “Récents développements de la théologie africaine,” in Bulletin de
théologie africaine 5, 9 (janvier-jiun 1983), 141.
32. Mveng, 141.
33. Mveng, 141.
34. Mveng, 143. My translation.
35. Kä Mana. L’Afrique: va-t-elle mourir? Bousculer l’imaginaire africaine
(Paris: Les éditions du cerf, 1991, 22.
36. See Oscar Bimyenyi-Kweshi, Discours théologique négro-africain: Problème

des fondements (Paris: Présence africaine, 1981).
37. Mana, 68–86.
38. Mana, L’Afrique: va-t-elle mourir?, 57.
39. Mana, 57.
40. Mana, Christians and Churches of Africa: Salvation in Christ and Building
a New African Society (New York: Maryknoll, 2004), 28, emphasis added.
41. Mana, 31.
42. Mana, 30.
43. Mana, 30–31.
44. Mana, 3.
45. Mana, 31.
46. Mana, 31.
47. Mana, 32.
48. Mana, 32.
49. Mana, Christ d’ Afrique: Enjeux éthiques de la foi africaine en Jésus-Christ,
216.
50. Mana, 218.
51. Mana, 218.
52. Mana, L’Afrique: va-t-elle mourir?, 175.
53. Mana, 184.
54. Mana, 190.
55. Mana, Christians and Churches of Africa: Salvation in Christ and Building
A New African Society, 107.
56. Mana, 104.
57. Mana, 104.
58. Mana, Christ d’ Afrique, 96.
59. Mana, 99.
CHAPTER 16
The Quest for a Radical Black Jesus:

An Antidote to Imperial Mission
Christianity
Anthony G. Reddie
The quest for a radical black Jesus has been an ongoing one but it has
never taken place in a vacuum. Since the epoch of slavery, segregation,
colonialism, and neo-colonisation, Christian people of African descent
have sought to find ways of connecting their existential struggles for self-
hood with the person of Jesus. Jesus, who is in conventional, normative
Christianity, believed to be the Christ, God’s anointed one, has provided
for many black people,1 a means of conferring personhood in terms of
their association with Godself.
This chapter seeks to argue for the apologetical case for a radical black
Jesus as a counter to the wholesale negation of blackness that was concom-
itant with the expansionist explosion of Imperial Mission Christianity and
its impact on ‘native subjects’ across the contours of the British Empire.
One cannot understand the theological force of this work without under-
standing the nature of the intellectual discipline and contextual praxis, that
A.G. Reddie ()

The University of South Africa, Pretoria, South Africa

DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54689-0_16
286 A.G. REDDIE
is, Black Liberation Theology, or black theology, to name its shorthand

nomenclature. Black theology provides the intellectual rationale for under-
standing the quest for a radical black Jesus.
WHAT IS BLACK THEOLOGY?

Black theology can be broadly understood as the self-conscious attempt
to undertake rational and disciplined conversation about God and God’s
relationship to black people in the world, across space and time. The God
that is at the centre of black theology is the one who is largely, although
not exclusively, understood in terms of God’s revelation in Jesus Christ.
Black theology is most often, although not exclusively, understood as a
branch of the wider family of ‘theologies of Liberation’—that is, part of a
wider family of theologies that seek to reinterpret the central meaning of
the God event within history, particularly, in terms of the life, death, and
resurrection of Jesus the Christ; seeking to offer a politicised, radical, and
socially transformative understanding of the Christian faith in light of the
existential experiences of the poor, the marginalised, and the oppressed.
Black theology has grown out of the ongoing struggles of black peo-
ples to affirm their identity and very humanity in the face of seemingly
insuperable odds. African American scholars, such as Asante, estimate that
upwards of 50 million African people were transported between Africa and
the Americas over a 400-year period. Inherent within that black, transat-
lantic movement of forced migration and labour, was a form of biased,
racialised teaching that asserted the inferiority and subhuman nature of
the black self.2 The continued struggles of black people that arise from the
era of slavery can be seen in the overarching material poverty and margin-
alisation of black people across the world.3
In addition to the structural and disproportionate material poverty of
black people is the more ephemeral phenomenon, that is, the continu-
ing tendency of black people to internalise the damaging effects of such
racialised demagoguery within the confines of the fragile human psyche.
The internalisation of this demonised indoctrination has led to black peo-
ple directing the fire of their repressed and disparaged selves onto their
own psyche and that of their peers with whom they share a common
ancestry and ethnic identity.4
In this chapter, I am seeking to juxtapose black theology-based reflec-
tions on Jesus as a means of speaking to the postcolonial realities of
incipient anti-blackness that arises in the construction of Imperial Mission
THE QUEST FOR A RADICAL BLACK JESUS: AN ANTIDOTE TO IMPERIAL... 287
Christianity. The latter term will be unpacked shortly, but for now, I want
to illustrate how this facet of Christianity in Britain, born of the British
Empire, has helped to create an anti-materialistic, abstract form of faith
that has taught black people to ignore the existential concerns that impact
on their embodied sense of self.
THE IMPERIAL LEGACY OF CHRISTIANITY IN BRITAIN

It should be axiomatic that one cannot talk about Christianity in Britain
without engaging with the broader thematic hinterland, that is, empire
and colonialism. The antecedents for the mass presence of black people in
Britain have their roots in the British Empire, in terms of the migration of
the ‘Windrush Generation’5 between 1948 and 1961.
I write as a confessional black Christian from within the Methodist tra-
dition. Methodism found its way to the Caribbean via the missionary work
of Nathaniel Gilbert, even though the indefatigable work undertaken by
his two black enslaved women has largely gone unheralded.6 The ‘historic
church’7 version of Caribbean Christianity into which approximately two
thirds of all black people of Christian faith in Britain have been inducted
and formed is one that echoes to the continual strains of British-run slav-
ery in the English islands of the Caribbean.8 Caribbean Christianity, which
emerges from the comparatively more recent Pentecostal tradition, has,
nonetheless, been influenced to an equal extent by the blandishments of
empire and colonialism.
The African dimension of Christianity in Britain has also been informed
by colonialism and empire, which continues to circumscribe the param-
eters of acceptability and notions of what constitutes the status quo and
normality in terms of faith adherence. Space prevents a detailed explora-
tion of the relationship between Imperial Mission Christianity and black
Christians in Britain—suffice it to say, that there can be no doubting that
the two are inextricably linked, to a level and at a depth that scholars are
only now beginning to tease out. It is worth noting that at the time of
writing, there are only a handful of texts that have explored this relation-
ship to any satisfactory degree.9
But if the legacy of the under-explored relationship between
‘Christianity, Commerce, and Civilisation’10 within White British theo-
logical circles is a cause for concern, the record amongst black Christians
in Britain, has until comparatively recently, has been equally lamentable.
This indicates that ‘we’, of which I am a part, are really no better, given
288 A.G. REDDIE
the ways in which black people in Britain have internalised the colonised
legacy of Christianity. The comparative lack of anti-colonial work by black
British theologians is testament to the fact that the blandishments of
empire remain wedded in the black psyche, thereby, leading to a dearth of
scholarship that seeks to explore the continuing impact of colonisation on
black Christian minds in Britain. In all the truth, for example, the dearth
of anti-colonial work by black scholars in the UK has only operated mainly
in the theological and religious fields, which have lagged far behind black
British cultural studies.
In effect, black theology has enabled black people in Britain and in
other contexts to name the ‘Whiteness’ of Mission Christianity. I know
that African Americans can and have said the same thing regarding their
own experiences in the USA, regarding the corrosive power of Whiteness
and the dangers of imbibing the indoctrination of Colonial Christianity
and the way in which non-White people are othered, even in the midst of
the so-called promised notions of equality in Christ.
In using the term ‘Imperial Mission Christianity’, I am speaking of a
historical phenomenon in which there existed (and continues to this day)
an interpenetrating relationship between European expansionism, notions
of White superiority, and the material artefact of the apparatus of Empire.
In terms of the latter, one must note the relationship between external
and internal forms of economically informed socio-politio-cultural impo-
sition upon client states, who exhibit limited agency within these forms
of geopolitical arrangements. When speaking of external imposition, I am
referring to externalised control of territory from European metropolitan
centres (London, Paris, Brussels, Madrid, Berlin, Lisbon, etc.), usually
via colonial apparatchiks, such as Viceroys, Governors, and more faceless
bureaucrats in the civil service.
In terms of internal imposition, I am referring to the axiomatic episte-
mological superiority of Eurocentric sociocultural norms, manners, aes-
thetics, and morality, which affected the social arrangements between the
colonised and the coloniser, within the body politic of those nations ruled
under the aegis of empire. Within the context of all of the aforementioned
operated the Imperial mission church. It was, undoubtedly, informed by
and was nourished by existence of Christendom and both reflected and
benefited from the overarching frameworks of empire and colonialism.
Hence, my use of the term ‘Imperial Mission Church’.
The relationship between empire and colonialism, in many respects,
remains the ‘elephant in the room’. Empire and colonialism found
much of its intellectual underscoring on the basis of White, Eurocentric

supremacy, which marked the clear binary between notions of civilised and
acceptable against uncivilised and transgressive. There are no prizes for
guessing on which side of the divide black people found themselves rel-
egated? The unacknowledged weight of invisible Whiteness and its dam-
nable offspring, White supremacy has been remarked upon by the African
Caribbean, black British TV presenter and religio-cultural commentator,
Robert Beckford thus:
I would say that theology is the last bastion of White supremacy in Britain.
Most disciplines have woken up to the need to engage with critical the-
ory. They’ve engaged with diversity at the core, thinking more critically
and constructively about how they shape things. Sociology students here at
Goldsmith’s take courses in “critical Whiteness”. In theology circles they’d
think you were dealing with table cloths they have at different times of the
year!11
It is my contention that a black Jesus is necessary in order to deconstruct

the debilitating effects of internalised oppression and self-negation that
has remained a constant feature of Imperial Mission Christianity on the
psyche of some black people in Britain.
A RADICAL BLACK JESUS WHO IS WITH US AND FOR US
In the interests of time, I am unable to offer a detailed exposition of how

the universal symbol, that is, Jesus became refracted and distilled into a
particular image of normalised Whiteness and Eurocentric hegemony. A
number of black scholars have looked at how the person of Jesus came to
be possessed and colonised for the purposes of political and cultural control
by the dictates of White European elite power. In particular, it is worth
noting Jacquelyn Grant12, and Kelly Brown Douglas13, especially the latter
who, in her book What’s Faith Got To Do With It?,14 outlines the means
by which a White image and vision of Jesus has been used to exploit and
demonise black bodies.15 African American religious scholar, Anthony Pinn
offers one of the most telling analyses of how White thought control and
repressive action was able to use White Eurocentric norms built around a
White image of Jesus in order to dismantle and degrade black bodies.
It worth noting that around that time of the latter end of the Patristic
period, a number of significant developments were already in evidence,
which gave rise to the later attack on and the dismemberment of black
290 A.G. REDDIE
minds and black bodies. As the construction of the overarching doctrinal

and creedal building blocks on which much of our Christological under-
standing of Jesus is based were taking shape; notions of White normativ-
ity and black otherness were already beginning to find their way into the
lexicon of Christian thinking.
One of the major challenges offered by black theology to the privations
caused by Imperial Mission Christianity has been the means by which it
enabled black people appropriate a visible black construal of Jesus as a
black counter-cultural hero. In British context, as well as in many other
cultural milieus in which black people live, a black Jesus has been envi-
sioned as means of reasserting the normative claims of being and possess-
ing agency that has often been denied to us by the rapacious tentacles of
White hegemony.
In the development of black theology in Britain, the most important
person in this movement has been the African American black theologian,
James H. Cone. Cone’s landmark trilogy of books in the late 1960s and
1970s, Black theology and Black Power16, A Black theology of Liberation17,
and God Of The Oppressed18 remain the dominant texts in outlining the
importance of conceiving Christology from the perspective of disenfran-
chised and oppressed black peoples.
The concept of Jesus being one of us (a central concept of the incarna-
tion) remains the key theological theme by which all peoples have sought
to identify with him and he with us in our particular contexts. If God
became human in Jesus and he became ‘one of us’ and if that same Jesus
continues to intercede for us with God, then it would appear to be axi-
omatic that he (Jesus) continues to be present in the many varied contexts
where those who seek to be one with him are found. If, then, added to
this thought is the notion that where two or three are gathered, so is Jesus;
then it does not seem too outlandish to assert that Jesus’ presence, which
Christians believe is the consistent visible form of God’s interaction with
human kind, will be found in any place where his followers are in exis-
tence—even black existence, with a black visage!
A development of a black Jesus has been a central locus in the intel-
lectual development of black theology. Black and womanist theologians
have written a great deal about Jesus, illustrating how the identification
with him has been at the heart of the faithful response to black suffering
and oppression. But as Cone so rightly states, it is not simply the black
identification with Jesus that is crucial, perhaps of greater importance is his
identification with black people.
The importance facet of a black Jesus can be found in the way in which
his actions and example of heroic sacrifice offer an important theological
norm for the ‘Christian’ articulation of black theology. In making this
claim, I am arguing that Jesus’ life and death should be understood as the
basic grounding for the thrust for black liberation, in terms of the praxis
that should guide black Christian belief in its ongoing thirst for full life
and the transformation of all peoples.
Given that the generative theme for book is the often unheralded leg-
acy of Albert Cleage, it is incumbent on me, at this juncture, to acknowl-
edge the importance of his thinking in developing a thematic thrust for
a radical black Jesus. It can be argued that Cleage’s proposal for a radical
black Jesus unlike Cone’s is not anchored to the mainland of Christian
orthodoxy. Cleage does not deify Jesus.19 The efficacy of engaging with a
radical black Jesus is not predicated on any theological norm that asserts
the divinity of Jesus as the Christ. Rather, Cleage asserts that Jesus was
literally a black person of African descent and that his life and death serves
as the quintessential paradigm for evincing the praxiological realities of
heroic, sacrificial action.20
The failure of black theologians (myself included in all truth) to
make greater use of Cleage may be a product of two differing perspec-
tives.21 First, the Black Christian Nationalism he espouses forces scholars,
Diasporan African scholars, to wrestle with their relationship with Africa
and the literal identification of the Godhead in African, cultural national-
istic terms. I submit that this form of identification represents an ongoing
existential challenge for all of us schooled in the norms and procedural
niceties of a White, Western intellectual canon. Second, Cleage was not
a career academic and so his work, fused within the demands of pasto-
ral ministry and church leadership, has been under-regarded, given the
intellectual hierarchy that still exists within the scholarly arena, vis-à-vis
those who occupy teaching positions juxtaposed with those who operating
within the church.
Cleage’s premise that Jesus was a radical black man of African descent
seeking to liberate and redeem a black nation is undoubtedly an arresting
polemic challenge to conventional, Christian thought. I do not propose to
interrogate the epistemological weight of this contention. Rather, I simply
want to acknowledge the importance of Cleage’s proposal and affirm his
importance to this project. As Cleage would affirm, the aforementioned
importance of Jesus’ praxis can be seen in his life that affirmed those on
the margins, culminating in his death on the cross, a martyr’s death; a
292 A.G. REDDIE
man who identified with and stood alongside the poor in their struggle
for justice and liberation.
Jesus’ actions reminds us of one of the central tenets of black theology,
namely, that of orthopraxis. Black theology, like all theologies of libera-
tion, is governed by the necessity of orthopraxis rather than orthodoxy. In
using this statement, what I mean to suggest is that one’s starting point in
talking about God is governed by the necessity to find a basis for acting in
response to the existential struggles and vicissitudes of life, which impinge
upon one’s daily operations in the attempt to be a human being. The need
to respond to the realities of life, as it is in postcolonial Britain, is one that
has challenged many black British Christians to seek in God, a means of
making sense of the often constructed absurdities of postmodern life in
this island nation.
That unlike much of the tradition of Christian doctrine where Jesus’
death is solely for the purposes of achieving our salvation and atoning for
human sin, black theology rejects this belief and argues for a robust under-
standing of Jesus’ death being linked to the struggle for the liberation of
all oppressed peoples. To quote black British theologian, David Isiorho,
Jesus died because of our sins, not for them or on behalf of them. God did
not demand that his Son be offered as a blood sacrifice but rather that Jesus
gave his life as a ransom for many, as a soldier would die for his country.
In Jesus as an individual, the universal consequences of sin were annulled
through this determination of his human and his divine will combined. His
humanity hurt, the wounds were real, and he still bears the scars today. But
his divinity was enough to stop the chain of cause and effect, the chain of sin
and death, as the new humanity living and embodying the decision to turn
to God and to live in love for all, whatever happened. And so our proclama-
tion of his death and our faith in his Resurrection tells us that our powers
and our decisions do not have the last word.22
This identification with Jesus’ death is one that has challenged many black
Christian people to see their contemporary struggles for justice and equity
as bound up in partnership with God, who not only knows their own
travails, but also participates in them. Jesus is, in effect, the Divine co-
sufferer with them in the midst of their ongoing struggle to fight for their
freedom. The notable Womanist Theologian, Jacquelyn Grant, states
In the experiences of black people, Jesus was all things. Chief among these
however, was the belief in Jesus as the divine co-sufferer, who empowers
them in situations of oppression. For Christian Black women in the past,
Jesus was their central frame of reference. They identified with Jesus because
they believed that Jesus identified with them. As Jesus was persecuted and
made to suffer undeservedly, so were they. His suffering culminated in the
crucifixion. Their crucifixion included rape, and babies being sold. But
Jesus’ suffering was not the suffering of a mere human, for Jesus was under-
stood to be God incarnate.23
The inspiration of the Resurrection story is one that has propelled myriad
people to fight for the freedom in the belief that almost certain death
does not mean the end and that in the economy of God, oppression and
evil will never have the final word. For many ordinary black people, the
more comparative, contemporary examples of Martin Luther King in
the USA or Nelson Mandela in South Africa, serve as paradigms for the
larger struggles for human rights through the more specific fight for black
liberation. These individuals not only exemplify the inspiring presence of
indefatigable black sacrificial struggle born of love and solidarity for oth-
ers, but also show the emotive power of partnership and communitarian-
ism, between peoples committed to a common goal.
Historical experience has shown the power of collective action as a
force for transformative change. While evangelical Christianity has offered
the deep temptation for people to believe that their desire to be free neces-
sitates a kind of individual, spiritualised response to existential realities, in
terms of being saved by the blood of Jesus, the truth is, and has always
remained, that it is the socially located, collective, practical thrust for free-
dom that proves the most effective conduit for change. It is in this regard
that the resurrection holds it central power for black liberation struggles.
The hope that is imbued in the human spirit as a result of the cross and
ultimately the resurrection is one that can give rise to prophetic, faith-
based struggles for liberation, as the inspiration of Jesus’ actions becomes
the basis for more contemporary battles for justice and equity. The resur-
rection demonstrates that evil will not have the last word. The emotive
power of Jesus’ actions, in solidarity with black suffering, arises from the
belief that God’s victory over evil gives expression to the inevitability of
the ultimate victory of black liberation movements. Martin Luther King
Jr. in his last speech in Memphis, on 3 April 1968, declared, ‘I may not get
there with you. But I want you to know tonight that we, as a people, will
get to the Promised Land. And I’m so happy tonight! I’m not fearing any
man! Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord!’24
It can be argued that such certainties in the final resolution of God’s
purposes can lead to a level of passivity. If one believes the inevitability of
God’s victory over evil, as symbolised in the resurrection of Jesus Christ,
then it can become the basis for a withdrawal from all forms of politicised,
294 A.G. REDDIE
social activism on the basis that God ‘will do the work for us’. Robert
Beckford has noted aspects of this tendency in the actions of some black
churches in Britain.25
The actions of a radical black Jesus in his praxiological actions for
justice reminds us there is the ongoing necessity of human activity and
participation in the struggle for liberation. While the faith-based claims
concerning God’s presence in the risen black Christ are undoubtedly at
the heart of and indeed underpin the black liberation struggle to which
black theology bears witness; this struggle will ultimately be of little value
unless it is imbued with the commitment of ordinary people to participate
within it. And as the death of countless people of faith has shown, whether
in the figures of such luminaries as Nanny of the Maroons and Marcus
Garvey in Jamaica, Malcolm X and Fannie Lou Hamer in the USA, and
Steve Biko in South Africa, plus many more, there is always a cost to the
struggle for liberation. James Cone reminds us that cost of liberation is
measured in the cross and the contemporary forms of lynching and the
monstrous death that has faced all those who have asserted a fierce ‘yes’ to
life.26 There is no quick fix to liberation—no short cut to full redemption.
As Cone reminds us,
But we cannot find liberating joy in the cross by spiritualizing it, by tak-
ing away its message of justice in the midst of powerlessness, suffering and
death.27
It is my belief that a radical black Jesus who identifies with black suffering
and oppression has not simply been invoked by black theologians because
it is de rigueur for ‘proper’ theologians to undertake Christological work.
Rather, I believe the focus on a black Jesus has arisen because many black
theologians have realised the potent force that this figure has for reimag-
ining the black self as an embodied human person of worth and value.
Conversely, the White Christ of Imperial Mission Christianity that was
enforced on many people of African descent often has the stultifying effect
of denigrating the black self.28
I believe that the presence of a black Jesus who is the Christ, God who is
with us, remains vital as it provides a means by which ordinary people can be
enabled to see and experience another reality and to see beyond the limitations
of the material world in which they presently live, move, and have their being.
When black Christologies of the likes of Kelly Brown Douglas29 and
James Cone30 are invoked, in terms of black theology, I believe their
continued importance lies in the ways in which they respond to the

prevailing challenges of anti-black rhetoric that remains within the psyche
of many black people. Dianne Stewart, in her groundbreaking work
looking at the African dimensions in the Jamaican/Caribbean religious
experience, highlights the continued levels of anti-African (and implied
anti-black for the purposes of this work) in Caribbean religious discourse,
even amongst Caribbean liberation theologians.31 The denigration of
blackness and the negativity attributed to black, Diasporan African identi-
ties is replete within the popular European imagination.
The claim of the black Jesus that is evoked within black theology is
one that seeks to speak of the miseducation and biased, self-serving teach-
ing strategies that have led black, African people to develop negative self-
images. The crucial learning that emerges from the relationship between
a black Jesus and the inhibited, and often circumscribed lives of ordinary
black people, is believing oneself to be a central character in God’s story
of redemption, and not a distant player.
The challenge of a black Jesus is one that seeks to speak to the seem-
ingly endemic marginalisation and oppression, both materially and psy-
chologically, in the world. A radical black Jesus, through the self-giving
and sacrificial, praxis of the cross, urges black people to engage in com-
munitarian, collective, faith-based struggles for justice, that eschew selfish
forms of sectarianism and narrow sectional self-interest. To restate the
point made previously, it is only through the active co-operation of ordi-
nary black people working together in solidarity with a black Jesus, God
and the Spirit, that we will be able to bring about the hoped for existen-
tial freedom we have sought for so long. It is my belief that a radical and
inclusive black Jesus is one who will inspire ordinary black people to a
better understanding that the contextual realities of their faith in God
demands that they are pulled towards others in love and in solidarity, with
all who are suffering. The quest for liberation is not something that can
be reserved for only those who can claim to be Christian like them or the
ones who belong to their tradition of the faith.32
CONCLUSION
A radical black Jesus, who is for us and with us, is one who identifies with
the mass of suffering humanity, that is, the ordinary commonplace experi-
ences of many, if not most, black people. He is a figure who in his very
identification with us, places us right at the centre of God’s concern for
296 A.G. REDDIE
the whole of creation. This Jesus tells us that we matter. He reminds us

that we were created in the image and likeness of God and that not only
our ‘spiritual identities’ as Christians matter, but our socially constructed
identities as black people matter as well. Namely, that our black epidermis
matters! That the pursuit of life in all its fullness is a cause worth living for
and ultimately dying for! This black Jesus tells us that full life as conceived
in John 10:10 is not about mere existence. Too many of our older forbears
largely existed. Too many black people on the continent of Africa barely
live and only just exist.
A radical black Jesus, who is housed within the theological framework,
that is, black theology, is one whose presence will help to give rise to new
forms of knowledge that challenges the hierarchical claims for White supe-
riority and supremacy.33 A radical black Jesus will assist ordinary black to
assess critically the veracity of particular truth claims and the processes that
produce hegemonic, interlocking systems and structures that constrict
and inhibit the God-given selfhood of black peoples. Far too often, black
Christianity in Britain has imbibed and internalised seemingly axiomatic,
androcentric, and patriarchal forms of epistemology, largely for the pur-
poses of maintaining an uneducated lay following in churches; namely, the
construction of black congregations less likely to challenge the prevailing
top-down models of ecclesial authority exercised by largely uneducated
clergy. I believe that a radical black Jesus is one of us who offers alter-
native models of leadership, which prove the antithesis of self-serving,
leadership, and top-down hierarchical models of power. Such a black Jesus
in his very ontology witnesses to the illusory dimensions of the White,
Euro-American Western world order.
This visage of Jesus is one who, then, becomes the basis by which new
models of Christian learning and reflection can be developed, which, ulti-
mately, will provide a means by which the negative impact of Imperial
Mission Christianity’s legacy on black people can be dissipated. This
emerging and developing model of education is one that can be likened
to the reshaping of reality, that is, the vision of God’s rule or reign, which
is allied to the embodied realities of life that are bound in up in the vision
outlined in Isaiah, Chap. 12. The changing perceptions of reality and what
constitutes the ‘real’ is what lies at the heart of this renewed approach to
education in light of one’s rethinking of the legacy of Imperial Mission
Christianity.
A black theology-inspired understanding of a black Jesus is one that

gives rise to radical, transformative ways of seeing the world and chal-
lenges ordinary people to become critical agents in a dialectical process
of apprehending the visionary reality, that is, God’s kingdom, rule, or
reign. It is my belief that the process of cognitive and affective change,
which has sometimes been likened to the notion of conversion, is one that
begins in the imagination of the self, before it can be enacted as a form of
concretised praxis. The re-envisioning of reality that is central to this work
is one that calls for ordinary black people to be empowered to envision
a new reality that is beyond the warped intimations of life that has been
bequeathed to us by the White supremacist tentacles of the Western mis-
sionary paradigm.
A radical black Jesus, informed by black theology, provides a better
means of rethinking the past. It forms a theological break from what often
defined the churches’ mission within the framework of Britain’s Imperial
past. The resultant learning that emerges from our engagement with this
alternative model of Jesus is one that emerges from the experience of the
marginalised and the oppressed: that to envision a new reality requires
one to be able to apprehend such from within the deepest contours of the
black self.
A black Jesus must be one who affirms those whose voice has rarely
been heard outside of a few select situations where such individuals experi-
ence a sense of being valued and feel ‘safe’. In practical and pastoral terms,
it is my hope that such a black Jesus will enable black people who are poor
and oppressed to find the necessary resources for more holistic and fruitful
living. The inspiration of following such a Jesus who is like us, is one of
us, and indeed is for us will enable ordinary black people to critique the
negative legacy of Imperial Mission Christianity. It reminds black believers
that there is another dimension and interpretation of Christianity and that
this faith can be the conduit for black liberation and a more expansive,
holistic form of living.
This black Jesus tells us that the material needs of people matter
more than fossilised dogmas and religious strictures often controlled and
patrolled by those with power. This radical black Jesus offers another way
of believing, one that is concerned with justice and equity for all people in
the ‘here and now’, and not solely with saving our souls for the world to
come. The quest for a radical black Jesus continues!
298 A.G. REDDIE
NOTES
1. I will use the term simply to denote people of African descent whether on
the African continent or in the African Diaspora.
2. See Eric Williams, Capitalism and Slavery (London: Andre Deutsch,
1983).
3. See Dwight N. Hopkins, Heart and Head: Black theology, Past, Present and
Future (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002), pp. 127–154.
4. Cornel West, Race Matters (Boston: Beacon Press, 1993), pp. 11–15.
5. This term ‘Windrush Generation’ emanates from a pivotal event on the
22nd June 1948, when 492 people from the Caribbean arrived at Tilbury
docks on the SS. Empire Windrush. These postwar pioneers ushered in a
wave of black migration to Britain from the Caribbean (approximately
500,000 people across the period 1948–1961), which (for the most part)
forms the basis for African Caribbean communities in Britain. For further
information see Mike Phillips and Trevor Phillips, Windrush: The irresist-
ible rise of multi-racial Britain (London: Harpercollins, 1999).
6. Michael Jagessar has critiqued Nathaniel Gilbert’s importance and give
agency to the two enslaved African women in an important essay. See
Michael N. Jagessar ‘Early Methodism in the Caribbean: Through the
imaginary Optics of Gilbert’s slave women—Another Reading’. Black
theology: An International Journal 5, no. 2 (2007): 11153–11170.
7. In using this term I am referring to those established denominations of the
Protestant tradition, plus The Roman Catholic church, which account for
the greater majority of the population that can be described and identified
as attendees and practising Christians. The churches in question are the
Anglican church (The Church of England), The Methodist Church, The
Baptist Church, The Reformed Church (The United Reformed Church in
the UK) and the Roman Catholic Church. See entries marked ‘Christianity’
and ‘Churches’ in David Dabydeen, John Gilmore and Cecily Jones, eds.,
The Oxford Companion to Black British History (Oxford: Oxford University
press), pp. 99–104.
8. See Richard Reddie, Abolition: The Struggle to Abolish Slavery in the British
Colonies (Oxford: Lion, 2007).
9. See Robert Beckford, Dread and Pentecostalism: A Political Theology for the
Black Church in Britain (London: SPCK, 2000). See also Anthony
G. Reddie, Black theology in Transatlantic Dialogue (New York: Palgrave
Macmillan, 2006), Michael N. Jagessar and Anthony G. Reddie, eds.,
Postcolonial Black British Theology (Peterborough: Epworth press, 2007)
and Michael N. Jagessar and Anthony G. Reddie, eds., Black theology in
Britain: A Reader (London: Equinox, 2007).
10. Comments made by Stanley Livingstone to sum up the imperial colonial

missionary enterprise in Africa. See Fidelis Nkomazana, “Livingstone’s
Ideas of Christianity, Commerce and Civilisation,’ Botswana Journal of
African Studies 12, no. 1 & 2 (1998): 45–57.
11. Interview with Robert Beckford in Reform—URC magazine (London: 86
Tavistock Place, June 2010), p. 12.
12. See Jacquelyn Grant, White Women’s Christ and Black Women’s Jesus
(Atlanta: Scholar’s Press, 1989).
13. See Kelly Brown Douglas, The Black Christ (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis books,
1994).
14. See Kelly Brown Douglas, What’s Faith Got To Do With It?: Black Bodies/
Christian Souls (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis books, 2005).
15. Anthony B. Pinn, Terror and Triumph: The Nature of Black Religion
(Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2003).
16. See James H. Cone, Black theology and Black Power (20th Anniversary
Edition New York: Harper SanFrancisco, 1989).
17. See James H. Cone, A Black theology of Liberation (20th Anniversary
Edition New York: Orbis, 1990).
18. See James H. Cone, God Of The Oppressed (New York: Harper SanFrancisco,
1986).
19. See Albert Cleage, The black Messiah (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1968)
for a collection of his essays and sermons where he outlines the basis of
approach to black theology,
20. The broader framework for Cleage’s overarching theological vision for
black people can be found in Albert Cleage Black Christian Nationalism:
New Directions for the Black Church (New York: W. Morrow & Co, 1972).
21. Credit must be given to Jawanza Eric Clark who has been quite prescient
in his appreciation of the alternative vision for and method of undertaking
black theology as espoused by Albert Cleage. See Jawanza Eric Clark
Indigenous Black theology: Toward An African-Centred Theology of the
African American Religious Experience (New York: Palgrave Macmillan,
2012).
22. David Isiorho, “Black Identities and Faith Adherence: Social Policy and
Penal Substitution in the Epoch of the SS Empire Windrush,” Black
theology: An International Journal 7, no. 3 (2009): 298.
23. Jacquelyn Grant, White Women’s Christ and Black Women’s Jesus (Atlanta:
Scholars’ Press, 1989), p. 212.
24. Richard S. Reddie, Martin Luther King JR: History Maker (Oxford: Lion
books, 2011), p. 168.
25. See Robert Beckford, God and The Gangs (London: DLT, 2004), p. 6.
300 A.G. REDDIE
26. See James H. Cone, The Cross and the Lynching Tree (Maryknoll,
New York: Orbis, 2011).
27. James H. Cone, The Cross and the Lynching Tree, p. 156.
28. See Josiah Young, “Envisioning The Son of Man,” Black theology: An
International Journal 2, no. 1 (2004): 11–17.
29. See Kelly Brown Douglas, The Black Christ (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis,
1994/2003).
30. See James Cone, A Black theology of Liberation (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis
1970/1990).
31. See Dianne M. Stewart, Three Eyes For The Journey: African Dimensions of
the Jamaican Religious Experience (New York and London: 2005),
pp. 189–198.
32. See Michael Jagessar, “Is Jesus The Only Way?: Doing Black Christian
God-Talk in a Multi-religious City (Birmingham, UK),” Black Theology:
An International Journal 7, no. 2 (2009): 200–225.
33. See Emmanuel C. Eze, ed., Race and the Enlightenment: A Reader
(Oxford: Blackwell, 1997).
INDEX1
A Black Lives Matter Movement,

Adams, Charles, 25 13, 204
Africana pastoral theology, 14, 157–68 Black Madonna, 1, 2, 11–14, 22, 24,
Althaus-Reed, Marcella, 263 25, 39, 51, 73, 81, 94n6, 94n8,
Anderson, Victor, 42, 43, 45, 49 117–55, 161, 167, 171, 172,
Athanasius, 236–42, 271 176, 181, 184, 187n23, 191
Black Messiah, 1–12, 14–16, 77–95,
117, 119, 120, 133, 135, 144,
B 145, 163, 166, 175, 176, 183,
Baldwin, James, 72–4 185, 189–205, 234, 244, 245,
Baraka, Amira, 105, 136, 147, 148, 251–67, 269–83
151, 154n44 The Black Messiah, 103, 111, 131,
Beckford, Robert, 289, 294 163, 191, 255, 257
Best Self Theology, 36, 91 Black Nationalism, 12, 22, 26, 64, 69,
Black Arts Movement, 14, 136, 148, 99, 118, 166, 216, 217, 219,
149 221, 251–3, 255, 258, 261
Black Christian Nationalism, 7, 11, 12, Black Power Movement, 41, 48, 68,
21, 26, 40, 52, 53, 81, 84, 181, 104, 105, 136, 142, 148, 186n6,
209, 255, 291 255
Black Jesus, 14, 16, 145, 160, 168, Black Slate Inc., 13, 105, 106, 233
174–8, 183, 191, 197, 199, 210, Blyden, Edward Wilmot, 209
260, 285–300 Butler, Judith, 262
1
Note: Page number followed by ‘n’ refers to endnotes

J.E. Clark (ed.), Albert Cleage Jr. and the Black Madonna and
Child, Black Religion/Womanist Thought/Social Justice,
DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54689-0
302 INDEX
C F
Capra, Fritjof, 54 Finch, Charles, 234
Carter, J. Kameron, 45, 46 Foucault, Michel, 7, 8
Chapman, Mark, 7, 10 Freedom Now Party, 100, 101
Citizen-wide Citizen Action
Committee (CCAC), 101, 102,
141 G
Cleage, Albert B. (Jaramogi Abebe Garvey, Marcus, UNIA, 5, 15, 70,
Agyeman) 100, 143, 153n30, 167, 174,
biography, 21–38 217, 219, 252, 270, 294
theology, 2, 3, 6, 8, 10, 13, 22–4, Giroux, Henry, 179, 187n17
31, 34, 36, 40, 41, 44, 47–51, Glaude, Eddie, 32, 43, 44, 48, 49, 51,
53, 60, 81, 86, 87, 149, 164, 64, 65
191–200, 251, 253, 255–7 Grant, Jacquelyn, 42, 174, 197, 198,
Clement of Alexandria, 240 216, 259, 260, 289, 292
Collins, Patricia Hills, 118, 119
Cone, Cecil, 42
Cone, James, 6, 16, 24, 41, 42, 45, H
46, 49, 52, 60, 61, 68, 69, 110, Heteronormativity, 16, 263
149, 173, 182, 196, 260, 290, Hippolytus, 238–41
294 Hopkins, Dwight, 6, 7, 49
Copeland, M. Shawn, 25
Cosmic energy/creative intelligence,
7, 12, 28, 29, 35, 53–5, 83, 89 I
Crummell, Alexander, 80 The Illustrated News, 13, 24, 100, 111
Isiorho, David, 292
D
Des prêtres noirs interrogent (DPN), J
270–4, 280 Jones, Major J., 165
Detroit Free Press, 101, 140, 143, 145, Jones, William, 13, 52, 54, 86, 88–90
146, 212–14, 224n10
Detroit Rebellion, 15, 24, 101,
222 K
Douglas, Kelly Brown, 42, 174, Kä Mana, 16, 270, 277, 280
185n3, 197, 198, 289, 294 Kee, Alstair, 43
Dowdell, Glanton, 135–55 King, Martin Luther, 293
Dubois, W.E.B, 145, 168 KUA, the Science of, 12, 27, 28, 33–5
E L
Ellis, Raymond, 166 Lomax, Louis, 71
Evans, James, 6 Long, Charles, 42, 46–7, 92, 162
INDEX 303
M Poinsett, Alex, 161, 166

Mack, Burton, 232, 233, 247n19 Poussaint, Alvin, 160, 161, 164
Malcolm X, 2, 3, 13, 59–76, 100,
110, 220, 252, 294
Malloy, Helen, 220 R
McCown, C.C., 229, 231 Roberts, J. Deotis, 6, 198
McIntosh, Shelly, 109
Mohanty, Satya, 261, 267n23
Moltmann, Jürgen, 93 S
Morenz, Siegfried, 233–4 Sanders (Shabazz), Betty, 220
Moses, Wilson Jeremiah, 71, 73, Shrines of the Black Madonna, 11, 14,
75n35, 120 51, 117–20, 122, 129, 131, 134,
Mtoto House, 109, 118, 119, 124, 187n23
126, 129, 132 Stewart, Dianne, 182, 295
Mulago, Vincent, 272–3 Sweet, Ossian, 15, 213–16
N T
National Committee of Black Theodicy, 13, 77–80, 86–93
Churchmen, 13, 25 Tilley, Terrence, 77, 93
Nelson, D. Kimathi (Jaramogi Turner, Henry McNeal, 80, 153n30,
Kimathi), 12, 105, 108, 110, 209, 255, 256
113n32
V
O Vaughn, Edward, 138, 139, 146, 149
O’Murchu, Diarmuid, 97
Ontological blackness, 12, 40–6, 49, 52
W
Walker, Theodore, 91, 92
P Washington, James Melvin, 79
Pan African Orthodox Christian Church Wilmore, Gayraud, 42, 43, 49, 50, 71,
(PAOCC), 13, 22, 29, 34, 73, 77, 73, 111, 167
84, 86–92, 98, 117, 138, 151n4
Peck, Fannie, 15, 216–21
Pinn, Anthony, 13, 43, 74, 79, 80, Y
91, 289 Young, Coleman, 105, 223

Albert Cleage Jr. and The Black Madonna and Child (PDFDrive)

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Black Religion / Womanist Thought / Social Justice

ALBERT CLEAGE JR.

More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/

Albert Cleage Jr. and

Black Religion/Womanist Thought/Social Justice

Library of Congress Control Number: 2016946227

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2016

Printed on acid-free paper

This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by Springer Nature

1 Introduction: Why a White Christ Continues to Be Racist:

Part I Albert B. Cleage Jr.’s Theology and Politics 19

2 The Theological Journey of Albert B. Cleage

3 Nothing Is More Sacred Than the Liberation of Black

4 “We Needed Both of Them”: The Continuing

5 The Black Messiah and Black Suffering 77

6 Politics Is Sacred: The Activism of

Part II Representations of the Black Madonna and

7 The Black Madonna and the Role of Women 117

8 Black Power and Black Madonna: Charting

9 The Power of a Black Christology: Africana

10 Image is Everything? The Significance

11 A Crucified Black Messiah, a Dead Black Love 189

Part III The Legacy of the Black Messiah

12 The Crucified City: Detroit as a Black

13 Savior King: Re-reading the Gospels

14 He Is Black and We Are Queer:

15 The “Black Messiah” and African Christologies:

16 The Quest for a Radical Black Jesus:

Torin Dru Alexander is a scholar in the area of African American religion

Theology, and the Association of Black Psychologists. He received his Bachelor of

Anthony G. Reddie is a Learning Development Officer for the Methodist Church.

Almeda M. Wright is Assistant Professor of Religious Education at Yale Divinity

Fig. 8.1 Glanton V. Dowdell, black Madonna chancel mural,

Introduction: Why a White Christ Continues

J.E. Clark ()

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2016 1

Cleage’s Black Christian Nationalist (BCN) movement. It was an interpre-

creative intelligence, a conception of God that coheres with many Eastern

Albert Cleage Jr. performed a theological paradigm shift away from

THE BLACK MESSIAH—ALBERT CLEAGE’S CHRISTOLOGY

black people.” Hopkins continues, “His one-sided use of human nature

According to Cleage, White society is corrupt because it pursues an individ-

symbol of what has historically been America’s “regime of truth,” White

Old Testament to a preoccupation with individual salvation via Paul’s the-

Cleage’s claim is that black acceptance of the doctrine of the atonement

In Chap. 4, Stephen Finley offers a textual analysis of Albert Cleage’s

BaSean Jackson, in Chap. 11, makes an argument for resurrecting the

In Chap. 14, Pamela Lightsey is interested in exploring Cleage’s black

Albert B. Cleage Jr.’s Theology

The Theological Journey of Albert

It is important to understand the theology and philosophy of Albert Cleage

D.K. Nelson ()

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2016 21

underserved problems confronting black people continues to serve as the

radius surrounding this pulpit. That is my church. That is where I will

and a specific Black Christian Nationalist program of building institutional

In 1976, Cleage introduced a psycho-spiritual change process that

The tremendous amount of energy required to avoid facing the facts

We were created out of the substance of God possessing an inner divinity,

Cleage began to see the church as offering therapies to people malformed

For Cleage, the direct, personal experience of God as cosmic energy

Like the ancient Egyptians, African pantheist, Chinese Taoist, and

Human society cannot survive without a conscious restructuring of its basic