Narratives about the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and ’60s often highlight the influence of the Black church, especially the role played by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who co-pastored Atlanta, Ga.’s Ebenezer Baptist Church with his father and later served as the minister at Montgomery, Ala.’s Dexter Avenue Baptist Church.
King’s activism led him to become president of the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA) and orchestrate the Montgomery bus boycotts, but his social justice work was not the norm; most Black churches played little to no role in the Civil Rights Movement. Only a vanguard few churches actually supported activists by offering a secure space for them to meet and plan their next actions.
The legacy of Black church participation in social justice movements will be discussed at a panel discussion sponsored by the Stoutsburg Sourland African American Museum (SSAAM) on Mar. 15, a free event to be held at the Princeton Theological Seminary (25 Library Place, Princeton, N.J.) from 5:00 to 6:00 p.m. Faith-based social justice activists will come together to talk about the past and present role of the Black church in U.S. society.
“It’s a complicated legacy that I think continues today,” said Rev. Naomi, the city of Philadelphia’s director of faith-based and interfaith affairs. “We have some Black church leaders and some Black congregations leading the way in terms of strategizing, organizing, mobilizing for the struggles that we face today, and then you have other leaders and congregations who sort of abdicate their responsibility to be involved in the public square or are so inundated with maybe local problems –– problems in the congregation –– that they haven’t come up for air to sort of see how those local problems fit into larger systemic problems.”
Joining Washington-Leapheart on the panel will be Dr. Keri L. Day, Princeton Theological Seminary’s professor of constructive theology and African American religion; Rev. Tamesha Mills, pastor of Saint James AME Church in Danbury, Conn.; and Rev. Dr. Charles Boyer, pastor of Trenton, N.J.’s Greater Mt. Zion AME Church.
“The very existence of the Black church is as a resistance movement in response to slavery and the dehumanization of Black people,” said Rev. Boyer, who is also the founder of Salvation and Social Justice, a non-partisan public policy organization. “The African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church, for instance, was founded by Richard Allen, who was formerly enslaved, purchased his way out of slavery, and started the Free African Society, which ultimately became the African Methodist Episcopal Church. That was in response to the need for freedom amongst Black people in the United States. Whatever those needs were, spiritual, social, economic, the church became that for the people because the laws, the system, and even the predominantly white churches were not there for us; they segregated us, stole from us, you name it. Therefore, we had to create our own.”
Boyer said someone recently pointed out to him that the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement was one of the first liberation movements in the United States not led by the Black church,but BLM hit its peak in 2020 and has struggled to survive; it does not seem to have the sustainability that the Black church does.
Today, as the United States appears to be reinstituting race-based segregation, Boyer said, the New Birth Missionary Baptist Church’s Pastor Jamal Bryant and Rev. Dr. William J. Barber, president of the Repairers of the Breach social justice organization, are mobilizing Black people and reminding them to stay activated.
“The Black church is still here, 200-something years later,” Boyer said. “It’s been here as long as the United States has been here, and I think we’re seeing an awakening of the Black church in this moment.”
Washington-Leapheart, who is also an adjunct professor of theology and religious studies at Villanova University, noted that Black church involvement in the past was poignant. Members of the Black church marched across the Edmund Pettus Bridge on Mar. 7, 1965 — Bloody Sunday — in Selma, Ala. However, she told the AmNews, “The conditions are different. The context is different. We have this as a frame of reference, but we know we’re living in a different time, and we’re facing different conditions now. How should that change our approach?”
Audience members will be invited to participate in the dialogue about the role of the Black church with the panelists and encouraged to suggest new approaches for Black church activism, Washington-Leapheart said: “I’m hoping that people, in asking a question or making a comment, talk about their experiences. What have you seen that’s contrary to what we’re saying? Or what have you seen that’s affirming or validating what we’re saying? I think that there’s always wisdom in the room, so I hope people will contribute that wisdom to the conversation and can talk about these issues.”
To reserve a seat for this event, go to https://bit.ly/social-justice-ssaam.