Sublime

the Religion of Whiteness.

The black Church taught me how to deal with the contradictions of life and provided a way to create meaning in a society

used to liberate more than 300 slaves to freedom. Sojourner Truth, Fannie Lou Hamer, and other prominent black women were empowered by their faith to become passionate freedom fighters. Faith in Jesus’ cross inspired 50,000 blacks in Montgomery (1955–56) to boycott city buses for 381 days, risking their lives in KKK territory rather than ride in hu

political, social, and economic forces, the significance of which he himself did not understand. During all the period since then you have lived in a Christian nation in which you are segregated, lynched, and burned. Even in the church, I understand, there is segregation. One of my students who went to your country sent me a clipping telling about

great crisis. Our lives have been marked with debate about great issues; issues of war and peace, issues of prosperity and depression. But rarely in any time does an issue lay bare the secret heart of America itself. Rarely are we met with a challenge, not to our growth or abundance, our welfare or our security, but rather to the values and the pur

The key to the theological affirmation here is not only the verbal assent to the power of God to grant identity and liberation to an oppressed and humiliated people. Equally important is the verbal passion with which these affirmations are asserted and the physical responses they elicit from the community in which the testimony is given. Some will

violence makes it very difficult for any escape from the pattern to be effective.