Table of Contents
Universities & Slavery
Report of the Brown University Steering Committee on Slavery and Justice: Released in 2006.
Brown University Center for the Study of Slavery and Justice: The center focuses on issues related to but broader than the black church. CSSJ creates a space for the interdisciplinary study of the historical forms of slavery while also examining how these legacies continue to shape our contemporary world. Created in 2012. the Center has organized hundreds of public programs to examine issues of social justice and racial equality, including the impact of anti-black racism on our nation’s educational systems, and racial segregation and its persistent structural legacies.
Columbia University & Slavery The Columbia University and Slavery project explores a previously little-known aspect of the university’s history–its connections with slavery and with antislavery movements from the founding of King’s College to the end of the Civil War.
Black Church Centers
Black Church Studies at Duke Divinity School: Black Church Studies teaches, researches, publishes, and creates experience to nurture effective leaders for the church, the academy, and the world. One of the leading Black Church Studies Departments.
Kelly Miller Smith Institute on Black Church Studies: The Kelly Miller Smith Institute on Black Church Studies was established in honor of the late Kelly Miller Smith, Sr., assistant dean of Vanderbilt Divinity School from 1968 until his death in 1984. The Institute perpetuates his legacy of theological and academic excellence and prophetic witness.
Candler School of Theology Black Church Studies: Candler’s Black Church Studies program prepares men and women to provide learned, prophetic and compassionate leadership in Black and multiracial churches; and educates the entire Candler community about the origins, development and contemporary diversity of the Black church tradition.
African American Church Studies at Wesley Theological Seminary: The African American Church Studies Program (AACS) will prepare students to address the issues and challenges of leadership in African American contexts and communities. Exposing students to social, historical, and theological nuances of African American religious culture, the AACS program strives to meet several core objectives:
- Provide a historical and theological framework for African American religious life from the 17th century to the present.
- Build students’ capacity to exegete and interpret non-traditional texts and other cultural phenomena.
- Emphasize the theory and practice of prophetic witness and crisis ministry in the African American context.
Brite Divinity School Black Church Studies
Center for the Study of Black Faith and Life (CSBFL) at Chicago Theological Seminary: Established in 2007 as an initiative in order to make CTS a more welcoming place for African Americans while making CTS a more responsible community partner by moving us from liberation rhetoric to working to liberate the oppressed. The Center for the Study of Black Faith and Life is the first center within a denominational seminary to seek connection with the larger Black Faith community inclusive of a variety of Black religions. The CSBFL is dedicated to inspiring and encouraging religious leaders committed to addressing the forces of oppression and dehumanization that plague the Black community and the world.
William E. Pannell Center for Black Church Studies: The William E. Pannell Center for Black Church Studies provides indispensable formational education—by building a body of Black leaders who believe in the power of the church, the community, and the culture. In order to accomplish this vision, the Pannell Center embraces a mission to proactively build and empower Black Christian leaders by centering kingdom work, cultural enrichment, and academic rigor.
Ecumenical Center for Black Church Studies at University of La Verne: the Ecumenical Center for Black Church Studies (“ECBCS”) at the University of La Verne is at the heart of a theological tradition built for our contemporary age. In addition to granting a bachelor’s degree in religion, ECBCS draws upon the rich legacy of liberation theology as seen through the African-American religious tradition to craft a truly unique contextualized investigation into religious life in the 21st century.
Center for the Study of African American Religious Life: Through innovative scholarship, public programs, and collecting religious artifacts, the Center for the Study of African American Religious Life expands the ways religion is acknowledged and explored by our nation’s research and cultural institutions. The Center organizes public events exploring religion’s place in African American history and culture and the contemporary roles and needs of faith leaders, faith-based organizations, and African American communities.
Institute for Black Church Studies at the Baptist Seminary of Kentucky
Black Church/Africana Religious Studies at GTU: The Black Church is but one expression of the broader phenomenon of African American Religion. Spatially, the phenomenon of African American Religion encompasses West Africa, the Caribbean and Latin America and North America. Temporally, the phenomenon emerges in the sixteenth century and continues into the present. The nature of African Americans’ religious experience can be better understood when the Black Church is situated within this broader spatial/temporal framework.
Black Church Studies Consultation at Louisville Seminary: This seems to be less of a center and more a repository of research performed on the black church.
Black Church Studies Program at Baylor University’s George W. Truett Theological Seminary: The Black Church Studies Program at Baylor University’s George W. Truett Theological Seminary seeks to be an evangelical seminary’s interdisciplinary megaphone for the global, historical, theological, and prophetic traditions of Black Americans and members of the African Diaspora.
Urban Theological Institute at United Lutheran Seminary: For 41 years, the Urban Theological Insttute at United Lutheran Seminary has been dedicated to providing theological education to church leaders that is relevant and upbuilding for the African American community.
The Center for African American Pentecostalism and Leadership Development: The Center will identify, examine, communicate and preserve the prophetic witness and work of African Pentecostalism. The Center will also explore the power and purpose of Pentecost in the life and work of the church and provide educational and networking opportunities to Pentecostal leaders, assemblies and the larger body of Christ.
The purpose of the Center for African-American Pentecostalism and Leadership Institute purpose is to:
- Enlighten all concerning the rich heritage of the African-American Pentecostal heritage and theological traditions.
- Empower African-American Pentecostal assemblies and local churches to more efficiently and effectively address the needs of the people and communities served through attention to creative ministry models, best practices, theological study, leadership development, and networking for solutions.
- Equip church leaders in Pentecostal traditions through educational programs that honor the Spirit, develop the mind, and promote excellence in ministry.
- Effect Change by cultivating a shared vision and facilitating the integrated efforts of congregations, leaders, civic organizations, and governmental agencies for the engagement of prophetic witness and practice that effects social change.
African American Church Studies at Perkins School of Theology: Perkins School of Theology affirms the importance of the institution of the African American church and has committed itself to the preparation of church leaders with the knowledge and skills for effective ministry in and with the black church. The program seeks to broaden students understanding of African American religious experiences as well as prepare for leadership in the black church or related social agencies.
Black Church Research
Black Church Relevant Journals
Journals focused on issues relevant to the Black church, its leadership, congregations and communities
Black Theology: An International Journal. New York, London: Sheffield Academic Press. Formerly Black Theology in Britain.
Black Theology, according to its website, “provides a forum for the articulation and expression of issues of faith among Black people across the world,” in the United States as well as the rest of the Americas and around the world. It aims to be relevant to courses and scholarship in Black studies while remaining accessible to lay readers as well. Articles include “theological reflection, ethnologies and qualitative surveys or historical analyses written from religious studies, theological, anthropological or other social science perspectives,” as well as book reviews and books received. It is indexed in the ATLA Religion Database, EBSCO’s Academic Search Premier and Religion and Philosophy Collection, and Religion and Theological Abstracts and is published three times a year.
Journal of Black Studies. Newbury Park, CA: Sage Publications, 1970-present.
This bi-monthly journal, published since 1970, “offers important and intellectually provocative articles exploring key issues facing African Americans.” It covers a wide range of subject areas and includes some articles related to religion. It is indexed in a number of databases, including the International Index of Black Periodicals (part of the Black Studies Center), but not the ATLA database.
Black Church and Social Justice
Black Church PAC (Political Action Committee
Black Church Center for Justice & Equality: The goal of the Black Church Center for Justice & Equality is to reaffirm the social justice tradition of the Black Church by providing a platform for progressive theological debate, public policy advocacy and public engagement that will amplify the voices of progressive African-American faith leaders.
Black Church Action Fund: The Black Church Action Fund is the answer to injustice system run rampant. A strategic and data-driven initiative by movement, millennial, and faith leaders to stand by progressive-righteous candidates, effectively support their elections and hold them accountable to the interests of our local communities, values, and justice.
National Black Church Initiative
The Gift of Black Theological Education & Black Church Collaborative: The Collaborative is the Gift of Black Theological Education and The Black Church reaffirmed and reawakened in learning communities over six years with the six Historic Black Theological Schools — three with Howard University School of Divinity and six with Hood Theological Seminary, Payne Theological Seminary, Samuel DeWitt Proctor School of Theology at Virginia Union University, Interdenominational Theological Center and Shaw University Divinity School. The leaders of these schools were reawakened to the dual crisis of democracy and Christianity in America, the historic witness and experience of the Black Church and Black Theological Schools, and were determined to offer distinctive resources in response. The current crisis in America provides opportunities to respond in significant ways to an unparalleled situation with faithful creation, cultivation, preservation and dissemination of the knowledge, wisdom, culture and practice that has long sustained the Black Church and theological schools. The model of the Collaborative is to prepare Christian denominations associated with the schools to better serve the congregations and the public.
Pew Research Center-Historically Black Protestantism: Series of research articles on black religious experience.
Conference Of National Black Churches
Black Church Food Security Network: The Black Church Food Security Network utilizes an asset-based approach in organizing and linking the vast resources of historically African American congregations in rural and urban communities to advance food and land sovereignty.
National Black Catholic Organizations
Hogg Foundation for Mental Health – African American Faith-Based Education and Awareness : The goals of this initiative are to educate African American faith communities about mental health, wellness and recovery, and to build on the unique strengths of churches and other faith-based organizations in African American communities to identify and connect congregants with local behavioral resources for treatment and support. An additional goal is to support faith leaders in addressing their own mental wellness.
