US Black church coalition names reparations, voting, health equity among priorities
United StatesRNS The Conference of National Black Churches has called on African American congregations to embrace a list of priorities – from “government-sponsored reparations” to improved access to healthcare – as they move out of a pandemic era and into an election year. “We believe Black life must be valued and the humanity of all […]
Essay: A brief history of the Black church’s diversity, and its vital role in American political history
JASON OLIVER EVANS, a scholar of Christian theology and African American religion, looks – in an article first published on The Conversation, at the history and influence of the Black church in the United States…
In the US, Tyre Nichols police beating video prompts faith leaders to react with grief, goals
United StatesRNS Religious leaders reacted swiftly – with legislative appeals and collective grief – to the release of video footage of police officers beating Tyre Nichols, a Black man who died days after a traffic stop in Memphis, Tennessee. An image of Tyre Nichols and the words “JUSTICE FOR TYRE NICHOLS” are projected onto a […]
Church of God in Christ names Detroit’s Bishop J Drew Sheard new presiding bishop
RNS A Detroit bishop of the Church of God in Christ has been named the new presiding bishop of the nation’s largest historically Black Pentecostal denomination. Bishop J Drew Sheard, the husband of Gospel singer Karen Clark Sheard of The Clark Sisters, was elected on Saturday by the COGIC General Assembly, the denomination announced. Bishop […]
US Gospel legend Bishop Rance Allen, known for ‘Something About the Name Jesus,’ dies at 71
RNS Gospel legend Bishop Rance Allen, a Gospel Music Hall of Fame inductee perhaps best known for his Gospel hit Something About the Name Jesus, has died at the age of 71. The formal announcement of his death came in a statement from Bishop Robert G Rudolph, Jr, adjutant general of the Church of God […]
In the US, faith leaders mark 50th anniversary of Memphis sanitation workers’ deaths
RNS The names Echol Cole and Robert Walker are far less familiar than the Rev Martin Luther King, Jr. But it was the labor action over harsh working conditions triggered by the deaths of the two African-American sanitation workers that prompted the civil rights leader to travel to Memphis, Tennessee, where he was assassinated on […]