Although we are only about halfway into 2010, it has already been a year full of rich public conversations about religion in America. Much of the credit can be given to the emergence of several new blogs and web portals that direct concentrated attention to the topic. Indeed, there is much material to mine as we think about “The Future of Religion,” in general, and of The Black Church, in particular.
With regard to the latter, to restate a common theme this year, it must be acknowledged that such a conversation can move once and for all from the singular to the plural. There has always been a range of black churches, in terms of theology, polity, politics, aesthetics, etc. So it is also impossible to speak of any one future for the array of institutions lumped together under the rubric, “The Black Church.” That said, there are several things that should be considered in efforts to forecast the futures of black churches…
To continue reading, go to: Washington Post’s “On Faith”
Also, check out the series of essays from which the above was selected, at: Patheos
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2003 was a pivotal year in the religious history of rap music, if for no other reason than the release of Kanye West’s debut album, The College Dropout, which featured the song “Jesus Walks.” This single signaled a new development in rap music, a genre that in its earlier years was firmly aligned with the visions of racial opposition and religious nationalism articulated by black Muslims, especially NOI and Five Percenters. As much as the song indicated a spiritual shift in hip hop—making Jesus a centerpiece of the culture—it also inaugurated a new (and related) class sensibility. No longer was the voice of “the hood,” as a stand-in for the black underclass, dominant. The College Dropout effused the anxieties of a particular black bourgeois sensibility, and the album put the lie to the myth that hip hop and middle-class identity are mutually exclusive. In fact, on the track “All Falls Down,” Kanye performed an overdose of the proverbial “conspicuous consumption” as he rapped:
I wanna act ballerific like it’s all terrific I got a couple past due bills,
I won’t get specific
I got a problem with spending before I get it
We all self conscious, I’m just the first to admit it
Continue reading “Kanye West’s Critique of Prosperity Preaching” at Religion Dispatches
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