FACE-IT Finding Answers Concerning Every Issue Today
Renewing the Black Church by Reclaiming the Black Man
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Chapter One – The Black Church and the Community
A Unique Relationship
The African American church has traditionally served as the pinnacle of all things related to the Black Community. It has provided the platform for acceptance, identity, and solace from a world filled with bigotry and prejudice. It helped to unravel the ropes of injustice through the eras of Slavery, Reconstruction and Jim Crow. The Black church gave its people religious and academic education, while patiently teaching them how to read, write, and reason. Its place within the community allowed it to become a haven for social connection among its members and the primary jurist for acceptable and unacceptable behavior. To be a member of the Black church was to also be a good community member. Each family within the community was expected to join, attend, and participate in church-life until death. Today, African American churches are numerically and spiritually declining and it is imperative to adequately address the factors that are contributing to the regression.
The unique relationship that the African American church has historically shared with the African American Community is slowly unraveling. The relational ties began to evaporate as social, economical, and religious changes within society negatively impacted the Black family. There is a serious need to establish effective spiritual care to Black churches that are experiencing the residual affect of declining memberships, spiritual apathy and scarcity of new conversions. Consistent with Black church membership numbers declining is also the challenge of attracting viable spiritual leadership from the pulpit. African American churches often lack both the appeal and the funds to attract suitable ministers that are not self-serving at any level of experience.
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About the Book
The Black church has traditionally served as the unifying agent within the Black community. It was the locus of formation regarding morality training, spiritual awareness and social activism. It provided a safe space for African Americans to heal from the evil wounds of slavery, bigotry, Jim Crow, discrimination and racism.
In recent years the role and place of the Black church in the life of African American people has begun to diminish. In no specific gender is this reality seen more clearly than in the absence of Black men from church pews. Across denominational lines, irrespective of geographical locations, backgrounds, and class, Black men are exiting the Black church at a rate that is both shocking and alarming. The key to restoring the Black church lies within the heart and hands of the Black man. This book seeks to offer a new strategy to reach, resource, and restore the Black man to his God-given position of prominence by facing the issues that have marred his identity.
About the Author
Dr. Ava S. Harvey, Sr. is the published author of the book Milk, Manna, and Meat – 90 Days of Spiritual Nourishment and the Visionary of the FACE-IT Fellowship Ministry. He serves as the Senior Pastor of the Pilgrim Rest MB Church of Brandon, Mississippi and holds degrees from Jackson State University, Wesley Biblical Seminary and the Morehouse School of Religion at the Interdenominational Theological Center in Atlanta, Georgia.