(PNS) With praise and singing that shook the roof, more than 500 African-American Presbyterians recently came together for a spirited, worship-filled bicentennial celebration marking the birth of black Presbyterianism in the United States and sounding hope for the future.
The historic 200th anniversary gala, featuring rousing sermons and gospel music that brought participants of all ages to their feet, was the focus of the 39th National Black Presbyterian Caucus convention, which was held here July 11-15.
The NBPC elected new officers at the meeting. The Rev. Gregory Bentley, pastor of Brown Memorial Church in Tuscaloosa, Ala., is the new president. The Rev. Karen Brown, executive director of the Family Life Center at Madison Avenue Church in Baltimore, Md., is the new vice president. Joan Alston, a member of Westminster Church in Sacramento, Calif., is the new secretary. Incumbent Warren McNeill of Philadelphia remains treasurer.
The five-day event, whose theme was “Celebrate Our Heritage and Embrace Our Hope,” was a homecoming too — deliberately convened in the city that on May 24, 1807, became home to the nation’s first African-American Presbyterian congregation: First African Presbyterian Church of Philadelphia.
A special Sunday worship service at First African church was held on the convention’s final day to commemorate the congregation’s 200th anniversary.
NBPC revelers — some clad in traditional African robes and crowns –recounted the turbulent history and plight for racial equality. They celebrated their common faith in Christ and lifted up the unique contributions of African-American ministry over the last two centuries in the mostly white Presbyterian Church, which even today is about 90 percent Caucasian.
The throng of clergy, elders, scholars, youth, and laypersons was challenged to consider how churches could better address issues such as evangelism in their communities and bringing young people into the pews long-term.
The convention also stressed the importance of African-American church growth, the NBPC’s historic traditions of devotion to racial and social justice, and re-affirmed the group’s mission connection to Africa.
The Rev. Jerry L. Cannon, who completed a four-year term as NBPC’s president with the convention, said the question becomes how to continue being evangelists, to proclaim the gospel of Christ in and among racial-ethnic groups. “We have a long way to go, not just because of African Americans receiving or being partners with a predominant (white) church, but a long way to go in just carrying out the gospel mandate of Christ,” said Cannon, pastor of C.N. Jenkins Memorial Presbyterian Church, an African-American congregation in Charlotte, N.C.
About 350 adults were registered for the convention along with some 160 youth, according to Cannon, who said additional participants who showed up just for worship nudged attendance to more than 600 people.
He said the multigenerational event helped the NBPC address its past and present while charting its future. The program also connected older and younger African-American Presbyterians, an important component of every convention, organizers stressed.
With that in mind, there was a passing of the torch from established leadership to younger members, who demanded an increased role in the decision-making processes of the NBPC, particularly youth-related matters.
“This is a prerogative and if our demands are not met there will be consequences,” a young adult representative announced to the entire convention prior to the Edler G. Hawkins Banquet. “You will be held accountable. I want our demands met.”
The litany of terms stirred adult onlookers, who clapped and cheered in approval as young convention-goers encircled the meeting venue at a downtown hotel.
Major issues
Other issues were explored at the convention through such vehicles as a discussion group-wrap up session. Subjects included developing a more inclusive worship for church members of different ages and backgrounds to meet various musical preferences, spiritual characteristics needed to follow God into the future, leadership development and how the church can maintain its prophetic voice.
Issues of youth violence, HIV-AIDS, and declining schools were among other concerns tapped at the NBPC convention, the first such event since 2005 when the caucus moved the annual gathering to a biennial schedule.
Linda Valentine, executive director of the PC(USA)’s General Assembly Council, commended the Rev. Katie Cannon, who in 1974 became the first African-American woman to be ordained as a Presbyterian minister, and other black Presbyterian leaders for advancing the African-American cause in the church.
She also commended the work of African-American national staff members with the PC(USA), new and old, for their strong leadership to the denomination. “African-American Presbyterians have been a vital and important voice for justice, compassion and inclusion,” Valentine said. “An important witness as Christ calls us to model all those things. You are children of God through faith. There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female, for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.”
The Rev. Warren Dennis, a Presbyterian minister and seminary professor from New Brunswick, N.J., said he thought this year’s NBPC convention was one of the best in 30-plus years of attending the conferences.
Dennis said he believed the convention in Philadelphia was well planned, featured excellent speakers, and he was pleased with the range of issues examined. He said he found encouragement in seeing the mantel passed from elders to the younger generation, particularly in terms of leadership.
The convention comes at a crucial time, he said, claiming that many black Presbyterian lay members are now at a crossroads in determining their future in the PC(USA). Many, he said, are at a place where they may be willing to follow African-American leadership out of the denomination.
“This caucus is now challenging itself and the denomination about its willingness to be partners and that’s a real good conversation to have,” Dennis said, “whether or not the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) is serious about partnership with the African-American community.”
The Rev. Gayraud S. Wilmore, a founding NBPC member, retired professor, author, and civil rights leader, said he believes black Presbyterians should stay in the PC(USA), at least for now.
Wilmore said, in a video played at a caucus business meeting he attended, that some young black Presbyterians feel “that we perhaps would be a better black church if we were not connected” to the predominately white Presbyterian Church.
“And that may be,” Wilmore said. “But I say it’s too early to come to that conclusion. I don’t think we have demonstrated yet the freedom we have, the contributions we can make within this church if we take ourselves more seriously.”
Wilmore celebrated what he acknowledged in the video as positive developments within the caucus, but challenged the group to go even further.
He told young people not to be ashamed of being Presbyterian even when friends are affiliated with faith groups boasting larger African-American memberships.
“Be proud of the fact that you have held your ground and that your ancestors held their ground in terms of the mandate from the gospel for truth, liberation, and equality in this world,” Wilmore said in the video. “All that is still available to you. All that is out there. And it’s yours to seize and to use to the glory of God.”
Moderator’s word
The Rev. Joan S. Gray, moderator of the PC(USA)’s 217th General Assembly, acknowledged during the Edler G. Hawkins Banquet the need for reconciliation between African-American Presbyterians and their white brothers and sisters.
“In the midst of words of celebration and gratitude there is another word that is appropriate,” said Gray, an Atlanta pastor. “And I, at this time, would like to say that word. It is a word of regret and even apology for all the ways that the Presbyterian Church down through the centuries has made it hard to be both black and Presbyterian.”
Gray, who thanked many in attendance for touching her life, said she was painfully aware that in the past white Presbyterians once stood at the doors of churches barring entry to African-American worshipers.
“I’m very sad that white privilege still flows into the doors, in your faces, and the faces of others in this church and in our nation,” Gray said. “And I see the word sorrow for that. But I’m also very aware that sorrow is not enough. We are called to repentance.”
She asked those attending to give the PC(USA) “the gift of speaking the truth in love so that those of us who need to hear the truth can hear it and can be brought into a saving, healing, grace-filled relationship with our sisters and brothers in Jesus Christ.”
Katie Cannon gave a lively speech in sermon-like fashion at a luncheon named in honor of Lucy Craft Laney. Laney was the daughter of a Presbyterian minister, born 11 years before slavery ended, who in 1883 started the first school in Augusta, Ga., for black boys and girls.
Cannon, a professor at Union Theological Seminary and Presbyterian School of Christian Education, called on the audience to take up Laney’s legacy by knowing what it’s like to “feel with our brains and speak with our hearts” by making time each day to spend with the Lord.
