Albert Cleage Jr. and the Black Madonna and Child

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xvii

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2. Introduction: Why a White Christ Continues to Be Racist: The Legacy of Albert B. Cleage Jr.

   • Jawanza Eric Clark

   Pages 1-17

3. Albert B. Cleage Jr.’s Theology and Politics

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 19-19

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   2. The Theological Journey of Albert B. Cleage Jr.: Reflections from Jaramogi’s Protégé and Successor

      • D. Kimathi Nelson

      Pages 21-38

   3. Nothing Is More Sacred Than the Liberation of Black People: Albert Cleage’s Method as Unfulfilled Theological Paradigm Shift

      • Jawanza Eric Clark

      Pages 39-57

   4. “We Needed Both of Them”: The Continuing Relevance of Rev. Albert B. Cleage Jr.’s (Jaramogi Abebe Agyeman’s) Radical Interpretations of Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X in Scholarship and Black Protest Thought

      • Stephen C. Finley

      Pages 59-76

   5. The Black Messiah and Black Suffering

      • Torin Dru Alexander

      Pages 77-95

   6. Politics Is Sacred: The Activism of Albert B. Cleage Jr.

      • Aswad Walker

      Pages 97-114

4. Representations of the Black Madonna and Child, Christian Education, and Pastoral Care

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 115-115

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   2. The Black Madonna and the Role of Women

      • Velma Maia Thomas

      Pages 117-134

   3. Black Power and Black Madonna: Charting the Aesthetic Influence of Rev. Albert Cleage, Glanton Dowdell & the Shrine of the Black Madonna, #1

      • Melanee Harvey

      Pages 135-155

   4. The Power of a Black Christology: Africana Pastoral Theology Reflects on Black Divinity

      • Lee H. Butler

      Pages 157-169

   5. Image is Everything? The Significance of the Imago Dei in the Development of African American Youth

      • Almeda M. Wright

      Pages 171-187

   6. A Crucified Black Messiah, a Dead Black Love

      • BaSean A. Jackson

      Pages 189-205

5. The Legacy of the Black Messiah in the African Diaspora

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 207-207

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   2. The Crucified City: Detroit as a Black Christ Figure

      • Kamasi C. Hill

      Pages 209-226

   3. Savior King: Re-reading the Gospels as Greco-Africana Literature & Re-imaging Christ as Messianic Pharaoh

      • Salim Faraji

      Pages 227-249

   4. He Is Black and We Are Queer: The Legacy of the Black Messiah for Black LGBTQ Christians

      • Pamela Lightsey

      Pages 251-268

   5. The “Black Messiah” and African Christologies: Pan-African Symbols of Liberation

      • Josiah Ulysses Young

      Pages 269-283

   6. The Quest for a Radical Black Jesus: An Antidote to Imperial Mission Christianity

      • Anthony G. Reddie

      Pages 285-300

 In this collection, black religious scholars and pastors whose expertise range from theology, ethics, and the psychology of religion, to preaching, religious aesthetics, and religious education, discuss the legacy of Albert B. Cleage Jr. and the idea of the Black Madonna and child. 


Easter Sunday, 2017 will mark the fifty year anniversary of Albert B. Cleage Jr.’s unveiling of a mural of the Black Madonna and child in his church in Detroit, Michigan. This unveiling symbolized a radical theological departure and disruption. The mural helped symbolically launch Black Christian Nationalism and influenced the Black Power movement in the United States. But fifty years later, what has been the lasting impact of this act of theological innovation?  What is the legacy of Cleage’s emphasis on the literal blackness of Jesus?  How has the idea of a Black Madonna and child informed notions of black womanhood, motherhood? LGBTQ communities?  How has Cleage’s theology influenced Christian education, Africana pastoral theology, and the Black Arts Movement? The contributors to this work discuss answers to these and many more questions.

• Albert Cleage
• Black theology
• Black Madonna
• Black Messiah
• Africana theology
• Black Jesus
• Black Christ
• Black Christology
• Jesus
• psychology of religion
• theology

“The publication of this collection of 15 essays coincides with the 50th anniversary of Albert B. Cleage Jr.’s unveiling of the mural of the black Madonna and Child … . This collection of essays is vital for understanding not only Cleage’s theology and activism but also the history of contemporary Black theology in the United States. The collection fills a large void.” (Frederick L. Ware, Black Theology, Vol. 16 (1), December, 2017)

• Manhattan College, Riverdale, USA

  Jawanza Eric Clark

 Jawanza Eric Clark is Associate Professor of Global Christianity at Manhattan College, USA. His first book, Indigenous Black Theology, is a work of comparative and constructive theology that incorporates the indigenous African notion of ancestor in the development of a new Black theology for the church. 

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