[align=center]Has the Black Church Failed Black People?[/align]
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[align=left]Min. Paul Scott

A while back, a Sista rolled up on me with a laundry
list of complaints about the Black church. Her voice
quivered as she ran off a list of concerns from the
failure of the Black church to address social problems
to the number of young Black men who go from the
church pew to the prison cell. Unlike many Black folks
who point the finger at the church as a scapegoat for
the millions of problems facing Black people, this
sister was sincere and wanted not only answers, but
action; now!

When I say the Black church, I am not talking about a
little building where Sister Sara goes to get her
praise on every Sunday morning, rain sleet or snow.
Nor am I talking about a congregation that takes what
little they have to feed Bro. Ricky who hasn't had a
job in five years and mentors little Tyrone every day
after school. What I am referring to is an institution
that was set up by a white supremacist system, using a
Eurocentric theology for the purpose of keeping Black
people spiritually, mentally and physically enslaved.

So, I am not talking about a collective expression of
spirituality nor individual acts of goodwill but the
systematic trapping of Afrikan spirituality within the
confines of a building and the relegating of the daily
expression of reverence to the Creator into a weekly,
one hour ritual.

There can be no denying the fact that 'Christianity'
was forced on African people in order to carry out the
African Holocaust/Maafa (Transatlantic slave trade)and
the Black church was used as an agent of social
control to carry on the slave legacy on the spiritual
and mental level long after the physical chains had
been rendered obsolete.

In elementary physics class, we are taught that an
object in motion tends to stay in motion. Therefore,
the Black church has not much deviated from its
original intent, which is to control the actions of
Afrikan people by using a few Eurocentric religious
symbols that will create predictable responses shown
in the action of Black people.

Many in the older generation had to accept this
religious manipulation for several reasons including
the fear of death at the hands of white racists and
the fear of being ostracized by friends and family
members for forsaking the slave religion i.e.
plantation theology. Also, it must be remembered that
in earlier decades many black folks could not read and
had to depend on a preacher to tell them "thus sayeth
the lord." many of whom were agents of the white
supremacist system either by ignorance or by choice.

Today, this slave religion has produced rebellion and
confusion in the Hip Hop generation whose access to
information and ideas far surpasses that of previous
generations. When the slave theology meets Hip Hop
philosophy the results are often catastrophic, a
generation trying to find god using the methods of the
oppressor.

Is it hypercritical to blame the young folks for
making religious martyrs out of slain gangsta rappers,
when the church has made saints and religious icons
out of popes and preachers who either condoned white
supremacy and the enslavement of Afrikan people, or
refused to take a stand against it? Is it
hypercritical to blame the younger generation for
worshiping a god who blesses them for advocating
Black-on-Black crime, and disrespecting Black Queens
with Grammy awards and private jets, while the Church
has worshiped a god who has rewarded the murderers of
Afrikan people with political offices and billion
dollar corporations? The religion of Hip Hop is not a
result of the practice of an African spirituality, but
the mirroring of a Eurocentric religious concept.

What we must never forget was that the religion that
Europeans call Christianity was taken from a spiritual
system practiced by the Black Hebrew Israelites of
Northeast Africa including Yeshua, the Black
Revolutionary Messiah, who was transformed into the
blue eyed, blond haired ambassador of white supremacy,
'Jesus Christ' by the European.

There are many Black folks in the church today who
call themselves 'Afrocentric Christians' only for lack
of a better Afrocentric term, and recognize that the
Bible is about a group of African people who suffered
oppression and their attempts for FREEDOM and
reconciliation with the Creator. They also realize
that the term 'Christian' is a European term meaning
'of the anointed one' and that the term used by the
Original Black Hebrew Israelites was 'Messianic'.

The catch-22 facing the 'Afrocentric Christian' is
that they are caught between a religion of white
supremacy, that exploits them, and an Afrocentric
community that rejects them. Unfortunately, many in
the Afrocentric community have chosen to discount
Church folks and criticize their religious practices,
instead of seeing them as allies in the struggle, and
helping them find the Afrikan Liberation Spirituality
within their own religion, thereby giving them a
theological foundation for Afrikan Nationalism. After
all, the first religion started when the first human
being (in Africa) tried to praise and understand the
will of the Creator. All religions stem from that. No
religions has a monopoly on African Spirituality.

So the Messianic Afrikan Nation has taken on the
mission to organize those Brothers and Sisters who
accept the teachings of the Bible, but reject the
Eurocentric Nationalism that poses as Christianity;
those who follow the teachings of Yeshua but reject
the figment of the white man's imagination, the white
'Jesus Christ.'

Although the Black Church has historically, been
resistant to change, as Sam Cooke said, "It's been a
long time comin' but I know change 'gon come."

Oh, yes it will.


TRUTH Minista Paul Scott represents the Messianic
Afrikan Nation in Durham NC. He can be reached at
(919) 451-8283
email: minpaulscott@yahoo.com
His lectures can be viewed at:
http://www.youtube.com/profile_videos?user=minps
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I checked out some of the this guys work, the Divine god spark seems to be in him, but his details are off a bit in relation to the whole "messianic" thing.

Yeshua is JC of the New Testament, the New Testament was written in Greek by the greeks. He never had a Hebrew name. Here is the example of giving a person of the new testament who never really had Hebrew names; it is likeriding aroundon the streets and picking up a whore and taking her as a wife, she takes your lastname as well as new first, but guess what? She is still a whore and she doesn't want to stop whoring! Whytake in a whore as your housewife to profane your temple that is yourvery own house? Never turn a whore into a housewife? Seek the woman who virtuous already, so that she can be pillar in the foundation of your temple in house. Understand?

Thegeneral message of the Spiritual Identity vidswere spiritual on-point when he was coming from the top of dome in speech, but his reading/undestanding of the book and the confusion between the twotestamentsis holding him back spiritually where he could rise to.

Also, Iwatched theVSCoolio vids too. Coolio did still seemed a slave to the music matrix. He said that we needed the revenue of the mainstream masses in order for Hip-Hop to exist. Hip-Hop existed, in better status and conditionat that,before it was leeched for monetary worth through the mainstream...sohe wasn't making complete sense to me. Hip-Hop thrived in creativity just likeDave Chappelle has done with his show, but as soon asthe wrong peoplelatched onto it, it started to die in creativity.

Saved a few hoodlums from a life of crime and maybe a few sistas from becoming jezebels but failed black people as a collective movement - YES!...but then what hasn't failed us. From that perspective I am biased to the notion that the black church has done us more good than harm.

Yes and no. The African Methodist Church in Dallas certainly did not fail the victims of Hurricane Katrina. They paid for helicopters to airlift stranded Black folks from the roofs of their submerged homes. They also served over 1 million meals to evacuees.

Yes and no. The African Methodist Church in Dallas certainly did not fail the victims of Hurricane Katrina. They paid for helicopters to airlift stranded Black folks from the roofs of their submerged homes. They also served over 1 million meals to evacuees.

HatHaruhotep wrote:
Yet in that selfless act, did they tell the victims how to prevent that from ever happening again? That is the higher plane and level failure. Nothing happens without reason and purpose. Being of service to humane-kind is excellent, but helping brethern to help themselves spiritually and holistically is the reality of not failing black people.

Nothing has caused us to be so damning of our history and civilisations than the fact that the church refers to such beliefs as "heathen/uncivilised" and therefore a shameful episode in our own history. And many of us believe it too. Because the Bible says so.

The church hasnt failed black people

i dont feel that christianity is alien to Africa.

LadyDay wrote: No it's not alien to Africa, but it is in it's present form alien to the truth of our history, making it harder for many to educate and promote focus on things necessary for Africa's development.