African Immigrant Religions in America

2: African Immigrant Churches in the United States and the Study of Black Church History

2 African Immigrant Churches in the United States and the Study of Black Church History David D. Daniels The advent of African immigrant churches, specifically denominations, in the United States since 1965 creates a new moment in the history and study of the Black Church in North America. Should African immigrant churches become included in the studies of the Black Church and within African American religious history, or should they be topics only within immigrant studies and studies of new religious movements? Possibly, the emergence of African immigrant churches in United States requires a reconceptualization of the Church. As a conceptual framework, the Black Church might be so tied to the overall history of people of African descent in North America that there is insufficient conceptual space to include the religious experience of recent arrivals from Africa. For the religious experience of post-1965 African immigrants to become incorporated conceptually within the rubric of the Black Church and to be more than a mere addendum, a reconceptualization of the Black Church is required, and this reconceptualization entails a critical dialogue between the historiography of African Christianity and the historiography of African American Christianity in order for the incorporation of African immigrant religion to be performed with intellectual integrity. This chapter has its origins in a 1992 survey of sub-Saharan African immigrant congregations in Chicago. Until this time, I was unaware of the existence in the United States of African-based congregations beyond the presence of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. The initial survey was related to preparations for the Parliament of World Religions in 1993. A goal of the African American host committee was to include a representative 47 group of black world religions in the Parliament. So a survey was conducted of African immigrant congregations and religious communities, as well as other religious communities from the Caribbean, in Chicago. In 1993, the survey was shared during the planning phase of The New Ethnic and Immigrant Congregations Project, directed by R. Stephen Warner and Judith Wittner and funded by the Eli Lilly Endowment and the Pew Charitable Trusts. In 1995, a second survey was conducted, this one focusing on sub-Saharan African immigrant congregations in Chicago. In addition to the general survey, three pastors were interviewed. The study results were presented at a symposium sponsored by Butler University in Indianapolis in 1995. In 2000, the research findings, as a paper titled “African Immigrant Congregations in Chicago: A Preliminary Report on a Survey and Its Impact on the Study of Black Church History,” were presented at the American Academy of Religion. Locating African Immigrant Congregations on the Map of U.S. Black Religion For historians of U.S. Christianity, the initial challenge is where to place African immigrant congregations and denominations on the religious map of the United States. For the most part, African immigrant denominations are invisible to scholars and the general public within the United States. Currently, there are a few dissertations on African immigrant congregations . Yet, the presence of African immigrant denominations in the United States goes undetected. Publications such as the Yearbook of American and Canadian Churches and the Directory of African American Religious Bodies include only a few African immigrant denominations. The rare exception among scholarly works is a bibliography authored by Charles Edwin Jones and titled Black Holiness: A Guide to the Study of Black Participation in Wesleyan Perfectionist and Glossolalic Pentecostal Movements.1 Various African-based denominations have affiliated congregations within the United States. These denominations include: Brotherhood of the Cross and Star Celestial Church of Christ Cherubim and Seraphim Christ Apostolic Church 48 d av i d d . d a n i e l s The Church of Pentecost Deeper Life Bible Church Ethiopian Orthodox Church Musama Disco The Presbyterian Church of Ghana The Redeemed Christian Church of God Western denominations with missions in Africa are also represented among immigrant churches, including the Roman Catholic Church, the Church of the Seventh-Day Adventist, the International Church of the Foursquare Gospel, and the United Methodist Church. While the denominations vary, we await future studies to determine whether a particular religious tradition among the African immigrant congregations will become predominant in the United States. In greater Chicago, during 2000, forty congregations were identified. Out of the various denominations, it appears that a significant number (21) belong to the pentecostal/charismatic wing of Christianity. The second largest group (9...