A stone of hope : prophetic religion and the death of Jim Crow / David L. Chappell.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Chappell, David L.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

African Americans--Civil rights--History--20th century.

African Americans--Civil rights.

History.

African Americans--Segregation--History--20th century.

Civil rights movements--United States--History--20th century.

Civil rights movements.

Church and social problems.

Civil rights workers--Religious life.

Civil rights workers.

African Americans--Segregation.

United States.

Civil rights workers--Religious life--United States--History--20th century.

Civil rights--Religious aspects--Christianity--United States--History--20th century.

Civil rights--Religious aspects--Christianity.

Christianity and politics--United States--History--20th century.

Christianity and politics.

Church and social problems--United States--History--20th century.

United States--Race relations.

Race relations.

United States--Church history--20th century.

Church history.

Physical Description:

344 pages : illustrations ; 25 cm

Place of Publication:

Chapel Hill : University of North Carolina Press, [2004]

Summary:

The power of religion in the civil rights movement. The civil rights movement was arguably the most successful social movement in American history. In a provocative new assessment of its success, David Chappell argues that the story of civil rights is not a story of the ultimate triumph of liberal ideas after decades of gradual progress. Rather, it is a story of the power of religious tradition. Chappell reconsiders the intellectual roots of civil rights reform, showing how northern liberals' faith in the power of human reason to overcome prejudice was at odds with the movement's goal of immediate change. Even when liberals sincerely wanted change, they recognized that they could not necessarily inspire others to unite and fight for it. But the prophetic tradition of the Old Testament--sometimes translated into secular language--drove African American activists to unprecedented solidarity and self-sacrifice. Martin Luther King Jr., Fannie Lou Hamer, James Lawson, Modjeska Simkins, and other black leaders believed, as the Hebrew prophets believed, that they had to stand apart from society and instigate dramatic changes to force an unwilling world to abandon its sinful ways. Their impassioned campaign to stamp out "the sin of segregation" brought the vitality of a religious revival to their cause. Meanwhile, segregationists found little support within their white southern religious denominations. Although segregationists outvoted and outgunned black integrationists, the segregationists lost, Chappell concludes, largely because they did not have a religious commitment to their cause.

Contents:

Chapter 1: Hungry liberals: their sense that something was missing

Chapter 2: Recovering optimists

Chapter 3: The prophetic ideas that made civil rights move

Chapter 4: Prophetic Christian realism and the 1960s generation

Chapter 5: The civil rights movement as a religious revival

Chapter 6: Broken churches, broken race: white southern religious leadership and the decline of white supremacy

Chapter 7: Pulpit versus pew

Chapter 8: Segregationist thought in crisis: what the movement was up against.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages [293]-326) and index.

Local Notes:

Gift of Mr. & Mrs. Sheldon Hackney.

ISBN:

080782819X

OCLC:

52838413

Online:

Publisher description