Nuanced Conversations Podcast
Welcome to Nuanced Conversations Podcast, where we dive deep into the complex and often overlooked aspects of today's most pressing topics. Each week, we bring you thought-provoking discussions with experts, innovators, and everyday people who offer unique perspectives and insights. Whether we're exploring the intricacies of social issues, science, culture, or personal development, our goal is to move beyond the surface and engage in meaningful dialogue that challenges assumptions and expands understanding. Join us as we navigate the gray areas and uncover the richness that lies in nuanced conversations.
Nuanced Conversations Podcast
The Calling That Couldn't Be Denied Part 3
Step into a pastor's journey from California to Detroit and discover how the shifting landscape of Black church leadership has evolved since 1985. This riveting conversation pulls back the curtain on the realities of denominational politics, revealing the sometimes painful gap between preached values and organizational practices.
When our guest arrived in Detroit during Coleman Young's mayorship, he encountered a church community transitioning from family-controlled congregations to broader leadership models. The cultural shock of moving from the emotionally expressive Southern worship style to the more intellectually-focused Northern approach forced growth and adaptation that continues to this day, as he navigates generational changes and embraces new expressions of ministry.
With remarkable candor, he shares his recent experience running for the National Baptist Convention presidency, expressing disappointment in a process he describes as manipulated and constitutionally questionable. This leads to a thoughtful exploration of how the Convention has evolved since Joseph Harrison Jackson's controversial 27-year leadership, suggesting that somewhere along the way, the powerful Black nationalist focus that once gave the organization a seat at the United Nations table was diluted.
Most fascinating is the discussion of "hooping" – that distinctive, musical sermonic style in African-American preaching tradition. "It's that indescribable something," he explains, connecting this art form to African heritage and noting how it serves as "the icing on the cake" of a well-delivered sermon. The conversation concludes with reflections on the most impactful Black preachers throughout American history, from Richard Allen to Martin Luther King Jr.
Subscribe now and join us each week for these nuanced conversations where faith, wisdom, and real-world complexities intersect. Share your thoughts on this episode and let us know which topics you'd like us to explore next!
Welcome to Nuance Conversations, a podcast where depth meets dialogue. Hosted by Dr George E Hurt, this show explores the great areas of life where faith, wisdom and real-world complexities intersect. No easy answers, just honest conversations that challenge, inspire and inform. Get ready to lean in, listen closely and explore the nuance. This is Nuance Conversations.
Speaker 2:What did y'all know about Detroit? Absolutely Well.
Speaker 3:I had an uncle here or there. Rather, I'm in California now. My mother's oldest brother lived there. In fact it was his home in which I stayed until they got the church's parsonage. I don't live in a parsonage now, but until the church's house was ready I stayed in his home and my aunt's home, along with their two daughters and son, and his bed was my bed. So, yeah, she handled it like a champ and Cecil was. As a matter of fact, she was pregnant with our oldest daughter, brandy, at the time and I didn't know much about Detroit anymore than having gone there to do that revival Did two of them. They called me after the second one and I had to come to know what Detroit was all about. Otherwise it was just going to a place to preach, staying doing the revival. Revival is over. Catch a plane, go home.
Speaker 2:What was the context of Detroit at this point?
Speaker 3:Detroit was transitioning out of the civil rights, the impact of the civil rights era, the transformation of blacks coming into politics more heavily than the 1960s and 1970s. 1960s and 1970s, I think at that time Detroit had a black mayor when I arrived in the city, coleman Young Of Detroit. Yes, coleman Alexander Young. So the political landscape was changing. Blacks were coming into their own politically.
Speaker 2:It's 1985.
Speaker 3:It's 1985. Socially, geographically as well. So it was a emerging Detroit Well, I would say re-emerging and a re-imagining of Detroit when I went there as pastor.
Speaker 2:Did you know any other pastors there at the time? I did not, besides Simmons, who you did the revival for.
Speaker 3:I did not. I did not know any pastors in Detroit.
Speaker 2:What was your first? Some of your first early relationships there.
Speaker 3:The pastors who received me were pastors Gabriel Lewis, who pastored the Second Baptist, second Royal Baptist Church. I remember Ferndale Everett Jennings who, by the way, his mother and my mother were Robinsons who came from the same town in Alabama Demopolis Alabama Now Demopolis is about as big as this microphone that I'm speaking on. So the likelihood of two Robinsons coming from that place, which was so small, were cousins, and this is how I bonded with the Jennings family. Edward L Branch, who is now retired, pastored the Third New Hope Baptist Church and Dr Vellman Stotts, who became a mentor, dr David Kelly.
Speaker 3:Yes, Unity Baptist.
Speaker 2:Church.
Speaker 3:Dr David Kelly these are men who are now resting in the pleasantries of paradise Took me in as his own son and under his tutelage, and as time progressed I began to meet other pastors. Preach for other pastors were the first who embraced me as a newcomer into the city of Detroit and into the black church community, and I'll never forget them for how they took me as a brother and as a son.
Speaker 2:Yes, what was Galilee like as a church and what was that transition like, especially in comparison to having so many intimate relationships in the Southern hospitality, if you will, yeah.
Speaker 3:Galilee at the time was a family church, very close-knitted, not a large congregation at all it might have been 300 members there on the church's roll and very family controlled and over time, with new disciples influxing and ingressing into our congregation, that family group and this is not to demean or belittle you know those families because, matter of fact, our 83rd church anniversary was just this past Sunday and I just called the roll, the names of those individuals whose families were foundational in our church, so that to remind our congregants now who who is at the foundation of our church. But when those families began to wane or die out, so to speak, the elders, the older generation dying out, newcomers began to come into our church family. The church dynamics of leadership and worker-ship began to change and more accepting of individuals who were not of blood or friendship began to assume roles of leadership in our church. That was different Now, culturally, whereas the South was more spirited in their worship expression and their cordial behavior.
Speaker 3:You know you can go to anybody's house at any time, Culture shock and you get to Michigan. Different type of culture Now. They were spiritual, true enough, spirited, yes, but not as Southern aura and ambiance of worship. I take it that they were more appreciative of an intellectual approach to church work, to church worship, to preaching church liturgy, whereas the South, you know it was—and this does not infer that they were less appreciative of—or not appreciative, rather of an intellectual approach to things. But it was this emotive, more emotive and emotively expressive in their worship than a crowd that would listen for substance in a sermonic expression, if that makes sense.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, absolutely. How are you maturing as a preacher and a pastor at this point? Still growing, yeah.
Speaker 3:Man, I'm still growing, I'm still learning. I learned from younger pastors like yourself. And what are you guys doing? How are you affecting your congregation? Now I am growing, I would say intellectually, I am growing more socially with the younger generation Now.
Speaker 3:I grew up old school preacher conservative suit, white shirt, black tie and the young people have gotten me out of it was like pulling hen's teeth out of a necktie in the pulpit. I mean that's sacrilegious man, but what am I doing? I am demeaning my training, but no, but nevertheless, and matter of fact, it'd be youth-led worship this Sunday. So I will be tireless and probably in casual shoes, because I'm growing, not that I'm trying to be different. I'm growing and learning that sometimes you can allow tradition to be an impediment and concretize to a certain custom, that it could become an impediment to your generational connect. And if this is what it takes to connect, then I'm no less preacher, I'm no less pastor, I'm no less a father figure. It's just that this is a type of aura that they can identify with Because this Generation Z, and some of the millennials as well, they are different in their worship posture and they could care less about you and your necktie and your collar and your traditional liturgies. They want it in their genre.
Speaker 2:Well let's go there. We had a little bit of discussion on that on the way in. Recently you ran for national Baptist president. What was that experience like? What did you learn from that experience? Are you still probably processing? You want me to be honest? Yes, please.
Speaker 3:You didn't ask me an honest question Because there were those in whom I had great confidence. But I've lost that Because of the and I'm just being honest, yes, sir deceptive behavior and manipulative actions to thwart a legitimate constitutional process to make an election fair. And because of those actions and dispositions and voting by those who assume the role of leadership and governance of our convention. I have lost a lot of confidence in them because these were and are individuals who preach fairness, who preach truth, who preach unity, who preach righteousness, but did just the opposite to favor one individual over against several others, against several others. And, in my opinion, God did not smile upon it, is not smiling upon it and, as far as my theological ramifications go, cannot smile upon it. As for me, my conscience is clear. We did everything by the book. We followed every rule, even during the time of filing grievance. We filed our grievance, which was legitimate. We proved all of our records, not once, not twice, but three times. And for the directors of the board to vote, not to take a constitutional matter to the body politic of a convention so that a convention could decide its own destiny, Then this body becomes a dictatorship for those who pay the bills but who cannot have a voice or a vote. This is my dissatisfaction and disaffection with those who, in the name of brotherhood, righteousness, convention, who perhaps don't know where our convention once was Some, I believe, do remember our days of carrying 40,000 plus into an arena, into a city, on any given convention venue.
Speaker 3:This city itself couldn't hold us all. We were staying 30 and 40 miles out, some 60 miles, just because of what the convention had at that time people and properties. In fact, the convention once had a seat at the United Nations, with the power to help shape world policy, and to have been relegated to where we are now is an insult to those who paved the way for the convention to become what it had become and what it is today. And what it is today, and to see the recipients of all of that hard labor, all of that hard work, all of that sacrifice, reduce the convention to what it is today and to manipulate your own brother, whose hand you shook, whose shoulders you hugged, et cetera, and manipulate him out of the process and them out of the process. So, beyond that, I am fine. I'm still who I am. I never stopped preaching.
Speaker 2:Absolutely.
Speaker 3:I never waned from pastoring and it's not hard for me to shake their hands and look at them eye to eye, because I know my conscience is clear and I know we did the right thing. As far as the convention itself, I can only hope and pray that it finds its purpose and rediscovered Its purpose.
Speaker 2:Would you be open to involvement in that process or sort of after this experience, or you need more time to think through that?
Speaker 3:I am I. I'm no longer processing because I went through the process. I'll say I am, I am, if I could. For the lack of a better word, I'm healing from it. For lack of a better word, I'm healing from it Because to have seen what I've seen, to have experienced what I've experienced, is a disappointment. So if healing is not the word, I'm getting over the disappointment, gotcha.
Speaker 2:Yeah, thank you for sharing that. I know that was transparent and honest. That's what we try to do here in this space.
Speaker 2:So, let's kind of dig deeper into convention and maybe some of the historical you mentioned JX Jackson earlier, some of maybe the historical blind spots in my opinion, maybe that we didn't see even in the years of having 40,000 people having things in place, as we talked about earlier.
Speaker 2:Look at institutions like World Vision, samaritan Purse, ie, on and on and on, and in no way I can list other African-American-led organizations to make the same. Even maybe if you look at some of the fluidity of the conferences just you know, ek, bailey, ic3, and so on and so on a WHW Frank Ray's conference you think exists even in the quote unquote, heyday that may be led to no longer being a voice in local politics, national politics, world politics, not having systems in place to make sure that at least there's a clean process. I'm sure if somebody else was on the opposite side in space they'll make an argument. They did do all these things and your angle is just looking at it through your angle. But if there was maybe a cleaner policy in place, systems in place, I'm just asking, do you think could have maybe avoided some of the cons now in the experience that you had in running for president?
Speaker 3:I'll take the former first. Somehow, someway, somewhere, after Joseph Harrison Jackson, the National Baptist Convention lost its disposition towards black nationalism. We've got God, we've got Jesus. You talk to a black man? We've got God, we've got Jesus. You talk to a black man, he's got Jesus right. But we lost our sense of black nationalism.
Speaker 3:What is black nationalism? Embracing the black community, advocating for the black community, black business, black church, hbcus, and the list goes on and on and on. We somehow some way devalued the importance of what we owned by trying to amalgamate and and assimilate with another culture who has never been receptive of us, and we're beginning to see that resurface with Trumpism. So in the days of following Dr James Jackson, the convention went into a building individualistic kind of church attitude, meaning that under under Dr Jameson and God bless and God rest his soul he had a concept of the convention having a headquarters. So he sold some property, acquired the resources, built a headquarters, but the headquarters was never occupied by the leadership of the convention entities.
Speaker 3:And in the event of paying for a building, along with older pastors dying out, younger pastors taking on churches who did not grow up in the convention era, et cetera, somehow we lost the protest to production kind of mentality. We lost the proactive agenda as that of the civil rights era with John Lewis, with Martin Luther King Jr and others. So I think that because of the eventuation towards a more independent black church, we lost the collective dependence of black nationalism and the convention got lost in that process, because now most of what black pastors and churches do is reactionary more so than proactive. And this is how other national bodies have maintained their strength, because they had their own consciousness, their own mission. Their mission was clear, their objectives were certain, but somehow, some way, we lost it.
Speaker 2:Two things. One is my analysis and I would love to be corrected of JX Jackson's reign. It was highly controversial. He was someone that extended his term somehow some way every time he also was in our equivalent. Pro-nixon would be equivalent to being pro-Trump today almost that's quiet. Nixon was not as polarizing, but it was divisiveness towards that and there was always a temper. In fact, there's a YouTube clip where people are bullying him Right Because of his support for the conservative agenda.
Speaker 3:Yeah yeah, he was a staunch Republican. His philosophy was you have to have something to get to the table for negotiations. You have the power to negotiate to gain leverage from your opponent. I was about to say oppressors, but to him they weren't oppressors. If he knew it, he didn't make it known because he knew that they were going to win and he said it in one of his sermons it might not have been the one to which you're referring which the title was the challenge of the cross. His contention was vote for the candidate who is going to win, and aside from that was Martin Luther King Jr's disposition. We've got to fight for our rights.
Speaker 2:And the King clash right.
Speaker 3:The clash was really over tenure in the National Baptist Convention, more so than political disposition, because Dr Jackson's because of his eloquent preaching and pulpit aura he was the one who incorporated the voting of the president for a successive term by having the vote taken after he preached. So while the people will honor that Jace Jackson preaching spell, they voted back in time after time after time. That's how he did, I think, for 27 years. Yeah, that's unheard of. It's unheard of. So he and Martin Luther King Jr never came to terms on how to handle black nationalism. King's thing was give us our rights. We want to live where we want to live, work where we want to work, be in the political process as we deserve.
Speaker 3:Because of what happened in Reconstruction 1980, I mean 1880, 1873. I mean 1880, 1873. Nevertheless, jace Jackson's contention was move from protest to production, own something, negotiate, demand and have leverage. And they were at an impasse and never came to terms one with the other. So to the latter part of your question the system that the convention had in place to prevent what happened in September 2024 was systematic enough for the convention not to embarrass itself and insult individuals who are vying for the office of the presidency. It was systematic enough so that people who registered churches who registered, would not be disenfranchised this law. I think it was Plato, no Augustine, who said any law that is unjust is no law at all. Our law, which is the Constitution, or the Convention that is, is not unjust. It was decent enough, systematic enough, clarion enough to be followed, but those individuals who are governing the board and the leadership for the convention failed to follow that, which is how we've ended up where we are, and now we've gotten even weaker.
Speaker 2:What was your maybe three passions that you had for the convention if you were able to get the opportunity to serve as president?
Speaker 3:Foreign mission, if I can say foreign mission and I don't like to use the word foreign, they're our brothers and sisters Worldwide mission. Worldwide mission to affect those in undeveloped countries to the extent that they could become self-sustaining. Now, evangelism, of course, is at the top of all of this. Now you can call it church campaign, membership drive. It all boils down to evangelism, because the convention is a conglomerate of churches, not a church itself. Second piece would have been that of the African-American community helping our people reinvest in themselves. The third piece would have been the political component, so as to affect the political landscape with capable and competent individuals who are very strong with black consciousness. I am unapologetic when it comes to my community, because any other demographic or culture in America is blatant. They are sincere about who they are and what they want. They are sincere about who they are and what they want. You take anyone from the Jewish community. Their concern is the state of Israel. Take any Palestinian or Arab, for that matter.
Speaker 3:their main concern is the Palestinian state and, unashamedly, the demographic in Michigan, the Palestinian demographic voting demographic refused to vote in this past election did not because of what's going on in Gaza as we speak. Why? Because their concern is the Palestinian state. You've never heard anyone from the LGBTQ community. You've never heard anyone from the LGBTQ community, and this is not to say that your show nor my personal disposition is against LGBTQ. That's not the issue here. The point is they have an agenda. They push their agenda. Absolutely Right agenda, absolutely Right.
Speaker 3:We see now what the white supremacist agenda has been since Donald Trump came down an escalator and announced his candidacy for president, president of the United States of America. This is why you got had an insurrection, people climbing, scaling walls of the nation capital when the steps were just a few feet away from them to express their nationalism. The black community does not have a specific agenda since the civil rights era. This is where I will have been taking the convention, the convention Now. This includes job fairs, llc forums, rural church programs, pastoral counseling, and the list goes on. This is where I will have taken the convention on a major scale to answer your question about my three passions and I think this will have at least gotten us to a more relevant and respectable level in American society.
Speaker 2:Well, man, so much more to talk about. We're out of time. Praise God for it. But I want to get out of here on something fun because we've been heavy the whole time. What is hooping? And fun because we've been heavy the whole time. What is?
Speaker 3:hooping. Hooping is, in the words of Henry Mitchell, is indescribable. It's that indescribable something that is a part of the African-American preaching experience. It is that lyrical summation of a sermon that he says, and along with Frank Thomas, who is now the voice on black preaching, this comes from our African heritage who, in the event of their communicating, they sang their communication, they intoned their communication, they verbalized it with, you know, cadence and this kind of closing of a sermon, I believe, embraces a whole lot of nuance. But what is it? It's hard to describe.
Speaker 3:My thing is it's the summation of that sermon with some musical emphasis. The black preachers got to holler, for whatever reason. And in the event of that hooping or that hollering, it just seems like it's the icing on the cake. Yes, sir, yeah on the cake, yes sir, yeah. And for others who may, you know, not feel as though lyrical preaching is educated, right, you know it's antiquated, I beg to differ, because when that black preacher gets into that cadence and that music, that rhythmic conveyance of that sermon, and then close it with the hoop, it says now I'm celebrating. Yeah, I've given you the message, but just let me give you some extra to hold on to this message. I feel good now. Yeah, this part's for me, not just for you, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Top five hoopers of all time in your opinion.
Speaker 3:That's a tough one. Now, of course we know CL Franklin gets the number one space. We know that I guess I was a big fan of Cesar Clark yeah, he would be one. And of course those we heard mostly, and of course those we heard mostly 1990s of the younger generation I guess would be Jasper Williams who was recording at the time in the 1980s. Now four and five this is going to be kind of hard to say top five hoopers, and I'm saying I'm using these names because pre-social media.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:To hear a preacher was to go where they were preaching Originality.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 3:And so we heard the so-called intellectuals the Samuel DeWitt Proctors, the Gardner Taylors, the YT Walkers, so, and the Dr Sandy Rays. We heard them, but they didn't. They didn't holler and hoop like the other guys, so to speak. Like the other guys, so to speak. So, since they were the voices we heard, pre-social media conventions, congresses and revivals when they would come to our cities, those are the top three names that really come to mind.
Speaker 2:I'm struggling with four and five. You've got to give us too long. And I could call several names, just some names that jump out to you.
Speaker 3:Don't worry about top five.
Speaker 2:Just some great hoopers period.
Speaker 3:Original raw talent. Bernard Mitchell, even though he's a cousin of mine, is just a rare gifted preacher who works hard at putting his sermon together, delivers his sermon and then hoops it out towards the end. And for number five.
Speaker 2:Don't even worry about the five, just people that jump to your mind when you think about oh, that's a good, that's somebody that's good at the craft. I have to go east coast, west coast so many there's so many areas, so many ranges, so many different styles, so many different ways, and of course you can't put yourself on there but everybody else will put you on there. So you'll be the imaginary five for the rest of us. For the rest of us, not you.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yes, yeah. So I would say, guys, pastors who I preach with, maybe in revivals, man, it's tough yeah so many. It's tough. I would mention a Tim Glenn. Tim Glenn, Tolan Morgan.
Speaker 2:Oh, and a Tolan Morgan, I would say this younger generation a Toland Morgan.
Speaker 3:I think he would be a legitimate rounding out the five. Yeah, yes, I didn't think of Toland. Different styles and different occasions Tremendous preacher.
Speaker 2:Some people have the smoother styles and things of that nature. People who intellect in their preaching sometimes make you miss how good their preaching, their closing is, and so on, and so on, and so on. Lastly, five whatever, not even a number just most impactful black preachers in American history. In American history In American history.
Speaker 3:Aside from those names that we mentioned, you know the originators of the black church like—.
Speaker 2:Richard Allen Richard.
Speaker 3:Allen, you're not referencing them, of course.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I would put—I would reference Allen then.
Speaker 3:Well then you've got to put the founding fathers there.
Speaker 2:And who would be consistent founding fathers. You have Richard Allen, joseph Harrison, jackson Joseph.
Speaker 3:Harrison Jackson, and today, I mean, you got Otis Moss, a tremendous intellectual, harry Wright, who's still living.
Speaker 2:Otis Moss Jr. Otis.
Speaker 3:Moss Jr, otis Moss Jr. Yeah, not the third, not the third, otis Moss Jr.
Speaker 2:But the third is great, but you're talking about overall impact. Otis Moss Jr. Yeah.
Speaker 3:He may be on song yeah very on song. But my God, what an intellectual, what a tremendous preacher. Martin Luther King Jr has to be a part of that conversation.
Speaker 2:Frederick Douglass.
Speaker 3:Oh God, frederick. Well, there's your five.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, there's your five, and I mean who is comparable to a Samuel DeWitt Proctor.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's a lot, I think. When I think of impact, I'm thinking of the Kings, the Douglases, that's just preaching history. Americans. Shaping the church that spills over, you probably have to put Charles Mason. Shade being the church that spills over, you probably have to put Charles. What is it, charles Mason?
Speaker 3:from the community.
Speaker 2:Yeah, CH Mason you probably have to put in there as well. Well, listen, we have to bring you back because I know half of the stuff I didn't get to that I wanted to talk to for. But thank you for your time and transparency, your honesty here on Nuance Conversations. Thank you for your time and transparency, your honesty here on Nuance Conversations. Thank you for tuning in, look out for the next episode, upcoming season and ways that you can support this space. My name is George Hart, again creator and curator, and we're out.
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