Saints in the Struggle: Church of God in Christ Activists in the Memphis Civil Rights Movement, 1954–1968(Religion and Race)

Mason Temple, the headquarters of the Church of God in Christ (COGIC), looms large in the history of the Civil Rights Movement because of its connection to the late Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. who delivered his last sermon there during the Sanitation Workers Strike on April 3, 1968. This book highlights the unsung contributions local activists from the COGIC made to the historic strike and to the broader civil rights struggle in Memphis. It troubles the rigid otherworldly versus this-worldly binary that has inaccurately framed black religious activism and bolstered the view that saints’ theology influenced their detachment from the civil rights struggle. It explores the Memphis Movement from the angle of activist saints and describes their involvements in civil rights organizations such as the Ministers and Citizens League, the Memphis Branch of the NAACP, and the Community on the Move for Equality. Ultimately, analysis of Memphis saints’ activism reveals local grassroots activists’ vigorous commitment to working to galvanize and mobilize black pastors and churches to work collaboratively to advance the freedom struggle, including through coordinating voter registration drives, aiding desegregation efforts, and assisting sanitation workers in their struggle for economic justice. This work provides a historical blueprint and a source of inspiration for fostering collective activism among denominationally diverse black churches in the 21st century.

Table of Contents:
List of Figures Acknowledgments Introduction Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Epilogue Appendix Bibliography About the Author

About the Author :
Jonathan Chism is assistant professor of history at the University of Houston-Downtown.

Review :
Conventional historical knowledge of the civil rights period holds that black Pentecostal churches largely refrained from political activism. In this well-documented text, Chism (Univ. of Houston-Downtown) ably refutes that interpretation. Taking the Church of God in Christ in Memphis, Tennessee, as a case study, he details the ways churches linked membership among the elect of God to the secular obligations of citizenship. Chism’s study draws from printed sources and a few solid oral histories as much as from primary material to focus on the short Civil Rights Movement (1954–1968), a story that has been hiding in plain sight. One of the book's strengths is the author's ability to meld professional insight with the social insight of being on the inside of the movement as a church member. In the process, he is able to perceive the role of women and avoid the trap of concentrating strictly on the agency of male clergy, while deftly weaving together the religious and social politics of race in Memphis. This volume is essential for any academic collection on modern America or the Civil Rights Movement. Summing Up: Essential. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty. Wonderfully written and impressively researched, Jonathan Chism's Saints in the Struggle is a vitally important study of the Church of God in Christ (COGIC) and its contributions to the fabled Civil Rights Movement in Memphis and beyond. From charting the genesis of COGIC as a historic African American Christian denomination to the galvanizing of divine justice and social justice in the souls of the grassroots activists, Chism's book reveals the often-overlooked political dimensions of Pentecostalism as well as the spiritual roots of the Memphis civil rights struggle. Any scholar or student yearning to more fully understand the historic contours of race, religion, region, and social activism in the 20th century should read this remarkable book. 'When the saints go marching in...' is an old hymn with sights set on heaven, but Saints in the Struggle suggests the refrain can be sung amid this-worldly endeavors in the polis as well. Jonathan Chism tells of Church of God in Christ saints working to mobilize the black electorate, to support the NAACP, and to unionize and strike for better wages and more just working conditions. This book shows that shifting our perspective from Azusa Street, Los Angeles, to Mason Street, Memphis, opens up another window into Pentecostal witness not at the ends of the earth but at the center of America, one in which the struggle for holiness drove saints into the streets, voting booths, and city council halls in their quest for civil rights and mission for justice. Saints in the Struggle by Jonathan Langston Chism brings to light the heretofore unrecognized role played by notable leaders of COGIC in the Memphis Sanitation Workers Strike of 1968. With meticulous archival research and groundbreaking photographic evidence, the author proves that G.E. Patterson Sr., J.O. Patterson, and C.W. Porter acted as key players in the mobilization of the strategic coalition of diverse black pastors and congregations that succeeded in gaining better working conditions for the Memphis sanitation workers. Dr. Chism persuasively argues that the grass roots level of strike and boycott was larger than that played by national civil rights luminaries and can serve as a model for local grassroots activism today. Saints in the Struggle fills a major gap in Civil Rights and Black Church studies by focusing on black Pentecostal civil rights activists in Memphis, Tennessee, especially Bishops J. O. Patterson, Sr. and G. E. Patterson. In this well-researched and nuanced book, Jonathan Chism spotlights voting rights and economic justice rather than the bus and school integration. By placing black Pentecostal activists at the center of his analysis, he offers a fresh perspective on this critical Civil Rights era. In this thoughtful, well-written exploration, Jonathan Chism shows us how the Saints of the Church of God In Christ navigated the dynamic tension between the imperative of Sanctification and the demands of social justice. Saints in the Struggle is a much-needed addition to our ongoing discussions about faith, protest and the pursuit of God’s Will. Jonathan Chism paints a rich history of black Pentecostal involvement in the Memphis civil rights movement in the 1950s and 1960s.... Overall, Saints in the Struggle is crucial in overturning a narrative that treats Pentecostals as politically uninvolved during the twentieth century.