Black Theology and Holy Hip-hop in the Inner-city Dilemma

Blog post #1

Over the past several years of theological study, there are two areas of black youth culture that has generated both a conflict and challenge to Christian tradition: Hip-hop and Black Theology. Hip-hop has been both an empowering and undermining phenomenon for black and brown youth culture. It is undermining because society and the church picture deterioration of black and Hispanic youth solely through the images portrayed through commercialized gangsta rap. This Hip-hop generation faces social barriers that were not present in the Civil Rights movement. These barriers include economic recession, racist policing, high incarceration rates, limited employment options, and sub-standard academic preparedness. 

 The other area of black youth culture that has generated a conflict and challenge to Christian tradition: Black theology. Black religious thought and Black theology together share a simple reality: an indestructible belief in freedom, a freedom born in the African environment which includes aspects of black life and culture, which non-black scholars would call secular. Black theology speaks to a hip-hop generation because it lends its rhetoric to youth who do not have the patience for the standard method of theology.  There is a weakness and slave undercurrent in the “waiting for the promise-land” mindset.