The All Souls Collective

Come join us to discuss life meaning, religion and faith from an African American, Afro-Caribbean or just plain African, perspective. This group will attempt to share beliefs, ideas and experiences in a spirit of openness and acceptance.

We will first center our discussion around a series a variety of topics that allows participants to start talking about what religion is, how it's framed within an experience or understanding, life, death, relationships, ethics, gender, sexuality, and beyond. The books we choose to read are meant to provide some structure for studying various topics but are not meant to impose a particular viewpoint. Along the way, other resources and activities such as videos, visiting places of worship, plays and music will be incorporated into our exploration. We will explore ideas, concerns, thoughts, experiences and the like within the context of African and African American experiences without having to be confined to the boundaries of any one belief system or faith. We will discuss ideas of black religious history and how it has shaped our personal lives and society. We will also discuss ideas of science, sexuality, gender, race, education and poverty.

We will explore thought and discussion through action and experience. When ready, we could develop solutions to address poverty or provide educational support for children. We could help an acting company in developing a play, assist a concert in the making or support a poetry reading. We could also explore nature by walking a trail at Meeman-Shelby forest or by going out of the city to observe astrological events such as a shooting star or lunar eclipse.

As a Christian, Muslim, Pantheist, Buddhist, Pagan or Atheist/Agnostic you are welcome. As a queer or straight person you are welcome. As someone who wants to explore religion and science in tandem you are welcome. No member will be asked to give up their existing faith or beliefs but participants are asked to be open and respectful to other members as we embark on this journey. You might say that we are looking for a few people, unafraid of being poked or prodded, who are willing to ask the questions we are told we can't ask.

Content

Introduction

  1. Introduction
  2. Love and Unity
    • Salvation: Black People and Love
  3. Doing Theology
    • African Traditional Religion Encounters Christianity: The Resilience of a Demonized Religion
    • The Pursuit of the Sacred: An Introduction to Religious Studies
    • God Is Not One: The Eight Rival Religions That Run the World
    • The Oxford Handbook of African American Theology (Oxford Handbooks)
  4. The Religious Experience
  5. Self-Awareness
  6. What is God? What is the Ultimate Reality?
  7. History
    • The Black Church: This Is Our Story, This Is Our Song
    • The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story
  8. Ethics and Morality
    • Introduction to Applied Ethics
  9. There are Black People in the Future
    • The Dreamer and the Dream: Afrofuturism and Black Religious Thought (New Suns: Race, Gender, and Sexuality)
    • Black Landscapes Matter
  10. Your theology. Our theology.

Going Deeper: Exploring our theology further

  1. What do we know for sure? What is true and what anchors us?
  2. Unity in Diversity? Who are we? What unites us?
  3. The Sacred
    • A History of Religion in 5½ Objects: Bringing the Spiritual to Its Senses
    • Rooted: Life at the Crossroads of Science, Nature, and Spirit
    • Varieties of African American Religious Experience: Toward a Comparative Black Theology - 20th Anniversary Edition
  4. Sin and Salvation. Reincarnation. Nothing.
  5. How do we make sense of Evil?
  6. The tug of war between individualism and community
  7. Suffering and finding Meaning
  8. Death. What does the afterlife look like? How do we celebrate life?
  9. Your theology. Our theology.

Going Deeper: Ethics

  1. Our anchor - Can we be good without God?
  2. Motivation and intention - Doing the expected for the wrong reason. Does the end justify the means?
  3. Social Justice and Liberation
  4. Healing and Restorative Justice

Ourselves, Family, and Community

  1. Family.
    • The Black Calhouns: From Civil War to Civil Rights with One African American Family
  2. Integenerational Conversation
  3. Community - In communion with each other
    • Four Hundred Souls: A Community History of African America, 1619-2019
  4. From margin to center. Acceptance of the queer community.
  5. Social justice
  6. What are our values?
  7. Your theology. Our theology.

... more?

QR code