"Therefore, in that tension, we called for sermons for a two-volume set titled Preaching During a Pandemic: The Rhetoric of the Black Preaching Tradition is a two volume collection of sermons from those who preach within the Black preaching tradition during the COVID19 pandemic. By publishing these sermons, we hope to address questions such as what were those who preached in the Black preaching tradition sharing with their congregants? How were they incorporating and infusing Covid19 in their sermons? What shape did the prophetic and priestly sermon take when preaching during a pandemic? Were specific models or types of sermons-womanist, prophetic/liberation, narrative, contemplative, celebrative, expository, thematic, induction, deductive-more frequently employed during a crisis?"--

"Therefore, in that tension, we called for sermons for a two-volume set titled Preaching During a Pandemic: The Rhetoric of the Black Preaching Tradition is a two volume collection of sermons from those who preach within the Black preaching tradition during the COVID19 pandemic. By publishing these sermons, we hope to address questions such as what were those who preached in the Black preaching tradition sharing with their congregants? How were they incorporating and infusing Covid19 in their sermons? What shape did the prophetic and priestly sermon take when preaching during a pandemic? Were specific models or types of sermons-womanist, prophetic/liberation, narrative, contemplative, celebrative, expository, thematic, induction, deductive-more frequently employed during a crisis?"--

The Rhetoric of the Black Preaching Tradition is a two volume collection of sermons from those who preach within the Black preaching tradition during the COVID19 pandemic.

Preaching During a Pandemic: The Rhetoric of the Black Preaching Tradition is a two volume collection of sermons from those who preach within the Black preaching tradition during the COVID19 pandemic.

One hundred sermons that display the victorious, although sometimes painful, historical and spiritual pilgrimage of black people in America. A groundbreaking anthology, Preaching with Sacred Fire is a unique and powerful work. It captures the stunning diversity of the cultural and historical legacy of African American preaching more than three hundred years in the making. Each sermon, as editors Martha Simmons and Frank A. Thomas reveal, is a work of art and a lesson in unmatched rhetoric. The journey through this anthology—which includes selections from Jarena Lee, Frederick Douglass, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jr., Gardner C. Taylor, Vashti McKenzie, and many others—offers a rare view of the unheralded role of the African American preacher in American history. The collection provides new insights into the underpinnings of the black fight for emancipation and the rise and growth of the Civil Rights and Black Power movements. Sermons from the first decade of the twenty-first century point toward the future of African American preaching. Biographies of the preachers put their work in the cultural and homiletic context of their periods. The preachers of these sermons are men and women from a range of faiths, ancestries, and educational backgrounds. They draw on a vast and luminous landscape of poetic language, using metaphor, rhythm, and imagery to communicate with their congregations. What they all have in common is hope, resilience, and sacred fire. “Even during the most difficult and oppressive times,” Simmons and Thomas write in the preface, “the delivery, creativity, charisma, expressivity, fervor, forcefulness, passion, persuasiveness, poise, power, rhetoric, spirit, style, and vision of black preaching gave and gives hope to a community under siege.” This magnificent work beautifully renders the complexity, spiritual richness, and strength of African American life.

The Introduction to African American Preaching is an important, groundbreaking book. This book acknowledges African American preaching as an academic discipline, and invites all students and preachers into a scholarly, dynamic, and useful exploration of the topic. Author Frank Thomas opens with a “bus tour” study of African American preaching. He shows how African American preaching has gradually moved from an almost exclusively oral to an oral/written tradition. Readers will gain insight into the history of the study of the African American preaching tradition, and catch the author’s enthusiasm for it. Next Thomas traces the relationship between homiletics and rhetoric in Western preaching, demonstrating how African American preaching is inherently theological and rhetorical. He then explores the question, “what is black preaching?” Thomas introduces the reader to methods of “close reading” and “ideological criticism.” And then demonstrates how to use these methods, using a sermon by Gardner Calvin Taylor as his example. The next chapter considers the question, “what is excellence in black preaching?” The next chapter seeks to create bridges and dialogue within the field of homiletics, and in particular, the Euro-American homiletic tradition. The goal of this chapter is to clearly demonstrate connections between the African American preaching tradition and the field of homiletics. Thomas next turns to questions about the relevancy of the church to the Millennial generation. Specifically, how will the African American church remain relevant to this generation, which is so deeply concerned with social justice?

Henry H. Mitchell has completely revised and integrated his popular books The Recovery of Preaching and Black Preaching for seminarians and pastors--both Black and White--who are seeking to add power and vision to their sermons. Mitchell persuasively demonstrates that Black culture and preaching style are vital for the empowerment of Black congregations and have much to offer the preaching method of all preachers. By focusing on the use of storytelling, imagination, and style of preaching rooted in African-American culture, Mitchell spotlights effective techniques for lively preaching.