ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, February 25, 1996 TAG: 9602270056
SECTION: BOOKS PAGE: G-5 EDITION: METRO
TYPE: BOOK REVIEW
SOURCE: REVIEWED BY MARIE BEAN
REVIVING THE SPIRIT: A Generation of African Americans Goes Home to Church. By Beverly Hall Lawrence. Grove Press. $21.
One of the ways children act out rebellion is by trying to be as little like their parents as possible. That includes discarding the parents' religion as "irrelevant" and "boring." Sociologists have called the baby boomer generation "the generation that forgot God."
But something has been happening on the religious scene. Baby boomers are going back to church. Why?
In "Reviving the Spirit" journalist Beverly Hall Lawrence tells why blacks are "going home to church." This is no sociological study; it is personal and unapologetically confessional. Lawrence describes herself and her black contemporaries as "Children of the Dream," the generation that makes up the second wave of integrators. Access to better education and jobs reversed the fortunes of millions of blacks and produced a "new" black middle class. The Promised Land had become more than metaphor. "Our cups seemed to overflow with milk and honey."
In her own pilgrimage back to the church, Lawrence found that she was in a great company of fellow pilgrims. In 1990 Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Baltimore came to her attention. Bethel AME climbed from 310 members in 1975 to nearly 10,000 today. The average age of its members is 35. Bethel, she says, is a microcosm of the changes taking place in black churches today where "such churches are reshaping a traditional institution and making it relevant."
Blacks are not returning to the church for vaguely spiritual reasons; "they are returning to the only American institution they truly control, in the hope of reviving its role as a command center and strategic outpost for social change and renewal."
Lawrence calls her book "a hymn about the spiritual soul of my generation." It resounds with joy and hope and faith. This solidly documented account of genuine revival is an impressive contribution to the discussion of religion and its place in our culture. It lifts the heart to read it.
Marie Bean is a retired college chaplain.
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