I had gone through this deconstruction period where I was letting go of this white male Jesus that I had been taught to worship. And that was a major stripping of my identity, of my self-esteem.Christena Cleveland
Christena Cleveland was born in Oakland and attended pentecostal churches in the Bay Area. But for her something was missing in the religion she practiced most of her life —a god that validated her Blackness and gender. A few years ago, Christena went on a life-changing, spiritual pilgrimage to central France in search of Black Madonna statues. In addition to sharing this experience in her memoir “God is a Black Woman" Christena also decolonizes ideas of what she learned about God, through a critical analysis of racism and misogyny in the Church. She is a former professor at Duke University’s Divinity School. In this interview she talks about the book, her pilgrimage and how people in her circle have reacted to her spiritual transformation.
This interview was co-produced with Porfirio Rangel
There is some explicit language in this version of the interview.
