Plenty Good Room: Adaptation in a Changing Black Church

The contemporary black church is a product of the social movements of the 1960s. Alongside the rapid growth of megachurches, there are several important features shaping the church of the twenty-first century: (1) a transformation of consciousness that combines black consciousness with Christian ethics; (2) a rapid expansion of the black middle class and the geographic and social relocation of the new middle class; (3) the professionalization of a highly literate laity in terms of the quality of services it demands and the professionalized voluntarism it offers; and (4) changing gender relations evidenced by a continued dependence on women's work and growing numbers of women in ministry, along with a focus on the social problems of black males, especially among the urban poor. The tradition of adaptation to change remains strong as these new features are utilized to combine the work of traditional religion with efforts to pursue social justice and economic equity.