(Originally posted May 20, 2011)
Why the Billboard?

Black people are suffering from the disease of religious intoxication. Every group, with the exception of Blacks can see the contradiction of being notoriously religious on one hand, but on the other hand, helplessly dependent upon other groups for their sustenance. Blacks are the segment of society most committed to the idea of godly intervention as the primary means to affect change. The church has conditioned Blacks to seek supernatural fixes instead of using intellectual and analytical approaches for dealing with critical issues. Blacks have been conditioned to “walk by faith and not by sight.” Walking in blind faith and uncompromising religious loyalty has primed the Black collective to be gullible, exploitable and vulnerable. This mindset has made Blacks regular targets of exploitation and vulnerable to other groups who easily, without the slightest resistance, control the resources and sell the goods and services inside nearly every Black community in the U.S. The irony is that all of this exploitation takes place in the midst of an abundance of Black churches.

When people are intoxicated, not only are they mentally impaired but also the obvious things escape them. For instance, the drunk behind the wheel of a vehicle is not aware that he or she is driving in the wrong lane. It should be obvious that there is something very peculiar about a people of African ancestry, being told by their preachers to open up a bible and turn to a book called Romans, Corinthians or Galatians instead of books called Malians, Ghanaians or Ethiopians.

Here in America, Black people’s obsession with praise and worship is consistent with people all over the world who’ve been conquered, who are powerless, who are not in control of any wealth generating resource and who are brainwashed to the degree where they see absolutely no problem with embracing the religion and belief system of the dominant group that once enslaved and regarded them as property.

It’s one thing to hear lectures or read books about the perils of religion but it’s an entirely different experience to actually see how religious fallacy contributes to the Black mental health crisis. It is our hope, that many will begin to read and research beyond their what preachers have provided them with and that the many episodes of Slave Sermons will help shed even more light on this insidious institution we experience as the Black church.