M. Shawn COPELAND. Knowing Christ Crucified: The Witness of African American Religious Experience. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2018. pp. xxvi + 198. $24.00. pb. ISBN: 978-1-62698-298-7. Reviewed by Moni MCINTYRE, Duquesne University, Pittsburgh, PA 15282.

            Truly an exceptional book, this most recent volume of M. Shawn Copeland reveals a lifetime of reading, research, and profound theological reflection upon the despised of the earth, especially the enslaved Africans, their American descendants, and Jesus the Christ. Copeland, a Catholic Christian professor of theology at Boston College,places the suffering, death, and resurrection of the Jewish Jesus at the heart of her reflections.  She invites her readers to confront the hundreds of years of horrors of chattel slavery as experienced by the Spirit-filled believers of these United States.  Copeland analyzes a few of their more than six thousand spirituals as she reflects upon the tortured individuals who composed, sang, and clung to them for sustenance that sprang from their deeply rooted relationship with Jesus.

Originating in her “grappling with the meaning of the cross of the Jewish Jesus of Nazareth in relation to the transgenerational and enormous social oppression of African American children, youth, women, and men” (ix), Copeland locates her young self growing up in segregated Detroit, a city that provided plenty of opportunities for her to wonder about the sufferings of the crucified Christ in relation to the mixed messages of her church and the world about her. Her roots helped to shape and deepen her desire to understand the religion of her ancestors.

Chapter One, “Dark Wisdom from the Slaves,” underscores the importance of slave narratives and spirituals as a window into an explanation for the centrality of the Jewish Jesus in their faith.  Copeland explores the attraction and importance of the cross of Jesus as a credible symbol upon which the survivors of the Middle Passage could stake the meaning of their lives.  Relying on white preachers for much of their information, the enslaved found themselves sifting among the words and themes of the Bible to piece together a credible narrative for themselves.  The compelling figure of the suffering One spoke to the condition of the slaves in ways that could lift them into relationship with him and the God who did not abandon him and, consequently, would not abandon them.

Chapter Two, “Meeting and Seeing Jesus in Slaveholding Worlds,”investigates the dangerous memory of the crucified Jesus that was withheld from the world of the enslaved and astonishingly preserved in the words and music of the spirituals.  Ever the theologian, Copeland grounds her observations and conclusions in both the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures.  Each chapter is laced with citations from reputable sources in both scripture and African American scholarship.  One can justly conclude, therefore, that the enslaved peoples knew Jesus Christ crucified.

Chapter Three, “Marking the Body of Jesus, the Body of Christ,” exposes a few of the problems in Catholic teaching concerning the sacredness of the body. Homosexuality is one issue that Copeland discusses.  She considers the double bind of homosexuals in the church who wish to be faithful to themselves as well as their chosen religion.  She concludes: “If Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ of God, cannot be an option for gay, lesbian, transgender people, then he cannot be an option” [emphasis there] (73). Her conclusions are clear and challenging.

Chapter Four, “The Dangerous Memory of Chattel Slavery,” reveals many of the differences between slavery elsewhere and slavery in the United States.  Copeland challenges the Catholic Church to remember its part in enslaving Africans and their descendants throughout the history of this country.  She cites the honest admission of the Jesuits of Georgetown University in the part they played in the sale of slaves as a beginning of confronting the dangerous memory of our peculiar institution.

Chapters Five, Six, and Seven explore the consequences of choosing to follow the crucified and risen Jesus.  Those who wish to follow must take up their cross, as Copeland notes.  She explores many of the implications of this in today’s world.  Her concluding chapter treats the resurrection as an article of faith and as a goal of all Christians. 

In her Epilogue, Copeland notes that “the deepest desire of this work is to make clear the brilliance and power, inspiration, and relevance of the witness of African American religious experience” (174).  This she does quite thoroughly, convincingly, and elegantly.