Black HIstory Month Ideas and Activities

Black History Month Idea/Action List

15 Celebration Ideas & Activities for Creative, Caring Congregations!

1. Select a different theme for each week of Black History Month. Use the theme in the preparation of sermons and classes, selection of worship music, artwork for worship folders and posters for public display spaces.

2. Hold a testimonal/prayer service. Note: It will be important for the pastor or worship leader to monitor the length of time each person speaks to keep the service moving and to allow time for several people to share.

3. Consider holding a "gospel sing" or "singspiration." Incorporate the hymns and songs listed in the Black History Month Hymn/Music List, see below. Consider incorporating African drumming into your gospel sing service and intersperse the songs with prayers and scripture readings.

4. Invite people of African descent from other MCC congregations to preach, share testimonies and share music.

5. Extend invitations for gospel choirs (with membership primarily of people of African descent) in your area to present a concert or to share music in your worship services.

6. Highlight the biography of at least one person of African descent each Sunday during February. Present a brief (2-3 minutes) bio on such individuals.

7. Carry information in your bulletins and church newsletter highlighting the contributions and accomplishments of persons of African descent. Make use of quotes provided by MCC, see below.

8. Invite organizations serving people of African descent in your community to participate in your worship services.

Invite organizational leaders to preach or to share their organization's work and mission during a worship service.

Invite organizations to set up display tables at special events at your church.

9. Sponsor a fundraising activity or volunteer time during February to assist the work of a nonprofit organization in your community serving the needs of people of African descent. A great model of ministry is to contact a group and ask for a list of their needs or projects.

10. Contact your local City Hall or Chamber of Commerce for a list of local events and activities connected with Black History Month. Publicize these events in your church services -- and be sure your church is represented at these community events.

11. Sponsor a Film Night in honor of Black History Month and show, for example, "All God's Children" or Essex Hemphill's "Tongues Untied."

12. Make slides of artwork and images (see the websites listed in MCC’s Black History Month Media Resources or contact a Museum of African American art in your area) by persons of African descent. Flash slides on the sanctuary walls as part of the worship experience.

13. Hold diversity training workshops at your church. Publicize these workshops through news releases and public service announcements to your local mainline, gay and religious press outlets.

14. Contact the National Council of Churches for ways your congregation can participate in The Burned Churches Fund. This fund primarily assists African American churches which have been victimized by arson. Address: 475 Riverside Drive, Room 880, NY, NY 10115.

15. Remember that one time per year is inadequate to recognize the gifts, contributions and ministry of the people of African descent in our communities. Encourage your church's Worship Planning Team to prepare to do something regularly.

Have you participated, or will you participate, in an activity in your community that could be duplicated around the fellowship to celebrate Black History Month? Please share it with us!

Black History Month – Hymn/Music List February, 2006 Below are suggestions for music to use in your services during Black History Month. If you have additional hymns, praise choruses, songs, or other musical works to share, please send them to us, so we may add them to this list.

Every Time I Feel The Spirit Glory, Glory Hallelujah Hush, Hush, Somebody's Calling My Name I Woke Up This Morning I Want Jesus to Go with Me I Love My God, Who Heard My Cry I Will Trust in the Lord I Want to Be Ready I Thank You, Jesus I'll Fly Away I've Got a Feeling I've Got Peace Like a River Jesu, Jesu, Fill Us With Your Love Jesus is Here Right Now Let Us Break Bread Together Lift Every Voice and Sing Lord, I Want to be a Christian Lord, Make Me More Holy Not My Brother, Nor My Sister Over My Head Precious Lord, Take My Hand Sweet, Sweet Spirit Take Me to the Water There are Some Things I May Not Know (Yes, God is Real) There is a Balm in Gilead This Little Light of Mine We Shall Overcome We Shall Not Give Up the Fight We Are Climbing Jacob's Ladder What a Fellowship

Black History Month – Quotes February, 2006 "...that's what this whole thing is about. We aren't engaged in any negative protest or in any negative arguments with anybody. We are saying that we are determined to be men. We are determined to be people. We are saying we are all God's Children. And that we don't have to live like we are forced to live."

--Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., April 13, 1968 in Memphis, TN. From his last public sermon.

"When do any of us do enough?"

--Barbara Jordan, former US Congressperson, deceased "I'm both black and gay. As far as I'm concerned, I've hit the jackpot."

James Baldwin, 1924-1987 "You once said to me, 'Essex, no one comes from their consciousness fully developed." In that statement you summed up, for me, the daily task of being accountable to ourselves and to one another, truthful and honest, and of course open to change. Committed to change. Determined, in our willful ways to make change a reality, to replace the cages and the rooms of disempowerment where we might choose to dwell without mirrors, without reflection, without courage. You said, "Look within," you said, "Don't be afraid," you said, "I support you," you said, "I love you," you said, "Man," you said, "Brother." You welcomed your brothers to come into the circle you were creating.

You never barred us from participating in envisioning a new world. You only asked that we be brave, we be strong, we be committed to working for a joint liberation for the oppressed, a joint liberation for us all. You reminded us that new worlds do not come delivered on silver platters. New worlds, new ways of living do require getting the hands dirty. New worlds require more than lip-service and appearances.

--From a letter by gay African American artist Essex Hemphill to lesbian African American poet Audre Lorde. Lorde died of breast cancer. Hemphill died of AIDS complications.

"That one universal Father hath given being to us all; and that he hath not only made us all of one flesh, but that he hath also, without partiality, afforded us all the same sensations and endowed us all with the same faculties; and that however variable we may be in society or religion, however diversified in situation or color, we are all of the same family, and stand in the same relation to him. Sir, I freely and cheerfully acknowledge, that I am of the African race, and in that color which is natural to them of the deepest dye; and it is under a sense of the most profound gratitude to the Supreme Ruler of the Universe, that I now confess to you, that I am not under that state of tyrannical thraldom, and inhuman captivity, to which too many of my brethren are doomed, but that I have abundantly tasted of the fruition of those blessings, which proceed from that free and unequaled liberty with which you are favored; and which, I hope, you will willingly allow you have mercifully received, from the immediate favored; and which I hope, you will willingly allow you have mercifully received, from the immediate hand of that Being, from whom proceedeth every good and perfect Gift."

--From a 1791 letter by African American Benjamin Banneker to Thomas Jefferson, then US Secretary of State.

"To be sensual ... is to respect and rejoice in the face of life, of life itself, and to be present in all that one does, from the effort of living to the breaking of bread."

James Baldwin "We tend to think of the erotic as an easy, tantalizing sexual arousal. I speak of the erotic as the deepest life force, a force which moves us toward living in a fundamental way."

Audre Lorde, 1934-1992 "As they become known and accepted to ourselves, our feelings, and the honest exploration of them, become sanctuaries and fortresses and spawning grounds for the most radical and daring of ideas, the house of difference so necessary to change and the conceptualization of any meaningful action."

--Audre Lorde "The Black artist. The Black person. The holy person. The person you seek. The climber, the striver. The maker of peace. The lover. The warrior. We are they who you seek. Look in. Find yourself. Find the being, the speaker.

--Imamu Amiri Baraka, 1976

"We build our temples for tomorrow, strong as we know how, and we stand on top of the mountain, free within ourselves."

--Langston Hughes, from "The Nation," 1926 Have favorite quotes by persons of African descent that you would like to share? Send them to us by filling out the form below...

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