Kingdom Come: The Politics of Faith and Freedom in Segregationist South Africa and Beyond

In Kingdom Come, Tshepo Masango Chéry explores how early twentieth-century Black Christian activists in South Africa used faith as a strategy against global racism, creating Black-controlled religious institutions to resist colonial domination. Her research spans South Africa, Zimbabwe, Kenya, the UK, and the US, illuminating the formations of racial identity, state control, and religious belief.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 264 pages
Publication date: 19 October 2023
Publisher: Duke University Press

In Kingdom Come, Tshepo Masango Chéry offers a groundbreaking genealogy of early twentieth-century Black Christian activists who confronted racism in South Africa before the establishment of apartheid. By harnessing faith as a strategic tool against global racism, these activists laid the foundation for a Black freedom struggle. Masango Chéry meticulously traces this struggle, highlighting how South African church leaders defied colonial domination by establishing Black-controlled religious institutions that aligned with their liberation goals. She demonstrates how Black Christians strategically positioned the church as a platform for political resistance, centering their organizing around African visions of freedom. Drawing on extensive archival research conducted in South Africa, Zimbabwe, Kenya, the United Kingdom, and the United States, Masango Chéry weaves a captivating global narrative that sheds light on the formation of racial identity, state control, and religious belief during the twentieth century. By reorienting South Africa's place in the history of worldwide Black liberation, Chéry's work challenges prevailing understandings of spiritual and intellectual dissemination within the diaspora.

Weight: 363g
Dimension: 229 x 152 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781478019930