The work of bell hooks informs the definition and application of the phrase “white supremacist capitalist patriarchy” to capture all the ways in which Black women experience the intersections of oppression. In “bell hooks: Cultural Criticism & Transformation,” we gain clarity for her rationale in using the phrase:
I began to use the phrase in my work “white supremacist capitalist patriarchy” because I wanted to have some language that would actually remind us continually of the interlocking systems of domination that define our reality and not to just have one thing be like, you know, gender is the important issue, race is the important issue, but for me the use of that particular jargonistic phrase was a way, a sort of short cut way of saying all of these things actually are functioning simultaneously at all times in our lives and that if I really want to understand what’s happening to me, right now at this moment in my life, as a black female of a certain age group, I won’t be able to understand it if I’m only looking through the lens of race. I won’t be able to understand it if I’m only looking through the lens of gender. I won’t be able to understand it if I’m only looking at how white people see me.33
White supremacist capitalist patriarchy speaks to the ways in which Black women, on a daily basis, experience life. All aspects of Black women’s lives, even those parts that are positive and nurturing, are negotiated with resistance through the prism of white supremacist capitalistic patriarchy—the interlocking systems of race, gender, class, and age discrimination.
In her research, Irie found no academic or scholarly resources specifically addressing a theological constructive framework for a womanist ecclesiology. While there are, in fact, numerous books and articles on Black women in the Black Church, none highlight the formation of church vis-à-vis a womanist theoretical lens.
Although there is indeed a dearth of academic material relative to a womanist ecclesiology, she discovered scores of Black clergywomen currently engaged in what Lyn Norris Hayes coins as “practical womanism”34 or what Irie refers to as “practical womanist ecclesiology.”35 She found myriad ways and platforms in and through which Black clergywomen are engaged in practical womanist ecclesiology. In other words, there are Black clergywomen living out a womanist ecclesiology in their respective congregations, digi-church ministries, Cyber Assemblies,36 and womanist gatherings even though they do not identify their community as “church,” or ekklesia. Building upon Hayes’s definition and articulation of “practical womanism,” Irie defines “practical womanist ecclesiology” as the “performance of a womanist hermeneutic in the everyday lived experiences of Black women in order to resist oppression in its myriad manifestations and facilitate communal flourishing and wholeness.” A womanist hermeneutic is embodied and articulated in the thinking, being, and doing of Black women. Because womanists learn to work around systems of white supremacist capitalist patriarchy, a practical womanist ecclesiology of necessity is wide and broad enough not to be confined to a building that requires maintenance or a mortgage. As God’s Spirit “blows wherever it wishes” (John 3:8 CEB), so are the creative contours of a practical womanist ecclesiology.
Irie’s research project revealed in very practical ways that, like God’s Spirit, the articulation and implementation of a practical womanist ecclesiology cannot be contained, confined, or controlled by denominational, judicatory, or economic systems, or by institutional structures or ideological frameworks that undermine its premise. Her interviews with womanist clergywomen clarified this reality. For example, the co-conveners of Lewa Farabale: A Womanist Gathering in St. Louis realized they had “to do something different.” Rev. Lorren Buck, one of the founders of Lewa, remembered sharing with her colleagues: “We can’t continue to repeat what has been placed before us and think that is going to be sufficient in liberating women, specifically, not Black women. Because the church is full of Black women who don’t have the equal voice and say of their male leadership that believes that their role is really to support the vision of a man with their labor and with their money . . . everything. And that Black women should gladly do it without question.” The three Black clergywomen who founded Lewa had an epiphany born of the Spirit: “What if there was a church that had three pastors, one that resisted hierarchical arrangements?” They had no location, limited financial resources, and no denominational support. What they did possess was a prophetic knowing, that is, an organic way of knowing the deepest needs of a certain segment of society and strategies to meet those needs. In her book Toward a Womanist Ethic of Incarnation: Black Bodies, the Black Church, and the Council of Chalcedon, womanist ethicist Eboni Marshall Turman describes this prophetic knowing as a womanist epistemology. A womanist epistemology emerges from a posture of radical subjectivity that “resists notions of black women as passive subjects and rather determines that their distinctive consciousness empowers them to proactively engage and shape their own vindication.” Turman argues that Black women are not “broken subjects.” On the contrary, “radical subjectivity allows for a revaluation of the white racist, patriarchal, capitalist system of values that subjugate black women by privileging black women’s embodied experiences rather than oppressive ideologies, theologies, and practices.”37
A Constructive Framework
From onsite interviews and participant observations, Irie discovered a constructive framework for a womanist ecclesiology, consisting of at least six components. A womanist ecclesiology is artistically expressive, social justice-oriented, informed by a communal Christology, organically trauma-informed, maintains God is Universal, and situates womanist preachers as primary proclaimers.
1.Artistically Expressive
The ministries of the clergywomen Irie observed are artistically expressive. Each displayed creativity of color, vibrant visual imagery in clothing and symbols, stirring music, and creative use of digital spaces and social media apps. For example, as we were in the process of writing this book, the world was hit with a pandemic, COVID-19, the likes of which we had never seen before. Among other adjustments required to ensure the safety and well-being of each person, religious leaders were forced to reimagine processes for carrying out worship and other religious gatherings. What became clear was that there was a group of people, Black clergywomen, already navigating efficiently and creatively alternative modes of communicating spiritual and religious services and conversations. In an article titled “While More Black Churches Come Online Due to Coronavirus, Black Women Faith Leaders Have Always Been Here,” Candice Benbow, theologian, essayist, and creative, describes the prophetic innovation of Black clergywomen as a response to white supremacist capitalist patriarchy and heteronormativity: “While some congregations have always had a digital presence, there is one group that has been most consistent with providing ministry in the digital realm. Using social media apps, streaming platforms and websites, Black women have created their own spaces to do the work of faith and spirituality.”38
Black clergywomen, such as Rev. Dr. Melva Sampson, curator of Pink Robe Chronicles, and Ree Belle and Rev. Lorren Buck of Lewa Farabale, as a strategy of resistance, had already carved out digital spaces for themselves to preach, teach, write, and facilitate social justice organizing in order to “do the work their souls must have.”39 These resistance strategies included art, rituals, and curating spiritually expansive space—grounded in sound theological reflection. As a means of survival and subsequent thriving, Black clergywomen were ahead of the curve in taking ministry online by crafting their own digital resumes. The North American Church can benefit from Black women as connoisseurs of creativity by consulting and contracting with them to develop relevant digital ministry that is also artistically expressive, thus speaking to the soul.
2.Social Justice Orientation
Irie’s exploration of the ministries of six clergywomen made apparent the social justice orientation of a womanist ecclesiology. Each clergywoman is engaged in ministry in the street. “Ministry in the street” as described by Rev. Dr. Maisha Handy, senior pastor of Rize Community Church in Atlanta, is “resistance to empire.” Bishop Yvette Flunder, senior pastor of City of Refuge in