by: Marceline Donaldson

Many years ago when I was in college at New York University I lived on Riverside Drive and walked to church at Riverside Church on Sunday mornings. It was an amazing experience.

In those days Riverside Church was mostly all white. The minister when I was there was Harry Emerson Fosdick. Riverside Church was interdenominational and quite an experience for me. It was at Riverside Church that a very strong call was made for reparations to African Americans for all that they experienced in these United States including slavery. James Forman, executive director of SNCC took over the pulpit at Riverside on May 4, 1969 and read the document created in Detroit Michigan for the National Black Economic Development Conference. The document came to be known as the Black Manifesto and was written because racist white America had exploited and still, to this day, is exploiting the resources, minds, bodies, labor of blacks who helped to build this most industrial country in the world.

Formans demand was that white churches and synagogues pay reparations for Black enslavement and continuing discrimination and oppression. It had been written by Forman and delivered by him commandeering the pulpit of Riverside Church disrupting the regular service. The Black Manifesto was first presented at a conference funded in part by the Episcopal Church and the National Counsil of Churches amongst others hoping to bring Black leaders together to discuss how to socially and economically implement Black Power. If ever there was a time to go back into history it is today as Donald Trump and Elon Musk try to bring about in these United States what even South Africa has rejected.

Given that history, through which I lived, Robert and I decided to go back to Riverside Church, knowing where it was we wanted to see where and what it is about today.

We are including for you a service from the church. Their services are recorded and you can access them; join the list of those who “go to church on the internet” on Sundays; or just to watch and listen to what has happened since the very emotional events involving Riverside Church in the 1960’s.

It is a very moving service. As you can see the church is no longer mostly White. Today, it has a black female pastor and is inclusive of many cultures and different kinds of people with a commitment which is very strong. It is a place where one could raise children in the Christian faith and they would be quite happy to be there – not many churches today can say that.

We would appreciate your feed back.

Please ignore our lack of media experience. We somehow put up two film of the same service and don’t know how to take down one leaving the other for your use.