Carl Kenney II To Launch Liberation Station And The Underground Church
Durham, NC – Carl W. Kenney II, former pastor at Durham’s Orange Grove Missionary Baptist Church, Compassion Ministries of Durham and columnist for local and national publications, is leading a team in the launch of two ministries rooted in liberation theologies with inaugural events on Friday, August 16 and Sunday, August 18.
Liberation Station is the umbrella organization for the Underground Church. Kenney envisioned this model to merge the academic teachings of liberation theologies into the work of a local congregation.
“My desire is to use these ministries to help other congregations involved in work aimed at addressing critical needs of human and social justice in Durham,” Kenney says. Liberation Station seeks to strengthen the individual and collective goals of spiritual and material liberation for all people through solidarity, advocacy, service, spiritual practice and the celebration of creation.”
Liberation will host a community conversation called “Faith & Reparations” on Friday, August 16 at Watts Street Baptist Church, located at 800 Watts Street, Durham, NC 27701, beginning at 7:00 pm.
“The panel will deliberate the theological relevance and significance of local communities taking on the challenge of executing a plan for reparations,” Kenney says. “This discussion will be held within the context of the claims of our faith traditions.”
The moderator for the discussion is Rev. Dr. Sterling E. Freeman, director of the African American Heritage House at Chautauqua and an associate with OpenSource Leadership Strategies where he focuses on racial equity work.
Panelists include:
Dr. Blair L. M. Kelley, the Assistant Dean for Interdisciplinary Studies and International Programs for the College of Humanities and Social Sciences at North Carolina State University. She is also an Associate Professor of History and is on the faculty of the Public History graduate program. Her scholarship, which has been published in scholarly journals and edited volumes, centers on the history of African American social movements. She is the author of Right to Ride: Streetcar Boycotts and African American Citizenship in the Era of Plessy v. Ferguson, which won the 2010 Letitia Woods Brown Best Book Award from the Association of Black Women Historians. She has taught courses on African American history, African American women’s history, Civil Rights, oral history, and Katrina and the history of New Orleans.
Dr. Amy Laura Hall, associate professor of Christian Ethics at Duke Divinity School, is the author of four books: Kierkegaard and the Treachery of Love, Conceiving Parenthood: The Protestant Spirit of Biotechnological Reproduction, Writing Home with Love: Politics for Neighbors and Naysayers, and Laughing at the Devil: Seeing the World with Julian of Norwich. She served as a faculty adviser with the Duke Center for Civic Engagement (under Leela Prasad), on the Academic Council, and as a faculty advisor for the NCCU-Duke Program in African, African American & Diaspora Studies.
Ben Haas, Executive Director of the Religious Coalition of Nonviolent Durham, a 501c3 nonprofit organization comprised of individuals who, as an expression of their faith and goodwill, actively seek an end to the violence that is plaguing Durham neighborhoods.
Rev. Mel Williams, the coordinator of End Poverty Durham. Before his retirement, he served as pastor of Watts Street Baptist Church in Durham, N.C. for 24 years. While in that role, he served as president of Durham Congregations in Action in 1991-1992; was the co-founder of Religious Coalition for a Nonviolent Durham in 1992; led the creation of the Walltown “Neighbor to Neighbor” mission in 1995; and in 2004 co-founded End Poverty Durham. For five years, Williams chaired the Committee on Baptist Studies at Duke University, which later became the Baptist House of Studies.
Underground Church will launch with its first worship service on Sunday, August 18 at the St. Joseph AME Church, located at 2521 Fayetteville Street, Durham, NC 27707) beginning at 2:00 pm.
The planned one-hour worship service will feature music by recording artist Rissi Palmer. She has performed on the CBS Early Show, CNN, The Tavis Smiley Show, Oprah & Friends, at the White House, Lincoln Center, and the Grand Ole Opry. In addition, Mavis ‘SWAN’ Poole, crowned “Little Ella” by legendary trombonist Curtis Fuller, will provide music. She is an award-winning Vocalist, Composer, and Bandleader.
Kenney will preach on the topic: “Seeking Freedom In Perpetual Struggle.”