Black Religion's Promethean Motif: Orthodoxy and Militancy

Abstract

Black religion as inspiration of and opiate for militancy is explored on the basis of data collected in an urban community in the upper South. Orthodoxy is shown to be positively related to militancy, while sectarianism is inversely related. Orthodoxy, viewed as churchlike ideology, is shown to be significantly related to church participation. Sectarianism, interpreted as part of the general culture of less educated blacks, is tangential to the religious system per se. Sectarianism is unrelated to participation in a religious organization. The results of a secondary analysis of the Gary Marx data are also reported.