Freedom Faith: The Womanist Vision of Rev. Dr. Prathia Hall

The Reverend Dr. Prathia Hall was a civil rights activist whose work was grounded in social justice, Christian practice, and womanist thought. As a significant figure in the Civil Rights Movement, Hall served in the Student Nonviolence Coordinating Committee (“SNCC”) and would often be called on to speak at mass meetings.  Her intellectual and theological development was a product of her childhood formation as the daughter of a Baptist preacher and forged in her fight against “racism, sexism, classism, ageism, heterosexism, [and] denominationalism” in all its forms.  Of Hall, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. once said that she was “the one platform speaker I prefer not to follow.”  As a preacher, pastor, professor, pioneer, and the one who coined the phrase “I have a dream,” Hall’s thought and activism influenced many more widely known civil rights leaders and early womanist scholars.  Come hear Dr. Courtney Pace discuss her scholarship on the life and legacy of Rev. Dr. Prathia Hall.

DATE & TIME

Sunday, March 10, 2024, 1:30 PM

The Riverside Church | 9T & Online
490 Riverside Drive
New York, NY

PRESENTER

Rev. Courtney Pace, PhD, is the Prathia Hall Scholar in Residence of Social Justice History for Equity for Women in the Church. She has a PhD in Religion from Baylor University (2014), a Masters of Divinity in Theology from George W. Truett Theological Seminary (2007), and an Honors Bachelor of Science in Computer Science Engineering, with minors in Mathematics and Psychology, from The University of Texas at Arlington (2004). She researches social justice movements in American religion, particularly race and gender. She is the author of Freedom Faith: The Womanist Vision of Prathia Hall (2019), Beyond Eden: The Collected Sermons and Essays of Prathia Hall (2022), and 150+ peer-reviewed articles, book chapters, book reviews, and encyclopedia articles. She is an ordained Baptist minister and has trained as a figure skater for 31 years. Dr. Pace founded and chairs the Clergy Board for Planned Parenthood of Tennessee and North Mississippi. All of that is her labor of love, done after hours and on top of her day job as a Senior Consultant with Deloitte’s Government and Public Service practice, specializing in State, Local, and Higher Education consulting. She was named among Memphis’s 40 Under 40 in 2023.