In the previous chapter I outlined a tentative proposal for reparations based upon a postcolonial-inspired Black theological reading of the Bible and Christian tradition. As I stated in that chapter, I am not a political economist, so the fiscal and procedural mechanisms for affecting this form of restorative justice is not within the orbit of my competence.

In this chapter, I want to move from more theoretical considerations to those that arise from the need for the praxis of Black people, particularly in terms of how we engage theologically with the legacy of slavery, which shapes the macro and micro dimensions of life in the African Diaspora.

The impetus to write this chapter arose from my engagements, in 2007, across the length and breadth of Britain, as we marked the bicentenary of the abolition of the slave trade. What struck me, repeatedly, as I preached, led workshops, taught seminar classes, wrote new material and edited other work, was the marked reluctance of many Black people to engage with the subject from a theological perspective.

As I have outlined in the prologue to this work and in the first chapter that follows, there continues to exist within many Black Christians in Britain an unhelpful dichotomy between the rhetoric of their Christian faith and the material realities of their Blackness. Far too many Black Christians in Britain, to my mind, seem unable to integrate these two arenas of human experience.