Monica A. Coleman's Blog

Explaining religion to my child was harder than I thought. I understood how to be religious with my family. We sang our prayers, went to worship and dressed up. Lord knows that taking a baby to a church that was 45 minutes away was essentially a day trip with snacks and clothing changes. We talked about God and how God lives inside of us and how we can always talk with God. So I thought I was doing the religious education job.

And then my kid goes to school with other kids and learns that oth...

Writers will often say that we write our way into our stories. Or that, no matter the plan or outline, our stories or arguments unfold in the writing. That is definitely true for me. In the talk I gave in June entitled, “How Will Grandma Find Us?” I wrote myself into several new insights that I’m still reflecting on.

I may have convinced myself that I’m a naturalist. In my mind, naturalists are atheistic scientists who talk about “laws of nature,” and eschew ideas about God. My former profess...

This year this month marks 30 years since I accepted a call into ministry. I did not grow up thinking that “minister” was a career option. When and where I was raised, if you were a boy who liked church, people would say that you might be a minister one day. If you were a girl who liked church, people would say that you could be a good church school teacher one day. This wasn’t an insult because I had the most amazing church school teachers and superintendents. They were the ones that fostered a...

Honored to be quoted talking about Black religiosity in a recent Essence magazine article.  Here’s a small excerpt:

Today, it is not uncommon for Black women to set up ancestral altars, practice yoga, sit in mindfulness meditation, get a Tarot card reading, and still make it to church on Sunday.

When delving into the concept of multiple religious belonging, Rev. Dr. Monica Coleman encourages us to think of it as “being on a religious spectrum,” a more nuanced understanding of spirituality.

Data...

When Dr. Claudine Gay resigned from the presidency of Harvard University, my phone lit up with phone call and texts. The callers and texters included Black women academics, Black professional women, Black male academics, and the like. Reeling with emotion from profound sadness to explosive anger, we had been watching a tried-and-true hallmark of American racial oppression—a public lynching.

Even though this type of lynching did not involve a rope and a tree, or fire or bullet, there was an attac...

I have a friend who asks me every year about what I’m doing for Black History Month.

And I always reply: “Nothing, I’m Black every day.”

And I mean it. I don’t celebrate Black History Month, but I am happy to be a part of celebrations of Black history – when they occur in February or any other time of the year.

I grew up celebrating the official end of enslavement in the United States. As a churched Black kid, New Year’s Eve was spent in church at some kind of testimony service. Then we went hom...

Hope Made Strong hosts this great podcast, The Care Ministry Podcast, and Laura Rowe and I had such a good conversation. We talked about my journey from being a “curious Christian” to being a religious leader, what led me to write Not Alone, and how religious leaders can be accommodating with those who live with depression.  Check it out here.

I so love this podcast conversation with Gabby Wilkinson on her podcast Dear God, I’m Sad.  Gabby’s introduction to our conversation is just gold, and she asks me a couple questions that made me pause – and that doesn’t happen often.  We had a good dialogue about Bipolar Faith and lessons for our contemporary understanding of God. Check it out here.

I had an insightful conversation with Sarah I. Fox on The Rough Edges podcast. It’s always a particular joy to speak with other people who live with bipolar depressions.  We talked about Bipolar Faith and Sarah asked me some questions no one else has.  Check it out to hear more behind the scenes intel.

How does it feel to be a problem?

W. E. B. DuBois

W. E. B. DuBois posed this question in the essay “Our Spiritual Strivings” in The Souls of Black Folk. DuBois was referring to the ways in which African Americans were understood by white American society in the early twentieth century.

​This quote came to mind last week when I was in a work meeting where people with power proposed a complex plan to address the fact that peers did not have the same power or decision-making influence. At the sugge...