PhD student La Ronda Barnes (’26) published in Homiletic: The Journal of the Academy of Homiletics
The following is an excerpt from Homiletic: The Journal of the Academy of Homiletics article “A Particular Oneing: Zilpha Elaw as a Model for a 21st Century Womanist Contemplative Homiletic” by PhD student La Ronda Barnes, published on December 2, 2024. Her article appears on page 95 of the issue.
In this article, I present nineteenth-century preacher Zilpha Elaw as a model for a twenty-first-century homiletic. I discuss particularity, as understood through deep interiority and contemplation, as the key to connecting with other beings. As preachers, we have the ability and the responsibility to model the need for and benefits of understanding and owning our particularities and to guide others in embracing their particularities in ways that affirm self and community. Thanks to the incomparable gifts of African American contemplative preachers, I believe that we can bridge innate differences and societally created divisions through a psychospiritual interiority that acknowledges and encourages communication in the spiritual realm.
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