Season 1

The project demonstrated how men and women of color have been forced -- arguably more so than any other ethnic group in the U.S. to rise above their circumstances to flourish and prevail, guided by their unshakeable faith in a divine power (either one borne of their own African religions or one instilled in them by white society).

1. 1. There Is a River

   2003-02-02 · 360m

   Explore the evolution of African-American religious thought, from the beliefs and rituals Africans brought to America to the influence of Christian teachings imposed on slaves in the new world.

2. 2. God Is a Negro

   2003-02-03 · 360m

   After Emancipation, the minister and journalist Henry McNeal Turner uses the black church to engage newly freed blacks in the political realm.

3. 3. Guide My Feet

   2003-02-04 · 360m

   Trace African-Americans as they move from the rural South to the promised land of the industrial North.

4. 4. Freedom Faith

   2003-02-05 · 360m

   Faith sustained black families through the oppression of segregation in the 1940s and 1950s.

5. 5. Inheritors of the Faith

   2003-02-06 · 360m

   Follow those who seek spiritual fulfillment outside of Christianity. It explores Islam and Yoruba.

6. 6. Rise Up and Call Their Names

   2003-02-07 · 360m

   In 1998, 60 people embarked on an Interfaith Pilgrimage of the Middle Passage.