Black Church Blues Could Shake Up The Christian World

Online, December 13, 2011 (Newswire.com) - Some books have the power to change the world; The Bible did it. The Communist Manifesto did it. Uncle Tom's Cabin did it. But can Black Church Blues do it too?

Black Church Blues is a spiritually insightful, knots-in-the-stomach hilarious novel about the misadventures Kizzy Marie Sheppard Myles, a cantankerous old retired schoolteacher/scientist, fondly known to her dysfunctional fellow parishioners as Mama Kizzy.
Her mission is to save her congregation from the power-hungry, conspiratorial deacon board. In the process, however, she unravels the precarious relationship between man-made science and God-made religion. Through her raw humor and scientific analysis, she exposes the conflicting mandates of the Holy Ghost and the Human Ghost and facilitates a behind-the scenes look at how quickly church business can go a-rye.

"This behind-the-scenes perspective is the gritty aspect of the novel that will give most Christian a sense of uneasiness," says Grogan, a bestselling author of six books in eleven countries. "During my many years in the church, I had seen too much hypocrisy, too much restating of the truth to fit a distorted public image of Christians walking around in a state of bliss with hands stretched toward heaven. I felt the image was counter-productive to saving souls because when people came into the church and actually saw members with their masks removed, they felt deceived that throughout the so-called 'holy' sanctuary, imperfection prevailed."

Therein lies the book's virtuous mission to change the world, to trip up the fake cloud-walkers, dispel the glazed-over harmonious Sunday morning spiritual utopia and present human souls as God sees them in heaven ... weak, imperfect and struggling to find their way.

"I wanted to debunk the myth before unsuspecting recruits came through the doors with distorted expectations," says Grogan. "I wanted to explain to them why imperfection will be with us until Jesus comes back."

Is the book powerful enough to change the "make-believe" Christian landscape that is, in Grogan's opinion, so counter-productive to saving souls? Can it pierce the veil of hypocrisy and unveil a new era of realism about the holy institution we call the black church? Only time will tell.