Reverdy Cassius Ransom

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Reverdy Cassius Ransom
Born	January 4, 1861 Flushing, Ohio, USA
Died	April 22, 1959 Wilberforce, Tennessee, USA

Reverdy Cassius Ransom (January 4, 1861 – April 22, 1959) was a United States African American Christian socialist, civil rights activist, and Methodist Bishop.

[edit] Life

His father was an unknown Native American, and his mother, Harriet Johnson, was an African American who sacrificed herself in order to ensure Reverdy's education. Ransom attended Oberlin College. He later got married and had a child, but became distanced from wife due to an intellectual chasm; he remarried, but it is recorded that he was not faithful to his second wife.

He recognized the inequality in American society, blaming it on capitalism and seeing socialism as a way to tackle this. He considered that the world had enough resources to cater for all humanity, but the distribution of it was wrongly handled. For Him, socialism offered a means to help the downtrodden, which was in keeping with the teachings of Jesus Christ.

Reverdy disagreed with the idea that the African race was inferior to the White, and explained the hardships suffered by his people as a necessary test from God. A way to better themselves and bring the African race to their rightful position in American society. This can also be seen as his answer to the theological question of the problem of evil.

“	God brought naked barbarians from Africa, put them upon the anvil of American Christianity and Democracy; under the white heat of denial and persecution, He is fashioning them with sledgehammer blows into a new pattern from American civilization.	”
—Reverdy C. Ransom, The Negro

[edit] References

Pinn, Anthony (1999). Making the Gospel Plain: The Writings of Bishop Reverdy C. Ransom, 1st Edition, Harrisburg: Trinity Press International. ISBN 1-56338-264-4.