During the lengthy time of slavery, religion was a way for black Americans to escape harsh realities that they faced on a daily basis, and at that time they were not allowed to vote, or to do much of anything else. The church was one of the few places that a black American could feel somewhat empowered, with a sense of belonging, and eventually this became political as more and more changes were made. This was the one place that a black American could go when cast out by other institutions, and a place that gave them a sense of shelter and strength by being a

Further, by denying the fact that these church burnings were racially motivated or taking a passive stance on the issue may make some black Americans feel as if their concerns are not being addressed. African American churches suggest that church burnings are a direct outcome of racial unrest, and that churches are presumably selected as targets of violence because of their strong organizing influence in African American communities (Morgenthau & Carroll, 1996). These kinds of crimes are part of the reason that black churches have become more political over the years, as there has been a desire to increase the black voice within the community, and therefore force politicians to take notice of some of the crimes that are still being committed against them. Racism still exists, although it is not as severe overall as it used to be, and political action is part of what can be undertaken to help stop some of that racism from continuing, and from spreading.

The trend now is that hip-hop artists and other prominent black individuals are becoming involved in the issues of elections and voting, and because of this they are taking some of the work that the black churches used to be involved with (Torres, 2004). This is a significant issue for the black community, as its churches are becoming more 'mainstream' and losing much of the political clout that they were seen to have in the past. This is especially true of elections that were seen over the last 10 years.

In the last presidential election, it was believed that John Kerry had the vote from both women and blacks, but he still lost. There are many reasons for this, and there was a lot of speculation as to why this was the case, because he appeared to be winning in early results. Whether he would have been a better choice is also up for debate, but not within the confines of this discussion. What mattered was that he had the black vote, and he lost, which indicated that either not enough blacks went and voted, or that the 'white vote' was stronger, which would indicate that there are still issues in the political arena that black churches will want to address.

Arson has always been a touch crime to investigate, and many cases are never solved, due to lack of evidence. Therefore, there are many different explanations for burning churches. About half of all the arsons are inside jobs, some are conducted by extremists, and other involve no racial motivation (Morgenthau & Carroll, 1996), and arsons occur at white churches as well as black (Booth, 1996). Just recently, there were black churches in the state of Alabama that were burned, showing tha

Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1768
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page double spaced)