Fascinating and informative read

I am not a Xtian and not spiritual and even though nothing I’ve heard has influenced me towards Dr. Cleveland’s belief systems, I am so happy to have been recommended this book.

Her childhood experiences, though not unique, were still heartbreaking. The path to overcoming her past, the racism and misogyny she encountered in education, academia, and the wider world is a narrative that can be replicated across the paths of millions of Black women—unfortunately.

I am gratified that she could create a system of belief in the spiritual realm that could offer support and sustenance in a world where our existence is crushed on a daily basis—I often wonder how we have managed to survive this far.

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Disappointing

I got this book because I was interested in its central idea of exploring the sacred black feminine yet this book was a disappointment. While the memoir sections of the book were interesting enough, the recurring appearance of the sacred black feminine as the black Madonnas of France felt like a high grade undergraduate essay. For example at one point we encounter a black Madonna standing on lotus flowers and our author quotes a famous Vietnamese Buddhist teacher on what the flower meant to him. Yet at no point does the author seem to be curious if lotus flowers have the same symbolic meaning in rural Catholic France (where the Madonna is) and in Buddhist Vietnam. And this gets to the central problem with the book. Our author laments white men being able to write about subjects in which they have little experience yet she has written a book largely about the black Madonnas of France despite not being French or Catholic, speaking little French and having no formal training in either art criticism or art history. This book proved only that academic entitlement to a subject is not solely the domain of white men.

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