Introduction

This chapter introduces the concept of the American Empire, its definition, description, and international role as the leader of the free world. It identifies and highlights the spirituality of white supremacy animating and embedded within American history, culture, and society. While acknowledging the potency and power of American Civil Religion for imperial authority, the chapter distinguishes between civil religion and the theology of the American Empire that undergirds US foreign policy and global engagement in the contemporary context as the solitary world superpower. It presents the Christian realism of Reinhold Niebuhr and the black liberation theology of James Cone as interpretive frameworks for beginning to analyze and critique the American Empire theologically. The chapter outlines the writing structure of the work and proposes a constructive black theology of the American Empire for the twenty-first century.