Underworld Workers with Dr. Ahmad Greene-Hayes

On April 19, the William and Mary Religious Studies department was pleased to welcome Dr. Ahmad Greene-Hayes for a presentation on his book Underworld Work: Black Atlantic Religion Making in Jim Crow New Orleans. Greene-Hayes, an Associate Professor of African American Religious Studies at Harvard Divinity School, presented his research to students and staff to detail the life and legacy of Mother Catherine Seals, her Temple of Innocent Blood, and the theological impacts of a gender-race theology in the Jim Crow south.

Dr. Greene-Hayes’ presentation detailed how Louisiana’s Afro-Catholic roots prompted Mother Catherine to create this amalgamation of black religion in the aftermath of chattel slavery. Critical of Christianity, Mother Catherine synthesized the Bible’s ‘black Jesus” with verbiage that might relate to her primary female followers as they dabble in underworld work. Greene-Hayes shared how her hermeneutical approach to the bible was making joyful noise unto the lord, prioritizing connections with sex workers, women healing from abortions, and domestic violence survivors.

Another prime focus of the lecture was Informant 864, an individual that goes without a name or gendered pronouns. Greene- Hayes’ presentation of Informant 864 supports his argument of identify formation that suggests that queerness functioned as an ontological category within black religion in the Jim Crow south.

The lecture ended with a Q&A session, in which attendees questioned Mother Catherine’s impacts in Jim Crow New Orleans, Informant 864’s reproductive practices and healing, and conflict as a catalyst for new religion movements to unfurl.