Plymouth Congregational United Church of Christ
Reverend Dr. Jamall Calloway
Senior Minister
Rev. Dr. J.A. Calloway is a passionate minister, liberation theologian, and writer from Oakland, CA. He holds a PhD in Systematic Theology and a Master of Sacred Theology from Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York, where he studied under the late James Cone (the father of Black liberation theology) and Cornel West. Dr. Calloway has a Master of Divinity from Yale Divinity School and a BA in Interdisciplinary Humanities from Tougaloo College in Jackson, MS, where he was awarded the UNCF/Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship. With a background in pastoral ministry, youth ministry, and hospice ministry, Dr. Calloway has served churches in Western Massachusetts and southern California.
After receiving ordination in the American Baptist tradition in 2013 at Mt. Aery Baptist Church in Bridgeport, CT, Dr. Calloway began serving as the summer minister for the Church of Christ in Mount Washington, MA. The Church of Christ is a summer parish that opens for worship in the summers for ten weeks, and while serving that congregation, Dr. Calloway moved to New York City to continue pursuing his education. After finishing his postdoctoral fellowship at Brown University in Rhode Island, Dr. Calloway moved to San Diego, CA, to become the professor of theology at the University of San Diego and the Director of Christian Education at the Congregational Church of Chula Vista. Dr. Calloway served in that position until he accepted the call to serve as the Settled Minister at the Alpine Community Church in Alpine, CA.
As a passionate minister, Dr. Calloway believes the church ought to be of service to the community, that the effects of ministry should not solely be limited to the members, but that everyone within the vicinity feels the presence of God through the church. Dr. Calloway believes in social justice, in communal programs, and in being an inclusive institution that is a beautiful force for good. Dr. Calloway believes that a church should not only serve its faithful but also extend its reach to those who yearn to join. Often, traditional practices, older members, and older customs are overlooked in favor of the church’s youthful aspirations and desires. But Dr. Calloway believes there’s room to ensure that everyone’s spiritual needs are met over time, and that can be accomplished by having a rich Bible study and progressive Sunday school, one where the stories of the Bible and its multiple messages come alive to the believer and the newcomer. And Dr. Calloway also believes, sincerely, in creating an intimate space of worship, one where congregants and visitors can feel warm, challenged, stretched, and yet, accepted.
Dr. Calloway is not only a minister but he is a professional academic liberation and systematic theologian. He is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies at Georgetown University, and he is also currently an honorary research lecturer in the School of Religion, Philosophy, and Classics at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg Campus, in South Africa. Prior to these positions, Dr. Calloway held the position of Assistant Professor in the Theology and Religious Studies Department at the University of San Diego. He was also an Affiliated—and founding—Faculty member in the Africana Studies Program. As a professor whose work and courses center the religious experiences of Black and Brown people, Dr. Calloway teaches systematic theology, liberation theologies, continental philosophy, 20th and 21st-century African American literature (notably Richard Wright and James Baldwin), and Black Atlantic religions. Not only that, but Dr. Calloway is also the author of a forthcoming book titled “Imagining Eden: Black Theology and the Search for Paradise,” which will be published by Columbia University Press.
Most importantly, by far, Dr. Calloway is married to Alexis V. Jackson and together they are raising their 1-year-old daughter—who is almost two—Genevieve Loretta Calloway, the apple of their eyes. Outside the pulpit and the classroom, Dr. Calloway is simply Jamall. And Jamall loves novels, coffee shops, traveling, and spending time as possible with his wife and child. To God be all the glory.
Rev. Graylan S. Hagler
Pastor Emeritus
