The Black Regiment was a derogatory term used by the Loyalists and British officials to refer to pastors who used their pulpits to provide the theological justification and moral authority for the American Revolution; to instill in their congregants an understanding of and a desire for true liberty; and to help them see their cause as a sacred duty.

These ministers of the gospel became more feared than the military might of the colonists. Reflecting on the effectiveness of colonial preachers during the siege of Boston, Peter Oliver, the last royal Chief Justice of Massachusetts, bitterly compared those preachers in their black robes to the actual British military forces: “But as little as the red Regiments performed, the black Regiment played its Artillery to some purpose; and The Pulpit – Drum Eccliastick – Was beat with Fist instead of a Stick.”

The Black Robed Regiment, as they came to be known later, preached sermons which would later be echoed in our founding documents through phrases like “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” and “to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility” and “make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” They emboldened their congregants to stand for the truth and, if necessary, fight for the truth. They were a formidable adversary indeed and their contributions live on.

We have a secular form of government – of the people, by the people, and for the people – but the people who founded this nation did so not in a moral vacuum, but in the morality and justice and truth they learned growing up in an Ecclesiocentric, and at times a Theocentric, world. They were taught the Word of God by their ancestors; inspired to know God’s justice and grace through the preachers of the Great Awakening; and they were inspired by Godly men like the Black Robed Regiment who gave them Godly wisdom and strength to stand up against tyranny and fight for true liberty and true freedom. So while our form of government is secular, the foundation on which it stands is sacred.

May we never forget from whence we came. May we never forget that God’s sovereignty brought this nation into existence. And may we never forget that the sovereign God who brought us into existence as a nation can remove us just as easily.

This Bible study was presented to the Agape Life Bible Study Class of the First Baptist Church in Brenham, Texas, on Sunday, June 28, 2026. It is part of a series called From Reverence to Revival to Revolution: The Influence of Christianity and the Great Awakening on the Founding of The United States of America. Handouts with class presentation content can be requested at: fromthebackporchintexas@gmail.com .

Handouts are also available at: fromthebackporch.org .


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