Finding the missing cups at Polegreen

By Natalie Johnson-Abbott

“Whose cup is missing from the table?”

That was a question posed to us at the beginning of the Religious Freedom Immersion Experience by Dr. Sabrina E. Dent, director of the BJC Center of Faith, Justice and Reconciliation. In her lesson to frame our discussion, she led us through an exercise known as “The Cup Ritual” created by Dr. Itihari Toure, who currently serves as the Senior Director for Major Grants for Program Development at the McCormick Theological Seminary in Chicago. This ritual is an African practice of naming the many communities whose voices are important but often missing and unrepresented from the narrative. On display was an African print tablecloth with an assortment of cups, mugs and glassware, each representing a person. In conversations about religious freedom, every story matters. Dr. Dent spoke with our group about being a vocal advocate for the people who are often left out of the conversations surrounding religious freedom by elevating their voices. I found the session to be powerful and motivating, but I did not expect to see so clearly a need to be that advocate during our experience.

On Thursday afternoon of the Religious Freedom Immersion Experience, our journey brought us to the historic Polegreen Church. Located 12 miles outside of downtown Richmond, Polegreen touts its connection to “the story of Rev. Samuel Davies and how he started Historic Polegreen Church, one of America’s first non-Anglican churches,” according to its website. While the original structure was destroyed during the Civil War, an open-air venue was built upon the original foundation to allow visitors to see it and to keep the story alive. Since then, the foundation that maintains the site acquired an additional 147 acres of land surrounding the church, all with significance to Patrick Henry, Virginia’s first governor, and the Rev. Davies. The foundation’s goal is to preserve the history of the site and continue to tell the story of the Rev. Davies. On their website, Polegreen states, “By accomplishing this mission, we preserve the memory of Hanover Dissenters who struggled courageously and successfully for civil and religious freedom in Virginia and in so doing increase appreciation for the liberties that we enjoy today in the United States.”

As the director of operations revealed the story of the Rev. Davies, one thing in particular stuck out to me: part of the renown of the Rev. Davies was his “pioneering effort” in educating enslaved Black people. As the story goes, he would line up the enslaved people and teach the first person in line to read from the Bible; then, that person would teach the one next to him, and so on and so on. This story has been told hundreds of times to thousands of visitors to Polegreen through the years, and it is a story that created fascination and a sense that the Rev. Davies’ actions were compassionate and inspirational. In a room full of people passionate about religious freedom, however, the primary feeling was shock.

We sat in silence for a moment before Dr. Dent spoke up, saying that the portrayal of these reading lessons is inauthentic to the narrative of the enslaved people who were forced to take part in church services and forced to read the Christian Bible. During this horrendous period in the American story, the idea of giving enslaved people access to the reading of the Bible may have been considered “free thinking” of the Rev. Davies — and it could have been done with good intentions — but something crucial was missing. By not mentioning the fact that the lessons were compelled and the likelihood that there were consequences for not taking part in them, this story is sanitizing the horrors of the enslaved peoples’ experience. Their cup was missing from the table.

This experience showed me that I need to get comfortable being uncomfortable. The fight for religious freedom is not a silent fight — it requires standing tall in spaces that seem intent to shrink you. It requires being the loud one in spaces where your silence is expected. And, as Dr. Dent modeled for us, it involves living every day with the belief that all people have the right to soul freedom. Even if it’s awkward. Even if the people impacted have long departed this earth. We have to be vocal and unafraid in our defense of it. We must not romanticize barbaric institutions for any reason — if we do, we are in danger of slipping down the same slope of white supremacy.

A preacher lining up slaves and forcing them to learn to read with no intention of those lessons being used to free them or of using his own position to advocate for their freedom is not something to be celebrated. The same enslaved people that are seen as background noise did not have a choice. Their participation in his “reading lessons“ was not voluntary. Their attendance at this church was not voluntary. As BJC often says, for faith to be authentic, it must be freely chosen and not imposed by any authority. While the Rev. Davies was a remarkable individual whose accomplishments for those he did not enslave were numerous, using these lessons as an example of his greatness and compassion actively participates in the erasure of enslaved people from this narrative.

Of all the lessons I learned during the Religious Freedom Immersion Experience, the greatest of them was to always challenge myself to ask the question, “Whose cup is missing?” and then be loud and persistent in the pursuit of their inclusion. And, if I am ever in a space where there is no cup set out for me, as Dr. Dent said, “I will bring my own.”

Natalie Johnson-Abbott is an education equity advocate in Central Virginia. She also serves as a programs coordinator for the BJC Center for Faith, Justice and Reconciliation.

Click here to read a companion article about the Religious Freedom Immersion Experience by Dr. Sabrina E. Dent.

This article originally appeared in the spring 2025 edition of Report from the Capital. You can view it as a PDF or read a digital flip-through edition.