One of Eric Thomas’ most harrowing experiences was hiding as a child with his missionary parents and siblings from rebels shooting up their village in the African nation of Congo during its move toward independence in the 1950s.
“My family had to hide in the attic of our house and one of the kids dropped a marble down the stairs. They were afraid someone might have heard,” recalled Mr. Thomas, son of the late Rev. Dr. Ndugu G.B. T’Ofori-Atta of Atlanta. “That was quite a terrifying experience. But God made a way through it."
A happier memory came after Dr. T’Ofori-Atta met with Nelson Mandela at a conference and the South African leader joined a group singing “Happy Birthday” into a tape recorder for Mr. Thomas. Mr. Mandela then spoke a personal birthday greeting to his friend’s son.
Tayor Branch, writing in "Parting the Waters: America in the King Years 1954-1963," said that as a student at Boston University in the early 1950s, Dr. T’Ofori-Atta connected civil rights for African-Americans in the U.S. and human rights for oppressed people elsewhere.
He organized a "Spiritual Cell Movement" of students who protested the war in Korea, atomic weapons and corrupt international leaders, Branch wrote. This led him to his work over the next seven decades in African liberation.
“More so than the missionary work,” Mr. Thomas said his father was moved by “the fellowship, the connections that separate us just by water.”
The Rev. Dr. Ndugu G.B. T’Ofori-Atta, 87, died of congestive heart failure Jan. 11 in his Atlanta home.
Visitation will be from 5-6:30 p.m. Saturday at Murray Brothers Funeral Home, Atlanta. A homegoing service will be held at 4 p.m. Sunday at Berean Seventh Day Adventist Church in Atlanta. Murray Brothers is handling arrangements.
Dr. T'Ofori-Atta, affectionately known as “Dr. T.,” was professor emeritus at the Interdenominational Theological Center in Atlanta, where he founded and directed the Religious Heritage of the African World project.
Dr. T’Ofori-Atta was born George Benjamin Thomas on July 11, 1924, in Stowe Township of McKees Rocks, Pa. He served for three years as a U.S. Army chaplain in the Pacific Theater during World War II, attaining the rank of captain.
After the war, Dr. T’Ofori-Atta received a bachelor's degree from Lincoln University in 1950, a bachelor’s and master’s from Boston University in 1953 and 1954, respectively, and a doctor of ministry at the Colgate Rochester Divinity School in 1975.
An ordained minister of the AME Zion Church, Dr. T’Ofori-Atta worked as a missionary in the former Belgian Congo in the 1950s and 1960s, where he made important links to the Kimbanguist independent African church movement. He was a founding organizer of the Pan African Christian Conference.
“He felt and saw the struggle of Africans all over the world and sought to use his influence to let us understand that we as Africans, in our various countries, we are in fact one people,” said a friend, Joe Beasley, southern director of the Rainbow Push Coalition and former international chairman of the Concerned Black Clergy of Atlanta, of which Dr. T’Ofori-Atta was a founding member.
Dr. T’Ofori-Atta spent significant time in Nigeria, Ghana, Zambia and Congo. Upon his return to the U.S. in the late 1960s, he took a teaching position at Hood Theological Seminary in Salisbury, N.C. By the 1970s, he had moved his family to Atlanta and joined the Interdenominational Theological Center faculty.
He also served in pastorates at Shaw Temple in the 1970s and 1980s, Bush Chapel in Winder and Faith AME Zion Church in Atlanta. He officially retired in 2006.
Dr. T’Ofori-Atta’s African name means “Brother Twin” or “Another Brother,” his son said.
“For me, he was so humble,” Mr. Thomas said. “No matter what he has done or experienced or had achieved, he was always considering himself a brother to everyone, doing God’s work.”
Beasley said, “Dr. T. had a very quiet demeanor, very soft spoken, but had a tremendous authority just in his presence. ... He has a lasting legacy not only here in the United States but across the world.”
Dr. T’Ofori-Atta also is survived by his wife, Alice Pippins T’Ofori-Atta; sons George Ghana Thomas of Montgomery, and Eric Allen Shaka Thomas and Arthur Pippins of Atlanta; daughters Roseanna Lorraine Abina Thomas Brannon of Atlanta, Akua Pippins Hicks of Decatur and Akosua Aisha T’Ofori-Atta of Washington, D.C.; his sister Naomi Thomas; eight grandchildren and numerous great-grandchildren.
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