Hurley, George Willie (1884-1943)

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Hurley, George Willie (1884-1943)

George Willie Hurley, the founder of Universal Hagar's Spiritual Church, a prominent Spiritual denomination functioning in the African American community, was born in rural Georgia near the town of Reynolds on February 17, 1884. He was raised as a Baptist and as a young man became a preacher, though he soon switched his affiliation to Methodist. In 1919 he moved to Detroit and soon affiliated with the Triumph the Church and Kingdom of God in Christ, a holiness church functioning primarily within the African American community. Hurley became the Prince of the State of Michigan.

His life was changed by a visit to a Spiritualist church. He was converted and he soon resigned his position and became a minister for an independent Spiritual congregation. Shortly thereafter, in 1923, he had a vision of a brown-skinned damsel who was transformed into an eagle. He interpreted the vision as a prophecy concerning a church he was to found. Thus on September 23, 1923, he founded Universal Hagar's Spiritual Church. He opened the church's School of Mediumship and Psychology the next year.

Along with his traditional Spiritualist ideals, Hurley taught a form of black Judaism. He believed that blacks were God's original Hebrew people and that the mark of Cain (God's curse) was the pale skin of white people. Hurley also suggested that he was the bearer of God's spirit on earth for the emerging Aquarian Age, just as Jesus was the spirit bearer for the Piscean Age, and Moses and Adam had been for prior astrological ages. He believed that the Aquarian Age had begun with the signing of the armistice following World War I, that it would last 7,000 years, and that it would see the end of Protestantism, segregation, and injustice.

Hurley died on June 23, 1943. He was succeeded by his wife, who led the church until her death in 1960.

Sources:

Baer, Hans A. The Black Spiritual Movement: A Religious Response to Racism. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1984.