The novel Go Tell It on the Mountain, by James Baldwin, provides particular insight into African-American religious experiences of the early 20th century. The author shows the reader a glimpse of the African American church in the northern United States by framing the book largely in the prayers of the characters. Baldwin also shapes the characters to show how their past religious experiences influence their relationships with each other and their surroundings. Although there are a large number of outside influences that shape the way one interacts with others, Baldwin argues that religion is one of the key elements of African American relations in the early 20th century. The broader context of Baldwin's book is set during the Great Migration of African Americans from the American South to the North. The Great Migration was African Americans' attempt to find better employment opportunities and benefits in the North. Go Tell it on the Mountain is set in an African-American part of New York and centers its narrative on a storefront church. Of great importance is the fact that Baldwin chose to center his novel on the front church called “The Temple of the Baptized by Fire.” The primary location of the church in the book speaks to the importance of religion in African American culture. Because the Church held such an important place in African-American culture, it also had strong control over the moral code. Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham wrote about African American religion in her article “Rethinking Vernacular Culture: Black Religion and Race Records in the 1920s and 1930s,” “The religious culture of the poor…adopted a strict moral code that denounced the. .. .. middle of paper ...... Florence and Gabriel's mother's beliefs about God and God's Word shaped the way she lived her life because she believed that God would bring down Caucasian Americans because of their pride. She taught her children that it was not their responsibility to bring down the white man, but that God would bring them down from their high position. Interestingly, Florence remembers how the big house was destroyed. His mother's beliefs, in at least one case, came true; which partly solidified their belief system. These beliefs passed down from generation to generation shaped the way Gabriel behaved towards Caucasians. He had a deep hatred towards the white man, but he never did anything to challenge the way African Americans were treated because of his belief that God was the one who would bring the white man to justice..