Heeding a new call

They come wearing baggy jeans, loosely laced Timberland boots, oversized leather jackets, gold chains, and some with gold teeth. They are unlikely congregants, young black men wearing doo-rags and corn-rowed hair filling the back pews of Eliot Congregational Church in Roxbury. They come to hear the preacher preach.

''When I look at our black community, sometimes I get hurt, disappointed, and downright ashamed," boomed the chiseled man in the pulpit wearing a bow-tie and a black, crucifix-adorned robe. ''We've got work to do."

Minister Conrad Muhammad was the incendiary black nationalist from New York who led mass demonstrations down the police-lined streets in Harlem in the late '90s. Today he's embraced Christian roots. He's severed ties with the Nation of Islam, giving up his national acclaim as a fist-pumping, slur-slinging Black Muslim, heir apparent to Minister Louis Farrakhan. He's reclaimed his birth name, Conrad L. Tillard .

And after 18 months of surveying Boston while studying at Harvard Divinity School, the Rev. Tillard, as he's now known, wants to spark a black movement he believes is years overdue.

''There is a black empowerment struggle that is yet to happen in Boston that has already taken place in other cities 20 to 30 years ago," Tillard said in an interview at his church office, where he became pastor in late 2003. ''This is not in any way throwing stones at anyone, but it is to say it's ironic that in this bastion of liberalism there is definitely some work to do in terms of empowering the people."

The 40-year-old activist says that Boston needs a revolution like those that transformed cities like Atlanta, Philadelphia, and New York. Instead of struggling black communities in Boston, he wants to see more black people in elected office, more black home-ownership, and more black youth challenging the white political establishment. And he wants to lead it.

With a history of working for black political stars including Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, and Farrakhan since he was 19 years old, Tillard has made a career courting the spotlight. But whether he can shake up already close-knit, politically established communities in Boston remains to be seen.

Many prominent black figures in Boston, including the reverends Eugene Rivers and Ray Hammond and city councilors Charles Yancey and Chuck Turner, have challenged the city on the very same issues, hoping to ignite the very same movement. Progress may be slow, Yancey acknowledged, but there has been some change.

''The types of issues he's raising about Boston can probably be stated in most major cities in the country," said Yancey, who has been involved in city government since 1983. ''I don't necessarily agree that Boston is that far behind other cities. But there is ample room for improvement."

Yancey said he looks forward to seeing what Tillard has to offer the city. So does Harold Sparrow, executive director of the Black Ministerial Alliance.

''He's an impressive young man," said Sparrow. ''He really understands and appreciates the protocol of learning a community, working with the people of the community. He also really understands the official networks and the unofficial networks of this city to be effective in his ministry."

New York's political and religious leaders say Tillard is likely to emerge as a powerful figure in Boston.

''I say he'll break the door down," said New York City Councilman Charles Barron, who watched Tillard, as a Black Muslim, get in the faces of police officers, dope dealers, gangsta rappers, and politicians alike. ''People respect audacious, bold, and daring leadership. Conrad is all of that."

Much as he did in New York, Tillard can be found pounding the pavement from Roxbury, Dorchester, and Mattapan, going to malls, jails, and even to funerals trying to attract young blacks to church -- not just to pray, he said, but to organize. He's been making rounds, meeting with the city's black leadership. He's become a member of the Ten Point Coalition, a network of black ministers fighting against violence and drugs. In January, Tillard was a keynote speaker at an annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day breakfast, attended by Mayor Thomas M. Menino and several city councilors. And he has watched as Boston has transformedinto a place where blacks and Hispanics are winning local elections for seats long held by whites.

''We have to elevate the aspirations of young people in the city," the divorced father of three said from his office, where pictures of him and Ronald Reagan, and Sharpton, and singer Diana Ross, as well as others, hang. ''We need to make sure that we speak to them, so they can know they can be more than a rapper or a gangbanger and start seeing themselves as attorneys raising up shingles in Roxbury, Dorchester, and even downtown."

Tillard is coy about his political ambitions in Boston, saying his first obligation is to his church, which is still mourning the loss of its longtime leader, the Rev. Ozzie Edwards, in 2002. The loss of Edwards, well known as a social justice minister who had the ear of influential city leaders including Menino, has fractured the church, causing some residents to seek other places to worship. Over the past year Tillard has worked to revitalize its membership. Beyond that, Tillard is working to build a following, using the church as a base to groom future black leaders.

As a teen, Tillard, the son of a Baptist preacher, lost faith in the church of his youth and turned to the Nation of Islam for guidance. But six years ago, the burgeoning Black Muslim, who made appearances on the ''O'Reilly Factor" and who has publicly clashed with rap mogul Russell Simmons, grew tired of the Nation's angry message. With time and self-reflection, he said, he slowly began to change.

''As a man, as a Godly man, I am the first to admit that I've made my mistakes," he said. His eyes glistened as he spoke of his evolution from a black teenager searching for a place to belong to a man searching for the God of his youth.

''When I was growing up, I wanted to fit in. I wanted to be cool. I wanted to be able to have street credentials. I didn't want to be a church boy," he said, his words soft and humble. ''What attracted me to the Nation of Islam, I guess, it was a very powerful voice at a very critical time. Their message was focused on black economic empowerment. As a young black professional that message appealed to me."

It is his experience working in black communities from Watts in Los Angeles to Harlem, evolving from a Black Muslim to a Christian preacher, that so far appears to have made him quite popular with the youth at his church.

''He gets us," said Hashim Lafond, 16, after church one Sunday afternoon. ''I think he's a genius."