Speaker Bio – Onleilove Alston

Onleilove Alston

A native New Yorker, Onleilove (Onlylove) was born and raised in East New York, Brooklyn. At 10-years old she felt led to pray and read the Bible though she was not raised in the church. At 14-years old Onleilove visited a neighborhood Baptist church where she had a life altering conversion experience, this conversion not only saved her soul but her life. She truly knows that the Gospel is good news to the poor. Currently, she serves as the Executive Director of PICO-Faith in NY a multi-faith and multi-race community organizing federation of over 70 congregations representing 80,000 New Yorkers who are united in a desire to Build the Beloved City where all God’s children live in dignity. Through her personal journey of experiencing homelessness and foster care she has developed a compassion for people fueled by a passion for justice. Her writing can be found at Sojourners Magazine & Blog, Huffington Post and Your Black World. She serves on the Board of Directors for Sojourners and leads A Women’s Theology of Liberation for the PICO Network. As an Pan-Africanist, she is dedicated to the restoration of Africa and the liberation of her people. She acknowledges the African Hebraic roots of her faith and worships at Temple Beth-El House of Yahweh in the South Bronx a congregation that observes the Torah, proclaims the gospel and serves the community. With a deep passion for uncovering the African presence in the Bible in 2014 she founded Prophetic Whirlwind: Uncovering the Black Biblical Destiny which is supported by the Beatitudes Society. She lives in Harlem with a community of Christian women and has five siblings and a large extended family in both New York and North Carolina.