#EvolutionofaHolyBadAss
I am comfortable with Maya Angelou’s characterization Father/Mother/God for several reasons, not the least of which is that some days I need a Father Figure, others the Compassion of a fierce and Omnipotent Mother, and other days when it does not matter. God is so much bigger than any box we could conceive.
Some of us are so pressed down right now we cannot breathe, let alone pray. Even the act of opening one's mouth to pray brings tears and sobs choked in the throat. These are the prayer requests marked urgent. Some of them are so desperate that they cannot be uttered. Do not withhold your mercy …
The sad reality about America the Beautiful is that we are divided. Until we address the pain American racism continues to cause, to ignore it, particularly in the wake of such carnage, and in a church no less is, as Jon Stewart so beautifully put it, is to ignore "the nexus of a just gaping racial wound that will not heal, yet we pretend doesn’t exist."
I believe in free will, knowing that the Perfect Will of God leads us to and through things in order to bring us to the places we need to be.
"The way you articulate your position...., you know, you're so articulate for a...." [expletive deleted] I speak like the people I know. Those I spend time with, those whom I love. Those who raised me, those who raised them, etcetera. English, well-spoken and well writ, is our first language. We go to college (we graduate). We're normal.
This is about to be a series. I have a number of things to be pissed-off about where the Community of Faith is concerned, but I'll start here.
Today, I'm talking Race, Culture, Identity, and Faith over at my new home. I'm joined by brilliant women who make me want to dig deeper and reach further, and I thank God for the opportunity.
It will be eight years ago this fall that I wrote and published this brave story. Brave because I hadn't ANY idea what I was doing except taking the advise of a friend that I trusted. I was obeying a call, and I am grateful. That obedience profoundly changed my life. I now write professionally for a living. I have grown, but I had to start somewhere.
It's a brown liquor and blues kind of day. A day after which, like an exhausted toddler, I will collapse in a heap on the floor. Tantrumed out. Bereft of tears. BOF. Being a Black Girl Who Rocks is my superpower, but my cape hangs limp today. Precious Lord, I am tired. I am weak. …
I am growing, but like my beloved Granny, I was not on the Peacemaker line for long as they handed out spiritual gifts. I got impatient and left. A sistah had a lot to do.
