An Open Letter to Dr. Bob Hughes

My Dearest Dr. Bob Hughes:

Last weekend, I was made aware of an incident that involved a newly introduced acquaintance.  She’s beautiful and black, intelligent and smart, classy and down to earth, accomplished and professional.  She is that quintessential, “I’m Everywoman,” kinda sistah."  You know the song that our sultry songstress, Chaka Khan sang about, and the one we made into the Black Woman’s Anthem.  On a particularly pleasant Spring day in Seattle, at a particularly bustling corner, sitting inside a particularly popular Starbucks coffee shop, like many – particularly exceptional people do – she was enjoying a reflective moment with another particularly exceptional and respectable black male colleague.  While the language may come across as a bit glib, to be clear, it is by design.  For the descriptors are apparently of significant importance to some people.  Here in polite Seattle, Washington, for example, where whites make up nearly (69%) of its population, and blacks at or around (7%) of its population, the likelihood of finding two black college administrators enjoying a cup of java or tea is the close equivalent of finding that proverbial needle in a hack stack.  And yet, in all of their specialness, their particularity, their exceptionality and respectability, a young white man found HER and her BLACKNESS, so particularly offensive that he hurled spittle from his foul, vulgar, uncouth and depraved soul onto her face – not once, but twice.  The particularity of her and their respectability and exceptionalism wasn’t enough to cover up their blackness.  The language, therefore, is also flippant to make a point in response to your post about the same incident.

In your blogpost, dated, May 2, 2016, entitled, “Are we in a post-racial world?  In a word, NO!  Make that, Hell No!,”  you documented the assault in great detail.  Your social commentary exposing the fallacy that we are living in a “post-racial world,” especially in Seattle, Washington, was spot on.  You were absolutely correct and justified in pointing out the fact that you and my friend’s, “socio-economic status (I suppose based on your attire), educational accomplishments, or [your] age required no respect or deference.”  You were also right to highlight the indifference and lack of concern you observed from other patrons of the establishment.  In fact, the blatant indifference, arguably, experienced by you both, elicited the strongest indictment when you noted, 

Everyone else at the café sat silently or went on with their business.  In a truly post-racial world, that would not behow things work.  In a post-racial world, that kind of violation would mobilize every person in that space to actively resist an assault on two people – an assault that only happened because of our race, and because of the gender of my colleague.  In a post-racial world, there’s no silence.

You go on to say, “Even if you can’t directly act, you take a stand to support those who are assaulted, like the woman who volunteered to be a witness, or the manager who took action.”  I couldn’t agree with you more on the assessment and social critique of the circumstances surrounding the assault.  But, while we’re here, and as a black woman myself, I’m curious to know, Dr. Hughes, what action did you take?  What support did you provide to your colleague, your “sister-friend,” who had just been spat on – twice?  Other than give the police a statement, what did YOU do?  What did you do to stand up for that black woman?  What did you do to protect that black woman?  What did you do to honor her, her dignity, her humanity – hell, your humanity? 

From all accounts, including your own, you, too, did nothing.  You, too, did nothing but stand by and watch a young white man, “brazenly assault,” a black woman and call her a, “fucking nigger bitch” – in your presence – and you did nothing.  No, wait, hold on.  Let me be fair.  You did do something.  In your blogpost you shared that, “[You] turned to [your] colleague and asked if she knew the young man.”  Why?  Would her knowledge or perceived history or association with the assailant have explained or justified his absolute indecorous behavior toward her?  Why did you go to the place of “questioning” the black woman, seemingly, with such ease?  Was it easier for you to think that maybe this black woman had done something wrong to this nice, young, clean cut, and well-dressed white man, than it was for you to believe his problem with her was due primarily to that which has been ingrained into his psyche as a privileged and entitled white man in an androcentric society?  Your “questioning” was as offensive and inappropriate as asking a female rape victim what she was wearing at the time of her rape.

Malcolm X once said, “The most disrespected person in America is the black woman.  The most unprotected person in America is the black woman.  The most neglected person in America is the black woman.”  As a sometime blogger myself, I know the limitless word count for writing a post, so I anxiously waited to read something from you that would have made me feel differently about the need to pen this response.  I waited to hear you reflect on the historical dangers that black men have faced when trying to protect the black woman.  I waited to read about your thought process and the possible ramifications – affecting your family, your career, even your life – should you have rose to defend and protect the black woman.  I waited to read that if no one else cared for, respected or valued the humanity of the black woman, surely her black male counterpart did.  I waited to read that at least in that instance, Malcolm X would be proven wrong.  I waited.  I waited only to hear your deafening silence, and the realization that my hope and my help is in myself or some other entity.

Dr. Hughes, I am thankful to you for bringing this matter to the public square.  But while you arraign those in proximity that did nothing to come to your aid – you the well-dressed, accomplished, professional and respectable good black man – I hope you were equally convicted by your lack of action, your lack of protection, your lack of care, and your incredulous presumption of the black woman’s guilt.  No, we are not living in a post-racial society.  You are correct in that assessment.  But know for certainty, that you have a large part to play in that narrative as well.

Peace and blessings,

Rev. Dorinda G. Henry   

"In The Meantime, At The Same Time"

A LOVE LETTER

I had to go through hell to get to Heaven.

The journey was bitterly long and full of entangled snares that prolonged the pain.  Heaven would have nothing short of a testimony that warranted the sensation that the journey there was of epic proportion and nothing short of divine revelation and order.  The heavenly court – made up of Gods of every known faith and others yet revealed, saints and sinners, Orishas, ancestors, children yet born, children who snuck away too soon and who were placed on heavenly time-out for their offense, men, women and the third (next) sex, perfectly embodying the union of both masculine and feminine – insisted this love story, of which they all played a part, would be told again and again and again.  In fact, it probably should be placed in a time capsule for future generations to know for certain that even in a time of absolute war, confusion, induced fear, doubt and uncertainty, there in the midst of it all, love found and fell into itself – when I laid eyes on her.  

Words are useless when trying to find the right ones to describe the moment between two seconds, when air catches itself, when the speed of light can be seen in slow motion and colors come alive to the point that they leak.  Such was the case when I laid eyes on her.  I knew her instinctively.  The clouds paused and whispered her name.  Trees shook at the excitement of her passing by, the sidewalk that bore her stride, eased its texture, and every soul within range of the moment instantaneously sang out in a harmonious chorus of praise – when I laid eyes on her.  I knew her for a lifetime.  In a moment that went on forever, I felt the smoothness of her skin, the crinkle of her hair, the sorrow of her present, anguish of her past and her longing for more, for bigger, for better for forever – when I laid eyes on her.

Time reversed itself to a place where we knew one another.  We floated weightless in the abyss of Divine Love – ethereal and endless.  We merged and meshed into one free-floating cell until the heavenly court summoned me.  It was my turn to enter into that place that all souls begrudgingly go to for a period of time to get a better understanding of the beauty and grace we arrogantly sat in and even began to resent because of its effortless peace and harmony.  Some souls, too eager at their chance, simply split off from their soul’s mate and run head long into the dank, dark, stale, stank, murky and musty tunnel with little to no regard for the soul(s) they left behind.  They run.  Some prematurely enter while others rethink things and turn around.  Still a few – unprepared and too stubborn and full of themselves to take a moment to reflect – enter haphazardly.  I, on the other hand conferred with my twin and made an agreement to do what? I don’t remember.  But between my Love and me, we vowed to find one another.  Because the realm I was entering into was so unfamiliar, we knew not what to expect.  We envisioned a place where we would be the same as we were in the abyss of Divine Love, and therefore it would not be difficult to find one another.  We were wrong.  We had some lessons to learn.

I come from a clan of warriors.  We are fighters – killers even.  Our soul’s mission is to fight.  It is to kill.  Our very nature requires, even demands it.  We are the protectors of right, of justice, of balance, of equality.  My Love on the other hand comes from a clan of lovers, of peacemakers and keepers.  Her soul’s mission is to bring beauty and sweetness into every situation, circumstance and life.  They are the vibrancy of yellow, the lush of green, the coolness of lavender and the still of blue.  My Love anchors, settles and calms me.  Love moves me from a place of murderous rage, contempt and passion to a place of peace, of second thoughts and second chances, of mature fighting and the grace that comes with losing – especially when winning would have been so easy.

My Love’s energy and our souls’ familiarity with one another pulled my attention toward her.  She glided by as if to be walking on air.  As dark as 15 minutes past midnight, hair locked and pulled back away from her face, dressed in the color of the Orisha Oshun, my heart slowed its beat – a protective measure so as not to burst and destroy this finite  earthly vessel I now dwell in.  Strangely enough, I could not see her earthly face.  I could only feel a soul connection, spirit and kindred energy flowing between us – when I laid eyes on her.

She was not alone.

She walked with the poise and presence of a ballroom dancer slightly behind a – “an-other.”  I watched with anxious nerves, anticipation, fear, jealousy and bitterness upon witnessing her obvious awareness and care of and for the – “an-other.”  I wondered, was I wrong?  Was this not my soul’s mate?  Yes, I knew her instinctively.  To test us – the heavenly court – would breathe a fragrance-laced mist of our soul’s mate on and inside of us that was only recognizable to the soul from which the fragrance came.  As she passed by the shaking trees, they did their part by capturing the fragrance in their leaves and wafted it into the air.  I caught it.  I knew it – I knew her wet.  She smelled of me.  How the heavenly court would work out our “chance” meeting, I knew not the time, the place nor the hour.  All I knew is that it would happen.
Days, weeks, even months went by.

The day before I laid eyes on her, the heavenly court dispatched a connector soul my way.  The connector had taken the form of the male species – a species I casually and platonically delight in keeping company with from time to time.  Connector souls are those souls that connect other souls together.  They are the ones, whom for the most part, lead single, solitary lives, but who are always instrumental in bringing other souls together.  They do their part and some remain within the circle, while others drift away or are relegated to and/or are content with a place on the fringe.  He knew her. And keeping in line with his soul’s purpose and intent, he brought her to me – literally.
It was a breezy autumn night.  I was paying penance at a system with a component called work when he and another soul called and demanded my presence at an eatery.  Reluctant, I arrived to find her sitting at the table.  From my internal ear I heard Etta James sing, “At last, my Love has come along.”  After a couple of earthly embraces, we were introduced.  She turned – looked up at me and rose to greet me.  The heavenly court had chosen a wonderfully beautiful and arresting vessel for her journey.  It was almost too much.  I diverted my eyes from the glory of her and Home, as I remembered both it and she at the same time.  My brain had to remind my back and my knees of their purpose.  Saliva filled my mouth, my throat got smaller and my eyes filled with a watery substance they call tears.

She touched me – embraced and held me.  I inhaled her and smelled me – she took me in and smelled herself – both of us smelling Heaven.  In her arms I became weightless again.  I felt our souls re-membering one to the other.  Though encumbered by the awkwardness of the forms we had taken on, we began to merge and mesh back into one free-floating cell.  We spoke quietly – almost secretively about our individual soul’s journey here.  Recalling the day I laid eyes on her and the “an-other,” I inquired.  She was presently occupied with and by an “an-other.”  I thought nothing of it – it was simply an in the meantime condition and nothing for me to be concerned with.  I was wrong.  I had some lessons to learn.

Again, days, weeks, even months passed.  In the meantime, I too waited for the arrival of her “an-other.”  At the same time, I kept a distant eye and an intentional ear on her status.  The heavenly court sent directives that permeated the earth’s atmosphere moving the connector soul to advance yet again.  Each encounter drew us closer and deeper.  We were bound one to the other, and while the unlimited finite condition of our present location created annoying challenges, we would be joined again as one in this realm as well.  It is what the heavenly court expects and wants – for us to get to a clear understanding of what Heaven really is – not necessarily a location or destination, rather a journey and a state of being.

More agonizing days, weeks, even months passed.

When, finally, I laid my earthly vessel upon her earthly vessel, the moon stood watch and gave its light, time forgot itself and the ancestors rose in praise and worship.  All material objects within range yielded their substance and once again we became a single, free-floating cell suspended by intense heat in the abyss of Divine Love.  We glided and swayed, ebbed and flowed, black to black, black on black, black in black, black as black – just black.  Salty discharge seeped from the pores of our earthly vessels blurring the lines between she and me until we became one and us was all that was left.  Us was brand new! Our souls rocked in the bosom of Abraham, fixed by the other until – we – reached – that – place – called – Heaven!  Amen, and Ashe,’ Ashe,’ Ashe’O...

*Just checking to see if you're still here...  I'll be back with our regularly scheduled program...

Peace 

THEOLOGIA HABITUS EST!

"Little Becomes Much"

"My God uses plain ole ordinary people.

He chooses people just like me and you,

who are willing to do everything that He commands.

God uses people that will give Him all.

It doesn't matter - it doesn't matter how small

your all may seem to you.  Because little becomes 

much as you place it in the Master's hand..."

This time last year, I was unable to do much of a post.  After losing my mother just a few months earlier, I could barely breathe, much less string together a thought into a cohesive sentence.  This year, I'd like to say that I am in a much better place.  However, as you can see, it's been quite some time since I've posted.  With that said, I must apologize not only to you all, but to God the Father/Mother.  I must apologize to my ancestors, Creation and the Universe for forgetting who I am, whose I am and what I've been called to do.  I have fallen down on my duties and my purpose as if I thought I would somehow be exempt from the reality of death and dying - from the reality of losing family, parents, friends and colleagues.  So please forgive me. 

Recently, I met a new acquaintance through a mutual friend.  During some light conversation on an occasion of breaking bread, we were all sharing how we belonged to the "Motherless/Fatherless" crew and how difficult Christmas and the New Year is for us all - and at the time, especially me.  She, having lost her mother and father as well, shared with us something her mother has spoken to her as her life ebbed away; "Everybody wants to see Jesus, but nobody wants to die."  Her response, although rather flip hit me like a glass of cold water.  The truth of the matter is that she's right.  We pray for and sing about "Going Up Yonder," and how we're gonna "Walk Around Heaven All Day," and yet, when death finds our door, we weep and wail for the loss instead of celebrating, really celebrating the fact that our faith tells us that our loved ones are going to a much better place.  Daily, we give little to no thought that God emptied out the God Spirit that manifested in human form for the singular purpose to die so that others might have life-eternal.  And, that that manifested human came into this earthly realm not as one born into a family of great wealth, power or privilege, but as a peasant, bastard child - one of questionable birth - born of a single woman, and cared for by a simple man - just ordinary people.

This post, therefore, is a re-dedication of sorts.  I must take pause and recommit myself to giving God what it is God has called for me to give.  I take this time to recommit myself to giving my all to God, to all that I have been "purposed" for in the first place.  I had begun to feel that I had failed miserably, that I had wasted a lifetime away because I had not acquired, nor could I present all of the accouterments of a "successful" or "Great" life.  And then I remembered myself and all of my heroes - women and men - who have inspired me to be "Great" and to do "Great" things.  They are men and women who endured incredible hardships, betrayal, loneliness, beatings, threats against their life and yes, many gave their life - certainly no small matter - for something as small as the right to vote.  If, asked by a contemporary, "What have you done with all that you have?"  Many of those women and men would probably have responded in the way that I did.  And yet, because of their "small" deeds, we now live in a world where we haphazardly go about with little to no thought about how "Great" those "small" deeds have become for us individually and collectively.

And so, Lord, forgive me for my moment in the pity-pot, for lamenting my lack of "Greatness."  As Martin Luther King, Jr. instructed in his sermon, "The Drum Major Instinct," I, too, fell victim to the desire to be "important," a desire for "attention," the desire "to achieve distinction, to lead the parade."  Lord, I had forgotten how "small" you chose to become, the "small" simple life you chose to live, the "small" simple lies, taunts and betrayals you chose to suffer, and finally, the "small" simple act of laying down your human life so that others might live.  I had forgotten who I was and whose I was until another dear friend sang the song, "Just Ordinary People," by Danniebelle Hall.  It was a song she felt - through her observations - best described me and my faith walk.  She brought me to tears because I had forgotten and lost myself within myself.  I had forgotten how "Great" the "small" act of maintaining a sense of "moral excellence," and how important a larger commitment to "love" is. I had forgotten the "new norm of Greatness."  That being, "everybody can be 'Great,' because everybody can serve."  And so, Lord, I recommit myself to live a life of service - to live a life of purpose that may not come with the material things of life.  I recommit myself to live the life I sing about.

Lord I beg your pardon...  I'm back.

"If I can help somebody as I pass along.
If I can cheer somebody with a word or song.
If I can show somebody he's traveling wrong, 
then my living will not be in vain." 
© Dorinda G. Henry, 2013

THEOLOGIA HABITUS EST! 

"Don't You Think It's Rather Funny?"

"Jesus said to them, my wife."

Yes, I know, I know...  But please...  Cut a sister some slack.  I lost my mother in August 2011.  I lost my father's mother in February 2012, published my first book, AND, it's an election year!  Hell... I had to take a break.  But really, you all know that Jesus and the man's life is nowhere near where we were in Reading the Bible Again for the First Time.  We were just about to get into 1 Samuel when life fell down on top of me, and yes, consequently, I've been derelict in my duties to you.  But suffice it to say, I am still on the wall!  So when the news came out of Harvard concerning the newly released (notice I did not say "newly discovered") papyrus suggesting the possibility of Jesus having a wife was too much for me not to step back into the water for a brief moment.

Now, you all know this is not anything that shook me up or came as a surprise.  I have played around with this topic before and have most certainly opined strongly about it.  What I am most taken aback by, however, is how dismissive people, Christians, and dare I say some scholars have been concerning the news.  I don't know about you, but I was excited to learn that, arguably, we now have definitive information that would - at the very least - suggest that discussions, debates, beliefs, or what have you, were going on in communities of thought in the early church that a certain Mediterranean Jewish peasant, named Jesus, did indeed have a wife.  That the man we have come to know as Jesus the Christ, the Messiah, may have gone so far as to even acknowledge, declare, or decree her to be a disciple! 

Okay, granted this may not be that big of an issue for you, but, to coin a phrase, "Never in my lifetime," would I have imagined the release of tangible evidence that can be studied, debated, added to the already loud discourse surrounding the Historical Jesus - the man, the message, the ministry - taking place in the academy.  Personally, for what it's worth, I will not allow it to be dismissed and swept under the rug.  It gives me goose-bumps!  As a woman in ministry, I'm excited to be alive at this time and in this space and place.  I, therefore, caution some scholars, lay leaders, teachers and preachers; this is not the time to act so blasé, as if it doesn't matter, it's old news.  THIS IS BIG NEWS!  Rather, this is GOOD NEWS!  Everyone has not taken "Introduction to New Testament."  Information accessed in such a class is only studied in academia, by "intellectuals" who then sit around and engage in what I call intellectual masturbation.  It is "privileged" information and it is now finding its way into mainstream - where regular, ole folk like Mama, Bo Daddy, Peaches, Mr. Junior Boy and Ms. Emma across the street can get it, have an opportunity to explore it deeper and consequently, become better informed about the foundation of their/our systems of belief.

Why is that important?  Because while in seminary, I always raised the question; "What good is the Black Theologian?"  Now, as the resident scholar/Preacher, we have an awesome opportunity to take a break from the intellectual masturbation with other Black Theologians/Preachers and engage the "Beloved Community" in ways that may have been blocked to us, or in some instances, by us, that could lead to extraordinary transformation, reconciliation and, redemption.  So, yes, I'm excited!  I'm ecstatic!  I am bursting at the seams to jump right into the discussion and encounter "everyday people" on what it all means personally, theologically, historically, and spiritually.  This is our time.  Yes!  This is our moment.  Carpe diem!  This is our "Call," our, "Charge to Keep."  To qualify it as anything other than that would be to abandon its most fundamental essence, and thus our purpose. 

"A charge to keep I have,
A God to glorify,
A never-dying soul to save,
And fit it for the sky.

To serve the present age,
my calling to fulfill:
O may it all my powers engage
To do my Master's will!

Arm me with jealous care, 
As in Thy sight to live;
And O Thy servant, Lord, prepare;
A strict account to give!

Help me to watch and pray,
And on Thyself rely,
Assured, if I my trust, betray,
I shall forever die."
                       (Charles Wesley) 

© Dorinda G. Henry, 2012

THEOLOGIA HABITUS EST!