Dignity. I remember the first time that I encountered the concept of retaining, maintaining, and protecting my dignity in majority culture (read: white Evangelical) churches. It was either during a Pass the Mic or Truth’s Table podcast. I felt this new idea on a level so deep that it scared me. I knew that even […]
This past week, the world paused and held its collective breath, waiting for the verdict in the Derek Chauvin Trial. Almost a year after Chauvin placed his knee on George Floyd’s neck, and killed him for all the world to see, his verdict was read. Is this justice? Will this lead to lasting change? Is […]
This summer, I protested the deaths of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, and Breonna Taylor starting and ending at the same place Dr. Martin Luther King Jr was assassinated – the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee. I had my mask on while we walked around downtown, sometimes kneeling and praying for the lives lost and that […]
Family, sometimes you have to throw out the script! That’s what PTM host Tyler Burns and Witness VP Ally Henny did during their latest Behind the Mic on IG Live. What was originally an episode recapping the second part of Tyler’s Leave LOUD episode turned into an unscripted convo about Black freedom in white […]
The morning of January 7, 2021, was a relief. I know that relief isn’t what many people felt after witnessing the terrorizing display of white supremacy twenty-four hours earlier, but I was relieved. I was relieved because I knew that it would make it through the day confident that my faith community would see me, […]
Read the Introduction, Part Two, and Part Three. During my fifth pregnancy, I contracted a rare infectious disease that made it necessary for me to abandon my plans for giving birth with a midwife at a birthing center and to find a doctor who would take me at seven months pregnant. You would think that […]
Read the Introduction and Part 2. For my first three pregnancies, I had the luxury of receiving care from a Black OB/GYN. My family relocated toward the end of my fourth pregnancy, which resulted in a struggle to find a care provider. Most of the practices that I contacted would not take me because I […]
According to the National Institute of Health, severe maternal morbidity (SMM) rates have nearly doubled over the past decade. The incidence of SMM was 166% higher for Black women than white women from 2012 to 2015. To be clear, it is racism—not race—that impacts prenatal care and maternal outcomes. This post is part of a […]
This conversation is like water for the soul, fam. Today’s episode features the incredible Cole Riley, the creator and writer of Black Liturgies— a project seeking to integrate the truths of Black dignity, lament, rage, justice, and rest into written prayers. Black Liturgies creates a space of sacred welcome. A space of dignity, lament, truth-telling, […]
Black Maternal Health Week is April 11-17 each year. Advocacy for Black maternal health should be a regular part of our advocacy work and not just during this designated time. The purpose of Black Maternal Health Week is to bring awareness to the systemic disparities stacked against Black women, center the voices and experience of […]
“Being black is exhausting.” A common refrain heard from the voices of disconsolate Black people whenever we are dealing with an onslaught of white terrorism on Black souls and bodies. We say it instinctually. After we’ve engaged in all the scholarly discussions and intellectual gymnastics about racism, we get to the point where the pain […]
Leave LOUD: Tyler Burns with Greg Burns This is a deep cut, y’all. A few weeks ago, you heard Tyler Burns tell his own #LeaveLoud story, but we couldn’t leave it there. As always, there’s more to the story. Tyler invites his father, Greg Burns, onto the podcast to discuss being converted and trained in […]
Black Christians often enter predominantly white or multiethnic churches hoping to participate in a spiritual community where the fullness of their identity in Christ is seen and nurtured. All too often, however, we end up contending with ignorance and insensitivity. We expend immeasurable amounts of emotional labor trying to educate our white siblings about how […]
Have you ever attended a Black Baptist church in rural Alabama for Resurrection Sunday (Easter) before? Since I was a little boy, my mother and I would travel from the Birmingham suburbia and go “back home,” where my grandparents live, joining relatives at a little country church for Resurrection Sunday. Home sits along Alabama’s Black […]
I’ve been wrestling with something that I wish I would have done better a few years ago. I was in a season where I was trying to find a church after suffering through racial trauma and spiritual abuse in a white evangelical church. The problem is that I was searching for a new church without […]
EPISODE DESCRIPTION: The stories continue…After Jemar Tisby and Tyler Burns shared powerful episodes of their #LeaveLOUD experiences, it’s time to hear from our very own Ally Henny. How is the Black Christian experience different in rural settings? Are multiethnic churches truly safe spaces for Black women? What happens when Black women #LeaveLoud? Ally had to […]
“Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows…” Isaiah 53:4 For the second straight year, my Holy Week began with driving by church to pick up our palms for Palm Sunday and receiving communion that was pre-packaged and pre-blessed. We will, Lord willing, get to worship in our church building on Easter (socially […]
In her national bestseller Salvation: Black People and Love, author bell hooks says, “We can not effectively resist domination if our efforts to create meaningful, lasting personal and social change are not grounded in a love ethic.” Effectively resist domination… not grounded in a love ethic. When I read these words, I stumbled, seeing the […]
Black women and Black girls are not valued in American society. Our voices are marginalized. We are often invisible. Even as we make strides in the political arena and fight for democracy, our contributions threaten to go unseen. When injustice threatens the Black community as a whole, the injustice committed against Black women is often […]
You learn a lot by feeding a child. They are creatures of habit with sensitive yet non-discriminatory palates. Yesterday’s breakfast is easily today’s breakfast . . . and lunch . . . and dinner—if the temperature is right. A young child has little control over what they are fed. Even more true is that a […]
