My
daughter turned 9 months last Friday. I celebrated simply by telling the people we
saw that day and the surrounding days. 9 months is a big miles-stone time-period. We are pregnant for 9 months, (more like 10) and then new life begins outside of the body.
Barely
one week later , I awake to the insane news that a shooting happened in the
state that touches mine, in a church. In
a Church. Killing life. Killing 9 lives. At a Bible Study. I'm a church girl, grew up in the church and
have been to probably a million Bible studies in a setting just like that one. The all-Black church that I was born into met every Wednesday night -- just like that. Around some old tables in the musty-ish basement where they randomly sometimes had lemonade and cookies, along with the Study if we were lucky. I especially liked those nights when they had a snack. I know how it goes, a small
group of people, extra dedicated to the work, often with just a little extra
hunger to the things of God, desiring to connect and be faithful. None of them
knew that their regular mid-week meeting, where they encourage everyone to
attend, new and old, would end in this way. Yes our hope is in GOD, alone, and
at the the same time, we have to live in this hostile racial climate, just as
these brothers and sisters, victims of this man's hate, unsuspecting that their
world was going to be shattered that night.
Where will the world be in 9 more months?
To
think that this is the world I have to offer her? A world with people who
simply hate, and I mean hate with a pure hatred, Black people??? It is still
mind-numbing to think, this could have been a number of settings that I am
accustomed to being in. Yes, where I often go, to find peace and serenity in. To worship God with others.
My
white brothers and sisters in Christ seem strangely silent. And it bothers me. I don't
know that I can go to one more setting with them, where they say nothing. Where
I have to be the one to bring it up. Where it goes over their head. Where the
subject quickly shifts to what movie we're going to watch this weekend, what
types of recipes are we using lately, how delicious the brownie tastes...I just
can't. I just can't be that Black friend, for anyone right now, of which I
know, I'm their only one, and that's why they have NO CLUE how to navigate
these waters. Well, the reality is that, I don't either. I've not been here
before. None of us have. But like so many other things, they get to check out
if they want to. Or avoid the subject altogether. For us, it's on all of our
minds, and if we're the church-going type, it'll be on our minds for a very
long time.
Where
are we safe? Several amongst of us have asked already. On Twitter, on Facebook.
Wondering, is there not anywhere that we can go anymore, that is considered
sacred, a safe space?
Since
this is a themed blog, where I focus on my journey as a Black woman, journeying
through motherhood as, mother, my first social challenges have already arisen.
How will I introduce my sweet little baby girl, Black baby girl to these
harsh realities? When will be the first time, that I have to wipe her tears as
folks say stuff to her they have no business saying? Will I be able to protect
her from the ignorance, loud silences from the white Church about who she
is, how she too is created equal and beautiful in the image of her God?
I
don't care what some insane-actioned white people think. I will
always teach her that she is beautiful and beautifully made on purpose, as a
Black person. This leads me to the terrible atrocities that is currently
happening in the DR towards my people. I will fight against this message that
Haitians are an undesirable people and are to be shunned from the only
country that thousands have known for generations. Why are we bent on
proving that one group is better than the other? Why can't we accept and
embrace that the God of creation has created beautifully both Dominicans and
Haitians? As a Black Canadian woman of Haitian descent, I am a very proud
Haitian-Canadian unapologetic woman, about my heritage. My daughter's heritage,
as well. When she reads these posts and articles about how Haitians were kicked
out by Dominicans, or treated badly by the Bahamians, I want her even before
she learns this foolish history that is being created, that Jesus made her very
intentionally, the daughter of a Haitian-Canadian, knowing full well that she
would therefore, amongst her other cultural/ethnic heritages, be Haitian too,
have Haitian blood running through her veins. That was not an accident nor a
mistake.
The
young man who killed those 9 people in Charleston, the Dominicans who choose to actively hate and shun their neighboring countrymen, the silent White church who
keeps quiet about racism, historical and current, and Sunday after Sunday does
nothing to educate, encourage, their members to do a 180 and repent and begin
to care about Black people in their cities; who does nothing to encourage them to form genuine
friendships and becoming true allies and understand what it means to be a
family in Christ across racial lines, perpetuate these atrocities. If that
conservative shooter had understood that these were actually his brothers and
sisters in Christ, he would not have shot them. His actions demonstrate that he
had no such understanding. And I believe all of this grieves, offends and
angers the heart of God.
Today
we weep with Charleston. We stand with the families, mothers, fathers, sisters,
brothers, uncles, aunties, cousins who have lost - in the most senseless tragic
way. Today as a Haitian, I refuse to take in the humiliation that is
being thrust upon my people by the Dominican Republic government. I refuse to
have my daughter question whether there is value in her skin tone, and her
ethnic heritage. As a Black Christian woman, I take my cues about who I am from
the Lord God Almighty. Jehovah is His Name. I do not receive the message from
this intentionally racist misguided hate-filled boy-man, that black lives are made to be
destroyed. This is a message from the enemy of our souls, not from the Creator
of these precious Black lives.
I
hope and pray that as my daughter turns 1 year, 19 months, 9 years old, 19
years old, 29 and so on, and so forth, there will be enough courageous souls,
especially those of White Christians, led by the Holy Spirit's leading against
all of this injustice and start with baby steps, whispering, "enough is
enough!" And then getting stronger, saying Enough is Enough. That they
will shout with us, their Black brothers and sisters, ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!! That
they will believe and say, and live with their actions, their friendships,
their homes, their churches -- that All life is sacred. Including Black lives.
- Achlaï Ernest Wallace
