Posted on Wednesday, October 14, 2015

Seven Oh So Necessary Things You Must Be Prepared To Give Up if You Turn Away From the Lord…

For My Wannabe Black Atheists Who Haven't Thought This Through...

Hello World,

So last week I was reading one of my favorite blogs VSB (Very Smart Brothas) which is by no means a Christian blog or a religious blog or a spiritual blog so if you know me here, don’t go over there expecting to be taken to church…It’s not gonna happen, but these very smart brothas are always good for a chortle or three and a fresh if not irreverent, well-written perspective on pop culture…so I appreciate them…So imagine my chagrin when I did come across this religious blog post “Six Foolproof And Effective Things To Do To Bring Atheists Back To The Lord” by Natalie Degraffinried last week…Judging by the title alone you could probably think that this blog post would be weaponry we could add to our arsenal because all my Christian soldiers are forever trying to bring back atheists to the Lord (because we are on the battlefield for my Lord), but knowing the very smart brothas as I do, I knew the content that followed this title would be anything but foolproof and effective things you can do to bring atheists back to the Lord…It seems that Miss Degraffinried recently revealed to her black mama (by the way Miss Degraffinried is also black) that she is an unbeliever and her black mama has pretty much gone ballistic…Because we all know that most black mamas (unless you a millennial) are believers…Here is one tactic her black mama tried…

“…my mother watched more Christian programming than I had ever seen in the days to follow. And not just the Black pastors, either—she watched the little wrinkled old White men who emulated the Black preachers, too, spreading the word of the lord to little southern middle-aged White ladies. In fact, she would very deliberately change the channel to it when I would come into the room, glare at me, and then sit and watch.”

Aside from what her black mama did, Miss Degraffinried goes on to illuminate the six MOST effective foolproof and effective things you can try to bring atheists back the Lord: Say “You’ll Turn To God When You’re Down On Your Luck,” Ask “What Made You Stop Believing In God?”, Ask Them A Bunch of Probing Questions, And Ignore Their Answers, Praise God…All the Time, Say the Same Things Over and Over and Over and Over and Over Again.

Actually, I like her list because it gives me some insight about what not to do obviously… and thankfully, as far as I know, I have never done these things…But don’t get it twisted…I haven’t tried any of these things not because I am enlightened…It’s probably the opposite…When I am come across an atheist – well really, black atheists in this country, I’m pretty much dumbfounded…everybody knows that the Lord is how we got over so when I meet a black person who must know that AND has a black mama, I really don’t say much of anything…In fact, I may just walk away mid-sentence and conclude he or she must be from the North because here in the South even the most backslidden believer with Hennessy in one hand and weed between his fingers on the other will call on the Lord when necessary…which brings me to the point of today’s blog post…I’m a much better writer than I’m a speaker so after thinking about Miss Degraffinried’s blog post for a few days, I’ve come up “Seven Oh So Necessary Things You Must Be Prepared To Give Up if You Turn Away From the Lord” blog post because a looong comment on VSB just wouldn’t do…So Miss Degraffinried, this blog post is dedicated to you and all my people who are thinking of becoming atheists…

If you are thinking of becoming an atheist, you must be prepared to give up:

1. Martin Luther THE Kang...Everybody knows that Dr. King, the father of the Civil Rights Movement, was down with G.O.D.(yeah, you know me…I know…I’m corny…Forgive me, I’m not a millennial) If you become an atheist, you relinquish your right to revere this man (as much as you can a man anyway without being sacrilegious…oh wait…never mind…) because he trusted in the Lord as his King and Jesus Christ was his Savior and both of them as well as the Holy Spirit guided him on how to get our civil rights…And you pretty much have to give up coming to the A too because we are all about the Kang in these parts…We are so Kang, we are building a monument to MLK on top of Stone Mountain (because he’s been to the mountain top) to make up for the fact that Stonewall Jackson, Robert E. Lee, and Jefferson Davis are etched on the side of it…

2. Your affiliation with your HBCU…While we are on Black History, many HBCUs were founded by people who believed in the Lord…Bethune-Cookman University, Clark Atlanta University, Dillard University, Meharry Medical College, Paine College, Rust College, Morehouse College, Xavier University…I could keep going…If you’ve got a degree from any of these institutions, you better get on your knees and thank the Lord because He opened the doors for these schools to be founded…

3. Pastor Shirley Caesar, Yolanda Adams, Cece Winans…In other words, you must give up gospel music…That may not seem like a big deal now…but when you are going through, you will be forced to either Bow Down to Beyoncé, Roll With Rihanna or worse- Elevate With Enya…You know as well as I do when you are going through, none of these ladies can lift you up like the aforementioned gospel greats…Read my blog post “Breaking Down the Holy Spirit/Why Beyoncé Did Ledisi A Favor…” and you will see what I mean…

4. The word “blessing” or “bless” or “blessed” etc.…Blessing means “God’s favor and protection.” So no more hashtags #blessed…And if you like Big Sean’s song “Blessed” and the remix, you’ve got to give up both of those songs too…I would guess that Big Sean aine in church ere Sunday but I would bet he believes in God and his black mama is working on getting him back to church ere Sunday…Kinda like when Marion Winans was rocking with Diddy back in the day…I’m sure the Winans were having prayer vigils trying to get him to leave the world alone and fully commit to Christ…And what are you gonna say when something good happens to you? Us believers say it was a blessing…Something about the double “s” makes you feel happy…What do unbelievers say? And you can’t even curse someone out without them knowing it anymore…That is what “bless your heart” means by the way….

5. Grace…And while we’re on the subject of blessing, you cannot bless or say grace over your food because you don’t believe in that… Miss Degraffinried says she told her black mama that God doesn’t fit in her life while they “waited at the window of an Arby’s drive-thru” where she ordered “beef n cheddar sandwich, curly fries, and jamocha shake.” I’m assuming she didn’t pray over that because she’s and atheist an all, but if it’s anywhere you need to say grace, it’s at a drive-thru…There and over your old auntie’s potato salad that used be so good you wanted to do cartwheels after the first bite but now since she gotten old, she doesn’t know how to season anymore but no one has the heart to tell her that she should probably stop cooking…

6. Getting married in a church…If you become an atheist, you have to give up getting married in a church…If you don’t believe in the sanctity of the church building, why bother honoring the sanctity of marriage there?…of course, you can always get married on the beach, a backyard, etc…And I will concede that getting married in a church is not necessarily any more holy than getting married anywhere else since God is everywhere…(if you believe) But here is the flip side, not only should you not have your wedding there but you can’t have your funeral there either…And nothing is more depressing than having a funeral at a community center or any other nondescript place that will host an atheist funeral…I know you’re probably saying why I should care, I will be dead, but think about those that have to go to your funeral…Are you really going to subject your family and friends to sitting in uncomfortable folding chairs while ignoring the fact that they smell old gym shoes mixed with Pine-Sol. And on top of that, they are forced to listen to Enya because of course, you can’t have hymns at your funeral…

7.Christmas cards…Atheists cannot send Christmas cards…”Christ” is smack dab in Christmas so why would you want to? So go ahead and start stockpiling your Merry X-mas cards which are pretty much stupid…What is X-mas? Everybody knows that X is supposed to be either a substitute for “Christ” or you just don’t know to spell…You would do better to get some Santa Claus cards…But then again, if you believe in Santa Claus over Jesus then I really can’t help you at that point…You are beyond saving…Just kidding…

So there you have it…before you black atheists turn your back on the Lord, you many want to reconsider…Christians of other races, please feel free to modify for your own culture….

Any thoughts?

Posted on Monday, September 28, 2015

Kelly Gissendaner Will Be Executed Tomorrow Without Our Intervention…

Read to find out how you can help!

Editor’s Note: This is a previous post from earlier this year. Kelly Gissendaner’s life was spared in March, but she is scheduled to be executed tomorrow unless we act. To find out more about Kelly Gissendaner, please read the blog post below . To help her: the most important thing you can do is call the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles RIGHT NOW and tell them to show mercy. Here’s the number: (404) 656-4661, press “0” and then “4.”

Then, email them by clicking here, post a message to their Facebook here, and click here to send a Tweet.

Hello World,

Last week, when I first saw a story about Kelly Gissendaner, I quickly looked at the mug shot and read a few lines of the story “Weather Threat Postpones Georgia’s First Execution of a Woman in 70 Years” and concluded, she looks like a criminal and went on with my life…

But then through the blog post “When Is Grace Enough?” by Alisha L. Gordon on findthepieces.com, I saw another side of this dead woman walking initially through the picture above…and then through these words…

This matters, even now, as I have friends and colleagues who personally know Kelly. They’ve laughed and talked with her. They’ve walked with her through new theological understandings and guided her to completing a certificate in theological studies through the Candler School of Theology and the Lee Arrendale Prison, where she’s currently housed. The partnership between Candler and Arrendale has provided women like Kelly the opportunity to transform their lives — from the inside out. It has given her a fresh start on a life that took a terrible turn. It was a full extension of God’s grace in action. To read the rest of the blog post, go to findthepieces.com.

And then on Friday, on the WAOK radio program “Too Much Truth” with Derrick Boazman, I listened to the testimony of Nikki Roberts, a former inmate at Metro State Prison in Georgia and pastor’s daughter, who found herself in jail and suicidal…As a pastor’s daughter myself, I was compelled to listen as she cried and described her friendship with Kelly Gissendaner…But for Kelly Gissendaner, she may have taken her life…Nikki Roberts talks about Kelly Gissendaner here…

Kelly Gissendaner’s story has even found its way to The New York Times…

From “A Death Row Inmate Finds Common Ground With Theologians.”

A lot of convicted felons find God while in prison. Some of their stories rise to the level of literature — Oscar Wilde, Malcolm X. Others are less sincere; parole boards around the country are treated to a lot of conversion stories.

Few are anything like Kelly Renee Gissendaner, 46, who is scheduled on Monday to be put to death by lethal injection. She became pen pals with one of the world’s most prominent theologians.

In 1998, Ms. Gissendaner was sentenced to death for persuading her boyfriend to murder her husband. The crime, which she now admits, was brutal. Many, including some of her slain husband’s relatives, want her to die. She probably will; the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles denied clemency this week. To read the rest of the story, go here.

Here is a link to her clemency application

And here is link to a Facebook page supporting Kelly Gissendaner, and if you tweet about Kelly Gissendaner, use the hashtag #KellyOnMyMind…

And of course, she can use our prayers….

Any thoughts?

Posted on Sunday, August 2, 2015

Hashtags, Confederate flags and Lions, Oh My…

Hello World,

I’m a hashtag away from jumping, head first, from a bridge…Okay, I’m so I’m being a wee bit dramatic…But I am a hashtag away from falling sideways from my desk chair onto the carpet below so that I won’t be able to see any new hashtags sure to pop up on my social media accounts on my laptop computer…

I’m still stuck on #PrayforCharleston and since then, the hashtag activism world has moved on to #SandraBland, #SayHerName and as of this week #SamDubose. Let me be clear, in my President Obama voice (Chile, what’s going to happen to us when he’s longer in the White House?), this post is NOT about trivializing any of these horrific incidents, diminishing the unfathomable grief these families must be experiencing right now nor downplaying the inspiring activism that has been organized to address these and similar incidents…This post is simply about my #fatigue and skepticism about various commentaries relating to these and similar incidents…

And I feel like an Internet traitor for feeling this way…Whenever a new horrific incident has transpired, we cannot wait not one beat before countless eloquently written diatribes are disseminated with the quickness…Just some knee-click responses if you ask me…It happens so predictably that I have to wonder if this #Internetoutrage is really true…And I have to wonder if I saw these people in real time, would they be ranting and raving like the way they do on the Internet…Sometimes, things that transpire are so terrible, so egregious, so tragic, there are no words that should be said and or written (outside of the basic news) for a while…

From what I’ve gathered from reading various blog posts, Facebook posts and tweets, it seems the popular sentiment is that black people should be walking around or driving around in fear of being stopped by the police or having any contact with the police altogether…It’s like an NWA song come to life…Truth be told, I tend to not care for the police, but my feelings about the police go back a long time way, way, way before a hashtag was created, when a hashtag was just a number sign even…Why, you ask? Well, #1, I don’t care for anyone telling me what to do (a character flaw), and #2, sometimes, I get the feeling that police officers and criminals are opposing sides of the same coin…However, that being aside, I refuse to live in fear of the police….My God, yes there are some racist, vile police officers out there, but I’ve also known some decent ones…

And maybe I’m not down with every aspect of the #movement because of my overall aversion to pain and discomfort and my ability to see good in almost anything…I wonder what I would been like if I had come of age during the Civil Rights Movement…I just can see myself marching with Dr. King and nem and after a while saying, “You know what? My feet hurt, and I’m ready to go back home to my mama’s house. I got rights there.” Or if I lived during slavery, when Harriet Tubman was trying to get folk to get on the Underground Railroad with her, would I have been the one who asked, “Do they have any snacks on the Underground Railroad cause Massa got snacks at the Big House?”

I jest…But seriously I do have #Fatigue…

***

Now on to this whole Confederate flag debate…I feel like this a classic case of “Come get yo crazy cousin.” Erebody has a trifling cousin that just won’t do right…That cousin who asks you for a loan but hasn’t paid you back from the 50-leven he or she has already asked you for money…That cousin who is always bragging about all of the moves they making when the last move he or she made is the move back to your auntie’s (mother of said cousin) house…That cousin who is hopelessly, undeniably, matter-of-factly stuck on stupid…I feel like rational people of all races realize the Confederate flag is about hate not heritage, but some white people refuse to see what everybody knows…I don’t care how you whitewash it… So to rational white people, I say, “Come get yo crazy cousin” because they are not listening to us (black people)…

Speaking of us…Case in point…Seen at a Confederate flag rally in Stone Mountain Park yesterday…An alleged KKK member wearing FUBU tennis shoes…The FUBU acronym means For Us By Us and is the creation of Daymond John, the black millionaire on “The Shark Tank.” If that ain’t a case of “Come get yo crazy cousin,” I don’t know what is…

And if the flag is about heritage not hatred, what’s up with putting Confederate flags outside of Ebenezer Baptist Church? Yes, that Ebenezer, the Ebenezer Baptist Church of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and at the Martin Luther King, Jr. National Historic Site? Allegedly, the culprits were two white males.…How are black people supposed to take that? “Come, get yo crazy cousin.”

***

Now on to this Cecil the Lion…As someone who loves the Cowardly Lion in “The Wizard of Oz” and Simba in “The Lion King,” I get the international outrage about dentist Dr. Walter Palmer hunting down and killing Cecil the lion…I guess it seems so inhumane because Cecil was big as a human being, and I just think there is something wrong with killing other human beings…I don’t see people being upset if Palmer would have stomped a million cockroaches to death or used his hands to smash a million mosquitoes although cockroaches and mosquitoes are also living creatures…#alllivesmatter, remember?

That being said, the #blacklivesmatter activists and the animal rights activists need to join forces because the animal rights activists are bout it bout it….they don’t play…they gets thangs done, you hear me?!

Actress Mia Farrow got gangsta with it and tweeted the Palmer’s address! He has had to close his business for fear of folk avenging the death of Cecil the lion! And now senators have created a bill dedicated to the the Cecil the lion according to The Huffington Post…

The Conserving Ecosystems by Ceasing the Importation of Large (CECIL) Animal Trophies Act would extend current U.S. import and export restrictions on animal trophies to include species that have been proposed for listing as threatened or endangered under the Endangered Species Act. Read the rest of the store here.

Here is one thing that black people can do to gain the sympathy of animal rights activists…