by Nicole Symmonds, Urban Faith Contributing Writer | Nov 10, 2014 | Headline News |
Dr. Myles Munroe
Last night news broke that Dr. Myles Munroe and his wife Ruth were among nine passengers who died in a plane crash as their flight headed into the Grand Bahama Airport. Munroe, the founder of the Bahamas Faith Ministries and Myles Munroe International, was a world-renown speaker, preacher, and the author of 69 books. His books covered topics from spiritual growth and personal development to nurturing romantic relationships and strengthening leadership. Munroe’s ministry touched many in ways that won’t soon be forgotten and a search through some of his work proves that he was a man who practiced what he preached in living a purposeful life. Already, many preachers and ministry leaders have taken to social media to share how much Munroe’s ministry meant to them.
We here at UrbanFaith.com and Urban Ministries, Inc extend our condolences to the Munroe family, friends, and ministry partners. Yet we are thankful that Dr. Munroe will live on through his work. One of the most significant ways Munroe will live on is through the books he wrote and co-authored. We gathered just a few of his encouraging words on spiritual growth, character development, and relationships to celebrate his life and work.
“You must decide if you are going to rob the world or bless it with the rich, valuable, potent, untapped resources locked away within you.” Understanding Your Potential
“People generally fall into one of three groups: the few who make things happen, the many who watch things happen, and the overwhelming majority who have no notion of what happens. Every person is either a creator of fact or a creature of circumstance. He either puts color into his environment, or, like a chameleon, takes color from his environment.” Understanding Your Potential
“God’s love sets us free from the need to seek approval. Knowing that we are loved by God, accepted by God, approved by God, and that we are new creations in Christ empowers us to reject self-rejection and embrace a healthy self-love. Being secure in God’s love for us, our love for Him, and our love for ourselves, prepares us to fulfill the second greatest commandment: To love our neighbor as ourselves.” The Purpose and Power of Love & Marriage
“Marriage is two imperfect people committing themselves to a perfect institution, by making perfect vows from imperfect lips before a perfect God.” The Purpose and Power of Love & Marriage
“Communication is the ability to ensure that people understand not only what you say but also what you mean. It is also the ability to listen to and understand others. Developing both of these aspects of communication takes a lot of time, patience, and hard work.” The Purpose and Power of Love & Marriage
“Purpose is when you know and understand what you were born to accomplish. Vision is when you see it in your mind and begin to imagine it”
“Being open to correction means making ourselves vulnerable, and many people are not willing to do that.” Waiting and Dating
“Solid character will reflect itself in consistent behavior, while poor character will seek to hide behind deceptive words and actions.” Waiting and Dating
“Friendship is not a gift, but is the result of hard work.” Waiting and Dating
“The greatest tragedy in life is not death, but a life without a purpose.”
Do you have a favorite Myles Munroe quote from one of his books or a moment when you heard him speak? Share them in the comments section. Please also keep Dr. Myles and Ruth Munroe’s families in your prayers as well as all of their friends and those connected to Bahamas Faith Ministries and Myles Munroe International.
by Nicole Symmonds, Urban Faith Contributing Writer | Oct 31, 2014 | Headline News |
Today is everyone’s favorite day for tricks and treats and great costume feats, well almost everyone’s. As many kids as there will be out trick or treating in ghoulish costumes there will also be a number of kids dressed up as biblical characters heading to Harvest Night, Hallellujah Night, Hallelujah House of Praise, Hell House and other Christian spins on Halloween festivities. But not all church kids do this excitedly.
In the video below, Kev on Stage–1/3 of the Playmakers, the group behind “Stuff Black Church Girls Say” and “10 Types of Black Preachers”–perfectly captures a church kid’s thoughts on celebrating Halloween as part of the set apart. If you let this kid tell it, church kids are a little disenchanted. Watch the video and see for yourself and then let us know what you and your kids do–or don’t do–for Halloween.
by Nicole Symmonds, Urban Faith Contributing Writer | Oct 27, 2014 | Headline News |
Over the weekend I encountered two posts which revealed what children, particularly black children, are being taught in school. It’s not as obvious as a Common Core Curriculum or a teacher’s lesson plan, instead it is the implicit lessons our children are learning from course materials and unfair disciplinary measures that communicate that they are less than equal to their white peers.
Example #1
Excerpt from a Frank Schaffer publications workbook
I came across this picture on Facebook on Saturday morning. The young woman who posted it didn’t explicitly point out the problems of this penmanship assignment but everyone who commented on her post saw it. I saw it too. Why were the white children happy and proud while the black children were sad and angry? Why was it not the other way around or a mix? Why didn’t the person who created this exercise realize the implicit message this could communicate to all children about the life experiences of their peers? This is not an innocuous assignment but one that could internalize for a child the misguided message that white is synonymous with good and black is synonymous with bad. We already have proof that at a young age, children have ideas about the meaning of whiteness and blackness as Dr. Kenneth and Mamie Clark’s doll test–and the countless iterations of it–indicate. As one Twitter user aptly pointed out:
When you’re “color-blind” things like this go unnoticed. #edchatpic.twitter.com/Qy2gYCX9ud
— zellie (@zellieimani) October 25, 2014
Example #2
Yesterday morning The Atlantic published a story entitled “The Economic Impact of School Suspensions,” based on a report released in September by the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund and the National Women’s Law Center. The report provides both qualitative and quantitative data showing the ways in which African-American girls are the victims of unequal and inequitable treatment in the education system. The Atlantic story focused on the finding that African-American girls outpace their white peers in suspensions and, because of these suspensions and other “overly punitive discipline practices,” they suffer in school and sometimes end up impoverished. The story unfolds with Tiambrya Jenkins, a 14-year-old high student who was suspended and placed in a transitional academy after a fistfight with a white student. The white student went back to school after 90 days, but Jenkins ended up at the transitional academy for the rest of the school year. What kept her in the transitional academy so long? “Minor missteps” such as talking out of turn, dress code infractions, and organizational mistakes such as forgetting a notebook. All of these resulted in turning the clock back to 0 on her 90-day suspension and her having to start the process all over again. Two years later Jenkins, once a top math student, returned to high school and couldn’t keep up with her classes because she was so woefully behind. Jenkins’s story is but one example of how disciplinary measures are unfairly meted out to black students versus their white peers. The study also finds that while black female students are suspended more than their white counterparts they actually don’t misbehave more than them. Instead it is cultural misconceptions and stereotypes that set black female students back. Of this the story says,
“Traditional” middle-class notions of femininity, which value passivity in girls, can clash with stereotypical images of African-American females as loud, assertive, and provocative, and generate differing punishments for similar conduct, the authors note. Subjective offenses like “disobedience” or “disruptive behavior” may signify little more than a student’s failure to conform to dominant gender norms or fit a teacher’s view of what constitutes appropriate “feminine” behavior.
The authors of the study state that racial stereotyping and perceptions are not the only reason for negative educational outcomes but they impose “significant barriers to achievement for African-American girls.” Other reasons for negative educational outcomes include the fact that African-American students are disproportionately enrolled in under-resourced schools–schools without quality resources, credentialed teachers, rigorous course offerings, and extracurricular activities; unequal access to STEM learning opportunities; sexual harassment; violence; trauma; early pregnancy and parenting challenges; and discrimination by personnel. Thus we discover that it is no explicit doing on the part of black female students, rather it is cultural misconceptions and incompetence held by teachers and administrators as well as the students social location that creates barriers to equitable access to the education system. A system that makes it clear that privilege shapes access and a black child’s access to a good education will be a hard won for manifold reasons mostly out of their control.
So what can we do when the odds are stacked against our children and they are bombarded by messages of their undesirability and unworthiness for an education on par with their white counterparts? The study offers a number of recommendations in the concluding section entitled, “A Call to Action to Eliminate Educational Disparities for African American Girls” including:
*Address overly punitive disciplinary practices that disproportionately impact African American girls and push them out of school.
*Combat gender-based harassment and violence and ensure that African American girls get the support they need to heal from trauma they experience.
*Improve STEM opportunities and participation among African American girls.
*Require the reporting of data that reflect the needs of African American girls.
*Invest in the future of African American girls.
It is one thing to talk about the challenges that African American girls face in their pursuit of an education and a piece of this so-called American dream, but what is necessary is action and investment in them. I don’t take it lightly that the authors of this report put their recommendations under a section entitled “call to action” because that is what is needed in the battle for equitable education for our children. It is not just the responsibility of parents but of whole communities–those with privilege and without–to take part in creating a more equitable educational space that is not stymied by social and cultural incompetence. “Invest in the future of African American girls,” is the last of the recommendations made in the study and it is time for us to invest in African American girls as much as we invest in African American boys.
Click here to read the complete study, Unlocking Opportunity for African American Girls.
by Nicole Symmonds, Urban Faith Contributing Writer | Oct 1, 2014 | Feature, Headline News |
OWN Network has brought us self-help from Iyanla Vanzant via her show “Iyanla Fix My Life;” life lessons from some of today’s most influential celebrities and public figures such as the late Maya Angelou, Whoopi Goldberg, Cicely Tyson via Oprah’s Master Class; and now the network brings us “Help Desk” via, you guessed it, a desk. On this new series journalist Gotham Chopra, the son of Deepak Chopra, hosts and introduces some of the world’s top “thought leaders” to everyday people in order to help answer the heavy-hitting questions of life. In a recent episode DeVon Franklin, the Hollywood producer and Seventh-Day Adventist pastor who married actress Meagan Good took a seat at the Help Desk to help a young woman who desires to abstain from sex until marriage.
28-year-old Fallon has been with her boyfriend for six months and they are sexually active, but she realizes that she now wants to abstain from sex in their relationship. She sees this move as trying something new since, in all of her previous relationships, she never abstained from sex. Therefore her question to Franklin is how she should broach the topic with her boyfriend and journey toward abstinence after time as a sexually-active person. Well she came to the right person. Franklin and Good pledged to abstinence until marriage and the couple is working on a book entitled “The Wait” about how they kept that pledge during their courtship. Thus Franklin rose to the occasion and offered Fallon some tactical suggestions and words of encouragement based on his experience. Watch the video to see what he says.
Do you agree with his advice? What might you add or subtract?
Catch Help Desk on the OWN Network every Sunday at 12PM EST.
by Nicole Symmonds, Urban Faith Contributing Writer | Sep 9, 2014 | Headline News |
By now many have heard about and/or seen the video of former Baltimore Ravens player Ray Rice punching his then fiancee Janay Palmer, rendering her unconscious, and dragging her out of an elevator in a New Jersey casino. The release and subsequent dissemination of this video lead to Rice’s termination from the Ravens and an indefinite suspension from the NFL. Following this many gave the Ravens a pat on the back for releasing Rice while others argued that it wasn’t enough. Another faction—both men and women—have taken up victim blaming and shaming Janay Rice because she stayed with Ray despite his violent proclivities.
In the midst of this Beverly Gooden, a writer and a member of the Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network speakers bureau–among many other things, shared the story of why she stayed in a domestic violence situation under the hashtag #WhyIStayed. Her sharing lead thousands of other women and men to share the stories of why they stayed in physically and mentally abusive relationships. #WhyIStayed was joined by #WhyILeft and both provided insight and firsthand accounts of men and women victims and survivors of domestic violence which made me thankful for the power of social media to serve as a vehicle for story and truth-telling. But there’s another hard truth being revealed in #WhyIStayed and that is in the role of pastors, Christian counselors, and the church at large.
Having scoured through many of the tweets I noticed that every tweet mentioning the church was sobering. Not one woman or man credited the church with helping them escape violent situations, instead the church—both Catholic and Protestant—enabled abusers through silence that implicitly stated their siding with the abuser. This is a reminder that the church’s silence on issues of this nature register as the church’s disregard and lack of concern for the victims. Below are just some of the tweets mentioning the church’s role in domestic violence–and it should be sobering to read the preceding phrase as the church choosing a side in this battle.
These are just some of the tweets from domestic violence and sexual abuse survivors and more are coming in by the minute. But these aren’t the only tweets pastors and church folk should pay attention to, no, they should be reading all of the tweets from their fellow brothers and sisters who have or are currently living in physically, mentally, and sexually violent situations. The community of faith must hope and work toward being part of the solution in situations of domestic violence and sexual abuse. Christian counselors, pastors, ministries, and churches should be widely mentioned in #WhyILeft instead of scantly as they currently are. It is my hope that pastors, pastoral counselors, spiritual leaders, and people of faith in general will start to be an explicit part of the solution and not an implicit and/or complicit part of the problem. Until then, here are some resources for those for victims of domestic abuse and church leaders struggling with how to care for current victims and survivors of sexual abuse.
The online hotline of the Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network a 24/7 hotline that provides support for victims of sexual assault, their families and their friends.
Safe Havens Interfaith Partnership Against Domestic Violence, a 23-year old interfaith organization that works at the intersection of faith and domestic violence through several projects such as vigils that raise awareness about intimate partner violence to cell phones drives where cellphones that are reprogrammed to dial 911 are donated to victims of domestic violence.
The FaithTrust Institute which develops and promotes resources that aid in increasing safety, justice, and healing to domestic and sexual abuse contexts.
Books to Read:
Domestic Violence: What Every Pastor Needs to Know
Telling the Truth: Preaching Against Sexual and Domestic Violence
This is by no means a comprehensive list and we welcome additions by way of leaving comments or by tweeting us @UrbanFaith and using the hashtags #WhyIStayed and #WhenILeft. We want the world to know that the community of faith has an active stake in the well being of all persons and to prove that we are not comfortable letting silence speak for us. We want to move from being part of the reason why people stayed to the reason why they left.
