Speaker 1: Happy Holidays listeners. It's Amber here. The ladies are taking
Speaker 1: a week off for some much needed rest, but we
Speaker 1: wanted to share last season's episode about making the holidays
Speaker 1: your own. In this throwback, Jill, Asia and Laia share
Speaker 1: their favorite traditions. We know that this is not the
Speaker 1: easiest time of year for folks, but remember to take
Speaker 1: care of you. There's power and peace and your divine no.
Speaker 1: I hope you all get some rest, whatever that may
Speaker 1: look like before the start of Infuse your days with
Speaker 1: a little audio, soul food, and catch up on any
Speaker 1: episode you missed of j dot Ill. We'll be back
Speaker 1: next week with a special episode to end out Welcome
Speaker 1: to j dot do a production of What's Up? Everybody?
Speaker 1: How are you? I hope that you're so good? Thank
Speaker 1: you so much for checking in with us. Um. This
Speaker 1: is j do Ill the podcast, and I'm here with
Speaker 1: my sister friends, my strong powerful woman, Liah Sinclair, strong
Speaker 1: and Powerful, Damn Straight and Age of Graydon Danceler Booty,
Speaker 1: whoa I like when I say dance dance That's a
Speaker 1: nice name. I wish I had more syllables. I didn't
Speaker 1: get enough syllables. And I'm gonna tell you that my
Speaker 1: mother put an exclamation point on my birth certificate. You
Speaker 1: mention that to you, You told me, Yes, So my
Speaker 1: name is really Jill Scott. That's amazing. It really is, though,
Speaker 1: Like it really is. I I enjoyed that choice. Your
Speaker 1: son King, that's a nice name. It is a nice name. Yeah.
Speaker 1: My nephew's name is King. It's short for Kingston, but
Speaker 1: we call him King. I saw you had a pretty
Speaker 1: baby on the Instagram. A that's your knee. She's so beautiful.
Speaker 1: First of all, my sister in law, my sister in love. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I really do believe that she was brought here to
Speaker 1: the earth to make pretty babies because she literally has
Speaker 1: five little girls and they are all adorable. Like she's
Speaker 1: a little pretty black girl baby making machine. And she
Speaker 1: her latest one is ah, it's the icing on the cake,
Speaker 1: her latest one, her latest one. Listen, I'm like Jill,
Speaker 1: the dam women like them babies, honey is point. Okay,
Speaker 1: they take the socks off when they're handling them. They
Speaker 1: take the socks off. Yes, girl, Yeah, you have a
Speaker 1: really really big family, huh, I do. But the teen
Speaker 1: my husband is the oldest of six children, and this
Speaker 1: is his sister who also now has six children, as
Speaker 1: we have six children. But yes, so they are a
Speaker 1: lot of cooking. Oh yeah, girl, you know I've cooked
Speaker 1: every day for bazilion years, but now I don't do
Speaker 1: it anymore. I'm gonna tell you what broke me, this
Speaker 1: here pandemic. I cooked every day for about three and
Speaker 1: finally I just was like, I can't do it anymore.
Speaker 1: So I implemented finn for yourself night. Oh and I
Speaker 1: also I also look hashtag like the kids. Okay, give
Speaker 1: it to um fit for yourself. I'm just shaking my head, yes, sir.
Speaker 1: And then was also just my older children had to
Speaker 1: take a certain night to cook. So yeah, a lot
Speaker 1: a lot of cooking. Can you come from a big
Speaker 1: family like you? No, it's you know, it's just me
Speaker 1: up and here. But my mother and my father are
Speaker 1: both the youngest of their bruise Like, my mom's the
Speaker 1: youngest of five, my dad's youngest of nine. And yeah,
Speaker 1: this is it for me. So I adopt people. I
Speaker 1: got a lot of god brothers and sisters and whatnot.
Speaker 1: So the holiday times is kind of uh, it's it's
Speaker 1: more relaxed for you because how many people are showing
Speaker 1: up friends and family or it depends. Last year we
Speaker 1: did the whole. A lot of New York folks from
Speaker 1: my dad's side came down and we had dinner at
Speaker 1: my mom's house. So that was really nice. But to
Speaker 1: be honest, shoot, as far as the Christmas holidays and
Speaker 1: then only child, we cut that out about twenty five
Speaker 1: years ago after the presidents and we just decided to travel.
Speaker 1: We do our own things on the holiday. That's delicious.
Speaker 1: My mama likes so jealous. Yeah, that's nice, So let's
Speaker 1: go somewhere instead. So now that we started that little tradition,
Speaker 1: I'm trying to hopefully maybe this year and maybe well
Speaker 1: don't I don't win. When do you start preparing for
Speaker 1: the travel? Well, Jill, as a daughter of a flight attendant,
Speaker 1: do right, I'm like that can vary from mommy, we're
Speaker 1: gonna we're going this year. We're we're going. Okay, so
Speaker 1: come three a week before, we're gonna start packing and
Speaker 1: then and then a couple of days for that, we're
Speaker 1: gonna pick the flight to see what the low look like. Oh,
Speaker 1: this fight attended life is real. Yeah yeah, so you Angel,
Speaker 1: you you gotta you know, cook for a lot of people.
Speaker 1: Let me tell you something. Thanksgiving was all I mean
Speaker 1: for years and turkeys, isn't it? Well? No, not, well,
Speaker 1: it is if we go to family's house, if we
Speaker 1: go over, we went up. We've gone over to my
Speaker 1: mother in law's house many times. And then because also too,
Speaker 1: I have a mother, we have bounced from my husband's
Speaker 1: mother's house to my mom's house, until finally I had
Speaker 1: so many kids, I was like, listen, y'all, I don't
Speaker 1: feel like dressing all these kids, cart and all these
Speaker 1: kids to go over to somebody else's houses and eat,
Speaker 1: And then like, what is the leftover situation gonna be? Like?
Speaker 1: By the time I pack up food from your house,
Speaker 1: I'd then packed up leftovers that looked like a whole
Speaker 1: like I cooked. So I was like, no, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: cook at home. I sit there and feed my children.
Speaker 1: I said, if y'all want to see these kids, I
Speaker 1: bring them over for a dessert or something like that.
Speaker 1: My mother with my mother and my family and my
Speaker 1: in laws are like a family. They're close to. So
Speaker 1: my my siblings and my mom are all close to
Speaker 1: my husband's sibling and mother. So we have a bit
Speaker 1: of a really good mixture. So we tend to spend
Speaker 1: time together. And we also have two different religions in
Speaker 1: our family. That's how I was about because my mother
Speaker 1: we don't celebrate Christmas because we're Muslims. My mother and
Speaker 1: please don't get mad at me for cussing and carrying
Speaker 1: on in this show, like look, y'all can just save
Speaker 1: the emails now, I cuss um so uh. And my
Speaker 1: mother's side is Christian, and so typically Thanksgiving over the
Speaker 1: years would be the time that we would end up altogether,
Speaker 1: but on on the on the Islamic side, on the
Speaker 1: Muslim side, we would do eat dinners and that would
Speaker 1: be that's the time. Add there's two eads a year
Speaker 1: and a calendar Islamic year, and so we would get
Speaker 1: together and cook and eat for eat, And then I
Speaker 1: just thought about that, Asia, you've got a lot of
Speaker 1: holidays in your bigs, like you got not a hot
Speaker 1: but traditions. You got a lot of traditions. And that's
Speaker 1: a lot of traditions. But it's not that you know,
Speaker 1: it's actually I think really good for the kids because
Speaker 1: the kids get to just understand about diversity within family
Speaker 1: and that you know, blood of ties are stronger than
Speaker 1: cultural ties and that you can still really believe and
Speaker 1: do what you do and still be able to be
Speaker 1: respectful of your family and things like that. So I've
Speaker 1: I've loved over the years that my kids have got
Speaker 1: an opportunity to do that, and the little extra work
Speaker 1: is just that, Hey, you know, you gotta have an
Speaker 1: extra conversation. You gotta keep family on point, make sure
Speaker 1: everybody is aware, you know, that kind of thing. And
Speaker 1: even with Christmas, though my children don't celebrate Christmas, they
Speaker 1: have family members who do so in the past they
Speaker 1: may have, like you know, sent the kids a couple
Speaker 1: of dollars or this that of the dog. You're about
Speaker 1: to say, you the hold you hold Jehovah. So that's
Speaker 1: I mean, not not now, but you were raised that right.
Speaker 1: So the first off, first, sorry what I do. I'm sorry, sorry,
Speaker 1: I'm I'm They're called Jehovah's witness. I'm sorry, I shortened everything.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry to be called Jehovah and be like me
Speaker 1: calling aja Allah. Okay, and y'all not a five percent
Speaker 1: of witness. I got it. Jehovah Witnesshovah, Jehovah. That's a
Speaker 1: black thing, and it is it is what it is.
Speaker 1: But they're Jehovah's witnesses, and um, yeah, I grew up
Speaker 1: as a Jehovah's witness, not because I was baptized as
Speaker 1: Tehovah's witness, but because that's the house I lived in.
Speaker 1: And as you know, you know, when you grow up
Speaker 1: in the house, that's what you do. You do whatever
Speaker 1: your parents are doing. So I grew up my my
Speaker 1: mom and my grandmam, and we definitely missed. I feel
Speaker 1: like I missed out on a lot of stuff like
Speaker 1: holidays and things until I got old enough to catch
Speaker 1: the transportation by myself. Once. Once I got old enough
Speaker 1: to hop on that fifty four and catch the subway
Speaker 1: and then gone, and I forgot what other bus I
Speaker 1: cold I don't remember now to to get to Mount
Speaker 1: Airy where I would go to my aunt's house and
Speaker 1: she would have Christmas there. So that meant I got
Speaker 1: to eat the good Christmas food. I got to play
Speaker 1: oh No all night long and laugh out loud, and
Speaker 1: my aunt would always get me something God blessed. There
Speaker 1: was never anything that I wanted, but the fact that
Speaker 1: she thought of me meant a lot to me. And
Speaker 1: until I got older and was like Hey, listen, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna just want you to keep that, like, keep that
Speaker 1: money in your pocket. You don't have to buy me anything,
Speaker 1: you know. Um, but the holidays were really, really fun.
Speaker 1: I thought from not celebrating them to celebrating I was like,
Speaker 1: this is cool. And then I got older and I
Speaker 1: was like, wait a minute, wait one minute talking work
Speaker 1: conversation after the break. So Christmas is I don't know
Speaker 1: the exact numbers right now, but when I was reading
Speaker 1: about it, it was like Christmas was seventy of America's
Speaker 1: economy three and that was a long time ago. That
Speaker 1: was a long time I don't I don't know, you
Speaker 1: know what it was then, but that was enough to
Speaker 1: shake my world up and asked myself, like what am
Speaker 1: I exactly getting into and why am I doing this? Um,
Speaker 1: there's the stories, clearly, you know, we've all heard the
Speaker 1: stories about uh Jesus and Christmas. Um how number one,
Speaker 1: Jesus wasn't born in December, So who made up December
Speaker 1: twenty five as his birthdate? And why do we give
Speaker 1: gifts and all of that? Jack and well it wasn't
Speaker 1: attempt Okay, So the historical implication of is that, um
Speaker 1: it was an attempt. I know she would. I was
Speaker 1: setting it up. We know this answer already, so I
Speaker 1: don't appreciate y'all set me up as almighty. It wasn't
Speaker 1: attempt for the king at the time. I want to say.
Speaker 1: It's probably like Constantine or somebody who was trying to
Speaker 1: spread Christianity but knew that the cultural and uh, the
Speaker 1: cultural beliefs of the people where he was we're not
Speaker 1: right in line with Christianity at the time. They were
Speaker 1: celebrating winter Solstice and uh something else I want to say,
Speaker 1: called christ Mass or something like that. And so what
Speaker 1: he decided to do was allow them to keep elements
Speaker 1: of their cultural celebrations and mesh it together with Christian
Speaker 1: tradition so that he could ease the people into celebrating
Speaker 1: or practicing Christianity. So, um, that's how you get Christmas
Speaker 1: in December. That's my understanding of it. Nick comes into
Speaker 1: the conversation. That's not how sat Nick comes into the conversation,
Speaker 1: but that is how stuff like uh you'le tie greetings
Speaker 1: and things like that come into play. And um, the
Speaker 1: like I said, the time period and things of that nature.
Speaker 1: So yeah, and trees like a Christmas tree. That's when
Speaker 1: the that's how the Christmas tree comes into play, and
Speaker 1: garland and um mistletoe and things like that. So yeah,
Speaker 1: so that's where you have some Christians who over time
Speaker 1: have actually stopped doing those types of traditions because they
Speaker 1: understand it it's not necessarily a quote unquote Christian tradition.
Speaker 1: Ship it's an American at this point in American, but
Speaker 1: now it's very American because you do find people, like
Speaker 1: she says, like a part of part of the economy.
Speaker 1: So people come here from other places and part of
Speaker 1: their um embracing American culture is to celebrate Christmas. The
Speaker 1: music is nice, and I have always loved the lights,
Speaker 1: my children, my little Muslim children. I've always loved the lights.
Speaker 1: I've always loved the lights, and I've I've always enjoyed
Speaker 1: the music and the getting together and the smells of
Speaker 1: it all. I always thought that was so nice. Um,
Speaker 1: But when I had my son, I think we had
Speaker 1: Christmas maybe twice, and I just felt wrong. I just
Speaker 1: I just didn't sit right for me, because you know,
Speaker 1: we have all of these things, all of these holidays
Speaker 1: that make money. Really, you know, think about it, I wrote,
Speaker 1: I wrote cards for Hallmark Father's Day, Mother's Day, Valentine's Day.
Speaker 1: You know there's as the cards by the way, the
Speaker 1: you know, I'm just saying every Mother's Day, Father's Day.
Speaker 1: I was looking at something so Christmas didn't feel right
Speaker 1: one because I didn't grow up celebrating it. I got
Speaker 1: a chance to participate in it with my Aunt Shirley.
Speaker 1: Shout out to Aunt Shirley, who was so beautiful and
Speaker 1: kind and loving to me. Miss you so much, um um.
Speaker 1: So I got a chance to experience that. But when
Speaker 1: I had my own child, I was like, do I
Speaker 1: really am I really setting him up? You know? Do
Speaker 1: I want to do? I want to tell him lies? Right?
Speaker 1: I always wonder how I handled this a parent. I'm sorry,
Speaker 1: go ahead, you yeah, like you know, it's it's not real,
Speaker 1: Like do you want to tell a lie? And and
Speaker 1: not for nothing? The thing that you know, I went
Speaker 1: around with my mom when she find decided not to
Speaker 1: do it. I started to think too about how I
Speaker 1: would have these amazing chris is this become the New Year.
Speaker 1: My mom was trying to figure out how to rob
Speaker 1: Rob Peter to pay Paul, and I was like, that's
Speaker 1: not it's not fair. No. So when I was little,
Speaker 1: what my mom used to do is she would wait
Speaker 1: until Christmas was over and then we would go shopping
Speaker 1: because it was all of the Christmas holiday stuff. And
Speaker 1: I had gone back to school without doing the then
Speaker 1: going shopping part. And I came back to school, I
Speaker 1: had on the same clothes I had on the week,
Speaker 1: you know, a couple of weeks before that, and all
Speaker 1: the kids had new clothes. Just was it messed with me? Like, oh,
Speaker 1: you know, I felt jealous and I felt like I
Speaker 1: was getting left out of something that I wanted to
Speaker 1: So I didn't want to do that to Jet. But
Speaker 1: I also did not want to lie to the kid
Speaker 1: about these holidays. So I invented it famists fam us
Speaker 1: fam yeah, faminess. You know. I was like, okay, Christmas,
Speaker 1: but I was like, faminist family is family is what
Speaker 1: are the things that I love about holidays or traditional
Speaker 1: holidays in America? Um? Well, you know, you get together
Speaker 1: with your family, you you cook with your family, y'all,
Speaker 1: listen to music, your dance, you play games. You know
Speaker 1: somebody's gonna you know, play spades or something like we're
Speaker 1: going to enjoy each other. And I was like that's
Speaker 1: what this that's what people really are, you know, inclined,
Speaker 1: that's what they really love to do. It's it's it's
Speaker 1: the family portion. So it's like, okay, I'm going to
Speaker 1: create a holiday that is about family. Family. Is the
Speaker 1: only difference between Christmas and Faminists is it is? Well,
Speaker 1: it's there's two differences. Instead of putting up uh garland,
Speaker 1: and we put up the colors of our of our culture.
Speaker 1: So there's a lot of African flags around the house,
Speaker 1: and we put up pictures of people we respect and
Speaker 1: admire all around the house during the during Faminists. Um, um,
Speaker 1: we we have a tree, but our tree is black.
Speaker 1: What the hell do you get that from the home goods? Wow? Yeah,
Speaker 1: we have a black tree and um we put we
Speaker 1: put pretty much anything we want on the thing thing.
Speaker 1: Sometimes it's pictures of us, sometimes it's a cante cloth,
Speaker 1: or sometimes it's African flags depend you know, all over
Speaker 1: the continent. Um. So there's pictures of people we admire
Speaker 1: and respect and then there's this black ash tree and
Speaker 1: that we do do presents, but you have to earn them.
Speaker 1: And how you earn a gift on Faminists is you
Speaker 1: have to write a one page essay. It can be longer,
Speaker 1: but it's a one page essay about whatever you want
Speaker 1: to talk about, whatever you want to talk about, and
Speaker 1: then we all sit after dinner. We all sit and
Speaker 1: listen to one another speak out loud and think out loud.
Speaker 1: So you know, one year, Jets was about raccoons because
Speaker 1: we had raccoons in our you know, trash sometimes, and
Speaker 1: what we found out from his essay was that raccoons
Speaker 1: have sensories in their hands. You know, they have five
Speaker 1: digits like we do, so, but they have sensories. So
Speaker 1: when they touch a trash can, they're like, that is jelly?
Speaker 1: What else is that? Some onions? And yeah, right, and
Speaker 1: then he's he's okay. So the essays have to be handwritten,
Speaker 1: or I mean, they don't have to be handwritten, but
Speaker 1: it's nice. I prefer them to be handwritten. Once you
Speaker 1: read your essay, then you get your gift or gifts
Speaker 1: depending because everybody in Abody can give anybody a gift.
Speaker 1: But if you don't um, if you don't read your essay,
Speaker 1: you ain't get nothing. And that's just the way it works.
Speaker 1: You don't get without giving, and that's just the way
Speaker 1: it is, so we go from listening to our elders
Speaker 1: to listening to the children and everybody in between. So
Speaker 1: we get to our family gets to hear us thinking
Speaker 1: about whatever we want to talk about. It could be anything,
Speaker 1: and that is the gist of families. It doesn't have
Speaker 1: any religious implications. So my mother comes, she's a Jehovah's
Speaker 1: witness and she's like, you know, she doesn't celebrate holidays, um,
Speaker 1: but this doesn't have any religious implications. So it's more
Speaker 1: of a family gathering. It's family is families. So I
Speaker 1: think it works for any culture, whether you're uh Indian,
Speaker 1: whether you're Italian. You know, to have pictures of Italian
Speaker 1: people that you're respecting, to admire all around the house,
Speaker 1: to have your true red, white and green um. To
Speaker 1: to sit and listen to your family, you know. Think.
Speaker 1: So that's pretty much what familis is, and that's what
Speaker 1: we've been celebrating for the last five years. So last
Speaker 1: thing is because it's the essays are on paper, I
Speaker 1: collect them and um keep them in a little famous box.
Speaker 1: What's not little anymore, but keep him in a famis
Speaker 1: box and it becomes a family treasure. So I can
Speaker 1: look back and say okay. In you know, uh, two
Speaker 1: thousand and and you know twelve, you wrote an art,
Speaker 1: you wrote an essay about why you don't want to
Speaker 1: do homework or why you think homework is unfair. You
Speaker 1: know what I mean? And you get to also see
Speaker 1: your own hand right here, particularly you know, particularly for
Speaker 1: the kids that how long does it take to develop
Speaker 1: a holiday? Jill? Um, I guess overnight if that's what
Speaker 1: you wanna do. I mean you fai is, how how
Speaker 1: long did it take you to figure all those elements out? Well?
Speaker 1: It didn't take long because I've been thinking about it
Speaker 1: for years, Like what is it that that bothers me?
Speaker 1: What is it that that doesn't sit well with me?
Speaker 1: That one? This is such a big economic holiday that
Speaker 1: bothers me? Um too, it doesn't have any basis in history?
Speaker 1: And why not praise the Lord all year round? Praise
Speaker 1: Lord's praise Lord all year round. Whomever you decided you
Speaker 1: call God based on information that you know, or based
Speaker 1: on your family and how they've taught you. Praise the
Speaker 1: Lord all year round. Be grateful for for your creator
Speaker 1: and creation all year round. But at this time, celebrate
Speaker 1: family and celebrate family and ask of them to do something,
Speaker 1: to get something. What I mean, I'm gonna tell you,
Speaker 1: I know that the being with family part, particularly for
Speaker 1: black folks, is the pool for all of these holidays,
Speaker 1: you know, because obviously even the question around whether or
Speaker 1: not black people should even be celebrating Thanksgiving has come
Speaker 1: up in my family in the past five years, as
Speaker 1: we talked about that should we even be celebrating this,
Speaker 1: especially since I have friends who are who are Indigenous,
Speaker 1: and they just feel so deeply disrespected by that holiday.
Speaker 1: And so for us, you know, as we all should
Speaker 1: feel deeply disrespected by it. Um. But I think also
Speaker 1: to you know, the idea of being with family for us,
Speaker 1: that's what resonates it says, Okay, well, I just wanna
Speaker 1: I'm not even I'm not keyed into all of it.
Speaker 1: I just want to be able to play bid with
Speaker 1: and eat some good food and you know, and be around,
Speaker 1: you know, my extended family. So I can really appreciate
Speaker 1: being intentional about that, because you know, these are things
Speaker 1: that keep us together, These are the things that keep
Speaker 1: us going, and you know, all over the diaspora, but
Speaker 1: particularly here in America, where it's like what is for us?
Speaker 1: But I love the fact that in some states and
Speaker 1: here in Pennsylvania, Juneteenth is now considered a holiday, an
Speaker 1: official holiday here in the state of Pennsylvania. And for
Speaker 1: Tina and I rode in the Juneteenth Parade last year,
Speaker 1: and um, we were the Grand Marshall's dolling yes and
Speaker 1: c ys and it. And it got me to thinking,
Speaker 1: I known about Juneteenth a long time, but I had
Speaker 1: never really been really intentional about celebrating it. Um and
Speaker 1: uh and again, Um, Black History Month in my household
Speaker 1: is a very big deal. And I am the only
Speaker 1: person I know who decorates for Black History. More so,
Speaker 1: I actually decorate for Black History Month. So when you
Speaker 1: were saying the thing about putting up the pictures and stuff,
Speaker 1: I was like, oh girl, this is me a Black
Speaker 1: History mouth, Like this is how I am. Man. I
Speaker 1: love the fact that, um, you kind of kind of
Speaker 1: came with your own family traditions. I think that's super
Speaker 1: important that even though there's some things cross culturally that
Speaker 1: we that we should continue to honor, one of the
Speaker 1: real things that I feel like it's important to honor
Speaker 1: is those things that become important to your individual family
Speaker 1: and that um, those are the things you get to
Speaker 1: pass on from generation to generation, you know, which is
Speaker 1: why stuff like family reunions are such a big deal
Speaker 1: in our community and um, you know things like that.
Speaker 1: Here's one thing I know I made up that my
Speaker 1: kids and I did UM on Juneteenth, I want to say,
Speaker 1: two years ago, was I decided that I bought a
Speaker 1: very large piece of um, handmade and hand printed UM
Speaker 1: mud cloth that has some cante woven into it as well. UM.
Speaker 1: And this was what I played over top of my
Speaker 1: mother's casket, m Um. And this is you know how
Speaker 1: she was there when when during her service we I
Speaker 1: took that and out laid it out on the table
Speaker 1: it was and and what I was telling the kids
Speaker 1: was that, you know, during slavery, obviously we weren't allowed
Speaker 1: to learn how to read, but we used to do
Speaker 1: these things called pit schools where people would escape in
Speaker 1: the middle of the night and dig a ditch in
Speaker 1: the into the ground and get inside the ditch and
Speaker 1: cover it with leaves, and that they would learn how
Speaker 1: to read at night in these pits schools and these ditches.
Speaker 1: And one of the ways they learned was by writing
Speaker 1: into stuff like flour and salt. M And so what
Speaker 1: I did was. I told the kids, I said, okay, here,
Speaker 1: we're gonna cover our table. This is a um something
Speaker 1: to honor our particular ancestors. And you know, my mother
Speaker 1: is an ancestor now. And I sat out a little
Speaker 1: tray and I said, okay, guys, I put the flower out.
Speaker 1: I said, this is our way of honoring how our
Speaker 1: ancestors learned before they were free, to learn how to
Speaker 1: read and to learn how to have their own self determination.
Speaker 1: And so I was like, you can write anything in
Speaker 1: a flower that you want. You can write the name
Speaker 1: of an ancestor, you can write a shape my heart
Speaker 1: or whatever your own name, whatever. But this is our
Speaker 1: way that we honor the ways that they learned. And
Speaker 1: so my kids and I did that, and you know,
Speaker 1: and that was our That was part of our June
Speaker 1: taking celebration. Yeah. Yeah, we're free. We're free in a lot,
Speaker 1: not every way, but we're not enslaved. Were not enslaved.
Speaker 1: So you have the capacity to come up with whatever
Speaker 1: it is that you want to come up and make
Speaker 1: that a thing for your family. Hey, listen, I think
Speaker 1: in this moment's funny jail, as you were talking about,
Speaker 1: I want to say, right that's about I was about
Speaker 1: to say, that'stivist. I'm sorry, that's that's time field. Oh,
Speaker 1: that's and that we have festivals the day before, families,
Speaker 1: festives for the rest of this, festivals for the rest,
Speaker 1: so that you have that the day before. So y'all
Speaker 1: do festive that y'all do families. And it is interesting
Speaker 1: because I thought it was a nice tie into quanda too,
Speaker 1: because while you're celebrating your family for one, then you
Speaker 1: start celebrating your culture in your community in the next. Right. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but I tapped out by then. I ain't gonna I'm
Speaker 1: not I'm not even gonna hold you up like comment.
Speaker 1: I will say, it's a lot to me. I tried.
Speaker 1: I didn't grow up selling it, celebrating holidays or birthdays
Speaker 1: for that matter. So I'm gonna apologize now. I'm probably
Speaker 1: not going to remember your birthday unless you tell me
Speaker 1: and I put it in my phone because I I
Speaker 1: I don't remember. I just already told you all. We
Speaker 1: got nine thousand people in our families, so I forget
Speaker 1: my own damn birthday. If the radio didn't tell me
Speaker 1: or the Instagram, they're like, it's just guy's birthday. I'd
Speaker 1: be like, oh it is, I'm two under nine again.
Speaker 1: I hesitated to bring up Quansa because I was like,
Speaker 1: I don't you know, people feel different ways about Mr
Speaker 1: Karna Karina, but at the same time, at the fundamentals
Speaker 1: of what it asked of you, of what it really
Speaker 1: boils down to is fucking amazing. And shouts out to
Speaker 1: m two May and all the rest of the elders
Speaker 1: who actually helped make that holiday happen as well, like,
Speaker 1: I mean, you can't deny it, right, yeah, actually don't
Speaker 1: have an issue with the actual principles of And I
Speaker 1: mean I know that people, you know, so many things
Speaker 1: have come out about about um you said about Karina.
Speaker 1: But for me, for me, I do think people who
Speaker 1: continue to celebrate Kawanza, I know what their intentions are
Speaker 1: and I and I think it's actually a beautiful time
Speaker 1: for a lot of families and really gives, you know,
Speaker 1: African Americans in particular, an opportunity to connect in a
Speaker 1: way that speaks to who we are here but also
Speaker 1: honors our culture in Africa where we and what we
Speaker 1: brought with us. And I don't think there's anything wrong
Speaker 1: with that. There's nothing wrong with saying Okay, yes that
Speaker 1: I am connected to an absolutely a product of the continent,
Speaker 1: but here we had a specific kind and not just
Speaker 1: here but in other places of the diaspora. Experience is
Speaker 1: you know, chattel slavery, which is you know, it's an experience.
Speaker 1: It's it's something that you can't forget. It's something that
Speaker 1: did happen and did affect our ability to be connected
Speaker 1: the ways that in the ways that we were before that.
Speaker 1: So I think it's nothing wrong with you know, as
Speaker 1: a community saying hey, let's let's figure out a way
Speaker 1: to reconnect. But then also um acknowledge that we are
Speaker 1: a new thing, you know, And I so no problem
Speaker 1: at all with that. I love it. I wish we
Speaker 1: could have more holidays like that, Like we don't really
Speaker 1: have a lot of holidays African American culture wise, do
Speaker 1: or do we am I tripping? I'm like Kwanza Black History,
Speaker 1: Black History June Team, June Team Team. What happens in
Speaker 1: New Orleans and Louisiana? What is it? Um Marti Gras
Speaker 1: Mardi Gras. Okay, it's funny. You know, some things are
Speaker 1: taken from us and built in the something else. So
Speaker 1: I totally forget about Mardi Grad that way, because you
Speaker 1: are so right? Uh ok, MRTI grad Junete Kwanza, all right,
Speaker 1: I could use it, just a couple other ones around
Speaker 1: in UM, in Chicago and the Midwest, they have Sweeter's Day.
Speaker 1: What's that Sweetest Day? Is um black people's version of
Speaker 1: Valentine's Day? Black Love Day? Or I'll take it all,
Speaker 1: I'll take or a single celebration whatever, Yeah, why not?
Speaker 1: And then of course in in in New York and
Speaker 1: Miami you got Carnival, you got mm hmmm yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, yeah, I forget weekend day parade single to Mayo.
Speaker 1: For other cultures is that who well, don't say this.
Speaker 1: This is this is where we get lost because we create,
Speaker 1: we create holidan. We didn't create holidays, but we celebrate holidays,
Speaker 1: which is just fine. Um. And creating your own holiday
Speaker 1: for your family and making a tradition for your own
Speaker 1: for your family is beautiful. And I think so um
Speaker 1: as someone who participates in it. But here we are, here,
Speaker 1: we are what's up? So she's about to get it.
Speaker 1: It does frustrate the life. Oh it drains my my,
Speaker 1: my life when I see so many of us going
Speaker 1: into debt for Christmas, going into debt for Christmas for
Speaker 1: people who do not deserve this amount of gifting. It's
Speaker 1: shocking to me that we still celebrate the holiday that
Speaker 1: we kind of know there's not really truthful of what
Speaker 1: it is, and we just definitely know that it's a
Speaker 1: big money making day. But we are so in the
Speaker 1: line of this tradition for generations and generations that we
Speaker 1: just couldnot let it go. It's amazing to me, very
Speaker 1: much like Jesus Listen already in Trouble Less about it.
Speaker 1: We said we were going to talk about things, and
Speaker 1: we are here to spark conversation. I asked my grandmother
Speaker 1: about that. Listen. I had the same conversation with my
Speaker 1: mother and my grandmother. My question is always this, what
Speaker 1: exactly have um white people that were enslaving folks giving
Speaker 1: them for their benefit. They don't want you to read,
Speaker 1: they want you to speak your language. They didn't want
Speaker 1: you to pray to how you pray, so they've given
Speaker 1: you and the fact that we continue to hold on
Speaker 1: to this. Yes, you know I I do don't I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't know what you're gonna do with this. I
Speaker 1: know this, I know that I love God. I do.
Speaker 1: I do. There's no there's no ifs, ands or buts
Speaker 1: about that. I am so appreciative. I am so grateful
Speaker 1: that I've learned my relationship with you, whope, God. And
Speaker 1: there are so many names, and that's that's your business,
Speaker 1: how you want to deal. I have Uh John three
Speaker 1: on my neck and it is because, um, it says
Speaker 1: for those who don't know, for God so love the
Speaker 1: world that he gave his only begotten son, so that
Speaker 1: whomever shall um believe shall not perish but have everlasting life.
Speaker 1: I'm paraphrasing a little bit, um, but nonetheless, most of
Speaker 1: you know what that is. And I just think that
Speaker 1: we've gotten that confused. For God so loved the world
Speaker 1: that he gave his only begotten son so that whom
Speaker 1: ever shall believe in him. Now, let me tell you
Speaker 1: like this, if I was if somebody asked me to
Speaker 1: save the world by giving my only begotten son, y'all
Speaker 1: will be some dead mother. She'd be dead, she could dead.
Speaker 1: We all be dead, and we're going together my only
Speaker 1: begotten son. I always think, man, that level of love,
Speaker 1: to to love human being so much to give your
Speaker 1: only child for them is massive, and that should be
Speaker 1: respected and appreciated and honored and cherished, if we're going
Speaker 1: with the stories to be true. I really feel that way,
Speaker 1: and it bothers me when people don't give our creator
Speaker 1: the credit deserved. For God so loved the world that
Speaker 1: he gave his only begotten son, so that whomever shall
Speaker 1: believe in him, the Creator himself, so whomever shall believe
Speaker 1: in him, shall not perish, but have everlasting life. Well,
Speaker 1: I mean, I think it's about to unpack. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: a lot of time, it's plenty. There's a lot to
Speaker 1: unpack there on one of the things that I will
Speaker 1: say this about black folks and there and they're um
Speaker 1: forced or perceived forced because well, after slavery, they were
Speaker 1: forced to embrace Christianity, but a form of Christianity that
Speaker 1: was obviously um twisted and intended to keep them, intended
Speaker 1: to keep them enslaved, you know. But obviously there it
Speaker 1: was that same Bible and that same teachings, those same
Speaker 1: teachings that also spoke to so many enslaved people that
Speaker 1: incited them to riot and rebel, you know, because Nat
Speaker 1: Turner actually believed that God had spoken to him. Harriet
Speaker 1: Tubman said God spoke to me, these are not people
Speaker 1: who read a book or were intellectuals. These were hardcore
Speaker 1: spiritual people. But they also came from very similar backgrounds
Speaker 1: in their africanness. Oh yeah know that they did. They
Speaker 1: actually did so, I mean so, and they had certain
Speaker 1: spiritual beliefs that were passed out. So the reason why
Speaker 1: I say all this is because African Americans have successfully,
Speaker 1: in many ways, many many many ways, merged together what
Speaker 1: they brought on the ships with Christianity in such a
Speaker 1: way that empowers the spiritually that has been at the
Speaker 1: core of their resistance. So if you start to peel
Speaker 1: back the layers of Black resistance over several years, you're
Speaker 1: gonna find a lot of that is what what changes it.
Speaker 1: And not just Christianity, but also with Islam, because when
Speaker 1: you look back at some of the other you know,
Speaker 1: leaders of different rebellions, they had some backgrounds and beliefs
Speaker 1: that were Islamic. And then also to the big Haitian
Speaker 1: Revolution was started with a religious ceremony based in Vodoon,
Speaker 1: which is based in Yaruba. So it's like all of
Speaker 1: this is who we are. We take who we are
Speaker 1: everywhere that we go, we take who we are where
Speaker 1: we go. And so when you talk about just from
Speaker 1: our own background, right, sometimes we don't always know, we
Speaker 1: don't always know that that's what it is. But believe
Speaker 1: you me, that is what it is. And when you
Speaker 1: start talking about holidays, that is where we start to
Speaker 1: get into Okay, well what does this mean or what
Speaker 1: is the mean behind this? So that I'm sure that
Speaker 1: it's not contradictory to what I believe, because you know,
Speaker 1: I hear your voice in the back of my head
Speaker 1: when it comes to these holidays, right, it's it's all
Speaker 1: because of white supremacy. That's not all of them, not
Speaker 1: all of most of the American ones that we celebrate. Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean because it's about capitalism. It's like Jill said,
Speaker 1: this is about people making money and being able to
Speaker 1: make money off of us as as individuals. It's not
Speaker 1: about making life better you know what I'm saying, or
Speaker 1: making you more spiritually connected. You know that whenever capitalism
Speaker 1: embraces a thing, but racial capitalism embrace Christianity from the gate,
Speaker 1: there's no way to separate the two. You've got to
Speaker 1: have the conversation, not be afraid to have that conversation.
Speaker 1: It doesn't it doesn't diminish any one person's belief because
Speaker 1: you can find Christianity and Ethiopia way before they ever
Speaker 1: came here. So you can because is everywhere. That's what
Speaker 1: I'll be scared. That's that's why I was scared, always scared.
Speaker 1: That's scared because I did as my grandmother. But it
Speaker 1: was always an interesting point for me because I was
Speaker 1: like as black as my grandmother. What it was I
Speaker 1: always wondered, like the story of Christianity and what I
Speaker 1: knew of it and how it came to Black Americans.
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, that's interesting that we get it
Speaker 1: when we have a habit of taking things and making
Speaker 1: in our own and switching it from a negative to
Speaker 1: a positive. But man, this is a doozy. This is
Speaker 1: a real juzy. I always start. I mean, it would
Speaker 1: be a really good idea to say that Ethiopia was
Speaker 1: never called used. That's true, but the me came down,
Speaker 1: it everywhere, came everywhere, everywhere. Well, you know, the end
Speaker 1: of the day is that I don't know a lot
Speaker 1: of folks who when they hear the world holiday, they're
Speaker 1: thinking a holy day. M hmmm. So and holy day
Speaker 1: can be two different things, and particularly People who are
Speaker 1: very religious are more likely to focus on a holy
Speaker 1: day than a tradition. Traditions for them can come and
Speaker 1: go because the tradition can be started by someone who,
Speaker 1: you know, whatever, but something that's tied into your actual
Speaker 1: belief system. You know, people I know. But then you're like,
Speaker 1: it's not his birthday. It's not a day. It's not
Speaker 1: a birthday. He's not a day. That's different. And then
Speaker 1: you tell us a story about how we all came
Speaker 1: to this day, and it's like, okay, of things. We
Speaker 1: believe a lot of things just because they tell us
Speaker 1: to believe it. And it's a tradition of believing. It's
Speaker 1: not just telling but forcing people got their teeth pulled out,
Speaker 1: um with with pliers and such, people got their feet
Speaker 1: cut off, you know, forcing them to be Christians another
Speaker 1: reason which makes it hard, always made it hard for
Speaker 1: a rebellious me to go. So we're just gonna roll
Speaker 1: with this is the truth, even though we was. What
Speaker 1: I would need though for me, UM, what I would
Speaker 1: need is for Christianity to actually do it's its job.
Speaker 1: I needed to do its work. I need UM churches
Speaker 1: to be smaller and black people to be more Um, affluent.
Speaker 1: I see a lot of a lot of big churches,
Speaker 1: and I cannot front with you like it. It bothers me.
Speaker 1: I know, people, Um, you know there's a I've visit
Speaker 1: a lot of different places, you know when it comes
Speaker 1: to religion. So you know, I'll check out a Buddhist
Speaker 1: temple for a while, and I'll go to a Catholic
Speaker 1: church for a while, and you know, just pay attention
Speaker 1: and look around and listen and see what I'm getting. Um.
Speaker 1: And sometimes I say one place longer than others. Um,
Speaker 1: there's a church that I was going to here in Tennessee.
Speaker 1: And I have a friend who was going through some
Speaker 1: hard times, particularly with this COVID and she's worked for
Speaker 1: the church and she's benefited and been there to help
Speaker 1: in so many areas and she needed some help. So UM,
Speaker 1: myself and some others we joined together to to help her.
Speaker 1: And then after that we were like, okay, so you
Speaker 1: know we're in a good a better space, a good space.
Speaker 1: Let's go to the church. And they told her they
Speaker 1: would pray for her, and I was like, wait, ha,
Speaker 1: I'm having a hard time with that. When the pastor
Speaker 1: has you know, a dumb ridiculous, big gass house. Like
Speaker 1: I'm having a hard time. My mom used to call
Speaker 1: her counselment about it, Like that church, you bid, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I just I don't understand why there isn't more um
Speaker 1: like like similar to the Black Panthers where you're supplying
Speaker 1: supplying food and shelter for people, like I don't understand,
Speaker 1: and somebody like, oh my church. I'm just talking about
Speaker 1: as a whole because this is such a part of UM,
Speaker 1: a part of Black people and what we pour ourselves
Speaker 1: into and were pouring ourselves into, not just our faith
Speaker 1: absolutely without question, but we're also pouring ourselves into these
Speaker 1: um these edifices, were pouring ourselves into these these places
Speaker 1: that don't seem to benefit the people as they should.
Speaker 1: There should be more universities, you um, um HBCU should
Speaker 1: not be struggling with the amount of money that comes
Speaker 1: through you know, um churches. The churches are getting bigger,
Speaker 1: but and the the you know, the pool is getting bigger.
Speaker 1: They've got lights like you know, uh, like a show
Speaker 1: like Vega shows that basket comes around. I don't know
Speaker 1: three phone times, you know, I just need it whatever
Speaker 1: it is to actually be a benefit or Yeah, it
Speaker 1: needs to be a benefit to the people and love
Speaker 1: to the churches that are because we know there's not everybody.
Speaker 1: I wanted shot out to the Alphad Street Baptists over
Speaker 1: there in Virginia that's trying to keep their church as
Speaker 1: small as possible with their thirty thousand members and still
Speaker 1: given to their hbc U s and all, but thank you.
Speaker 1: They just added, they just added services throughout the day.
Speaker 1: I had a church once that with the pastor was
Speaker 1: actually a carpenter. That's what he worked. And I love
Speaker 1: that because he could understand it wasn't just a you know,
Speaker 1: an offering, you know that he was living off offerings
Speaker 1: that he was actually working. I just don't think you
Speaker 1: should get without girls, please, Yeah, I think I think
Speaker 1: what happens is that, Um, obviously, you have had many
Speaker 1: conversations over the over the you know, several hundred years
Speaker 1: that we've been in this country in the West, where
Speaker 1: we've we've tackled this idea that black wealth and access
Speaker 1: to money helps us as a community and that's going
Speaker 1: to push us forward. And one of the main places
Speaker 1: where that wealth can be distributed, like you know, is
Speaker 1: typically in church. And so it was especially for black folks,
Speaker 1: you know, and or in their religious institutions period, because
Speaker 1: we've seen this kind of thing happen, you know, across faiths,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. And I think it's a
Speaker 1: good thing to a degree to have a church be
Speaker 1: a base for you know, social um supports and and
Speaker 1: and community supports. But the thing is that the community
Speaker 1: itself isn't just Christian people. So until we have a
Speaker 1: situation where as a community we can have like diverse
Speaker 1: spaces for everybody to come together, you know, and under
Speaker 1: the guise of strengthening the community and giving resources, uh um,
Speaker 1: we'll just be empowering these entities to just get into
Speaker 1: the race of who can raise the most money, who
Speaker 1: can bring in the most membership, who can do X,
Speaker 1: y and z. Until we start really working into coalitions
Speaker 1: and stuff like that. And not that we don't have them,
Speaker 1: because every idea that we could come up with during
Speaker 1: this this podcast, it's been tried. So the thing is
Speaker 1: that I think re re shifting our focus back into
Speaker 1: coalitions is important. I mean, I hate to pull out
Speaker 1: my little history lesson on this one, but we love
Speaker 1: this part. But you know, Denmark VC, who's really famous
Speaker 1: revolutionary and man who planned a revolt, uh slave revolt
Speaker 1: that actually was not successful, but it was used as
Speaker 1: a way to I mean, it sparked a lot of
Speaker 1: change in America moving toward emancipation. So the idea here
Speaker 1: is that when he planned this revolt, he was a
Speaker 1: very devout Christian, but one of his main conspirators was
Speaker 1: a man named Golla Jack and he he um practiced
Speaker 1: African spiritual traditions. And hey, you had a man who
Speaker 1: was a devout Christian who planned a slavery vote with
Speaker 1: a man who was strictly in the practice of African spirituality.
Speaker 1: And I think that this is really really profound because
Speaker 1: what it says is that Black people, no matter what
Speaker 1: we believe, no matter how we celebrate, no matter what
Speaker 1: we how we worship, that we have a combined and
Speaker 1: a unified struggle, and that struggle is against the oppressor.
Speaker 1: And so I think that's really important when we think
Speaker 1: about these kinds of things, that if churches, we can't
Speaker 1: put all the way on just the one church or
Speaker 1: just the churches, the churches have to be not be
Speaker 1: afraid to work with the moss. The moss has to
Speaker 1: not be afraid to work with the church. The church
Speaker 1: had the Moss, can't be afraid to work with the
Speaker 1: with the African spiritualists, you can all of this is
Speaker 1: all this has to come together so that we can
Speaker 1: serve one another, so that we can celebrate family and
Speaker 1: and and and building up community, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: And that's just my personal little two sense belief. Right,
Speaker 1: if we don't toss, if we don't toss these things,
Speaker 1: we'll always have some sort of critique. We will have
Speaker 1: a critique, and that that will that will maintain that
Speaker 1: there will be a hierarchy and a and ah, you know,
Speaker 1: monopoly within each of these spaces. Somebody will come up
Speaker 1: on it. It just is what it is. I am
Speaker 1: looking to see us bloom and prosper and grow from
Speaker 1: our efforts. And anything that you're pouring into that does
Speaker 1: not blossom is futile. It's dead Earth word word. I'd
Speaker 1: like you to check out how to make a Negro Christian.
Speaker 1: Oh shit, yes, ma'am. Don't get me wrong. You're and
Speaker 1: I'm pretty sure that you know some of you are offended,
Speaker 1: and you're probably going to get me wrong. Well that happens.
Speaker 1: I can't do anything about somebody getting me wrong. But
Speaker 1: I do know this that God has been in every
Speaker 1: single instant of my life, every single bit of it.
Speaker 1: He knows me better then I know myself and has
Speaker 1: been a beautiful, beautiful guide and even my foolishness, and
Speaker 1: I am grateful for all of it. How do you
Speaker 1: eat an elephant one by it kind it's produced, or
Speaker 1: eaves back with another resource? Today, Jill brought up the
Speaker 1: book How to Make a Negro Christian by Kamal mckazy
Speaker 1: to Hootie. In eighteen forty two, Thomas Purse published the
Speaker 1: book The Religious Instruction of the Negroes in the United States,
Speaker 1: written by Charles Colclock Jones. Jones owned plantations in Liberty County, Georgia,
Speaker 1: and wasn't enslavor and a Presbyterian minister. He encouraged other
Speaker 1: ministers and enslavers to provide religious instruction to black people.
Speaker 1: In this book, Jones advocated for evangelizing enslaved people, which
Speaker 1: he thought would make them more obedient, intellectual, morally upstanding
Speaker 1: and pliable, Leaving them without Christianity and in ignorance he
Speaker 1: believed would make them susceptible to rebellion. Mcazy to Hootie's
Speaker 1: book How to Make a Negro Christian contains a reprint
Speaker 1: of Jones's works, along with commentary and context around how
Speaker 1: and why Black Americans have come to embrace Christianity on
Speaker 1: such a large scale. The history of black folks in
Speaker 1: Christianity is deep and intricate, but you can start with
Speaker 1: How to Make a Negro Christian. I'll drop a link
Speaker 1: in the episode description and that my children, my sisters,
Speaker 1: my brothers, my friends. That is that. Thank you for
Speaker 1: listening to Jay dot Il, always hoping to spark conversation peace.
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to Jill Scott Presents j dot
Speaker 1: Il the Podcast. This podcast is hosted by Jill Scotty
Speaker 1: st Clair and Age Graden Danceler. It's executive producers are
Speaker 1: Jill Scott, Seawan g and Brian Calhoun. It's produced by
Speaker 1: Las Think Claire and me Eve Steph Coke. The editing
Speaker 1: and sound design for this episode we're done by Taylor Tacoma.
Speaker 1: Hey y'all, y'all, can we pause for one second? One second?
Speaker 1: Hold a couple of years. Hey, hey y'all, you're walking
Speaker 1: too hard on the floor. Sorry, I thought something mouth
Speaker 1: is about to go down I enjoy it every time.
Speaker 1: Now and listen, you know, agea Um. She gott to
Speaker 1: yell at the people that live in there, the people
Speaker 1: she made, and the one she didn't, yelling at them
Speaker 1: every now and then. They told him to shut up.
Speaker 1: They're walking too hard. I don't know what it's like,
Speaker 1: cubment in the heel of their foot. When you figured out,
Speaker 1: let me know what I can tell my upstairs neighbor,
Speaker 1: God Damn. J dot Ill is a production of I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio. For more podcasts from I Heart Radio, visit
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