Happy Juneteenth and Happy Father's Day!!!
It is wonderful that we celebrate Juneteenth... the final acknowledgment that enslaved descendants of Africa were officially freed from chattel slavery and Father’s Day at the same time. Enslaved women and men, who were considered property, were not protected from forced sexual cruelty. Our men could not stop the rape of their women without facing death and worse. But what they could do, what so many of them did, was to accept, in fact embrace the children born from that forced, diabolical act, as their own. What an act of love! As we celebrate Father’s Day, let’s offer a major shout out remembering our ancestors and those men who have stepped up over time and even today when the biological father is not in the picture. Thanks to the grandfathers, uncles, godfathers, brothers, family friends, step fathers and foster fathers who stepped in as fathers. Let’s honor them on this day. Let’s thank our Father who art in heaven for them.
Let’s all celebrate, honor, thank, appreciate these men who step up for the children. We are the village. Our children are our hope. Let’s raise our sons to know that they must take responsibility for their offspring whether they are with the mothers or not. Let’s raise our daughters so that they know they are worthy to be with men who love them and who will be responsible to the children they both co-create. Let’s all make clear to the men and women in our lives that abandoning a child is an act of violence against children.
Let’s celebrate our heritage by protecting, investing in, educating, unconditionally loving and ensuring that all of our children have both a mother and a father actively in their lives. That will make the most awesome Fathers Day.
To paraphrase Maya…we are the dream and the hope of the slaves…We rise! We rise! We rise! Let’s act like it today and everyday.
Love and realness,
#lindamichellebaron
www.mylindamichellebaron.com