Reverend Dr. Jeremiah Wright Transforming Urban Communities:Building Equity and Equality

good afternoon everyone so my name is jim yeager i'm the senior associate dean for academic affairs for the school of public health and on behalf of the dean of the school who is traveling internationally right now i want to welcome you all this afternoon to um to this event you know it's very exciting to have you come and to have our distinguished guests here for for our program on transforming urban communities and building equity and equality and um what i'd like to do now is to introduce dr robert blum dr blum is the director of the johns hopkins urban health institute and he will then begin to introduce our speakers for today bob thank you all thanks for coming out on uh saturday it is a pleasure reverend dr jeremiah wright to have you here at the bloomberg school of public health it is also a pleasure for me very personally to have uh the ability to uh co-host this with uh colleagues from uh build from sisters together in reaching from southern baptist church this really is a symposium that was determined by identified by driven by community residents who said we very much would hope that we might have the opportunity to hear dr wright speak and so uh it is uh a particular particular pleasure this is part of uh black history month and uh part of our university celebration of black history month it is also part of the lead up to uh the april 23rd conference on the social determinants of health in transforming urban communities equity and equality is the central theme of what it is about dr wright will obviously speak from a national perspective and our panelists will focus it uh in baltimore-related issues to introduce dr wright is pastor donte hickman pastor hickman was ordained almost a decade ago grew up here in baltimore and actually has some close connections on the panel for those who don't know probably in full disclosure should say that one of our panelists is pastor hickman's mother reverend hickman but she will be introduced separately reverend hickman has a bachelor's degree from wiley college in marshall texas he went on and got a masters of divinity from garrett evangelical theological seminary more recently completed the requirements for the doctor of ministry uh wells uh wesley theological seminary uh near here in d.c so let me turn it to you dante uh to uh introduce reverend dr wright thank you dr blum good afternoon it is my distinct honor and pleasure to introduce a man who is recognized as an international leader sage pastor and theologian dr jeremiah wright born and raised in philadelphia pennsylvania went on to attend the virginia union university transferred out after three and a half years to go to the united states marine corps and then on into the naval corps and served as a cardiopulmonary technician upon leaving the navy dr wright went on to howard university to graduate with a bachelor of arts degree as well as a master's degree and attended the university of chicago to obtain another masters and furthered his education into a doctorate of ministry degree he has served as the pastor of the trinity united church of christ since 1972 and has grown that ministry from 87 to over 8 000 members dr wright by no means is a shy man of god he is a man that knows the truth and the truth that he knows he speaks to power he is an icon and an inspiration to pastors in my generation that we should never settle for the couch of ministry being between the four uh padded walls of the church but that we should engage in social advocacy and ministry in the public square he continues on cutting edge ministry as he has formed the samuel dewitt proctor conference this coming monday it will be in its 10th year in which it seeks to retool pastors and scholars to engage in social justice as well as social advocacy it is my privilege to have known him now for almost 20 years and he is proof positive that there is life and ministry after retiring as a pope i introduce and present to you dr jeremiah wright pastor emeritus of the trinity united church of christ to dr blum to pastor hickman reverend hickman bishop miles sisters and brothers the title of my time with you today i've named with liberty and justice for all in observance of african-american history month the 150th anniversary of the emancipation proclamation and the 50th anniversary of the iconic civil rights march on washington for jobs and freedom and in light of the wording of dr blum's stated goal in his invitation to me his words were our goal and all these conversations my being here is not only a part of black history month it is also part of a series of events that we johns hopkins university and the east baltimore community are coordinating focusing attention on the social determinants of health and your stated goal is quote to identify the underlying factors that need to be addressed and highlight strategies and approaches that lead to equity and equality end quote an observance of african-american history month the 150th anniversary of the emancipation proclamation which only freed on paper the enslaved africans who lived in the rebel states that had already seceded states that did not recognize lincoln as their president anymore the proclamation that left all the other enslaved africans in the other states still in slavery the proclamation that as a matter of fact undid revoked and made null and void the second confiscation act passed by the united states congress that would have freed all the enslaved africans and all the states union states and rebel states the act that was scheduled to become law on september 23rd 1862 the day after lincoln made it null and void on september 22nd 1862 in observance of african american history month the 150th anniversary of the proclamation that re-enslaved the africans indefinitely who was scheduled to be set free the very next day by the second confiscation act stephen spielberg notwithstanding and in observance of the 50th anniversary of the march on washington for jobs and freedom which we still don't have 50 years later the success of a few exceptional blacks notwithstanding and in keeping with your stated goal to identify the underlying factors that need to be addressed and to highlight strategies and approaches that lead to equity and equality i have chosen as a title for my presentation the closing phrase of francis bellamy's pledge of allegiance to the flag written in 1892 with liberty and justice for all choosing francis bellamy's words is in and of itself a classic example of a complicated set of ironies and contradictions that almost borders on cognitive dissonance first irony bellamy was a baptist minister and a christian socialist haters who hear dr martin luther king jr described as both a baptist minister and a christian socialist who rushed to call or to label king as a communist have no idea that the white man who wrote the presence of allegiance was also a baptist minister and a christian socialist but my 46 years of ordained ministry have taught me that most haters don't read can't read or have adopted the attitude or mentality which says my mind is made up stop trying to confuse me with the facts second irony and first contradiction bellamy's pledge of allegiance was first published in the september 8 1892 issue of a children's magazine the youth companion as a part of the national public school celebration of columbus day a celebration of the 400th anniversary of christopher columbus's arrival in the americas the arrival of introduce introduction of an onslaught of slavery rape diseases racism and genocide of the vast majority of the native americans the original americans the real americans the tainos from eight million tainos in 1492 to three million dinos in 1496 to 100 000 titles by the time columbus left in 1500 what a celebration with liberty and justice for all third irony second contradiction as a socialist a christian socialist bellamy had originally considered using the words in his pledge equality and fraternity but he decided against it because in his own words he knew that the state superintendents of education on his committee carter g woodson would call them superintendents of miseducation bellamy knew that they were against equality for women sisters hallelujah me and the state superintendents of education in 1892 of bellamy's national committee were also against equality for african americans just like abraham lincoln was the so-called great emancipator with liberty and justice for all fourth irony third contradiction when bellamy's pledge was first used in public schools on october 12 1892 it was used on the day columbus day during observances that were planned to coincide with the opening of the world's colombian exposition in chicago my kind of town chicago illinois ida b wells ferdinand barnett frederick douglass and irvine penn wrote a piece whose title was the reason why colored american is not in the world colombian exposition their work masterfully and forcibly denounces the racism of the colombian exposition while school children all over the nation were chanting with liberty and justice for all in spite of the ironies and contradictions however i have chosen bellamy's words because i want to focus on the word justice or more precisely i want to focus on the words with justice for all dr anthony g reddy a black british professor of systematic and constructive theology combines the fields of black theology and practical theology in an exciting way for me that makes these words take on new meaning and makes them speak to your stated goals as well as to the two national observances that we reflect upon this year dr reddy's work with ordinary everyday church folk in the united kingdom is best illustrated for me by how he teaches non-academic types and quite a few academicians the difference between equity and equality ready starts by having them play a very traditional game of musical chairs now i realize that my youngest grandson is heavily into electronic games high tech is his cup of tea and every birthday and christmas he gets some new version of some upgraded 2.0 app expanding his xbox iphone 5 computer droid ipad galaxy best buy world of hand-eye coordination world of fantasy so my grandson might not know about the og games they played when i was his age but i'm going to assume that everybody at the hopkins black history observance remembers how to play the game musical chairs quick review the game works on the premise of there being one less chair than the number of people taking part in the game now get in your minds the games played in the urban centers across the nation from the 1890s to the 21st century games many of you are painfully aware of urban renewal or urban removal negro removal community development llc's gentrification city games metropolitan games musical chairs there's a game that works on the premise of there being one less chair than the number of people taking part in the game individuals are asked to walk around the chairs that are placed in a line in a row they walk while music is being played when the music stops each participant has to jump onto the closest available chair one of the usual rules of the game is that individuals cannot go backward to sit in a vacant chair all the participants can only move in a forward direction around the chairs which means that if there's a vacant chair behind them an individual will have to run all the way around the chairs in order to sit in the next available empty seat at every round of the game one seat one of the chairs is removed the last person left standing without a chair to sit in when the music stops is eliminated from the game in that round every round this simple game works on the premise that there is an element of surprise and that nobody knows none of the participants know when the music will stop nobody knows except the one running the game which results in individuals running to beat their com patriots to the available vacant seats the game works on the basis of fairness say fairness that means in being fair all of the people in the game are subject to the same rules of the game that's fair now with the ordinary everyday salt of the earth folk non-academic types black folks in brixton in london like folks in east baltimore poor folks folks in liverpool like poor blacks and brown folks and cities across this nation what those folk quickly realize after playing the game two or three times i hope you still have those urban games in your mind what they soon recognized was this the game was fair but the game was not equitable they saw right early as they say in the black church they saw that it soon became clear who was going to win in that game the healthy folk were going to win and the younger folk were going to win and what dr reddy did on purpose to drive his point home was deliberately choose two trained athletes and put them as ringers in the line of contestants playing the game the two trained athletes had a hidden advantage the ultimate duel would be between one of the two of them the weaker folk did not stand a chance the rules did not change the rules of the game made the game fair but those who did not possess the advantages of the trained athletes were never going to win the game the game was fair but the game was not equitable the critical point of learning doctor ready got ordinary folk to see was this there is a world of difference between equality and equity one of the things that troubled me about your stated goals in terms of equality the assumption is all people should be treated the same in terms you and i have heard over and over again this notion is called a level playing field or a fair race to use arne duncan's pet language and pet project of a race to the top when using the fair race metaphor it is the belief that all people should start from the same place and be subject to the same rules governing the activity and in effect all the people in the race should be treated the same what dr betty was saying what dr betty was showing ordinary people and proving quite pointedly however with his musical chairs game a rigged musical chairs game was that those notions and metaphors of a level playing field and a fair race lacked any sense of the structural and systemic ways in which fields are not level nor our race is indeed very fair what happens he demonstrated what happens if the governing of the race only appeared to be fair what happens if some people in the race are given a wealth of unearned advantages which render the notion of fair play in the race nothing more than an illusion think for a moment about the awesome speed of usain bolt the jamaican sprinter in the interest of fairness bolt and i might well stand together at the starting line of the 100 meter race the 200 meter race the 400 meter race or mile race both of us obeying the rules down in the starting blocks playing by the rules waiting for the starter to fire his pistol we are conceptually or notionally taking part in a fair race we are both subject to the same rules the race therefore can be said to be fair but it cannot be said in any way to be just it should surprise no one that in such a setup called a fair race between bolt and me usain bolt will always win to explain and to expand the metaphor so that it covers what i asked you to get in your mind a moment ago about the urban games you have seen played in development redevelopment small business startups strip malls low-income middle-income mixed income senior housing projects what if some of the contestants in that game were in that race what if some of them have unearned privileges from birth such as schooling education ethnicity access to health care access to dental care the privilege of gender social networks and the privilege of skin color in a racist society what if they have privileged privileges which caused them to always come out as winners in the race can that race be said to be fair dr reddy's point is i repeat equality often works on the naive assumption that fairness means treating all people the same irrespective of the structural or systemic advantages some groups or some individuals inevitably possess back to my field as a historian of religion for just a moment black theology would argue accurately that fairness and treating all people the same has never been the case either in the historic practice or contemporary practice of christendom or in the euro-american societies when it comes to the social arrangements regarding darker skinned people in an awesome work i recommend to you titled another world is possible a book edited by a member of our church dr dwight hopkins along with dr marjorie lewis a comparative study of the spiritualities and religions plural of global darker people from the deletes in india through the blacks in japan to the aboriginals in australia that 2009 study outlined the ways in which predominantly darker skinned people are invariably the ones most negatively impacted by the dominant model of economic laissez-faire neoliberalism fairness and treating people the same has never been the case but notwithstanding the illusory promises of equality what dr king called a promissory note that was never cast because of non-sufficient funds black theology argues that the very concept of equality is a flawed concept why because black theology is a theology of liberation and all theologies of liberation start from a different place theologies of liberation see the central meaning of the god event within history from the bottom up they read the scriptures in light of the lived realities and experiences of the poor the marginalized and the oppressed and as a result black theology the practice religion of the everyday people in east baltimore in bed stuy in south central l.a the south and west side of chicago in harlem in haiti in havana in the favelas in bahia and the townships in google they too longer kylie just away to south africa that theology those religions argue for equity not equality and equity is not based on notions of fairness that's equality equity is based on justice with freedom and justice for all which is why i chose a language that not even bellamy fully understood with liberty liberation and justice for all as dr betty pointed out so powerfully powerfully in the context of justice one does not treat all people the same because to do so sanctions the status quo in which some people inevitably win and other people are always condemned to lose the inequities and iniquities of equality can be seen in the pernicious doctrine that we call free trade which is of course anything but free in theory in wanting to treat all nations is the same the winners of history the global north usually triumph over the poor and impoverished south having already possessed and created the means for their own economic development which is now denied to newer developing and emerging nations this economic system may be called many things it may even be called free free trade but it is never just this system takes no account of the fact that in saying it is treating all people fairly those who have exploited the world and exploited the resources of others exploited world markets they possess a critical advantage over those nations that have been subjected to the dominant neo-colonialist exercise of power of the western nations it is usain bolt and me all over again in a so-called fair race black theology black theologians historians of religions and the religions of darker people in the globe are all committed to the cause of equity and that is why i believe as an outsider that you're having this series of discussions equity as a concept starts from the premise that for the sake of justice there must always be a commitment to systemic change and structural change to illustrate systemic change and structural change as cna quad known premises for equity let me give you two examples of what i mean from two different disciplines one example from the legal world and one from the religious world let me also give you two essential bibliographical references which explain in far greater detail what i've only have time to give you a glimpse of the first bibliographical reference is a book and legal example book by judge a leon higginbotham the book's title is in the matter of color higginbotham the supreme court justice for the state of pennsylvania colony by colony for all 13 colonies of the british commonwealth the british empire in the north atlantic north american black atlantic he demonstrates how all the laws on the books of all 13 colonies from the 1630s to 1787 all the laws laws pertaining to blacks all the laws pertaining to africans to negroes to colors or slaves have absolutely nothing to do with jurisprudence absolutely nothing to do with legal precedence absolutely nothing to do with english common law all the laws on the books of all the colonies pertaining to africans are based on prejudice custom racism and xenophobia in 1619 when the ship flying the dutch flag sailed up to james river into jamestown there were no laws on the books of the colony of virginia about africans because there were no africans in virginia by the 1630s however problems started arising africans were having babies by people who were not african so laws started appearing in terms of what we going to call these kids who they belongs to or they're going to be in slavery from now on all those kind of laws started appearing on the books so hickenbottom demonstrates after 150 years of racist laws on the books of the 13 rebellious colonies one could hardly be surprised at the racism sewn into the very fabric of the constitution which was drafted in 1787 the constitution structural and systemic the constitution of the united states of america has racism in its makeup the fugitive slave law provision the eventual proposed reversal of the legalization of slaving the country by and by and the definition of african men sisters not only racism but sexism in the constitution the constituting documents that make this a country and to the republic for which it stands african men are defined as property three-fifths of a man that's the constitution that's the legal framework that undergirds a slaveocracy that's a systemic and structural reality now are there any bakers present at johns hopkins in this room anybody here that can bake knows how to bake likes to bake wants to bake always wanted to be a baker has tried to bake okay after we dismiss this afternoon after we dismiss this afternoon you go home and you take some eggs and some milk and some flour and some butter and some cinnamon some nutmeg some baking powder some vanilla extract two little drops of lemon sauce preheat the oven stick it in ding ding ding pull it up right on time and then realize i forgot the sugar you cannot sprinkle sugar on the top of that mess and call it cake the constituting elements determine that it will never be a cake all them amendments you all got sprinkled on the top of that mess is sugar all you got to do is scrape it off we used to have a piece of sugar saying there would be no whiskey sold in this country ever again prohibition we got rid of that one quick in south africa those serious about change realized they could not sprinkle sugar on the top of their mess because of constituting elements the structure the system was permanently fixed against people of color against osha against zulu against indian bailly against sutu against those called bantu so they tossed it out and started all over again this time including some sugar equity for blacks for whites for indians for gays for lesbians for bisexual for transgendered for queer for christians for muslims for jews for seeks for buddhist for shinto er body a commitment to equity and justice means a commitment to systemic and structural change the south african example offers a perfect segue into the second example i want to give you in the second bibliographical reference i want to throw out to you the south african pastor dr alan buzak and the white professor of theology at bethel theological seminary in minneapolis dr curtis young buzak and the young co-authored a book two years ago whose title is radical reconciliation where they're combating christian quietism and political pietism and in their book starting with the reality and the failures of the south african truth and reconciliation commission they argue for a fierce commitment to systemic and structural change they make a case for equity and for restorative justice and one of the most powerful examples of what that looks like on the ground comes from what all the preachers in the room know from the christian scriptures as seen through the lenses of liberation theology and black theology found in the story of zacchaeus in luke the 19th chapter he was rich usain bolt privileged advantaged a winner before the race began very rich luke 19 says wealth obtained from taking advantage of the poor zacchaeus must have had an office on wall street zacchaeus was a founder not a bank america but a bank judaica serving in the jericho branch as the hedge fund manager a thief covered by the law upheld by the system structurally untouchable and after his encounter with the christ after his meeting with jesus the justice minister after his non-violent experience with occupy jericho zacchaeus shows us what radical reconciliation looks like reconciliation that radical gets to the root of the problem not cosmetic changes but radical change a radical commitment to equity a radical commitment to justice a radical commitment to systemic and structural change the case says half of what i own half of what i have half my stuff stuff i got taken advantage of other folks half of it i am giving to the poor and for all the folk i've cheated i'm giving them back four times what i took from them and that's called restorative justice where it is not just material goods that are restored but dignity is restored and personhood is restored as well equity as a concept starts from the premise that for the sake of justice with liberty and justice for all for the sake of restorative justice there must always be a commitment to systemic change and structural change the commitment to change grows out of the analyses of social reality economic reality and cultural reality and the burning desire to unmask the often hidden and covert ways in which equality seeks to preserve the inbuilt power and advantage of the status quo reddy uses his musical chairs illustration to show ordinary folk how there can be no serious change without people looking closely at the playing field and looking closely at the race they are in in order to see that neither the field nor the race is either level or fair and he offers what i consider a paradigm shift which i see you attempting to model by having all the stakeholders at the table as peers to effect meaningful change with input from the privileged and advantaged and input from the truly disadvantaged without this serious commitment to change systemic change and structural change those who have been the traditional winners in an unequal world will remain untouched by the reality of the losers for whom both the playing field and the fair race will remain an illusory dream going back to dr betty's fictional metaphor that race between usain bolt and me in the context of liberty and justice for all both in terms of black theology and the lens through which we see the world and in terms of what johns hopkins and the east baltimore community and his stakeholders are attempting to do consider this what if the fictional usain bolts of this world go to the best schools live in the best houses have access to the best trainers and in fact enjoy all of the privileges denied to an alternative group of people to say that one is judging bolt and those competitors fairly equally is to collude in a wholesale exercise of false consciousness or in other words it is a gross deception the race is as good as rigged the fact that it looks fair should not disguise the fact that the outcome of the race was determined long before each competitor reached the racetrack to change the outcome or to be serious about justice means we've got to be biased and unfair black theology is biased black theology is unfair and its unfairness arises from the reality that in this world in which racism blights the potential and scars the experiences of most ordinary black people god does not seek fairness god seeks justice in fact god requires justice god does not ignore injustice and treat the perpetrator and the victim exactly the same from the days of a stuttering moses to the days of a trayvon martin god is invested in getting justice for those who are oppressed james cohn put it this way back in 1990 23 years ago hannity can't even spell cohen's name yet he says in a racist society god is never colorblind to say god is colorblind is analogous to saying that god is blind to justice god is blind to right and wrong god is blind to good and evil certainly this is not the picture of god revealed in the old and new testaments jave takes sides the so-called unfairness or bias of black theology and addressing the problem in each of these headings in east baltimore or east of eden the so-called bias of the lenses of the downtrodden and marginalized from the days of negro removal to the days of gentrified aliens the unfairness of jim cohn's writing and the unfairness of the slave uprising stemmed from the bold call for equity not equality the call is for justice not fairness the restorative justice of luke 19 or the restorative justice of february 2013. thinking outside the box that's what equity requires thinking outside the box about addressing health disparities listening with care and compassion to the voices of academically trained people like dr maricela gomez and dr mindy thompson fully love you know cole dr gomez's work race class power and organizing in east baltimore rebuilding abandoned communities in america community organizing versus non-community participatory rebuilding processes gomez raises the issue of justice when she says how do we determine equity in benefit what is the effect of non-participatory and non-transparent rebuilding practice on the health of the people and the health of the community i was telling them on the way in here i don't understand how outside of dante and his mom i got invited here dr mindy fullerlove would have been the one to come dr fuller's book root root shock how tearing up city neighborhoods hurts america makes her eminently qualified to be a part of this forum and a part of your april 20th forms she's a psychiatrist and she says in terms of psycho analysis that there's a traumatic stress reaction related to the destruction of one's emotional ecosystem between 1949 and 1973 this federal program spearheaded by business and real estate interest destroyed 1600 african-american neighborhoods in cities across the united states but urban renewal did not just just disrupt the black community the anger it caused led to riots that sent whites fleeing for the suburbs stripping them of their own sense of place and she did her book based on three different very different cities hill district in pittsburgh central ward in newark and roanoke virginia acknowledging the damage caused by root shock is crucial for coping with this human toll and for implementing equity justice and building a road to recovery how how do we do justice how do we implement equity to heal the damages called by injustice i have a question i raised i received a notice about your april 20th conference gathering for this group but as soon as my name was listed as a presenter for today jamie wooten of kinetics sent me an invitation to attend a symposium on equitable and sustainable redevelopment a path forward being held on march 9th at sojourner douglas college here in baltimore which will use gomez's book as a point of departure for strategizing and planning future developments that start with the notion of equity since i'm an outsider here's my outside of question i'm just saying are there two groups and two symposia of participants conversing with each other as advocates for the citizens of east baltimore or are these two groups and two symposia across purposes with each other as adversaries about methodology who is excluded who is included as the issue of equity becomes or remains the two-ton gorilla sitting in east baltimore's living room equity equity equity requires thinking outside the box about addressing health disparity equity means listening with care and compassion to the voices of academically trained people like maricela gomez and dr mindy thompson philadelph while listening simultaneously with the same compassion to the untrained voices of the urban poor and low-income people of color who are directly affected by the proposed 88-acre expansion which is reported displaced more than 800 household of the working pool right here for me based on what i have seen in different communities across this country and in south africa it will mean creative deconstruction of the business as usual template and what we mean putting in place new partnerships of persons institutions and stakeholders partnerships about jobs partnerships for health care partnerships in terms of mental health please don't ever forget you i know you can at johns hopkins and public health that the only way the affordable care act got passed was to take the poor people off the table pharmaceuticals weren't going to let that get through without taking the poor public option off the what do we do how do we address health care for the citizens of east baltimore who have no insurance and have no prayer of getting any assurance partnerships that wrestle with reproductive health mass incarceration addressing the problems of recidivism education and to ensure access to quality education or equity in education with liberty liberation and justice for all for me i'm a retired pastor i'm not running for office so i can cite my scriptural passages without fear of journalistic backlash about my sensitivity or lack thereof for other traditions micah 6 8 says clearly what liberty and justice for all looks like god has shown you o mortal what is good and what does the lord require of us to do justice equity restorative justice to love mercy compassionate and sincere concern for the poor and all of god's creation and to walk only with our god as dr alan buzak demonstrates that doesn't mean walking only like this no it means walking wherever it is god is walking in 2013 walking with the 22 families of sandy hook walking with the 434 2013 death families in chicago walking with 800 families in east baltimore walking with the 1600 neighborhoods across this country walking with the homeless millions in south africa 18 years after the dutch africanas made a few black millionaires or walking with the homeless at our doorstep who have given up hope that is where god is walking and that is where we are required to walk i think everybody needs to stand up for dr right i'm so happy i chose to be here on saturday what an honor and a privilege that was and reverend wright thank you very much um for that that that message we we're going to continue to say we don't give i mean i'm like blown away um so we we have a um exciting uh afternoon plan for you in addition to having reverend wright we have some of our local leaders i think the point that you raised about being approached by two different groups as an outsider to work on equity in east baltimore definitely is something that this group will be happy to have a dialogue about to that end we have a steam panel of people who are steeped in what's happening in east baltimore and we have that panel reflect a good cross-section we think of experience and we will give you the audience an opportunity to raise questions and comments and chime in on this conversation so first i'd like to introduce one of our panelists reverend debra hickman reverend hickman come on up please many of you know reverend hickman but just a quick background she is the community chair which is the voice of conscious for the community with johns hopkins university urban health institute and is the co-chair of the urban health institute's community university coordinating council she's also the founder and executive director of sisters together in reaching which started off as a team of one her and now is a thriving nationally and internationally known and recognized organization providing hiv prevention services and outreach for african americans in the city reverend hickman is a in demand both in baltimore in the nation and internationally so thank you for being here reverend heckman and if you notice the similarity pastor dante hickman who came up earlier is her son and she also has raised some phenomenal children that have been major contributors to what's happening in baltimore we also have with us today uh bishop douglas myles bishop miles we please come up and bishop miles is another one he is the bishop of coinonia baptist church on belair road he founded the church on greenmount avenue on greenmount avenue bishop miles is a champion and a spokesperson for change in baltimore both within the faith-based community as well in the community at large he's initiated a number of innovative ministries that both guide and support youth women covering from addiction and the homeless some of you will also know him as a award-winning columnist for the afro-american newspaper he's an art an author he has published several of his sermons and lectures um and he's been in the forefront of a national effort to reduce tobacco products in america and he serves as a national spokesperson for the campaign for tobacco-free kids he's also this important uh distinction the clergy member and co-chair of build which is doing a lot of on the ground floor work here in baltimore so bishop miles thanks for being with us today and then lastly on our panel we have dr robert blum dr blum if you will come up dr blum is the gates william gates senior professor and chair of the department of population family and reproductive health he is the director of the urban health institute he came to hopkins to take that position in july of 2007 and many of you know dr blum has done great things i was a little reluctant to have someone from outside of baltimore come in and take that role but i think we can uniformly agree he's gone where no directors before him have ventured to go and he's been willing to really push the envelope and take some of the risks that have been uncharacteristics uncharacteristic of some of the leadership at hopkins so i want to say dr blum thank you for being the reason for this symposium and being the change maker that we really needed at hopkins and he embarrasses easily easy but i'll just say he has an extensive academic resume and has received several achievement awards from national societies he's published several books and more than 250 000 publications on child adolescent and family health so he is a public health expert in his own right thank you dr blum okay so here's how this is going to work we are going to give the panel an opportunity to respond and react and put some thoughts out um about the on their own as well as respond to what reverend wright said and then you the audience are going to write your questions down the session is being audio streamed and recorded the only things that are being recorded are what's happening on this side of the room so we ask that you write your questions and your comments down so that they can be read and the panel and reverend wright can have an opportunity to respond to you so with that said i'd like to turn it over to reverend hickman facts and he did not lose anything in saying what needs to occur and that there is not much that i need to add to it except to say that for our faith community that is here today i want to use a very hard and harsh word that if we are going to have justice at this hour if there is going to be equity and equality in any means of fashion that we must stop the rape that is occurring in our congregations and that rape looks like the fact that we are very interested in always building out our buildings but we must stop today building out our buildings while our people in baltimore city are suffering we must stop the rape and the rape is in the form of always requiring an additional offering before we ask the question as to whether or not you are doing okay last i checked the record it says that we are to take care of the widows and the widows indeed i don't believe that in our congregations today that we are even concerned about the widows and the widows indeed once they vanish from the congregation on sunday mornings and wednesday evenings that they are left alone at home to die from heart disease left alone at home to die from aloneness and so they eat themselves into obesity to the place where arthritis is crippling them i believe that they are left alone to die with their grandchildren who have been left alone because their parents have died from substance use and substance abuse and it is time now that we take the offering that is going to help that widow indeed pay her rent and keep her house in good order so that she can maintain a residence that she can live in with her grandchildren that she is trying to take care of i also will not put the weight totally at the foot of the church but i will put it at the foot of us community leaders community leaders that instead of coming on board and working to be as one we work apart and against each other we do not give our young people a voice anymore because when we show up at church on sundays or for any events we don't have our young people with us they are out there in the streets by themselves while we are filling up the churches we have homes that are fractionated because husbands are tired of wives always being at the church monday through saturday and then back again on sunday mornings we have so many problems that are taking place that the social determinants of health have not really clearly identified what are the social determinants of health and i only have a few minutes so i'm kind of like jumping all over the place but if we are going to be partners we cannot all of a sudden want money to be spent over here for this meeting and money over here for that meeting because those are monies that are being wasted that need to be invested in places where we can have adequate food in our community where we can reduce the cost of rent so that people can have decent places to live we need to make certain that every home has a computer in it so that everybody can stay fully informed and developing themselves and i'll stop there because i have much more to say as we get into a greater dialogue let me correct one thing before we go further i'm no longer the clergy co-chair of build my generation is over i'm clergy co-chair emeritus we have two newly elected young adult clergy persons in the city who are leading build now glenna huber the first african-american clergy co-chair of build african-american woman co-chair of build and andrew foster connor is the pastor of the brown memorial baptist church brown memorial a presbyterian church as a flashback who are now leading the build organization let me begin by stop thanking dr wright for causing us to have the discussion that we refuse to have in baltimore and that's the discussion that begins and ends around race it's the unspoken conversation that consistently guides every decision every major decision that's made in this city i was intrigued by his analogy of musical chairs because in baltimore we consistently play musical chairs and the music consistently stops in baltimore to the detriment i mean to the advantage of a few the chairs stopped at the inner harbor most of us were left without a seat the chair stopped with the building of two stadia again we had no seat the chair stopped with the building of the convention center again no seat the convention center hotel no seat east harbor no seat and now the whole discussion about baltimore heading toward bankruptcy unless we make draconian cuts in services and much needed uh budget items for the poor for the children of this city is again the musical chair stopping and those of us of color having no seat i was intrigued by his analogy about putting sugar on top of the mess and sugar on top of the mess is a black male black president of the city council black police commissioner that can be wiped away with one election and we're still left with the same mess i was con uh intrigued by his talk of restorative justice because again that's something that needs to happen in a city that's 60 to 70 percent african-american but less than four percent of its business community is african-american so we need to be about restorative justice in this city in terms of uh investment and black owned businesses investment in black neighborhoods tiffs and pilots need to make their way uptown just like they always make their way downtown and and to that end uh the the church community that i share with on on a consistent basis to build the build organization fights these kind of fights and and my plea to the to the church community isn't uh it isn't a negative chastisement at this point it's an invitation come and see what we're doing in the effort of a democratic process and and issues that come up from the bottom rather than down from the top come and see the rebuilding of east oliver come and see what was done in sandtown come and see february 25th when we take 3 000 people to annapolis to rally for 32 million dollars for a bond bill to create 1.8 billion dollars of new school construction that's restorative justice come and see what the church community is doing well that pretty much sums up everything i wanted to say dr wright thank you uh you touched both my mind and my heart uh and i say that most sincerely and most genuinely let me speak and start with the most trivial and then go to the far more important and my colleagues have spoken to the far more important on the most trivial there are some things that have been i think huge steps forward so you raised the question how do we address the care for those in east baltimore who are the most disadvantaged one of the things a small step but one of the things that has happened over the past three years is that johns hopkins medical institutions have done something that has done nowhere else in the country and that is that it has said in the seven zip codes that are its historical boundaries if you live here whether you are insured underinsured or uninsured whether you are legally here or not you are ours for health care if you choose the total cost from beginning to end of care is twenty dollars twenty dollars which will include total care coverage that has i don't know exactly how many have enrolled but i know it is in the thousands and i know that hundreds and hundreds of surgeries so hopkins has said without an affordable care act without health care coverage our community is our responsibility it hasn't always been that way and we have a long heritage that certainly does not shine brightly on us baltimore was a segregationist and segregated community and johns hopkins hospital was a segregated community hospital while it about one level of health care across the board it was long after that uh the wards the segregated wards broke down but it wasn't just racial segregation and baltimore's history is not just one of racial segregation it is religious segregation as well jews and gentiles did not live together they were redlined much like blacks and whites were redlined jews were not allowed to go to hopkins medical school except for a very limited quota so they were this city has an extraordinary history of divisions to overcome and it's not just east-west or race but it is whether you your grandmother or great-grandmother came up from mississippi versus south carolina or north carolina or whether you live in this little community or that little community and i would suggest from a political point of view and a social point of view it is extremely problematic i think that while i can speak to things that we have done in partnership with sojourner douglas the point you made is badal it is accurate that because we aren't closely tied with one another in a way that we should be things happen that shouldn't i would also say that the issue that bishop miles has spoken to is absolutely fundamental and it is absolutely fundamental in the social determinants of health and we will be addressing that on april 23rd we will have a panel it is already being drafted and crafted and the two people who you spoke about are high on our list whether we will be successful in that coming i know mindy i i hope we will be so that's at the more basic level but i think the fundamental thing that you spoke to that to me was both so important is that fairness is not equality that because things look fair does not make them fair and i could not agree more we know that people many people who live in our community face disadvantage we also know there are people in our community who live and work here all their lives who have tremendous assets and tremendous skills i think the challenge is not to slow hussein bolt down the challenge is to build up young people in our community through education one of the extraordinary things that has happened here over the last months and it has been done by young people is the stopping of the insanity of building another juvenile prison in this community and it was stopped not because of political leadership it was stopped because young people like devon love and young people from a beautiful struggle said no we will not allow resources to be poured and diverted from what can benefit young people so we do have glimpses glimpses of what's possible and i certainly agree that there is a huge role for the church as reverend hickman spoke to there is a incredible role to support young people and i think for us as a powerful large wealthy institution hopkins needs to be at the table outspoken on this and in the forefront with our community partners not leading but as collaborators i think i'll stop at this point as well you can let me just say one thing members of our audience is if you have your questions and your comments just hold your card in the air and there are people circulating and we'll bring them down and sort them out and get them um brought in let me just take this opportunity to thank dr blum for daring to risk by bringing dr right here i know my alma mater was leaving chicago in winter okay great so while we get the uh comments card comment cards brought down i would like to raise a comment and a question uh my daughter is here today jordan where where is she she'll be taking pictures today where are you she's probably so mad at me right there and i tell her all the time that you you can put icing over mud but it won't make it a cake right and that analogy that you gave i think is just so important that we try to sprinkle sugar on top of a mess but you can't get the sweet in something that just was not made sweet and so the comment that you made and it really resonated with me about being approached by two different groups for one major push for work around equity not even just in baltimore but specifically in east baltimore really speaks to while we've made a lot of progress we still are working on our own and there is a big gap in what our needs are and our willingness to come together to collectively fill those needs so i would like to put my panel in the hot seat we have the faith community here we've got the the you know the two-ton gorilla of hopkins which is very resource-rich i i would say let's stand in the position that we've we've tried to sprinkle some sugar over issues of equity in east baltimore and i want to ask this half of the panel what is the role of the black church in the uh moving us forward and then bob what is the role of hopkins and the urban health institute where have you fallen short and what can we count on from the faith community and from hopkins in the future well deborah since i am not the pastor at my church and i might be out of the pulpit based on the statement that i made but i made it from my heart and from what i know of working 22 years in the community with star and i know it very very well to listen to the people day in and day out and i know it from a different perspective of looking at that if we're going to do something today as the faith community and as the community we must come in solidarity of one voice we cannot be in the room with a different type of agenda that it's really about if i'm going to make the limelight if i'm going to get something for myself and for my family and for my friends and not for the whole community and too long right now i believe that we as a people are suffering from the fact that we are always or already have designated who's going to take my place and who's going to take my place today might keep us in the same place that we are in today borrowing from the statement that mr chris said that we are sitting in the midst of where hopkins is and so therefore no communities around it should die but when i ride through east baltimore i see much blight so that means that the community is dying and the question must be raised is it dying because of johns hopkins or is it dying because of us you might not want to clap and you might not want to hear the truth but the truth of it is is that justice comes about when we are not afraid to tell the truth justice comes about when we don't make it one person's fault but we take responsibility for what we have and what we have not done so if i want my cake baked right dr wright can give me a recipe however i need to study the recipe and i need to ask some questions about the recipe because trust me if you take coal eggs out of the refrigerator and you put it into your batter without it having set at room temperature you're going to get a different quality of cake it is not going to come out fluffy it is not going to be as moist but if you follow instructions and you observe what is taking place you will know exactly what the problem is and if i'm the problem i need to correct myself and remove myself i need to get to the place where i can be a part of the whole so that the whole process will work for what is upstream and what has come downstream needs to meet in the middle so that we can resolve the issue together and i think that we're at the precipice of doing something different something new we need to leave our old yesterdays behind us not in the sense of forgetting but being able to tell the story and know the parts of the story that caused us to be stagnated and not remain in a dynamic influx of moving forward so that we can deal with the problem that ended up downstream because we can no longer afford for any more bodies to flow downstream so it's each of us to take a look and examine self before we can blame someone else so that we can be an intimate part of moving things forward i would i would uh say that the role of the black church first is to reclaim its historical uh perspective uh there was a time in a saying that not everybody in the black community belonged to the black church but the black church belonged to everybody and we've got to reclaim that sense of ownership of of the institution the only institution really that we both own and control uh one of the sad realities is that the black church got caught up in the white church success the white evangelical church success model and what actually happened was was the same thing that happened in with in music uh white evangelicals sat around and watched black preachers took the best out of the black church to put it in their churches then you had black preachers emulating what the white preachers were doing and in the process which created this whole health wealth and prosperity disaster that has crippled us as a community uh the black church was at one time and and i think it still has an obligation to be a prophetic voice it has to be that voice that calls both the african-american community and the rest of america back to truth back to the basis of justice back to the basis of historical perspective that doesn't seek fairness but seeks justice for especially the poor the black and the disinherited in this nation bobby let me expand on the points that um bob can i can i ask you a specific question that will relate to this so the audience gets their question read it's going it's exactly what you're going to speak about uh it says with all the research dollars that hopkins gets and and the university of maryland get why can't they come together and what role can they play in the health of baltimore city and east baltimore you were going to speak to that right i would be i have a hard enough time reflecting on hopkins let alone the university of maryland uh uh so i i think i'll focus more on this side of the um charles the um so the question was raised what is the role of hopkins at least what do i see and i think and and looking forward i think a few things one is that we need to be willing to have a conversation about race we need to be willing to look at our place as an institution and the barriers around that that have been historically created i am a believer in what george santiano said that if you do not learn from history you're condemned to repeat it uh so i see value there but i see even greater value to being able to sit with our black brothers and sisters our growing latino community our small american indian community here to have much more honest communication that's based on trust that's based on breaking bread together that's based on coming back over and over and over again it doesn't just happen and it doesn't happen in halls like this that we can talk about it and we need to in halls like this two is that hopkins is a very large entity it is also a very diffuse entity as is our east baltimore community we need to be at the table together let me give you but one comment that one of the leaders of this institution said recently after a community meeting that person turned to me and said i knew that we needed the community to be part of this i didn't realize how smart those people are how smart well that you don't know that when you sit here and i sit here i don't know that i know that when i sit at the same table and that breaks down barriers and you should say or could say that should never have been i can't talk about what has been but i can talk about how to get beyond that and that is being at the table and saying what are the resources that in fact are at the table that can be shared because not everything can be not everything right is up for grabs so to be clear about that and again i think we have the beginnings of some of those kinds of conversations hopkins is an educational institution and what it does and can do much more and much better i would suggest is strengthen the capacity building in our community of young people but far beyond that we have some programs for example for ex-offenders that are training in capacity building programs that lead to jobs but these are model programs and our community is hurting and we need much more of that hopkins is a job manufacturer but it cannot do that alone it simply doesn't have that capacity to do it alone the final thing that i'd say is that we can and should bring innovations into our community and we should extract the creativity and harness the creativity of people who live in our community for economic gain and benefit of the community and of themselves there are the beginnings of business incubators that are beginning to develop across the east baltimore and baltimore community where people local residents who have ideas can come together with venture capitalists and nurture the creation of wealth in a neighborhood i think the likelihood that general motors is going to swoop in with the next factory to build 5 000 new cars and hire 20 000 new people is unlikely wealth will be created at the neighborhood level there are people at hopkins who have expertise and there are our neighbors who have ideas we need to bring it together i'll stop there great okay i have a comment and a question for reverend wright so the comment is liberty and justice for all thank you uh reverend wright for your focus on these two words a just person treats others justly a free person is unimpeded notice that the social location of each is different the very notion of liberty and justice is a moral proposition of right relationship thank you for this reminder that we as a city need to work on right relationships the question is you speak a lot about god and christianity but not only christians search for advocacy for restorative justice how do you work across faiths with people who are not part of any religion to strengthen any movement while still having such a strong rhetoric of christianity i think you do it um i i was just at lancaster theological seminary and i was asked a similar question that was reminding you know lancaster's united church of christ that in the united church of christ ordination questions asked during the ordination of all ordinance persons about to be ordained do you have the same regard for people of all faiths and people of no faith that people of no faith are people made in the image of god just as you are and just because you don't believe what they believe in they don't believe what you believe does not mean that they are any less and you are there at the table as peers at the table um building on that expanding on that that question bob said to me in his letter he wanted one of the things he was hoping we'd come away with one of the takeaways from today are some positive practices and some some ideas and hints about things that we can do beyond rhetoric and i have been wrestling with going back to deborah reverend reverend hickman's opening comment that problem that she quickly in a short period of time summarize for us about a part of the nature of the black church in this country i was pleasantly surprised and maybe we need to talk not so much to johns hopkins but clergy need to look at what's going on in some other places i was pleasantly surprised by something that's working in a place and wrestling with what do you do and how do you do that when you don't have 100 cooperation i was invited to come to several years ago the concerned black clergy's martin luther king day celebration in dallas texas well i thought dallas texas is going to be about 150 200 people we're going to sing we shall overcome i walked into hamilton park united methodist church and there were 4 000 people there and 4 000 people who were baptists national baptists progressive national baptist church of god in christ apostolic hope overcoming holiness church pentecostal centers of the world presbyterians united methodist women in ministry where some of those denominations don't believe in women and they're working together and i said you all come together once a year right that's that's what this is and freddie said no no no they took me this show into the middle income housing the mixed income housing the senior citizens have the things that they do together as concerned black clergy and i said like the people in matthew 4 we've never seen it on this wives we don't we don't work together in chicago clergy churches don't work together presbyterians don't work with pentecostals because they make too much noise pentecostals don't work representatives because they ain't saved and it depends on who who calls them nobody coming because the wrong person called the media that's how chicago and many cities are like that and these persons clergy persons in dallas the concerned black clergy have have done something phenomenal and are doing something phenomenal with the caveat and a learning lesson from that for me the caveat being is that the big names in dallas don't participate with the concerned black clergy but they don't let that stop them that they don't have tony evans or td jake's on their role they go right on putting up housing and go right on doing programs that are changing the communities in which those churches sit so that we start talking about how what what can we learn what takeaways that the that the churches here in baltimore that are willing to work those ones that want to build cathedrals like aussie mountain keats wrote ozzie mandias they want to build the memorials to themselves let them build memorials to themselves well don't let that stop you those who are willing to work together um the other piece in terms of people without faith going back to one of my favorite favorite favorite uh illustrations of what one of the things i think we need to learn how to particularly when you talk about april 23rd and and march 9th those two groups um learning how to work well let me start with with my favorite tony campolo anybody know tony campola tony got me in trouble with my mother and after he got me in trouble with my mother the very next week i saw him we were together on a panel in philadelphia on hiv aids and i said man you got me in trouble with my mother i remember quoting you and quoting you and get quoting you and that sermon got me somebody called i was at howard university 18 19 years ago quoting tony campola somebody called philadelphia and told my mother what i said and she didn't want to hear them about tony campolo say that i was quoting tony campola she just fussed at and i said i get the last laugh what tony campolo you offered me with what he did and how i got in trouble with that anybody no it's all all that speaking chinese to you uh when bernard richardson became suddenly he when he became the dean of the chapel at howard university school howard university i had been preaching at howard every december for about 10 years and he asked me to switch my sunday to the martin luther king sunday because he was being installed and he wanted me to preach his installation and i went there and challenged him to bring a prophetic ministry back to the campus because it had become priestly and i was there when i got out of service prophetic stokely carmichael called me to raid all that was would take students are taking over buildings and i say bring how university gospel choir was started while in that same period bring that prophetic ministry back to the church and scripturally i used amos and amazing to show the difference between a prophetic ministry and a priestly ministry the prophets allegiances to god the priests the legion sisters of the government as soon as amos preached amazing went to the president and told him you already hear what he's saying over here say shut him down fast forwarded i compared the ministries of martin luther king the prophet and billy graham the priest martin luther not only quoted amos he was his allegiance was to god billy's allegiance was to the government he did not participate in the civil rights movement he would not march and not even in the march on washington would he participate with martin luther king or with any of the black clergy he was in the white house for every president because his allegiance was to the government not to god and then to illustrate the point i quoted tony campola and i had his what he said in my hand in the pulpit just read it tony campolo pointed out speaking to the southern baptist convention every year they send 20 000 delegates to the southern baptist convention southern baptist 19 500 of them are southern baptist watts and 500 others tony campolo for those who don't know him is white used to teach at eastern baptist seminary and tony campolo was saying to the southern baptist convention that we have become comfortable in our priestly religion we're no longer prophetic and to show you what i mean he ticked off several facts about black life in america how many african-american males were in prison as opposed to how many african-american males were in college how many african-american women were in prison how many were crack addicted how many babies were born crack addicted how many people were hiv positive how many died of aids africa all these facts about african-american life he said and we continue to worship in our churches sunday after sunday completely oblivious to these facts and i'm reading it and he said and god has got to be sick of this he said but the real tragedy being that there are more christians in this room who are going to get more upset over that one word than all these facts well they love that at howard they loved that at howard they loved them in hollywood um and three weeks later man i'm in philadelphia my mom's in philly i'm in chicago phone rings i said hello she didn't say how are you how my children how the grandchildren i said hello she said did you say in the sermon at howard i said mommy don't mommy me you know who this is did you say in a sermon i said they say i was quoting tony i don't care who you were quoting did you say in the sermon so the very next week i saw tony i said man you got me in trouble with my mother he laughed at me i said but i get the last laugh he said how you get the last laugh i said because then southern baptists think they'll never have you back again and he said you're wrong jeremiah and here's deborah the question to about people of no faith here's the question about sojourner douglas and johns hopkins here's his response to the question about churches in the city of baltimore and across the nation tony said oh no no no you're wrong i'm going back this year i said what he said they invited me and my wife back this year and we got two and a half hours to sit up in front of twenty thousand dollar guess with nothing but some water in between us on this coffee table and i got 45 minutes to present my position she got 45 minutes to present her position and then we got the rest of that two and a half hours to go at each other because i believe he said that god created homosexuals just as god created heterosexuals i believe that god loves homosexuals just like he loves heterosexuals i believe jesus came for homosexuals just like he came for heterosexual i don't believe there should ever be any discrimination at any point job job security family leave health care in terms of where you can work where you can live if you are same gender but i don't believe the church or the blessed unions he said my wife on the other hand she believes god loves homosexuals like he loves heterosexuals god sent jesus for homosexuals like he said that there should never be any discrimination we believe the same thing except she believes that if two people same gender loving are willing to make a monogamous commitment for life that the church ought to honor that that's what she believes i got 45 minutes to make my point she got 45 minutes to make a point then we got an hour to go at each other to show christians how two christians can disagree but ain't nobody getting a divorce i'm not leaving my wife over this issue but us christians as christians especially you start talking about people don't believe in nothing well you ain't saved you don't believe in we not only want baptists we pull out and start a whole new denomination we don't know how to disagree we don't know how to work together on things we have in common and community issues that we both have whether we are muslim christian jews sunni muslim sunni sunni muslim nation of islam muslim or no belief comedic comedic we don't know how to do that without demonizing and dehumanizing the people we disagree with and i think we need that's something we need to start working on now in terms of how we do that and for the folk who don't like it we keep on working together they can go somewhere else yeah hallelujah hey he'd be behind well um but but but i think you don't stop working with people because they don't you know that they're not they don't share my scriptures i quoted the christian scriptures my jewish brothers and sisters don't recognize luke jesus was just a renegade rabbi who didn't quite get it right oh this is great so some of the points that have been made just so everybody's clear we think all your questions are important we just are not going to have the time to get to all of them i am going to make sure that dr blum gets these cards so you can get a sense of the the kind of topics and and questions and comments that this precipitated and maybe this is something that we can explore in the social determinants of health conference or in a future occasion but i do apologize we just will not have time to get to all of them but somebody did raise a question about lgbt um youth and is their love for them is god's love available for them because in a world where we talk about fairness and justice that is a community that is you know at the heart of a lot of of inequity so thank you for speaking on that i don't know if you'd like to speak on that at all but i feel like you sort of kind of got into that world well that's one of the reasons that tutu is is uh considered anathema now uh in that he stands in south africa and pushed to make sure that was a part of their constitution that that bishop tutu um that you know to save folk thinking he ain't saved because he did that um my the best articulation of the importance of that issue and how it is best addressed from my perspective is what i just shared in in detroit last night night before last how many of you have ever not have ever we're at the hampton ministers university ministers conference when gardener taylor was the was the person who with whom we spent an evening with the elders afternoon with the elders or any of you there hampton university ministers conference started a practice of having an afternoon with the elders where they would have senior states of women or senior states men or both henry and elemental both appeared and you give them 30 minutes to talk 30 40 however long they want to talk at their age if they can do whatever they want and then those of us in attendance have the rest of the two hours time slot to ask questions and garner taylor had just retired and he do you know dr taylor garnett hill in harlem brooklyn brooklyn conquer baptist church of christ and he talked about retirement he talked about the succession plan all that kind of stuff and then during the question and answer period uh questions were asked of him about sermon preparation the questions were asking him about you know somebody of your statute preaching with notes preaching without notes all those kind of questions and 15 20 minutes into the question as a period this very strident tone the person came to the center aisle michael said dr taylor the one issue that's tearing the christian church apart right now is this whole issue of homosexuality the united methodists have defrocked one of their clergy because they perform the same gender loving service the presbyterians are voting on this week the church of god in christ has taken a position against it the ames have taken a position against it what is your position on homosexuality now there are four thousand ministers sitting in the in the coliseum and it got so quiet you could hear rat urinate on cotton at 100 yards and dr taylor stroked his chin he said god god has this awesome word whosoever the prophet joel says in those days not only will women preach my sons and my daughters but whosoever shall call upon the name of the lord shall be saved he said and then jesus in a midnight seminary class for nicodemus a member of the sanhedrin he said to nicodemus that god so loved the world god sent god's only son but whosoever believeth in him shouldn't i i i would hate to come behind god and put qualifications on who's included in the whosoever yeah oh i love it all right um i we had that you definitely are getting the last word here today i think i'm gonna make one comment ask the panel to react to it and then reverend wright we are going to give you the last word for today so this is a symposium on equity and one of our audience members said and they did to everybody not everybody everybody but no hispanics no catholics they're calling into question if we're going to deal with equity in east baltimore we don't have quite the the populations at risk in in need and east baltimore represented on the panel you want to you want to speak to that i know bob said dad she put me on a hot seat anybody on the panel i i think that uh as the one thing that we and i say this everywhere that i speak now this is not our grandparents america and we have got to move to the point where in every venue that we have that we make the effort to be as inclusive as possible of all of those who are part of whatever community uh the event is being held and the there's a growing uh hispanic population within baltimore uh again the catholic church represents the largest population in the state of maryland uh but you know when when there are three spaces somebody has to do the inviting i didn't invite i'm putting it on back and so i'm going to uphold dr blum as we were in the room together and a discussion about our gotta have faith work that we do together around young people when the issue came up for me is the black church is she still relevant in the midst of our social determinants and our health disparities in the 21st century and the first person that came off of my lips that i felt like could address that was the one and only dr jeremiah wright i have heard him speak in the conferences where we talk on hiv and aids and also his preaching is prolific and he's always on point and i think that at this point in time the invitation went out to all communities and to everyone everybody has an opportunity to knock on the door and say i would like to be a part but more so than that for me debbie i think at this point it is about the fact that if we want to start taking the band-aids off of the molehill that we have created that have created the greatest and the deepest disparities in baltimore city in east baltimore we must deal with the issues around the african-american issues that have not been adequately addressed anytime you have a community of people who are still living with cardiovascular disease at the same rate that it was 20 years ago it is not that we are being discriminatory and nor was the door closed to the hispanic community but today i believe that we are a group of people as african americans that do not address our issues except for that we open the door and say everybody else come in everybody else gets taken care of everybody else goes home and we are still sitting in death valley it is time to stop so for me i believe that and i love my hispanic latino brothers and sisters but at this moment i believe that we all have a responsibility to also come to each other's events whether we are invited or not invited whether we have a seat at this table or we make a seat at the table for the next time around i'm sorry i'm very no it's a good issue because i one of the comments that has been made to me was i had this phrase that i had been acculturated into called people of color and i had used this term on my radio program my radio show and someone said to me when you're talking about black people say black people stop you let yourself off the hook you've gotten real politically correct and you use this less confrontational term called people of color but 90 of the time what you're talking about are people of african heritage or african americans or black people please have the courage to say exactly who it is that you're talking about and not not take the safe road unless you're running for office why can't you just say black people so it's a good point so i'm glad that endeavor and i by the way are the co-chairs of the the community university coordinating council i'm on the university side she's on the community side and i appreciate your being candid about your views on that i think it's time for us to be very candid about quite a few things and we have not had an opportunity to adequately discuss race but race is the elephant in the rhinoceros that stays in the room and we as an african-american people have always been very pleasant very cordial to say oh it's okay you come on in and you get your issues taken care of but we never get our issues taken care of it you know it's today is the day that we speak truth to power and we stop just you know laying down and letting everybody walk over and then what we do is we sit back and start tearing each other apart it is time to stop if we're going to do things different then i invite you to come to those meetings that are held the community health initiative which is called the chai or the chi whichever one you want to call it it is time for us to all come in the room and be in the room as equal partners it's time for us to go to the latino meetings that they have once a month we need to integrate both but we need to be respectful of both understanding that there are language barriers and that there are cultural barriers and that we need to be able to come together and understand them but not interfere in the process of making certain that either group is getting what they need to get but that we support one another excellent thank you deborah okay i'm going to give reverend wright the last word but before we do that again thank you bob and the uhi uh for putting this together dean yeager thank you for coming in and representing the university at the highest levels i know we have a lot of our faith-based community in the audience i want to acknowledge my own pastor p.m smith is here he's a real change maker as well in baltimore city all of the young people that are here the students there are some faces that i see at all the events whether they be hopkins events community events church events so for the people who are out there consistently at the table on the ground floor regardless of where your seat is i just want to acknowledge you because you do matter and your consistent presence is what's going to help us to actually move things forward so i just want to acknowledge all of you for whatever you set aside to be here today to really have this be a success and with that said i'd like to give reverend wright the last five minutes to leave us with whatever closing thoughts uh and messages you'd like to leave us with the uh thank you and i thank bishop miles and reverend hickman and dr blum also and participants that last question um i would go back to bob's opening salvo in terms of how complicated an issue this is and how things are going on at different places at the different times and then tie in with what you said about someone said to you i didn't know they were that smart that there's some conversations that take place and need to take place with hispanics with asians with catholics i don't think this forum is that place um that's just my response in terms of what i see happening what i see needs to happen especially in terms of what i've seen about a segment of and i thought you were going to go there reverend hickman when you started talking about us us meaning the black church taking into account number one the seriousness of eugene robinson's analysis that there are four black americans the super rich who normally don't go to nobody's church even though the ames claimed vernon jordan the wannabe rich middle class middle income whatever they call themselves the folklore don't realize they're two paydays away from welfare they're totally disadvantaged and the africans in our midst who are african been here 30 years 25 years from nigeria from sudan from ghana who consider themselves and when their kids finishing with high scores on act and s.a.t they want scholarships given to the black kids because they're black that's that's the four americas that make up our community and that are parts of our churches come back to this third this third totally disadvantaged one or two middle class like weezy who does have a college degree that one of the problems that we have and conversations need to go on at this level is that a lot of our churches that one of the things that blows me away every time i see your son every time i see his church i don't know why they haven't put him out of every minister's conference in the city he's got these bagging and sagging folk that a lot of us do not want in our churches a lot of our churches that are building those cathedrals for themselves do not want the totally disadvantaged we don't want the hip-hop folk we don't i mean if they walked up in the yo whatever we would have a stroke because we don't want them in our churches that's but we need to talk to them i've had for instance the two populations and the material i've read from bob and the material i've read from gomez and mindy and conversations most of us have never at johns hopkins not not the school not you not i mean university type six our kids do but not us my generation og's we will talk about and preach about gangbangers but we don't talk to gangbangers and they need to be in this conversation we talking about rebuilding our community you selling drugs out here on the corner remember do you know why they're selling drugs i had one one brother i was talking to lamont on the way in here today one one young brother who's an excellent rapper i mean this kid could freestyle he was supposed to freestyle right before me uh at a program in rochester the cops were up and down the aisles as as ushers because all the gangs had come together we had a week-long discussion and he never showed he wouldn't come out and i thought he had gone home when i got back to get my coat he's sitting back in the principal's office man you punked out on me he said no i didn't i said yeah she did you supposed you supposed to rap he said rev do you see any bling bling i don't do bling bling i ain't got no 24 inch 26 inch rims i ain't no big time drug dealer i sell enough blow with a ged to pay my rent get food for my kids when i got enough that's it to next month now selling up below next month for the rent food for the kids we got this image in our head about drug dealers and here's a kid saying i do this because i i want to work at mcdonald's for three four five hours an hour i need to feed my kids how many of you have ever talked to a prostitute that's right that's right they need to be a part of this conversation in this community father flager a catholic father flake of saints of miners like you were painting off painting billboards against tobacco led the charge against tobacco advertisement our alcohol advertisers in our community took the men of his church going up and down the street shutting down every store that sold tops paper any drug paraphernalia but he he really blew my mind last year and that he he went out and found i'm not going to ask the brothers here because i don't want them to get in trouble how much do the hoes make in in baltimore an hour if you answer you're in trouble what's the going rate well round his church is a hundred dollars an hour so he offered them 200 for two hours of their time to come into the church to talk to them about jesus and jobs and their lives and 22 of them got into rehab programs and got into training programs but we don't talk to prostitutes in our communities many of whom watch out for our kids at howard university they watch out for the students they know the students and they don't let the parents about people but we don't talk to them as a part of are we talking about rebuilding a community who's in our community you got lamont was telling me you got mixed housing here we got section 8 we got welfare next to doctors and lawyers you got prostitutes you got gang bangers you got folks selling drugs why why do you sell drugs because i ain't got no job if you got to training would you stop this how did we get the train that's why i'm talking about creative ways of deconstructing the template the business as usual that once michelle alexander points out once you get the word felon on your record you can forget the job why don't we talk to people in our churches why don't we talk to people in our community okay this person is a felon but i'm a voucher can you give him a job creative ways of getting them to change behaviors that are destroying our communities so i i think yes hispanics need to be a part of the company because we're talking about what affects us as black people what affects this nation we should still be honest about race and the other ethnic minorities need to be in as a part of that conversation as well as africans who are taught by the british that they are superior to african americans they need to be a part of the community including gang bangers including including all the people who who we see as a drag on our community and yet we're preaching a gospel that says you included come the lord loves you too i think all of them need to be but again not at a forum like this plus like like mickey wouldn't come up you know why he wouldn't come out and rap he said y'all did you see who the ushers were right all them cops they know i sell blow i ain't going out there on the stage that that that we need to have those come and we need them and as effort i found out that week with the gangbangers some of them aren't going to talk in no forum like this they're not coming to the they'll come to other meetings they'll come to community things they'll come to a job you say you got a job program all right i need a job but they're not coming if i know two three hundred people to talk to talk uh so so that's that's what i mean by not at this forum i think they're crucial i think they're a part of the ongoing conversation and i encourage and i want to thank you also for what you were doing and for the things that you that you articulated just this afternoon letting us know the things that are under the radar that people particularly outsiders are not aware of job manufactured job training health care for twenty dollars that doesn't make the news you know kurt smoke building a rapid transit system with no electricity under the ground to run the system that makes the news but the baltimore ravens that makes the news but not twenty dollars for health care and thank you for that and thank you for your continued work and your determination to make a difference which involves everyone as peers at the table working together to make this place livable for their children and for their grandchildren thank you thank you bob any final comments from you reverend wright bishop miles and reverend hickman and pastor heckman and dr deborah helden thank you all very much and thank you for uh coming out this afternoon i think i see this as one piece of a conversation if today is the end of a conversation if we go away and don't keep this conversation going it will be time wasted but if we do keep it going individually in twos and threes in our churches in our university in our colleges then we stand a chance thank you very much you

Channel: Urban Health Institute

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Id: 62qdwaC2b6g

Length: 114min 45sec (6885 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 11 2013