Theology in the Raw - Systemic Racism and Racial Reconciliation: Latasha Morrison

Episode Date: September 2, 2024

Latasha Morrison is a speaker, author, reconciler, bridge-builder and leader, committed to educate people on cultural intelligence and racial literacy. She’s the author of Be the Bridge and the recently released Brown Faces, White Spaces. In this podcast conversation, Latasha tells us how she got into the space of racial reconciliation, the challenges she’s faced, the power of listening, and how people can pursue great racial literacy in our polarized world around this topic. Register for the Austin conference on sexualtiy (Sept 17-18) here: https://www.centerforfaith.com/programs/leadership-forums/faith-sexuality-and-gender-conference-live-in-austin-or-stream-online Register for the Exiles 2 day conference in Denver (Oct 4-5) here: https://theologyintheraw.com/exiles-denver/  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hello friends. Welcome back to another episode of theology in the raw. We have our faith, sexuality and gender conference, September 17th to 18th at life family church in Austin, Texas. All the information is that center for faith.com and our two day exiles of Babylon conference in Denver, Colorado, October 4th to 5th. All the information there is that theology in the rod.com. My guest today is the one and only Latasha Morrison, author of this book, Brown faces white spaces. She is a speaker author, reconciler bridge builder and leader committed to educate people on cultural intelligence and racial literacy. She founded the organization

be the bridge in 2016 to encourage racial reconciliation among all ethnicities to promote racial unity in America and equip others to do the same. Her first book was titled be the bridge pursuing God's heart for racial reconciliation, which sold, I think 10 billion copies, not quite, but man, that book really take off, had a great impact on our, on the church and on society. So I'm super excited for you to engage Latasha. She was an absolute fun person to talk to, lively, engaging, thoughtful. And I think you'll enjoy this provocative conversation. So please welcome to the show. The one and only Latasha, it's such an honor to have you on the podcast.

As I said offline, known about you for a while. Be the Bridge, was that your first book? Yeah. I know that's just really first and- It was the first book. The name of the organization is The Cornerstone of why we do what we do the way we do it, basically, with Be The Bridge. It captures that. Did you think it would take off the way it did? I don't know.

Not in a million years. When I hear, I go around the country and you're like, my church used this or I read this book or we had Be The Bridge groups. And I'm like, where are you located? And they're like, Omaha. I'm like, Omaha? Like, what? That's never been the one. I'm like, Montana. I've never even been there. But there's places that Be The Bridge has been that I have never been. New Zealand. I mean, you know, there are organizations and there's a group of church leaders in New Zealand, you know, Christ Church, right before

they had that killing, I was actually meeting with them on Zoom. I think it was a synagogue killing that happened in New Zealand several years ago. I was actually meeting with two of the leaders. One was in Christchurch area and the other one was in Auckland. I was meeting with these two leaders that week about bringing Be the Bridge. They had Be the Bridge groups and these two churches were partnering, but they wanted to do a conference or something. And so we had just talked about that. This was right before the pandemic and all the things.

And I would have never imagined in starting this, it was just me as a local church girl trying to find solutions to the brokenness, you know, that I saw within the church and within society. So it's that thing where it says, like, do your little part. And I just had adopted this mantra just in my life of I'm going to just do the next right thing, because life can be overwhelming. And sometimes you don't know where to start or what to do. And so in my way of handling those times or those times of anxiety, I said, you know what, I'm just going to do the next thing I know to do. And my dad will always say,

you control your controllables, you know? And, and so with me, I'm like, we need to have conversation. And that's really how this started. So starting that, I never thought that it would go beyond, first of all, I never thought it would go beyond the group I was doing it with. I never thought it would go beyond my state. And then now to see this thing internationally where people in Italy were doing groups. And I'm like, wow, and in Africa and Rwanda and Uganda, like, I'm

just like, wow, because it translates the blueprint of although the history is different, the blueprint translates, you know, the pathway translates. And so I am very surprised. I'm still, I am in awe every time when someone says that. I never, and it's just like one of those things that God would use to just reassure you because this work, Preston, is very hard. It's very difficult, especially in a climate that we're in today and yesterday and last week and last year. And just even the future is not an easy work. I'm like, what? I mean, like, why couldn't my topic be about joy or faith or, you know, like hope or, you know,

just something like, something a lot easier. Why am I dealing with centuries old, I mean, things that go back to Genesis, like what in the world? Like why? So I'm going to have to talk about that with Jesus one day, just like, why? Speaker 0 4 I asked myself the same question, different kind of field of focus, but my wife, actually, I'm not going to lie. She's the one that asked me, like, why are we doing this? Can't you write a book on prayer? Be everybody's friend.

Yeah. That's what I'm like. I used to say that when I started this work and people were saying like, hey, this is something, this is a thing. You should do this. And I'm like, why? I said, I like when I walk into a room for people to like me. I want to be liked. I don't want to be shunned. Yeah, and that was just something that I had to really reconcile with myself. And I would tell you, and I know the same probably goes for you

and the difficulties and the things that you talk about and address. It has to come from a place of conviction because that's the thing that's going to keep you when things get hard. And so because I am convicted into this work, it is the keeping power for me. Right now I'm walking through a very difficult season, like even personally, professionally, all of it. Like just even right before I got on the call with you, I got a call from my mom and she was hysterically crying. My uncle's dying, you

know, he's, and she just talked to him on the phone, his organs are shutting down. And I'm like, hey, when I finish this, I'm going to come over there to you. He's in North Carolina. And I'm just like, God, like, wow, this is just a very, I've been in like a grieving season just over the last couple years. If anybody who has followed me, they know my dad died during COVID. I got so much outpouring of love from people. I was like, what? Why did I get like a thousand cards? It was because I wrote about my dad and be the bridge. And so people felt this connection to him. And then I had my, what I like to call my sister friend, my childhood friend I grew up with. I'm the

godmother of her children. She passed at the beginning of the year, this year, and she also lost her husband in 2022. So it's just been a grievous season where it's like when life happens, you know, you want to quit. But it was like, this is the work that I am convicted in and also energized in and you can't explain it. It's hard to explain. But it's like that, I would say, it's something that God does and places in you. And I think the threads and the patterns were there in my life early on, you know? And I always say like, I didn't choose it, but it chose me and God is keeping me in it through all the difficulty. So yeah.

Yeah. Eugene Cho wrote the forward to your recent book, a brown faces, white, white spaces. I'll hold it up again. Yeah. Beautiful cover, beautiful cover. Great title in the forward. He said something really important. He said, uh, you didn't just write a book or start speaking about this. You've been doing this work long before you became kind of a, a national figure if I can say. Can you tell us, let's go back in time. When did you start to get this passion for the work that you do?

And what is the work that you do? Let's just go there. The work of, I like to say justice and righteousness. The work of justice and righteousness that leads us toward reconciliation. And I started this work officially, I would say, like in 2014, when I started having like conversations, but my catalytic moment to really step out

was after the murder of Trayvon Martin And I was you know in a different church I wasn't in a predominantly African American church anymore and just the perspectives were so different and I'm like wow We need to address this and just my naive self just thinking like we just need to have a conversation Not knowing that I was stepping on all kinds of landmines and all the things, not even understanding that. But if you look at the patterns of my life, and I talk about this in the first book, when I was in high school, my grandmother, when I went to church, I went with my grandparents. I never, my parents didn't really go to church. We were those people in African American household.

A lot of times people say you go on Christmas and Easter. But in a lot of African American households, you go on Easter and Mother's Day and homecoming. It's a little different. We don't really do church on Christmas like that. We do January for December 31st watch night. So you go to a watch night service. But I went to church with my grandmother during Black History Month and they did this play and I was like, wow, this is incredible. And I thought about it and I was like, man, we don't, we need to learn this in school. We don't do this in school. So I was a part of our student government association when I was in high school and I brought the idea back to our leadership class.

So when, if you were in student government, you had to take a leadership class and I remember going back and, you know, for ideas, people were in student government, you had to take a leadership class. And I remember going back and, you know, for ideas, people were, you know, submitting ideas, and I raised my hand and I said, we need to celebrate Black History Month. Oh, my goodness. You would have thought, man, I just, and I was, I wasn't prepared for it, because I didn't have the language that I have now then. So I didn't understand the resistance. What was the pushback? It was like, I will never forget this.

And this is how things and words mark you because I remember these words. It was a guy that was in the class and I remember he was on the baseball team. And he was a good friend. Like we were in band together and all that. And he said, well, what are we gonna do next? Celebrate Italian history month? And I remember that. And I was like, but every month is your month. Like, huh?

But it was just people, and we see that today, people not understanding ethnicity, not understanding race, you know, all of those things in the category. So it was like just ignorance and that's not really understanding. And really, truly, I didn't understand it then either. And I just remember that resistance in the class, like, people that I just remember, my friends were pushing back and I couldn't understand it. And I almost had no words. But I remember the teacher. I can remember with her, there wasn't

resistance. I remember compassion, and she was trying to kind of mediate this conversation. I cannot think of this teacher's name, but I do remember her willingness to listen. And I left that class thinking like, oh my goodness. And I went, you know, if you go into any lunch room around the country at schools right now, a lot of times they are racially divided. And I remember that day I walked into, I was one of those kids, I had friends, very diverse friends. My school was pretty diverse. I lived in a military town. But I remember that day because I needed to be encouraged. I went and sat at the black table. When I ran for student government, I ran on a platform saying,

it's time to make a change. One of the girls reminded me of that. This was the name of a wine and song back in the day, like, it's time to make a change. It gave me the motivation to go back And so it gave me the motivation to go back and really push a little bit, not understanding. But there was a compromise made that year. And they decided, she said, we can do it. The teacher said, we can do it, but we have to call it Brotherhood Month. So and it went from a month to a week. And so we had Brotherhood Week during Black History, but it was basically Black History, you know, but Black History Week. But, you know, and I remember joining forces with in our school, we had a lot of indigenous people. I come from North Carolina. And so we have a lot of Lumbee natives there. And so I partnered with a young lady,

her name was Carla, and you know, and then also at that time, my Spanish teacher, he helped put some things together. So it was a good learning lesson for me, but it shaped me. And that was kind of like the blueprint of pushing for something. And I was telling someone this story. I was on their podcast, on their YouTube channel.

And I was telling someone this story. And this person, we found out probably just a little bit before that we were from the same hometown. That Fayetteville? Yes, Fayetteville. And not only was he from Fayetteville, which I knew he was from Fayetteville, but I did not know we went to the same high school. And so when I'm telling this story and I found out that he went to Southview, he was like,

wait a minute, wait a minute. And he's 10 years younger than me. And he was like, it started with you. He said, I graduated from Southview. We have Black History Month. I was a part of that choir that you started. And I was just like, wow, like you just never know the long term impact of your work where you may not see it at that time and you don't understand the difficulties of that, but the fruit of your labor will follow you. And I think that's what in this work of Be the Bridge, although it's very difficult and we're in a very difficult season, I'm thinking about that conversation that

the seeds that are planted, you know, that we're planning now, they're going to be water. And can you help us? That's a cool story. So you've been in this work for a while. I just, I would love for you to explain why is something like black history month significant and how, how would you respond to the, like a good faith, genuine person who says, but why don't we have Italian history month or whatever? Like, like, but they're not, they're not being snarky. They're, they're genuinely like, I want to, I want to understand this. How would you respond to that? You know, because Chris scripture like instructs us scripture instructs us in how we lift up the voice of the marginalized.

And because of the history of African Americans in this country, we are a marginalized, underserved community. And so there has been strategic efforts to not tell our story. And so with Black History Month, this was a month that started by Carlo G. Woodson to lift up our voice, so to give us a pride in our heritage and history, because we are a group

that was stripped of language and culture. And so I will never know like my true ethnicity because of the Atlantic slave trade. Okay. And so this was started to really bring about education for African Americans because in our history, in our history classes across this country is still today, we're not learning really about African American history. We learn about British history. We learn about world history, but we're not learning the story of the natives

in our country. I didn't learn about boarding schools and how people were stripped of their heritage or how people were adopted out until I was an adult. But that gives me context to what's happening in the indigenous and native community. So that's history I should know or why languages like certain tribes don't know their languages. Those are things that give us historical context that I don't know. And so that is, I think, where scripture tells us to mourn with those who mourn. And we don't do that well. We don't lament well. And I

think what we try to do as an organization and what I try to do in my book is to teach people to embrace lament. It's a hard history, but it's the truth that makes us free. It sets us free. Although it's difficulty, none of us, no one here with breath in their body, we're not responsible for this history. You know, we inherited a mess, but it is our responsibility as a collective,

as a collective body of Christ to be part of the solution. And I think that's the thing where when we look at this from a cultural perspective, you know, the Bible is collective culturally, you know, we are connected to one another, you know, we make up the body. And so if one part of the body is, you know, mourning, or if one part of the body is hurting or rejoicing, then we are to join in in that pain because we are connected to each other. What impacts me should also impact you.

I think that's the thing where we have this very individualistic mindset, culturally, where we detach ourselves from it. That's you, not me. That was them and not us. And so we need to have this more united, you know, not the they, them, and those, but it's the we and the us in this conversation. And I, you know, and when I, I became a Christian in college. And so when I look at scripture,

we're saying that we're connected, that we're brothers and sisters. I take that to heart. And so even if I don't agree, I need to be willing to listen. And a part of my responsibility is to show up with compassion and empathy. But there's this thing, if I'm in Christ, I'm a new creation, but a lot of times people

are showing up with apathy and resistance and anger. And I'm like, that is definitely not a fruit of the Spirit. You know? And so I'm like, okay, there's just some basic things that we as Christians that should be evident in our lives to show we're followers of Christ. And I may not understand everything. I may not agree with everything, but can I come to the table with compassion?

And so that is something where when we started these conversations, it was just basically a community of people wanting to understand and lean into growth. And we were using the restorative justice model and we were having these conversations around life. We didn't talk about what we did at that time. We just talked about life. And then in the middle of our conversations, Ferguson happened. And that became like a centerpiece to what we were talking about. And I would just point people, hey, I want you to read some background history on Ferguson and what's happening. You know, and just, and telling people to look behind the curtain versus looking at everything you see and also just a news cycle.

And for them, some of the people that were participating, they were like, it changed their perspective. And they were like, if I hadn't been in this group, I would have had a totally different perspective of what was happening versus seeing the background and also hearing people that have been impacted by this, tell their stories. And we had a young lady that was in our group that just told the story of how she,

when she was a little girl, she was probably around six or seven and she was so excited to buy her mom a Mother's Day gift. And her and her older sisters went into town, and this is the town that they grew up in, the town that we were in at that time, which was Austin, Texas. And they went in to the store downtown,

I forget the actual name of the store that they went to. And they got exported out, even though they had money, because they were not allowed in the store because of the color of their skin. That's recent history. The person that was sitting in that group with us at that time, she was no more,

that she was probably around 50 years old. This was in 2014. And she's telling this story. This is her experience that happened to her. But a lot of times in our country, if it didn't happen to you or someone that you know, we feel that our, our experiences are universal. And so how I grew up is how everybody grew up knowing that that's based on

where you, you know, where you live, you know, all of this different things. If you grow up in California, it's definitely different than growing up in Florida or growing up in Virginia or Texas. Those are different lived experiences, but we can't deny someone's lived experience and their story. They were impacted. I would say the gift that the ladies gave us in that group was the gift of listening, the gift of understanding, the gift of empathy. Even when they couldn't relate, they didn't try to make up a story. Well, this happened to me when I was little and tried to be comparative. And I remember, and that does happen sometimes.

Oh yeah. It happens. I've done that. I've been done this thing. Yeah. Like this one of my friends said, well, you know, discrimination is like, you know, like how I feel as a redhead.

And I was like, huh? No. And she was like, you know, because there's no dolls that have red hair. And I'm like, not the same, but you know what? That's a good perspective. That is true. And so I can have empathy for her in that moment, but also lead her in a way of not

to dissenter her perspective in this moment, how it's different. So yeah. Cause that, yeah, I feel like that's, that can be a good faith attempt at trying to, trying to build a bridge, trying to be compassionate, you know, like, oh yeah, I'm trying to understand. It's just, I mean, yeah.

Looking back at the times that I've done stuff like that, it's a little cringy, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But bridges are hard. Bridges are hard to build. Like, you know, when we think about physically and like just in real life, bridges are hard to build. Like what, the Golden State Bridge, 11 people died building that bridge.

You think about bridges over water. I always think about that bridge when you're going into Louisiana. I think it's the Pontchartrain Bridge. I'm like, it's over water. They have alligators or crocodiles in their water. Who did that? I think about that with us and building bridges. Everybody's not going to want to walk across. So I think about that with us and building bridges. Everybody's not going to want to walk across.

And it's hard work, it's difficult. Everybody isn't going to thrive at bridge building. There's some people who are, they're going to be truth tellers, but they not building a bridge while they're doing it. It's different personalities, but I feel like, um, I've been shaped for this and I feel like there's different ways to have this conversation and the way we do it with them be the bridge. It's just one way. The older I get,

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What are some of the main ingredients, would you say, in people that want to build a bridge, specifically in the race conversation? Dr. Keefe This, I would say grace and truth. Grace and truth. We have a t-shirt that says it, because giving people grace, grace upon grace, we've been given grace, but truth. And truth telling is difficult. So it's like telling the truth. It, you know, truth telling is difficult. So it's like telling the truth, like, it may not feel good. It doesn't sound good. You know, it's hard. But how do we press through what we're feeling to get to the other side?

Like, if just imagine, if you don't like hearing about it, what makes you think I like talking about it? I mean, I tell people, I was like, imagine if you don't like hearing it, just think about the people who have to experience it. You know, and so I would rather not talk about this. not talk about this. I would rather not talk about this. But it is, the scripture gives us a guide in life in this conversation. We see throughout scripture, ethnic hostility.

We see the story of immigrants. We see the story of a belonging in diversity, you know, like this is that happens throughout scripture. And I can see this when I read scripture, but I remember a time where I didn't see it, you know? And so this is, it has been a journey. And so I just like to kind of fill in those gaps for people as much as I can. But I know that I cannot convince everyone, you know, but there's a few and there's a remnant. There's always a remnant and we know that God works through remnets.

We see it, you know. You mentioned earlier when you talk or you want to just start a conversation or even talk about your, somebody else's lived experience and why that's important. You mentioned that that's sometimes faced with anger or apathy. What's, why is that? Like what's driving anger and apathy among people that

when they hear you talk, I mean. I think it's our belief system and how our belief systems have been informed. And so when you are coming to get someone's belief system or their values that they've come to embrace that sometimes have been informed by their theological interpretation. When you start coming against that, that can arouse anger.

Because you're telling them that either their parents are wrong, they're wrong, or society is is wrong in that sense. And so that's expected. But for us, we are not trying to, we're trying to show people a different way, but where Be The Bridge comes in, it's about acknowledgement, awareness and acknowledgement. So I'm aware of the racial brokenness. So I'm not trying to defend it. And so those are conversations that we have with people where I'm aware, but I don't know what to do.

Or I acknowledge it and I don't know which direction to go. We serve as an on-ramp to that conversation so that people can understand ABCD so they can get to EFG. But we want people to understand EFG before they even understand ABCD. And so we serve as our own ramp to the conversation, but we're not trying to convince you of the racial brokenness. This conversation that we have with them be the bridge or for people that recognize it.

So I'm not having this conversation with people that say that, Hey, there's no systemic racism at all. I don't care what you say. We all have a fair opportunity and choice. You know what? Then I'm going to let you sit right over there with that mindset. And you know, because you're not interested even if someone is like, this is to me, this is capital T truth. There's no, like you're like, we can't even begin a conversation. We can't even begin a conversation because we're not starting from a place of truth. You know, I tell people, you know, we're, when we say that sometimes when people say that they just don't understand what systemic racism is when they're saying that. And sometimes it's just, I refuse to listen

and I'm gonna make you convince me. So that means that person wants all the control and that's exhausting. And so that, those are not the people that I feel that I'm called to reach, you know? It may be someone else's calling, but not necessarily mine, especially when we sit in a world that I was born in 1973. My parents were born into a world where

their parents couldn't vote, where they couldn't go. My parents were born into the Jim Crow era. They were born in the 50s. So to say there's no systemic racism, you're denying the history of my family. And to me, that's really a slap in the face where I know my dad had to integrate into middle school into middle school, you know, that my mom, you know, was, you know, on her birth certificate, it says a certain thing, you know, like I think on my mom's birth certificate,

her birth certificate says Negro, but my grandfather said colored, you know, so it's just, you know, and mine says black. But the generation after me, it says African American, you know, so it's just, it's just these things where they're like, you're actually denying the story of my grandmother or my uncle and his 16 year old daughter who was arrested in Greensboro, North Carolina for doing the lunch counter sit-ins. You know, this is an actual part of my history. So it's insulting. And I do know that this is hard work. And so because I know that it's

hard work, there's a heart condition. And so there are other organizations, there are other people that can massage that area a little bit more. And like I said, like, this work has to be led from a place of conviction. And I just really feel that that takes the spirit to really sometimes cut through a lot of this, but I've seen it happen. The person who is our operations director of our organization, who is a white male, he's our COO, when he graduated college, it was about writing a paper on why the Confederacy wasn't bad. Now he's a C-O-O of Be The Bridge. Oh, wow.

So redemption and restoration is possible. This work, like I said, it begins with grace and truth, but there's a component that you have to have, and that's humility. And that is also the component when it comes to Biblical studies that you have to approach scripture with, is that of a place of humility. And one of the things that I've learned at seminary is that, you know what, there's a

30% chance you could be wrong. There's a 30% chance. So as you are talking and arguing scripture, well, not arguing scripture, but you have to realize there is keeping that heart posture of, I could be wrong. And that takes humility because there are some things that I know that I know, that I think I know, that I know that I know. But not taking that posture of just complete righteousness.

And so, yeah. Going back to your parents and family and systemic racism, what would you say to somebody that said, no, no, of course your, your, your parents and your grandparents were raised in an era when systemic racism was, I mean, etched into the law. This is like, it's there, but we have, we're in a different world now. We've progressed from that. So there's minimal, say, lingering effects of that world that your parents grew up in. How do you- Yeah, that's a good question. That's a really good question. I would say, well, what did we do as a country to end that? What did we do to end systemic racism as it relates to our housing?

Not just a policy and to say that this is wrong to do redlining. How do we make amends? Because if it's gone, that means that there's some repair that happened. So how do we repair the fact that my grandparents bought a home in a red line district, the only place that they can buy a home and their house was devalued? How did we repair that? And that's one of the things we even do in our training where there are solutions for

systemic racism. And sometimes when we have to think critically about the solutions, we're like, oh, like, now that makes sense that, you know, why we may need to do this. And so what we did is we said that redlining is now illegal. That's a good thing. But we never went back and repaired the people who actually were redline. We left it as is. And then what we did is we built a school system on top of that broken system. That's a good point. That's a really good point.

And we talk about that constantly. So even in let's talk about like, even as it relates to education, you know, that that impacts education, you know, we talk about the health care system, you know, when we talk about ideology that has been created, what have we done to change that ideology? If you go back and read a lot of health journals and even some of the things that we have in our writings where we refer to people in derogatory terms. Those things are still there in books and documents and all of those things and they create a story about human beings and we never went and undid that and they create that story and those seeds are planted and they grow and

So those are just just like that's just one concept and we can continue like to go on and on You know when we think about you know up and we can continue to go on and on. When we think about women for the first time, we're able to have a checking account in this country in the 70s. That's crazy. It's crazy. You couldn't have a business, you couldn't buy a home. And so in the 70s, and so think about the impact of that,

if you were a widow woman or if you never married, like myself, what would that look like for me today? Like I couldn't have a nonprofit organization. And so when we think about those things, when we talk about the process of restoration and reconciliation, there is a repair component that as Christians, we should know and understand, you know? And so, and we see that in scripture, we see it written into the Jewish faith, you know, this act of justice and righteousness,

when we talk about the year of Jubilee. The fact that even just a simple example, when we read about Ruth and Naomi, and how they were in Moab because of a, because of a famine and you know, they heard there was food back and they had to leave and you know, just all these things just to fast forward the story. But the kinsman redeemer of the family, that was like an act of justice in, you know, in their culture to help bring about redemption. And the fact that she could even glean the fields was an act of

righteousness and justice. It's a part of the system. And so those are things you know, we can go on like if you know anything about Jewish culture and history, there's so much there, you know, and so we're supposed to emulate that. So within our systems, having systems that bring about restoration and redemption, if anybody should get that, Christians, we should get that. You know, I always say if I took your bike Preston and I stole your bike and I ran it off the side of a cliff and you know, tore your bike up, but then I felt bad. And I said, you know what, I'm going to give you your bike back. And I gave you that broken,

crumbled up bike. And you're like, wait a minute, this is how I got to work. This is a necessary piece of how I survive. You stole it. You destroyed it. And now you're going to give me back a destroyed bike? You're not going to be too happy with that. Are you? Yeah. That's a good, that's a great analogy. Yeah. Yeah. You talk about several areas in your book. So I mean, education, healthcare, the justice system, marketplace, military, and several others. I'm curious. I haven't gotten here yet. The, the, um, uh, the justice system, can you talk about that? How has systemic racism, how is it, how is the justice system still affected by systemic racism? Yeah. Yeah. One of the things I, I give the history of policing in America so that we

can understand it. Um, and sometimes like, and it depends on where you were in our country. So I kind of walked through the history of, you know, why we needed policing. And in the South, it was to help catch, you know, runaway slaves. So slave patrols eventually moved into policing. So if you have this distorted view of humans that we are policing inside our society, if we don't train against that, you still see the outcome of that. And I started, like a lot of times when you read the judicial system, I started with policing because that's what we can interact with. I've never been arrested. I've never had any legal cases. So everybody doesn't interact with our judicial

system in that manner. But a lot of us, when we're driving, the first point of contact to our judicial system is that of a police officer. So I started with that just to kind of tell the story because we've, you know, over the last 10 years, we've seen a lot as it relates to policing in America. And we've seen how implicit bias plays in that. If you have a brain, you have a bias. So nobody can say, well, I have no prejudice in me. If you're born in America in a racialized society, a society that uses race categories as the basis for everything, you know, from the time that you're born to the time that you die, every country doesn't do that. But we use racial categories that

are not biblical. You know, these like white doesn't exist, just like black doesn't exist. But it's a form of a caste system that we've created a hierarchy that on your birth certificate, it says which category you're in. So we can't say it doesn't matter when that's the first thing we document from the first time that someone is born. That's like saying gender doesn't matter. And we know it does. And so when you see something like that, we have to make sure that we are understanding in our brain, there is a bias. So there are stories and narratives

that we believe about certain people. So if I even, we play this game in our train, is that if I even said, when you think of a white person, what are some of the things that first come to mind? And people will list out these things. What do you think about when you think of an indigenous person? People will list it. And most of these things weren't taught in school, but they are learned behaviors.

These are stereotypes that we've embraced and maybe not even knowing that these things come up when we see a person. And so if we don't train against it, so we're not born racist or anything like that. But if we don't train against the way society has cued us, and the first thing of admitting that, hey, I have a bias, and sometimes that bias is a racial bias. Sometimes that bias is denominational. If we don't train against it, then it's evident, it's there. We see this case after case after case when we start the story of Katherine Johnston.

This was an 86-year-old woman that was shot in here in Atlanta in 2006, I think it was. She was shot by the police. She was at home. She's in a very high crime area. She lives at home. She's in a very high crime area. She lives by herself. It was the fact that they did a no knock warrant, the same thing that happened to Breonna Taylor and so many others, but it was a no knock warrant, but they were at the wrong house. She's thinking someone, she lives in a high crime area.

She's thinking someone is coming in on her. Just imagine an 86 year old woman and so she fires one shot and this lady's body is riddled with bullets like over 90 times. Just imagine what she saw in her life and what she was born into and how she had to leave this earth. But that wasn't enough. So there was one thing that a mistake was made that you shouldn't have been at her house to own that responsibility and let this lady have her dignity, at least in her death, because

we didn't give it to her when she was alive. But then ensued a cover up to get an informant to say, oh, I brought drugs at that house. So you brought drugs from an 86. I mean, think about the things we go through and this is happening in our society. And so that was something that I remember it shook this community, you know?

And then we constantly still see these stories. This was in 2006, but we're still seeing these stories in 2024 because we're not doing anything in every state to combat this. I'm curious your perspective on, you know, 2020, a lot of stuff flared up. The race conversation was front and center. It feels like for my vantage point, it kind of died out again. Right. I mean, how would you, I think your advantage for this is correct.

And I can only imagine. And I don't, I, this, I can only imagine how frustrating that is. It's like, okay, it takes, it takes some, some catastrophe in society for people like, Oh, we should have this conversation. And once that dies down, people go back to normal. That's that rubber band effect. And, and do you feel like just constantly trying to push against this rubber band and at any moment he's not pushing, it just snaps back. Or how would you describe the last four years? Have we made progress regress? You're right. It's re I would say regress, which is sad because I think in 2020, I know a lot of brown people became hopeful. I remember listening to a author, a famous author that if I said his name, a lot of people would know, but he's not a believer.

He's actually agnostic and he's very pessimistic, but he's a beautiful, he writes beautifully, but it's hard sometimes for me to read his writing because it's not really hopeful. It's the truth, but it's just not hopeful. And I need a little bit of hope. And so I remember this author was talking to someone, being interviewed, and he had tears in his eyes. And he said, for the first time in my life, I know I'm going to shock you when I say this. He said,

I'm hopeful. And I was like, go, God, go. Because I remember this same person got into a tiff with a pastor, a prominent intellectual pastor online, and he actually left social media because of it. And I was just like, man, like, you were a wolf and not a shepherd in that conversation as a person of faith, you know, And to see him say he had hope again, I was so encouraged. And I remember in 2020, you know, when I would go to marches or go to rallies to speak, I would look at that audience.

It didn't look like it did in the 60s when you hear, I have a Dream, or you see some of the Freedom Riders, you know, that was a mixed group of people, but it was predominantly African Americans at that time. But when I looked into this crowd here in Atlanta, when we had this big rally, it was so diverse. It was so diverse. I mean, churches from different denominations, it looked like, I'm telling you the body of Christ. It was so encouraging. And I think that was the fear, because the thing that fuels racism is not hate, it's indifference. People were united across these lines. And when that happens, sometimes when people are in power,

they want to hold on to power. And I think it became an enemy in that sense. Our unity became an enemy. And not just like as it relates to this work, but also pointing back to Christ, because there were people who have fallen away from faith. There were people who were not believers, were seeing Christians act like Christians. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, were you talking about Kendi? I'm curious. Or you didn't want to mention his name, but it sounds like it wasn't Kindy. It wasn't. Okay. It was, it was Tata

Hissy. Okay. Okay. Yeah. It was Tata Hissy. And I just remember and kidney is another one, you know, but I just remember that. And I just remember seeing, you know, like here in Atlanta, you know, Asian American churches, like just. I got approached, this lady, she was a part of this East Indian Church and they were talking about, they were reading Be the Bridge at that time. I just was like, God, look at you. Where they will know me by the love that you have for one another. That's what was happening. I've seen it happen in our Be The Bridge groups where people who

are not people of faith come in and they say, I cannot believe Christians are having this type of conversation, centering grace and truth and love. This is making me want to sit here a little bit longer. And I think, you know, then you have all of the French things that started, that started in the church that uprooted the momentum that was happening and what we were seeing across this country. Now this didn't feel good because when you're faced with truth, when you're faced with historical truth, it doesn't feel good. But it also doesn't feel good for those of us

who are doing this work and doing educating to have to constantly talk about it. So like I said at the beginning, if you're getting sick of hearing about it, just imagine how we feel with talking about it and living it. A friend of mine, she let her driver's license aspire by mistake and she had to get her tag. She's like, I am not driving because I don't know who I'm going to get. There's

just constant fear or worry that a lot of times people who look like me experience that a lot of other people don't. And some people in our community, they start realizing it because a lot of entry point to this conversation has been those who have adopted transracially. They've experienced like a huge part of our Be the Bridge community are people that have adopted and they realize their experience in things as it relates to teachers, to when they take their kids to the pool or to Costco that they just did not experience before. And they're like, wait a minute. What is it me? And so that is a part

of it. But I would say definitely read any of the books, but also one of our cornerstones that we say is listen. Listen to people that are experiencing it, that are telling, like, if 96% of a group is saying one thing, if 96% of that group is saying one thing, but you're choosing to listen to the 5% that is saying something different to make you feel better, then something may be wrong. And so you have to be brave to listen, to learn, to educate yourself. Like you said, you're reading through this book. A lot of people won't pick up a book that's written by a person of color and read it. If you think about your library, how many books, how many theology books are you reading

from someone that doesn't look like you? You know? And so I think that's important. And then lament. We don't know what to do with our grief and our sorrow. And sometimes we take what is conviction and we turn that into, oh, you're making me feel guilty. But sometimes that's conviction. Yeah, that's not necessarily... Yeah. So, lament is a part of the process. I lament the fact that this is something that divides the body of Christ. I lament the fact that there was a point in history that I wouldn't be able to sit on this podcast with you, yet alone sit in the same church building issue. The black church, the Asian church only exists because of racial segregation. That's the only reason why it existed. So even our

faith couldn't unite us, you know? But scripture shows us the way. It shows us how we're to treat the other, but we've refused to see it. And so I think, you know, and then also leverage. And so And so I think, you know, and then also leverage. And so you leverage your position, your power, your resources, your platforms to elevate these voices, you know, and you know, the most important thing is love. And so listen, learn, lament, leverage and love, you know, those are just key components, I think to this conversation that, you know, that I try to write from and embrace.

I'm curious from my vantage point again, hopefully I'm one for one with giving my vantage point. So I'll try it again. It seems like if I look at like hurdles for even having the conversation, like those kind of immediate shutdowns, not disagreement when you're deep into the conversation, two people really trying to understand. And maybe they're not arriving at exactly the same position, but they're having the conversation. They're moving forward. They're going from, you know, F to G to H, you know, maybe you want them at a, you know, a K K K. You want them at an S or something, you know, it seems like one of the main hindrances from my vantage point is just how politicized it tribalistically politicized things are. So for people that are not just say lean, right,

lean left, maybe they resonate a little bit more with Republicans or whatever, but people that are very tribalistic about it. So that when they hear racial records or when they hear the word systemic racism, it immediately is filtered through in this case, but maybe some right-wing media outlets that have already said that this is a bad woke term or what, you know, so they're already there. They're like, no, my tribe has already said there's nothing here. This is bad. And they've already put you in another tribe. And it defined that that is one of the main hindrances because Christians should be able to talk about issues

of race and maybe not even arrive at exact same whatever, but it shouldn't be scared of the conversation. This shouldn't be scared of saying, maybe systemic racism is a thing. Let's have that conversation. They shouldn't be scared of that. Yeah. Am I onto something? You're, you're, you're, you're spot on because we've created idols out of our idols out of our partisan views. We value that more than we value one another. And that perspective has tainted everything. Now, politics are about people. So all of these conversations are going to be political because everything, every policy that we had that denied people was about politics. So it's going to take policy to even unravel some of those things. So it's not so much as we're talking about policy and politics, but it's the partisanship that has become so divisive and tribal, like never before, like at a point in our society, you know, since 1968 when

we had the Voting Rights Act, it was always reenacted, bipartisan. When we think about a lot of the things, a lot of, and that was a different time, you know, 68, you know. But things started unraveling, you know, around 2012, 2013, where you had the Goal to the Voting Rights Act was gutted. And so then you have more gerrymandered. I mean, you know, if you go back and look at why these things were put in place, but we're saying, oh, it's not an issue anymore. So we don't need those things. But then you start having all the states that actually remove those protections, those states have a common history as it relates to enslavement. And they also have a common, when we say partisanship, history. And so you have to look at those things. You can't deny those things.

So why are you choosing to remove it? We're not like thinking intellectually about some of those conceptions. And I think those are just some of the things that I feel like in Rwanda, when you look at the process of truth and reconciliation that they did after their genocide, the genocide against the Tutsi, and that's how you had to say, it's not just

a genocide, it's a genocide against the Tutsi. So you have Hutus and Tutsis that were pitted against each other through colonization because you divide and conquer. And so they've continued this ideology of who's better. But after the Rwandan genocide that killed almost a million people, they got rid of those tribal identification cards. You are no longer Hutu or Ticy. You are now Rwanda. Now there's certain features, of course, this is a country where all the people are brown, that's different. But I'm just saying there's policies and new governance that they put in to maintain truth and reconciliation. We've never done that as a country. We've never done that as a country.

We've never done that as it relates to, we've never even owned our past as a form of repentance. Like Canada has done that, Australia has done that to their Aborigine, Canada has done that to their First Nations. We've never done that as a country, but we say we are the Christian country. We are a Christian nation.

Wow, yeah. You know, think about the hypocrisy in that. You know, that we can't even say I'm sorry. We can't even say, like, I didn't do it, but I'm sorry for the people that did it before. Like, you know, we can't collectively say, you know what, this was wrong as a country and we're gonna do better.

We're doubling down trying to change the narrative and say, well, it wasn't that bad. And, you know, at least you were allowed to do this or at least you were, you know, we're trying to make excuses. We're denying, defending and deflecting. Latasha, what do you say we, cause I guess I hear both. I hear people that absolutely do apologize and, and you know, what a, uh, emphasize even kind of all the negative things

that the country has been through and other people that are more defensive. So, and again, I think it is kind of a, you're talking, okay. So when you say we- I'm talking structurally. When I say we, cause I'm a part of this country too. So, yeah, so I'm talking about, so I'm saying structurally. So like, it's not, we need more of a collective repentance, you know, a collective lament, not just individualistic. Because it's collective that's gonna help put repair and restoration in motion.

We've never had any really true repair and restoration as it relates to the harm that we've done. Now, we've done certain things that relates to the indigenous community. We've done that when it talks to Japanese internment camps. When we talk about the Chinese Exclusion Act, that was rectified more so through the 1968 Immigration Act when the quotas changed. For years, Chinese people could not be married and come to our country. And just think about the division and the brokenness that that caused within their society. But, so I think you couldn't file for a PAC, so our invention that you

created. Think about all these things when we start talking about wealth that sometimes was not translated, you know, because you were not the majority and you did not have any power, so you had no say. So those are just things we have to own and recognize. And we're doing that like in some ways culturally as it relates to telling stories, like hidden figures, like, you know, we're shining a light on the unknown heroes

and different things like that. But as a country, like when we start talking about what Rwanda did, and Canada and Australia and different ones, we have not rectified the wrong in some type of way, you know, collectively, structurally. And, and I think that is something that, you know, when we start talking about doing justice, and rendering justice, that that doesn't exclude us, you know, like, you know, like, we're, we're reading scripture, but the scripture reading us, you know, like, like, like that, there's, there's something, you know something to that, but what we do is kind of deflect it and say, well, you know what? You're nothing but a Marxist. I mean, and I'm like, what is that? I have people looking up like, what is it? And I'm like, what is it? But I'm like, when we think

about the antebellum south, that is actually more Marxist. When we think about white supremacy, that is actually more Marxist. You know what I'm saying? So it's just like we change these words and we make them boogie men and stuff. And I think I was called a critical race theorist. And I was like, when CRT first came out, I was like, I had to look it up, like, what is that?

And I was like, the people who started it, they're still living and breathing, go ask them what it is, you know? But I'm like, I'm talking about reconciliation. CRT doesn't lead you to reconciliation. It's talking about the brokenness is not a solution for it, but I'm talking about a solution. I'm like, so how about a theorist?

But it's just stuff that we do that's funny, but serious because people believe it, but it's stuff that people do to deflect and to deny. And a lot of times these fringe conversations, they are birthed out of the church. And I think that's the part that hurts the most. Like, if they were birthed in secular spaces, it wouldn't be that big of a deal. But when these are coming from brothers and sisters in Christ, you know, when brothers and sisters in Christ, you know, are not willing to learn the history, but would rather, you know, take up a talking point and say, you know, there is no such thing as systemic racism. You've had the same opportunities that I've had. And I'm like, have you walked in my shoes? Like, where is the compassion?

Where is the empathy? You know, and I know my experience is totally different from, you know, friends of mine that grew up in New Jersey or Florida or different places. Like none of us have a universal lived experience. And there's a lot of things. I've never had a negative contact with a police officer. Never. My uncle was a police chief.

I talk about that. But personally, I've never had that happen. But just because it's not my experience, it doesn't mean that that has never happened before and that I'm going to discount someone else's experience because mine was a good experience. There's just different things that I didn't experience growing up. I experienced a lot of diversity in my community, my neighborhood. Some people didn't have their first...

Some people have never had an African-American teacher. I had several, several, to the point I can't even count. I had so many. Starting from kindergarten, the assistant teacher was a... when I started kindergarten because of the community that I lived in. I lived in a military town in an area that was really diverse. I understand now that that's what helped shape me and mold me because I was able to see and to be. But everybody doesn't have that experience. They've never even worked or had a boss that was a person of color.

And so I know that has shaped people and it has created narratives and stereotypes. So what we try to do is create an environment where we're able to dispel those and at least give people the context of what they're missing so that they can make different decisions. I found that people that grow have an athletic background, especially if it's in a diverse area or you said military, of course. Not that there's not obviously racism and segregation and stuff in these environments, but I found that, I don't know, looking back at like my experience is more like diverse in terms of like a white and Latino, um, some African-American, but it was in, in an area that was predominantly

Latino and white. Um, uh, baseball, right? Baseball. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And it just, it just, it just, when you, when you have a common enemy, the other team or something where it's like, there's something surpassing your kind of day to day. I don't know how to describe it, but military same thing. Yeah. Yeah. Sports brings up, bring us together right now as we're recording this, the Olympus is going on and it brings us together. Like, you know, we think about, I have such pride when I look at the American team because we're not a homogenous country. And when I look at the American team, because we're not a homogenous country. And when I look at our team and all the other ethnicities that are represented in our team,

it just makes us so proud when you look at our gymnastics team. Just all of these things that we see, that is the thing, that is our superpower. That is what makes us great. It's seeing that it's not something to be ashamed about, but diversity is a song to be sung. It is a part of the legacy. It's a part of who we are. It shows the totality of who Christ is, of who God is. He didn't just, I would say that he didn't just create fish, you know, he created beluga wells, you know, and dolphins and sharks and, you know, all of these things that make the ocean and what it is, you know, that make

the sky and what it is. And we can look at those things and call it beautiful. Why can't we look at this world and call it beautiful because of our differences? And so I think sports is something that draws us together. That's why the military desegregated before our country did. Yeah, long, yeah. Yeah, because of World War II. Yeah, because of World War II where you're going and you're fighting for a country that doesn't even see you as human. That you can't even get a GI bill to move into a neighborhood because you don't qualify because you're Black or because you're indigenous. But I'm risking my life just like everyone else. You know? And so those are the stories of many soldiers like my grandfather, you know, that fought for this country in two wars.

And as he got off that plane, they said, Negroes go left, white people go right, you know, and the mess hog. And I mean, that is not something to make us feel bad, but that is something to give us pause to say, how do we make sure that this is never repeated again? And how do we redeem this? How do we repair this? How do we make sure our children are not viewed or see other people this way again? That's a beautiful thing. I mean, I'm thinking, do we think we're going to get to heaven or eternity and it's gonna be like the black side over here, we're gonna be the south side of heaven. And you know, like, do we think heaven is segregated? Like, really?

You know, if we have a problem with people speaking in other languages, like in our country, if we have a problem with people seeking, we may not want to go to heaven. Like, do you think Jesus is going to start speaking English? Come on now. It's just some common sense things that we have to learn to embrace because it's preparation, as we talk about Revelation 7, 9. But it's not just Revelation 7, 9. This is what we see in Genesis also. So yeah, I know, I know. I gotta let you go into just a second and I'm about, but I really want to ask this question. And it's a, it's probably too big of a question for me to ask this late in the game, but, um, and it's a, to prepare

yourself. It's a white boy question. Okay. I would have, so I, and I, I am representing the kind of question that a lot of, uh, I would say white people, conservative white people have that I think there's sometimes scared to even ask. Like I, what would you like, would you, when it comes to systemic racism, would you say, so I don't know, should I say it as a statement or a question? Like there are certain areas. Well, let me, let me say this. Okay. For sure. Being a white, say straight male brings me privilege in certain environments, maybe a lot of environments, but there are also other environments where it actually doesn't bring me any privilege at all. I'm thinking like educate. If I go into like a liberal, say I go to like Cal state Berkeley

liberal school or any most, I mean, say 90% of universities. And I say, hi, you know, my name is Preston. I'm a conservative Christian. I'm straight. And I want to give a talk on, you know, something, you know, traditional marriage or something like beat a white straight male is not going to, at least this is the pre, you know, it's like, that is not going to go, that's not going to bring me any privilege in that kind of maybe more liberal or progressive environment education. And I'm sure there's other environments I could probably think of. Is that a valid perspective? What would you say to something like that? They're an environment where, yeah, 30 years

ago, 50 years ago, being a white person would have brought them privilege, but now it's not much at all. Well, well, it depends on that's why I like to say structural privilege. Okay. So what was done to what has been done to white straight males that takes away their rights to be white straight males. What has done structurally in our healthcare system, our judicial system, our education system, what was done structurally through policy that makes it difficult to be Christian and a white male? Soterios Johnson So wait, are you saying those are good? Those are good things that have been? No, I'm just saying like name names. Like, like, so if you know someone, cause when we was talking about systemic, like our privilege, like although things are, can be challenging in certain environments, there's nothing, there's never been any policy or laws that

have been created to hinder you. So it's more of a cultural thing. Yeah. It's more of a cultural shift. And so it's different when you start talking about culturally versus when we start talking about policy. So yes, you're still the majority. You know what I'm saying?

You're still the majority. You know what I'm saying? You're still the majority as it relates. But when you start thinking about as time progresses, if there was a point where we said that, you know what? At this college, we're not going to have white straight males. Right. Right. Then that's something structurally that has been created to hinder you, to oppress you, to marginalize you. But there's nothing, you know, in our society that has, has done that as it relates to, you know, a white male. Now, women, on the other hand, there was things when we start talking about women,

even white women, like I said, you couldn't vote until, you know, what, what, what, when was it 1918 or something like that, or I may have the dates wrong. But, but, and then, you know, only you can, until the 70s, you can own a check in account, as you know, as a woman, you know, so those are things that were done structurally, as a woman. So those are things that were done structurally as it relates. There was never a time in this country as a white person that you couldn't vote. But every other ethnicity that has been the case. What about, what would you, what about, I got another call coming in here in a second. What about like-

We need to have a part two. I know. And here I'm thinking out loud this question, but what about like, um, like a, how about affirmative action? That's something, you know, white people are always going to, you know, or you look at like, even like, like the Ivy league schools, white people are actually in the minority. It's like 45% white, which is lower than the or Stanford's 25% white, you know? So I don't know. Well, yeah. Could there be any? Yeah. So.

Well, I think, you know, when we start talking about affirmative action, affirmative action only created space. The affirmative action was brought about as an act of repair because of the policies that we had that kept people of color out of those institutions. All of our university systems were all PWIs. In order for us to be college educated, we had to start our own schools, which were HBCUs. That's how you came about with, you know, and so that's where, how you came, how you came about with historically black colleges, um, because we could not attend PWIs, which were predominantly white schools, institutions. And so when we get, when we start, um, affirmative action came into play in the 60s and the greatest benefactor of affirmative action has been white women, not black women, not black people. It has been white women because in order to get it passed, we had to not just constitute

it for race, it had to be also for gender. And so that is an act of repair. And so just think about this. If, you know, the first African-Americans coming up in, I know there's some other dates when we start talking about the 1500s, but in August, I think it's like actually August the 20th, where the first African-Americans in 1619 arrived in this country. You have from 1619, so you talk about all these centuries of oppression and limitations. It was illegal as a black person to teach a black person to read or to learn to read

in this country. It was illegal. You could be hung for it. You could die for learning to read. People died because they tried to vote. John Lewis was beat down and he's someone that was living and breathing walking this earth with you and I both that passed a couple years ago. Was beat down because of wanting to vote. If you have, I'm trying to figure out And so, if you have, if you, I'm trying to figure out

where I was going with this conversation, but it was really good where I was headed towards, you know, with this. But when you have these centuries of oppression and you rectify it, you know, and create some systems of repair in the 60s, but everything we've done since 68 create some systems of repair in the 60s. But everything we've done since 68 has been to roll back

just those few advances that we've had. And here we are in 2024, only 60 years. So you had centuries, a couple of centuries of this. So this is generations. We can't get two generations of repair, like come on now, like that's just greedy. Like that is just, that just don't make no sense. Like where it's like, you don't want to share, like you know what I'm saying?

And it's not that you're saying that, that there's no one that I, no one is trying to create other systems of oppression. But what we're trying to do is create systems of equity. Because when we have a country with the history that we have, it's not just to say now, okay, you're all equal. There is some elements of repair that we have and equity is a part of that repair.

So affirmative action was equity. It is repair. And so when you think about all the universities, I mean, think about the expenses and all the different things. And know? And I don't know, like, when we still look at that, I think women now are like outrating men as it relates to college education. So are we gonna say, well, you know what? We need to limit the amount of women because women can't surpass men and as it relates to college education.

When we think of doing that, like as it relates to gender. So why would we do that as it relates to college education. When we think of doing that, as it relates to gender. Why would we do that as it relates to a system that we created called race? That is a man-made, broken system. I think we have to look at it and remember that it's creating space and not taking space. I think that's the thing that we have to, and then make sure that some of those misconceptions of us thinking that we're being replaced, isn't really necessarily statistically true. Latasha, it was so good having on. I know I took you over and I got a call coming in here, but again, the book is brown faces, white spaces confronting systemic racism to bring healing and restoration. Um, it's, it's out, right? is Brown faces, white spaces confronting systemic racism to bring healing

and restoration. It's, it's out, right? I can, I can never it's out. It came out, um, may the 21st. Okay. Okay. Um, it came out may the 21st and it's just, you know, our way, my way of explaining to people what system is system and racism is, but not just leaving it there, but how can we bring about

healing and restoration? There is hope, there is solution, but it's going to take all of us. It takes a collective community, a collective faith community to really bring about true restoration. And so that's what this is about. And it just gives us a little hope and also a blueprint of how we can govern our organizations and just our little sphere of influences that we lead.

Thanks so much, Latasha. Thanks for being on the show. Okay, thank you so much for having me. This show is part of the Converge Podcast Network.