A Quote by Cornel West
The wonderful thing about the black church for me is that it forces you to come to terms with the centrality of love in the world.
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Some of you young folks been saying to me, "Hey Pops, what you mean 'What a wonderful world'? How about all them wars all over the place? You call them wonderful? And how about hunger and pollution? That aint so wonderful either." Well how about listening to old Pops for a minute. Seems to me, it aint the world that's so bad but what we're doin' to it. And all I'm saying is, see, what a wonderful world it would be if only we'd give it a chance. Love baby, love. That's the secret, yeah. If lots more of us loved each other, we'd solve lots more problems. And then this world would be a gasser.
We don't live in a world that nurtures and cares for Black girls like me. And if the world doesn't care about a Black girl like me, then what will happen to our Black babies who grow up to become Black children and Black adults?
I love what the church offers to us as a culture - black people in particular. We would be nowhere without the black church.
As a black manager, somebody talking in good terms about me I don't think can be a bad thing.
If an audience doesn't get that [Black Snake Moan] is a movie about overcoming exploitation, it could come across as incredibly misogynistic. That would be the worst thing in the world for me.
So that when you come to read the actual Bible you have a lay of the land. And you come to the Bible knowing that it's not mostly a book about you and what you're supposed to be doing. It's most of all a story. It's this wonderful love story - about a God who loves his children with a wonderful, never-stopping-never-giving-up-unbreaking-always-and-forever love.
You have to know the forces that are against you and that are trying to break you down. We talk about the problems facing the black community: the decimation of the black family; the mass incarceration of the black man; we're talking about the brutality against black people from the police. The educational system.
I grew up in the church, Resurrection Baptist Church in Philadelphia, and my grandmother was that grandmother at the church, the one always at the church, always putting on the events. It was deeply instilled in me that every action, everything I create, everything I say and do in the world is inexorably bound to the lives of everybody I come in contact with - and it's my responsibility to put things into the world that have a positive influence on humanity.
I'm not talking about my children's father'he's a wonderful black man, the hero of my life, and he's never disrespected or betrayed me. But I'm talking about what I see in the streets and in the media, this naked hatred that black men have towards the authentic black woman'which is really an indication of black men's hatred for blackness itself.
It's wonderful to have the most important thing in the world there first thing in the morning. And especially in this business, where the opportunity to think everything is about you is there every day, now I really know that it isn't all about me.
I still go to that church now, and they don't believe in instruments in the church. But, my brothers and sisters in the church will listen to me. They will come out to a place to see me play. They will buy all of my records and everything, but they don't believe in bringing that instrument in the church. But, they'll come and watch me somewhere else. Why that is, I don't know.
I think it's a wonderful thing to have African-American characters. Look at life. It's not a white world or a black world; there are all kind of people in it. It's showing growth, and in today's world there are so many outlets.
Success is a terrible thing and a wonderful thing. If you can enjoy it, it's wonderful. If it starts eating away at you, and they're waiting for more from me, or what can I do to top this, then you're in trouble. Just do what you love. That's all I want to do.
It's not necessarily a church theme and it's not really about church. I like my album themes to be metaphors because it gives me the freedom to speak about something else that's going on in my life, so the Born Sinner thing is not about church, it's not even about religion. It's using that as canvas to get other messages across and that's what the album will be.
It's no accident that most of the great black spokespersons and leaders understood the centrality of self-affirmation, self-respect and self-love.
I love going to black churches, and I love some of these black preachers. The best preacher I ever saw in my life was a 93-year-old in a black church in Hamilton, Virginia. What a preacher!
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