A Juneteenth Miracle

We’ve all heard of Christmas miracles, but we’d never thought we would see the day where we would be receiving Juneteenth miracles! Not only did Senegal beat Poland at the FIFA World Cup today, the city of Charleston, SC decided to support a resolution that would make an official apology and denounce slavery.  Now, no one is exactly certain who asked for this, but many are claiming that although an apology is a nice gesture, we can only recognize this as a small step in the right direction for race relations here in South Carolina.

With portraits and ceramic buffs of former governers, (who probably owned a few slaves themselves), aligning the room and glaring at the audience in the background, Charleston City Hall was packed with residents waiting for the approval of a proclamation that would provide an official apology for Slavery in the city of Charleston.  The packed room was also filled with longtime residents waiting to have their voice heard as to why they were in favor of the resolution and what this apology would mean to them.  A number of pastors from churches throughout downtown Charleston made appearances and spoke highly of the resolution.  The pastor of First Baptist Church of Charleston along with Priest David Dooman from St. Michaels in downtown Charlerston,  who said his family came to the U.S. in 1792 and owned slaves in Virginia.  He talked about corporate sin and how the sins of the father passed down throughout generations.  He stated unconfessed sins don’t disappear, they are passed throughout generations, and called these sins ‘spritual legacies‘.  Dooman explained that sins can be confessed even generations after they’ve been committed and named a number of men in the bible that confessed to sins they hadnt even committed (david, moses, daniel, nehemiah, etc) and that the fruit of confession is renewal, revival, and healing.  This was Priest David’s explanation of why he felt that apologizing, right now, was the right thing to do.

World renowned painter, Jonathan Green approached the audience to speak, and stated that when he arrived in Charleston about 10 years ago after traveling the world, he was committed to learning everything he could about Charleston.  Green stated, “this entire state was a concentration camp built on the greatness of an agricultural phenomenon of African people from West Africa which supplied Charleston, and made Charleston the wealthiest city in America for over 100 years; wealthier than Philadelphia and wealthier than New York.  This is owed to the ingeniousness of West African people on every plantation in the state of South Carolina which enslaved mostly children.  There were mostly children brought on those ships; so great that it changed the migration pattern of the shark.”

The co-owner and daughter of the founder of Dell’z Deli even stopped through to explain how the restaurant is a million dollar success story; with $250 and a prepaid cell phone, her mom started the deli that many of us flock to on a weekly basis.  Because of the success her family has seen at Dell’z, she addressed that she wanted to see economic development plans for more black entrepreneurs in the city.  She also explained that she wanted to see more blacks have access to storefronts in the City of Charleston, with access to capital, grants and funding for African Americans within the community.  Right on!

So, What’s Next?

In a small way, many of us appreciate the gesture made on this historical day of Juneteeth, where we celebrate the official day of the abolishment of slavery.  In another small way, some of us want to say ‘man f*** your apology’.  Whether we have an appreciation or a distaste for the proclamation, there still lies many questions, like ‘what now‘? This piece of paper, this proclamation issued by a city that has made an insurmountable amount of money for centuries from our West African ancestors, and now our West African Gullah Geechee culture, is simply a piece of paper.  What more needs to be done to make certain the great, great, great, great, grand children of these ancestors take their rightful place in the City of Charleston growth and development? As the wealth gap increases for blacks all over this country, how do we assure that a 400 year history in America doesn’t leave us poor and broken?  What’s next for us, and our children’s children?

You can watch most of the meeting below.  Happy Juneteeth people, and never forget to keep striving.