Healing the wounds

By Dr. E. Faye Williams
TriceEdneyWire.com Columnist

The chaotic and catastrophic conditions we are seeing at an alarming rate across the world have even the most optimistic people around us very concerned. Mass shootings appear to be ordinary now. Just recently, there was the tragedies in El Paso, Texas, Dayton, Ohio and Odessa, Texas in rapid succession before we had a chance to recover from the tragedy before the last one. What just happened in the Bahamas is hard to imagine — and yet, tragedy of a monumental proportion just happened. Add to that the horrendous way #45 behaves daily both at home and abroad, and acts like none of it matters to him. As the song by Marvin Gaye goes, “It makes you want to holler and throw up your hand.” Unfortunately, that is not the solution.

In some way, we’ve all been wounded. Some us have been wounded by the circumstance of our ancestors’ enslavement. It’s too difficult for me to think about people like Harriet Tubman having to stand there and taking the lash of an evil system called slavery, of Fannie Lou Hamer having to leave her family and her home just because she wanted to vote, of Dr. Martin Luther King facing the threat of murder and ultimately being murdered, and about Malcolm, Evers, and many others being murdered for trying to do good.

Add to that all the mothers who’ve buried their children much too soon for senseless reasons. Our brains have been battered with mass shootings in churches and synagogues, and in schools where some children have become traumatized by the thought of going to schools. We’ve seen babies separated from their parents, and a recent report indicates how these children have been damaged — maybe even wounded for life unless we come up with a way to heal the wounds.

Can we afford to just let it go and hope that things will get better? I submit that we cannot. We must look for ways to heal our wounds. My eyes are always open to do just that. On a recent trip to Columbus, Ohio, I met a group of wonderful people who’ve come up with ways to heal the wounds of our circumstances. As president of the National Congress of Black Women, I’ve invited the principals of this process to come to Washington, D.C. during the upcoming Congressional Black Caucus Foundation conference to begin the discussion of what we can do as a group of people who’ve been wounded in this country for over 400 years, and with the current occupants in the White House, it seems there is no hope and no hope of hope, so the healing falls on you and me collectively with the help of professionals who’ve offered us help. Keep your ears open for the names Dr. Linda Myers, Dr. Monica Clement and Dr. Jordan Argus. In the meantime, you may do one of two things: Go to www.wpfwfm.org. Click on Archives, scroll down to Wednesday, September 4, 2019, 10 a.m. for my program called “Wake Up and Stay Woke.” Click on Play and you’ll be able to hear an interview with some of the leaders involved in the process called “Healing the Wounds of Circumstance.” I guarantee you’ll want to hear more about the program. It’s very promising!

In the meantime, there are things we can do to begin the process of healing. We can form healing circles, always do the right thing, look out for one another, refuse to meet hate with hate, anger with anger, jealousy with jealousy or fear with fear. Finally, never spend money where we’re not respected. Always “throw the ball in the right goal” lest we contribute to our own losses.

This article originally published in the September 16, 2019 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.