Required Reading

This is what I will be up to during Winter break and Summer break. Hopefully, that will be enough time to consider these greats.

The works of Howard Thurman
The works of C.S. Lewis
The works of Paul Gilroy
The works of Hazel Carby
The works of W.E.B. DuBois
The works of Audre Lorde
The works of James Baldwin
The works of Karl Rahner
The works of bell hooks
God's Politics by Jim Wallis
The Holy Bible

I have a real desire to see the ways minds work and how they develop over time. I am going to start chronologically with each author's works and then just hopefully bulldoze through them while writing some essays and such. I am gonna need some good fiction to keep me motivated through these more academic personas, but I definitely am excited to delve into thinkers with robust theories and beliefs.

Words

What does it mean for a writer to say 'words are cheap.' Or 'words are not enough.'

Kinda interesting, right?

Well, I asked one. A great one. More importantly, a good one.

Her answer: I write truths. And I can see when others write lies with their actions. And those are not enough. They are never enough.

In other news, I am leaving Ghana in two or three hours. I have inherited many memories from this place. It is an experience I will cherish. I cannot wait to return, to Ghana, to Africa, to the places that haunt me with their resonances.

I have to make it back.

Essential

For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same.

- Matthew 5:46-47

Love

Love needs to be close, immediate. It always needs to be in relation. It does not need to be suffocating, yet it demands a constant and urgent presence.

Love is mysterious.
And love is hard for us.

Thankfully, we are not alone.

I am in Africa.

Wow.