To be Young, Gifted and Black (a Wiccan Perspective)

I wish that my Grandmother were alive today. She grew up in Jim Crow Tennessee and moved to Detroit with the rest of her family for a better life in the then industrial capital of the world. At the time of her death eight years ago, she had six children, five grandchildren and was a retired schoolteacher. She raised her family to for education and excellence because where she was in the South, these things eluded her.

Welcome to 2008, when forty years ago a bullet claimed the life of Dr. Martin Luther King, America has done something that made the world stand still: it has chosen a Black man to be the Commander and Chief. Suddenly, a song written by Funkmaster George Clinton called “Paint the White House Black” takes on a whole new meaning.

Now with President-Elect Barack Obama preparing for his time in the Oval Office, the Black Experience is a focus on the minds of billions of people around the world. Many people has always had been exposed to the lives of Black people in one way or another and whether or not you agree with the government that Obama is now the figurehead for is another conversation altogether but one thing can be certain- ever since November 5th, Afro-Americans had more pep in their step and glide in their stride.

As an Afro-American Pagan, I am motivated to examine my understanding of what the Black Experience is. To be honest, it is a varied answer, because like anyone else, we are all different. We are not all of the same education, socio-economic status or even the same faith. Obama is a Christian; my mother is a Christian as was my Grandmother. Most Black folk I know are Christians. I am not. I don’t feel less Black or American because I am Wiccan and an Ifa initiate.

And I don’t feel less Pagan when I say that Christianity has been fundamental for the advancement of Afro-Americans.

I have been challenged on many occasions from White Wiccans who wonder why I would say that. For an answer, I calmly inform them that it is true that the Slaves who survived the Middle Passage were forced to convert. I acknowledge that in the New World, the African Slaves were required to adopt new Christian names and forsake both their native tongue and spirituality. However, even within the context of Christianity, the slaves prayed for freedom. While they sung gospel hymns in the cotton fields, they used double speak and secretly gave each other clues as to when and how they were going to escape.

When they did become free due to the Emancipation Proclamation, they opened churches to gain support and to be a support for the freedmen and women. During the twentieth century, it was the institution along with Elijah Muhammad’s Islam that helped to nurture the careers of people like Martin Luther King who inspired people like Barack Obama the world over.

I am not a Christian because unlike my ancestors, I have a choice on what faith I want to adopt as my own. When I learned more about Africa before the Slave Traders, I fell in love with the faith that motivated the people. That is how I got into Ifa. Somehow, I imagine that maybe my great, great, great, great, great grandmother prayed to the same deities I am praying to. Practicing Ifa helps me to tune into my heritage and I feel proud of it. I don’t agree with Christianity as a religion for myself, but I respect the institution of it and how it has helped my people. It has helped my Grandmother through some rough times as well as my mother. How can I totally down anything that is able to do that? I hope that my future kids will say the same about me: Believing in Oshun and Yemaya has made me a stronger person. No matter how you name it, faith does that to you.

Practicing my spirituality gives me a link into the past. It feels as if I am taking back that culture that was stripped from my ancestors. The Ifa/Yoruba people of Nigeria, like Wiccans, advocate the stewardship of the earth and being aligned with energies. Even though Wicca is European-based, in many books on the subject, I see descriptions of various Ifa “Gods” and “Goddesses” like Oshun, Chango and Yemaya. I don’t see many Black people within Wiccan circles or ceremonies but when I do, it is like seeing a long lost relative as we exchange hugs.

Wicca does the same thing for me. Like Ifa, it mandates alignment with energy and respect for our world. Even though our new President is a Christian, I feel that I can walk with my head held high in confidence. If he can run the country as a Black man, then I can live my pagan life happily and openly as a Black woman.

My family doesn’t agree with my choice of faith. My hometown of Detroit is a Bible town. All you have to do is to look on most street corners… you will see a church on them. I am out of the broom closet but I am not naïve: if I go downtown and proclaim my Witchy ways, I will either be regarded as crazy at best or evil at worst. There are many open minded African-American Christians who truly loves their neighbors and are not judgmental to other faiths. Still there are a lot of ultra-conservatives who think that anything not dealing with Jesus is automatically satanic.

I once got into a screaming match with my Mother because she felt that me going to mediate at a nearby Buddhist temple was shameful if not sinful. In fact, I have disassociated myself with many members of my family because they refuse to understand where I am coming from spiritually. Many of them deemed me damned and are praying for my soul. I still love them but I understand that Spirit loves me in a way that my own family or anyone else can’t.

If my Grandmother were alive today, she might feel really good to do something that no other Black person as done in recorded history become President of the United States. That being said, she would also most likely look at me with my pagan paraphernalia and scowl: “Baby girl, why isn’t your butt in Church!?”