Ujima, a collective responsibility.

UJIMA (Collective Work and Responsibility): To build and maintain our community together and make our people’s problems our problems, and to solve them together

Our government and our world didn’t become poorly overnight. It took the collective works and was the responsibility of our leaders. Global Climate Change didn’t occur overnight it was a slow collective effort of the greedy, and unawareness of others. The United States deficit didn’t happen overnight it is the result of the collective works and responsibility.

Ujima means we all take responsibility for our action and we commit to trying to make a difference for the year collectively. It’s an agreement made with our heart and mind signed on a contract with mother earth/universe. We need to no longer beat our selves up and keep blaming politicians when WE ALL had a part in destroying our planet, our country, and future generations. 

We need to make a commitment to do better and aim higher. We still have time. The earth isn’t dead, yet. We can still change global hunger, stop wars, save refugee people, provide medication to the poorer countries. We can still do better. As a country we can get out of debt, we can save our government and appoint leaders who can lead it with dignity, respect, integrity, and personal accountability. 

Ujima is the collective works and responsibility of each individual equally.  What can you do to be the change and leader America needs today? What can you do? What can we do? Do we even know what our responsibilities and roles are? No longer can we afford to blame others even if they’re in the wrong. What good is it? Be the needed change we want to see. Our children are dying, and it’s harder to afford higher education. Our children are hungry. Our children do not have good health care. our universities are failing us. Our leaders are being carnally human. We have the medicine but who can afford it? Why can we afford GMO-Foods with antibiotics and corn raised animals but not organic and locally farmed foods? Why don’t we take our money and put it into our farms, local businesses and let them thrive? Instead of the rich getting richer; why not give our farmers a chance, the local shops a chance, and local governments a chance? Why is Debt crushing the necks of our young people? 

Bottom line: It’s our collective works and responsibility. 

I pray your Ujima was a blessed and great day! 

Joyous Kwanzaa 

Domenia 

A Burden (we) carry

To the soul on this journey: take courage

To the soul alone: take hope

To the soul in battle: tread easily

Run this race not as one, but with one

There is a burden to know your calling

whether it’s to be a Christian or Atheist there is a burden we are all carrying

to convince the unbeliever

to cry with the broken

sit with the poor

have patience, have integrity

teach through self-discovery and disobedience and intolerance

wait patiently for the triumph

wait for the blind to see so that maybe one will put down that drink

wait for the deaf to hear so just maybe one will put down that needle

wait for the  lame to raise so they’ll believe again

and wait for the dumb to speak so they’ll be able to witness and clothe another

a burden we carry, a burden I carry, a burden you carry

imprinted on our hearts

to be marked with optimism

clothed in humility

standing through doubt

commit to perseverance, faith, kindness, meekness, the unforeseen, the evil, through the devil’s trials and many errors.

when we love

when we care

when we see the top of the mountain

We realize it’s a glorious burden to carry

given to the swift

pure in heart

strong and overcomers

Thank you, Jesus, for the burden I carry

 

Dear, Pastor->Leaders->Ministers->Reverends->Bishops->Church goers

I know many of my followers have different faiths and everyday I see a “like” or “share” my heart feels great. This is a letter to the church and pastors/leaders

Dear Church, Pastors and Leaders,

Thank-you for your service. There’re are hearts the need to be mended, spiritual wounds that need to be healed and tended too, struggles that require encouragement and stories that need to be heard and shared. It’s time to break tradition. It’s time to break religious customs. No rules, no religion but the true message, authentic message of Jesus. Please don’t preach opinion, and stay away from facts. Preach the unconditional love, acceptance, miracles, tend to the sick, open your ears and hear what your congregates hearts have to say. Teach your members about giving back to the community and reaching out beyond the four walls.

The building where we corporately worship, is just that a “building.” Jesus said that “we” the “person” is the church. So as a people, person; we need to reach out to the drug addicts, to the prostitutes,  to the struggling youth, to the homeless and hungry. We need to teach our congregates how to take the message we hear every Sunday and practice it for ourselves and for the community.

Hearts are hurting and people are crying out for help. We are the help through Jesus. People want authentic believers, and those with pure hearts. Stop the judgment, traditions and making people feel unwelcome. We need as a faith to grow, and encourage people to grow, no matter their faith or spiritual beliefs. Stop picking parts of the bible to follow, and follow the truth of Jesus, the truth in your heart and love of God. Show people that there is a God, and he loves you no matter where you are in life. Teach people people that God doesn’t judge and wants to help inspire them to have a life of purpose.

Lets feed the hungry, cloth those in need. Lets continue the work that the disciples started and Jesus taught. Take us to the KING! We need a word of life to that dying soul. We need a word for those who feel they are unreachable. We need a word, we need to hear Jesus’s teaching, love and why he truly died on the cross. Honestly we need to reach out to those not in our church, but also those in our churches. Reach out to all those you can, pray without cease. We as believers have a job to do.

Sincerely,

Domenia L Dickey

Thanksgiving and foster care

There was a time when I was young in foster care when I switched from different homes, group homes, and foster homes and all I had were two trash bags and a teddy bear. I clearly remember laying on a bed and wishing it was mine forever. I remember be counted as homeless and sent to live in a shelter with grown boys 45mins away from my home city. I was 11 years old. I remember I went a half a winter without a coat. I had a sweatshirt until my aunt gave me a coat. I cried. To this day I don’t think she knows how grateful I am for that coat.

I remember waiting for my mom to visit and she never showed up. I remember late nights when  my grandma would hold me and tell me it’s okay, grandma is here. I remember crying because my mother either didn’t show up or was late for court dates, family sessions- you name it.

I know what it’s like to have family members call you a liar, being bullied by cousins and feeling alone. I remember writing in my diary hoping to find the perfect parents so my twin and I could live together one more time. I wrote list of people I prayed that God would tell them to be my foster mom or dad.

I remember living in group homes and getting only weekend visits with my grandma and aunts. I know what it’s like to only have enough clothes for the week, using toilet paper as a maxi pad, one tooth brush, switching social workers every day, trying to comb my “thick” hair, spending my 13th birthday in a psych ward, I tried to kill myself because I felt so alone, granted visits twice a month with my twin, hardly seeing my family, my teddy bear became that home for me. I remember being sexually abused by the age of 6, and tortured by my twin. I know what it’s like to see your mom get beat have her life threatened.  I know what it’s like to have a gun pointed to your head and forced to give a stranger oral sex and I know what it’s like to be poor and having only Kool-Aid and spaghetti to eat for dinner.

The last true hug I received from my mom, I was in first grade and she honestly said that I love you.

This is the first thanksgiving where I have a job, apartment, my same teddy bear, attend college, a computer and a family I created over the years; I have more than three coats, I have clothes that I bought with my own money, my family and I are connected and trying to reach out to one another. I’m thankful for my journey and my continue success.

It’s the little things that makes me happy. I didn’t get to see my twin this holiday, but I know he feels my love and my energy.

Happy Thanksgiving