- 6 months ago
Latasha Morrison, Sarita Lyons, and Brenda Palmer share their wisdom and experiences in a soul-stirring conversation (moderated by Cheryl Polote-Williamson) about the importance of self-definition, the constant need for courage, and the transformative power of faith. This session dives deep into what it means to show up fully in your truth, navigate life’s toughest seasons with grace, and remain rooted in purpose—reminding us that healing, strength, and clarity often begin within.
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00I am so excited. I hope you can tell. Do I seem like I'm excited? I am super excited to be here today.
00:07I am Dr. Cheryl Pillow-Williamson. I am an author, a speaker, editor-in-chief of a magazine, and lover of women.
00:19Everything that I do is centered around loving and seeing my sisters.
00:24So, with that being said, I want to bring out some amazing sisters that we're going to spend the morning, I think it's afternoon now, afternoon with.
00:34If you hear something that you love, I want you to clap.
00:37If they say something that resonates with your spirit, let us know, because when you give us energy, we can give you more energy back.
00:46But if we look out and you're on your cell phone talking to your girlfriend, now you can take pictures,
00:51but I don't want to just see you on your cell phone texting friends.
00:55Let's focus on, let's keep the main thing, the main thing, which is to be here in company with each other.
01:03So, happy Sunday and let's go ahead and get this party started.
01:06Come on out, sisters.
01:09All right.
01:12Yes, clap it up. Clap it up.
01:17Clap it up.
01:21So, I get the amazing privilege to introduce each of these ladies to you, and I believe in making sure we understand the flow.
01:32So, I'm going to introduce them.
01:34We're going to go through some questions and answers, and then guess what?
01:38You, at the end, will be able to go right around the corner and purchase, purchase, purchase.
01:47Did you hear me?
01:50Holla if you hear me.
01:52Purchase a signed copy of their book.
01:54The reason that I say that at the end is because I don't want you to wander off and try to wonder,
02:00oh, am I going to be able to get a signed book?
02:01The answer is yes.
02:03So, with that being said, I first want to introduce to you Latasha Morrison.
02:08Latasha, yes, clap it up.
02:12Latasha Morrison is a speaker, author, certified trainer,
02:15cultural intelligence, and unconscious bias known for her transformative work in racial reconciliation and cultural literacy.
02:26As the founder of Be The Bridge, she has become a leading voice in helping individuals and organizations navigate the complexities of race,
02:37equality, and systemic change through empathy, education, and actionable steps.
02:44A natural bridge builder.
02:47And I know I could have shortened it, but I thought that that was key because people need to know that about you.
02:53A natural bridge builder, Latasha equips others with the tools to foster unity, cultivate cultural awareness, and create lasting impact in their communities.
03:07Is that not what we need right now?
03:09Let's clap it up for our sister.
03:13Next, we have our sister, Brenda Palmer.
03:17Pastor Brenda Palmer is an author, preacher, podcaster.
03:23Oh, yes, yes.
03:26Forgive me.
03:27My papers are out of order.
03:30But we're family, right?
03:33All right.
03:34All right.
03:34Helping others experience real encounters with Jesus.
03:39As the founder of Come Alive, collective and host of Life in Perspective podcast,
03:45she creates spaces for spiritual growth, healing, and purpose.
03:51Am I right?
03:52With a heart for ministry and a voice that blends authenticity with faith.
03:59Brenda inspires people everywhere to live boldly and surrender fully to God's plan.
04:11Now I'm going to back it up and get it correct.
04:15We have our sister, Sarita T. Lyons.
04:19Dr. Sarita T. Lyons is a Bible teacher, psychotherapist, and director of discipleship and women's ministry at Epiphany Fellowship Church in Philadelphia.
04:35She is passionate about the emotional and spiritual health of the church, the intersections of faith and mental health for equipping women to live boldly for Christ.
04:50Dr. Lyons is the best-selling author of Church Girl and a contributor to the Urban Apologetics book series.
04:58Dr. Lyons is a speaker and New York Times best-selling author of Up Still Here, Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness.
05:28Her work centers racial justice through powerful storytelling, cultural insight, and deep celebration of Black identity.
05:41With a background in business and social justice, Austin challenges audiences to pursue equity with honesty, courage, and hope.
05:52Is this not a panel?
05:54So we're going to go ahead and jump right in because I have papers because I'm long-winded.
06:02So I'm going to go ahead and jump right on into the questions.
06:05And Austin, I'm going to start with you if that's okay.
06:11I want you to share with everyone here, what does it mean for you to live full of yourself in a culture that often, hear me when I say, often demands Black women to shrink or stay silent?
06:30Yeah, so the name of my next book is Full of Myself.
06:34Can you all hear me?
06:37Thank you, girls.
06:38See, this is why we have a sisterhood.
06:39Okay, help me out.
06:42So the name of my next book is Full of Myself.
06:45And it is all about Black womanhood because we are often told that we cannot laugh too loudly or be punished.
06:52We cannot ask too many questions or be punished.
06:55We cannot be quirky and goofy or be punished.
06:59We are not seen as folks who can be sad, who can grieve, because otherwise we will be punished, right?
07:07And so my next book is all about us embracing our full humanity despite the systems of the world that try to keep us down.
07:15And what it looks like to take back agency in ways that we can and ways that are safe for us so that we can, in fact, be full of our own selves.
07:25Not full of whiteness, not full of disrespect, not full of all the things that we're expected to take on as Black women, right?
07:33But full of who you are and to flip your hair over your shoulder as you do it, okay?
07:38That is powerful in and of itself because you all know that we live in a world where it seems like people want us to shrink.
07:50And we cannot do that.
07:52And that's why, Dr. Sarita, I want to go over to you because I know that we navigate different spaces and places, and the church is definitely one of them.
08:02So to follow on to that, I want to ask you, and I know your book is church, girl.
08:09I'm getting my sign copy.
08:11I want to ask, what does flourishing look like for Black Christian women navigating both faith and culture today?
08:22Yes, that's wonderful.
08:23Hi, everyone.
08:24You're all up in my book because I actually have a chapter in my book called Blooming in Babylon.
08:30And it's looking at what does it look like to be a woman of faith in a culture that is dying and decaying because of sin, lack of moral integrity, racism, sexism, all the things where evil is rampant.
08:49And so the core, if you think the Bible often uses agricultural analogies to help us understand his will for our life, God's will for our life.
08:58And so if you're going to flourish, what is paramount is for you to have clear, a rooting system.
09:06And so if you're going to really bloom, you have to be rooted in God first and foremost.
09:11And so I am arguing that in order to be a woman of faith and navigate the culture, you have to have a relationship with God.
09:20And you have to let God define who you are, not people, not the world, but be who God made you to be and try to align your life, your choices, your identity, your purpose with his will for your life.
09:36If you trust and believe that his will for you is perfect.
09:39And so one of the things I think about in terms of blooming in Babylon or in a culture that is decaying around us, I believe God saved us from the world, but to send us back into the world.
09:53And so if you're saved and you want to live in your Christian bubble and your faith bubble, then you really don't understand God's mission for your life.
10:02He saved you from it to separate you from its ways and its foolish wisdom.
10:07But he sent you back into the world that you could be light, that you could be a rooting system to help other people flourish.
10:16And then finally, actually piggybacking off of what you all both were saying, I love the writer of Hebrews because he says we are a people who have such confidence in God that we do not shrink back.
10:31We do not shrink back, but when we put our hope and our faith in the Lord, we can stand boldly, unapologetically, fearlessly in a culture that would want to shut us up and make us small and live for God in a way that brings him glory.
10:49I don't know about you, but does anybody have a collection plan?
10:59Don't you feel like passing the collection plan?
11:02Are these answers not just what we needed for such a time as this to inspire and ignite that thing that is inside you to realize that you do not have to shrink back?
11:14You do not have to be less than who God is calling you to be.
11:18That you do not have to live beneath your birthright.
11:22Amen.
11:23Sister Latasha, while we're speaking of the church, in your experience working with churches and organizations, what are some of the most common barriers of racial reconciliation that you feel we need to make?
11:39And I want to shout this out, brown faces, white spaces confronting systemic racism to bring healing and restoration.
11:48Yeah, I find myself in a lot of what I would say white, predominantly white church spaces.
11:55And one of the things having been on staff in predominantly white church spaces that is not confronted is the unhealthy theology.
12:05The theology around justice, the theology around reconciliation.
12:11And I would go as to say the theology around God.
12:16The doctrine of God really is unhealthy in how other people are viewed and what it's rooted in.
12:23And that's something we really have to excavate.
12:26That's something that has actually also leaked into the black church experience.
12:32And we've embraced a lot of that because of seminary training and all of those things.
12:38And I'm in seminary right now.
12:39And one of the things I'm having to do is kind of deconstruct and reconstruct some of those things that I believe.
12:46And some of that is if you truly believe who God is, if you truly believe that we are created in the Imago Dei, then racism shouldn't have existed.
12:57White supremacy shouldn't have existed.
13:00So because of those things, when we think about the founding of our country, are prevalent.
13:05And it wasn't that the church was on the sidelines saying, don't treat people like that.
13:10The only people that were doing that were the Quakers.
13:13And it took them a while.
13:15We have denominations now that split over slavery and over segregation.
13:21So we have to reckon with that and understand that.
13:25But we also have to make sure that we are in our Bibles and we know how to excavate, you know, what that theology is and replace it with healthy theology.
13:36Not, you know, push Jesus away and say, I'm going to get in there.
13:41Like, Jesus is for white people.
13:43That's not, you know, that's not true.
13:45But I think we really have to reevaluate that.
13:48And that's what I try to do in my books is to give people a healthy theology around justice, a healthy theology around reconciliation and kind of reestablish that foundation for them to understand.
14:04So in getting a healthy theology and a healthy foundation, that comes with the journey of yes, saying yes to ourselves and yes to who God has purposed us to be.
14:17So, Brenda, you, in your book, The Journey of Yes, you often talk about the power of saying yes to God.
14:25What was the hardest yes you've had to give and how did that moment shape your life and or ministry?
14:36Wow.
14:38Look, I'm coming in hot.
14:40I know.
14:40I was like, okay.
14:43Jesus.
14:45Okay.
14:45I would say the hardest yes I had to give was the yes to forgive.
14:50Say that.
14:52I experienced a betrayal at the hands of my pastor.
14:56And I would say that I had to say yes to forgive, not just for myself, but for all the lives that are attached to me and what my faith represents to me.
15:06And so I think also we talk about, like, reconstructing.
15:10I think a lot of times people will experience hurt and walk away from the thing that's supposed to save them.
15:15And so I had to say yes to being able to separate a human's mistake from who my God is and his character and his nature.
15:26And so I had to say yes, I'll trust God enough with the hurt and with the pain and with the anger to say, no, I'm going to keep going into this, not shy away from it.
15:35And I think it changed my life because now I get to impact lives.
15:40And I just really love Jesus and I want people to love him the same way I do.
15:44And so I said yes to that assignment.
15:47I said yes to carry that burden so that other people wouldn't have to.
15:51And so that people would be able to know, like, Jesus is real.
15:54And despite what people do to you, whether they're black or white, Jesus doesn't change.
15:59And when people hurt you in the name of the Lord, back to what Dr. Cerita was saying, when you have a personal relationship, you can separate the two and I can love you anyway.
16:09And so I think that that, yes, has changed my life.
16:11It's shifted my perspective.
16:13I see life through a different lens.
16:15And I know, like, we don't live for this down here.
16:18So my job is to ensure that people know, like, they need to know Jesus.
16:24Amen.
16:26So I'm going to say yes to God right now in this moment because I'm very obedient to the Holy Spirit.
16:31So if you just deal, I'm not going to read from the papers.
16:35I'm just going to go with what God tells me to do in this moment.
16:38All right, go ahead.
16:41So I know many times when we're on these panels, it's certain questions.
16:46They're on paper, and the real meat of what you really want to say is not in a question that I ask on that paper.
16:55And so the Holy Spirit, oh, Lord, the Holy Spirit wants me to go in this direction.
17:03So, LaTosha, if I can start with you, what chapter in your book was the hardest for you to write
17:12because it took you to a place where you thought that you were over,
17:18but you realized that you had to slow down in that chapter
17:23because you really needed to dig in more and get in touch with yourself.
17:29It's hard to say a chapter because it's the whole book.
17:38Let's talk about it.
17:39This work, writing about racial injustice and writing about the work of reconciliation,
17:47it doesn't come easy, especially when you're in the midst of oppression happening, you know?
17:54When you're in the midst of dehumanization happening, it's hard to write,
17:59to continue to write about it and give context and give what I call racial literacy.
18:08And so a lot of my history chapters, when I have to go back and recount and connect the dots on why we are here
18:17or give honor to someone that lost their life, I think about in my first book the story of Mary Turner.
18:27And if you've ever heard the story of her, she's in South Georgia.
18:33And this is a woman who was pregnant.
18:34She was eight months pregnant.
18:35And just recounting that.
18:40And when you're a writer, you have to study.
18:43You know, I had to go.
18:44I actually went to plantations.
18:46I have to read a lot of history, you know?
18:49And so reading her story as a woman who was defending her husband because her husband had been lynched,
18:57and then how in Valdosta, Georgia, they actually lynched her and cut the baby out of her.
19:06So when you read stuff like that and you read that history, when I go to the Equal Justice Initiative,
19:12and I have to give, bear witness to all of the things that has happened.
19:18When I, you know, went to the Whitney Plantation here in Louisiana.
19:22If you live here, if you haven't gone, it's a plantation because it shifts the narrative back to the enslaved and not to the owners of the plantation.
19:34It honors them.
19:36It creates a memorial.
19:38And I took my mom with me.
19:40And my mom is 72 years old.
19:42And I took my mom.
19:43And even because we're not taught this in school.
19:46And she said, Tasha, there were babies because in the memorial there were babies.
19:51And I was like, Mom, babies were enslaved.
19:54They were born into slavery for over 200 years, generations.
20:01And she knew that, but we don't know that.
20:05And the reality of that, so carrying all of that with the hope of Christ.
20:11Carrying all of that and still having hope.
20:15And so I like to write where I'm going to bear witness.
20:18I'm going to give you historical context.
20:20But also, I'm going to give you hope.
20:23You know, because this too shall pass.
20:27And calling us to remember what we've been through so we truly understand where we're going and who we are in Christ.
20:37And I think that's really important.
20:39So the layers of this, this is why it's hard to produce these type of books all the time.
20:45You know, because you have to kind of recover.
20:48You have to take respite.
20:50You have to take breaths so that your heart doesn't get marred.
20:54And so that I can look, what I would say, evil in the space sometimes and say, I love you.
21:03I want to see you change.
21:04I want to see you transform.
21:06And that's what, to keep your heart pure.
21:08And so, and that's real talk, you know.
21:11And that's who I am.
21:15Oh, wow.
21:16I'm so glad you answered your question like that because it's hard for me to pick a chapter in Church Girl, the book who has fallen over.
21:24That represents sometimes how our souls feel.
21:28We just fall back.
21:32But my goodness, you know, I so relate to the Toni Morrison quote, if there is a book you need to read and it doesn't exist, you have to write it.
21:42And that's exactly what Church Girl is.
21:46You all have no idea the flack that I got from people who thought it was not just audacious but wrong of me to write a book where I would exalt God and center black women at the story.
22:01And I just thank God that a book that exalted the Lord but also focused on black women of faith became a national bestseller.
22:12Okay?
22:13Let's clap it up.
22:15Because they don't want us to believe that our voices and our stories matter not just to the world but to God.
22:24And so for me, every chapter was a birth pain of reminding me of what I needed for myself, starting with the introduction where I just share after going to an HBCU, FAMU, shout out to HBCUs.
22:39Growing up in a Christian home, I became someone who walked away from the faith and got involved in African spirituality and stopped serving God for years on my college campus.
22:54But the Lord, who is rich in mercy, came running after me and rescued me.
23:00And that same girl that walked away from God is someone that God would call to be a mouthpiece among the nations and communities for his glory.
23:11But in the book, I talk about our identity and how integral that is to our faith and that we do not come to God and God asks us to divorce ourselves from our blackness.
23:23One of the lines I have in the book is you don't have to lay down your blackness when you pick up your cross.
23:30But that God intends for you to stand fully in who you are as a black woman and represent him in the earth.
23:37I talk about our purpose and how we have often, as black women, been called pushy women.
23:44But how when Eve brought sin into the world and death into the world before God kicked her out of the garden, he gave her a name to redeem her purpose.
23:53And she was called Eve, which means the mother of the living.
23:57So I just am reminded that on our worst day, that's not the end of our story.
24:03And at the core, all of us have been called to be life givers.
24:08And then I think probably one of the hardest was the church hurt chapter, where I talk about the very unique ways black women have been hurt in the church.
24:18And so I just think that our stories, our struggles, our liberation, where God is at the center of it, need to be told so that we can rise up and take our rightful place in the earth for the glory of God.
24:35Amen.
24:36Sister Brenda and then Sister Chuck.
24:38Okay, y'all got preachers on this panel.
24:40You didn't know.
24:41You didn't know this question was going to be there.
24:42I got you.
24:43I got you.
24:44I guess I'm going to be producer.
24:46I'm going to go real quick.
24:47All right.
24:48So I have a chapter, the hardest one to write.
24:51What's the first one?
24:52Because most of my book is like stories of journeys that I've taken.
24:56But the first chapter I wrote in real time.
24:59And it was happening while I was writing it.
25:02And it was God asking me, could he be enough for me?
25:05And before you could tell God, yes, and surrender what you want or what's in your hand, you have to know that what you're already holding is enough.
25:16And so I was face to face with God saying, could I be enough for you?
25:20And I ain't going to hold y'all.
25:21I was like, bro, I ain't there yet.
25:23Because I had to sit with what that really meant.
25:26My dad was walking through a journey of prostate cancer.
25:29So I had to sit and say, if I never get married before my dad dies, could God be enough?
25:35Could my relationship and fellowship with God be enough for me?
25:39So I had to sit face to face with the Lord and say, okay, no, I'm not there yet.
25:44But let's take a journey to get there.
25:46How do I need to discover you so that you become enough?
25:49So that whenever I got to give up something or when you walk me into something, I can say, I might lose this at any moment, but God is enough.
25:57And the years that I've had with my dad, if he goes on to glory, are enough because you saw fit to call him in that time.
26:05And so I started the book with that chapter because you can't talk about, I'm going to give God my yes, when you don't talk about what you got to surrender and give up.
26:12And so that was the hardest chapter because I love God.
26:15So I thought I would be like, easy, yes, for sure, God, you're enough.
26:18And I'm like, hold on, hold on, roll that back.
26:21Is he really enough?
26:22And do I know him enough to be like, nah, he is.
26:25Whether I'm losing something or gaining something, it doesn't change the weight.
26:30And so I always say obedience is not about what you get on the other side of it.
26:34It's about the gods you meet through it.
26:36Say that.
26:37Say that.
26:38Is that not powerful?
26:40Is that not powerful?
26:44I'm with Tasha.
26:45The whole book was hard.
26:47The whole book was hard.
26:49But I think, I think specifically, you know, America is like a dumpster fire right now.
26:58Hello, somebody.
26:59Hello.
27:00And white supremacy is working overtime to dismantle everything we have erected.
27:07Right.
27:07The DEI offices we erected.
27:10Right.
27:10The budgets that we erected, the scholarships that we erected, the work we did on the streets.
27:18Right.
27:18That white supremacy is trying to undo everything that we have worked so hard for, for generations.
27:27And we are really quick to get online to talk about justice issues.
27:35And we're really quick to take to the streets over justice issues.
27:40We are really quick to participate in mutual aid.
27:44We are quick to volunteer.
27:46What we are not quick to do is to see our own self-possession as justice work.
27:53Say that.
27:55Right.
27:55We have been taught that justice work is to save everybody except ourselves.
28:04And so this, this next book was my attempt to say that self-possession is also part of our justice work.
28:13Saying what you deserve as a citizen is part of our justice work.
28:18Right.
28:20I think there are a lot of people who work on racial justice who talk about the work.
28:25In terms of either the ancestors and what we owe our ancestors.
28:30And that's good.
28:31And there are a lot of people who talk about this work in terms of our children.
28:36And the world we want to leave our children.
28:38And that's good.
28:39But what about you?
28:41You're here right now.
28:43What do you deserve?
28:44Don't you deserve voting rights?
28:47Don't you deserve, hello?
28:48Don't you deserve reproductive rights?
28:50Yes.
28:51Don't you deserve, okay?
28:53And so what are all the areas, not just systemic, but in terms of your own health?
29:01In terms of your own mental health?
29:04In terms of the way you show up at work?
29:06In terms of the way you show up in your family?
29:09That you still need justice for yourself.
29:15Because when you are fully possessed of yourself, I believe it makes all the other justice work an easier lift.
29:26You actually have something to pour from.
29:29Right?
29:30You can figure out how to do the work in a healthy way.
29:34Right?
29:35And so I think there are a lot of places in the book that I had to go to talking about depression.
29:43Talking about being on antidepressants.
29:45Hello, somebody.
29:46Me and my medicine.
29:48Okay?
29:48You don't want me up here if I'm not on my antidepressant.
29:51Okay?
29:52That's justice work for me.
29:53Okay?
29:55Having a chronic illness.
29:58Being a mom.
30:00Enduring grief.
30:01Having a cousin who's incarcerated.
30:03Right?
30:04The real work of being a black woman in this world before I've even stepped out on the street.
30:12Right?
30:13And so that is what this next book is about.
30:16It's about self-possession as justice work.
30:20Amen.
30:21Was this not a powerful panel?
30:25So I will tell you, I want to make sure that I get invited back next year.
30:30So I'm going to go ahead and end my panel because we're at the end.
30:36I could have asked, I had tons of questions.
30:39But I want to say thank you to my amazing sisters who joined me today for this powerful discussion.
30:47We want to thank you for being here with us.
30:53We're going to be able to continue this discussion with you.
30:57If you would join us right on the other side.
30:59And I'm big on purchase.
31:02Please purchase a copy of my sister's book so that you can sign them and get photos and some time and attention.
31:11Follow each of them on social media.
31:14When we ask ourselves this simple question, well, I don't have the resources all the time to help everybody.
31:23Let me tell you what's free.
31:25Like, share, and comment is free.
31:29Like, share, and comment is free.
31:32So the photos that you took here today, tag them in them.
31:36When you are standing in line purchasing the book, tag them and tell someone else, you missed a very valuable conversation here today.
31:45But if you purchase this book, you can catch up on what we discussed today.
31:49So thank you for being here.
31:52We appreciate you.
31:53You are loved, valued, appreciated.
31:56And most of all, we see you.
31:59We hear you because we are you.
32:06We hear you because we are you.
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