Kwanzaa: Imani / Faith

Habari gani, everyone?

Today is a celebration of imani, or faith. Faith is a tricky concept that brings people uncomfortably close to spirituality. Here it means to believe, with all of our hearts, in our people — our parents and teachers and leaders, and in the righteousness of our struggle. Even the secular language leans toward a place it’s hard to put faith in. How many of us have parents who’ve neglected and abused us? How many teachers, burned-out and unappreciated, have given up on us? How many leaders have turned out to be corrupt hypocrites, or risen up only to find another invisible barrier making change seem impossible?

It’s hard to believe in anything these days because very few seem committed to something bigger than themselves. But how can we be sure that anything bigger than ourselves even exists? Lofty concepts like dignity and equality (and faith) are ephemeral. Their shape changes from mind to mind, so one person’s faith can look a lot like stubborn ignorance to someone else. Most of us have seen how faith in the wrong things have harmed our elders and aren’t sure it’s possible to find anything solid enough to put faith in. 

My mother’s faith was a huge factor in her disowning me. She had been taught, like so many of our elders, that being queer was “unnatural” and anyone with those “urges” were just given an extra burden by God. We were meant to resist them, and once we passed the test we would know what we were being tested for. 

But it is hard to understand how someone could believe in a God who would test a 19-year-old with such a high price for failure. And once you see how faith can lead people to such toxic places, you come to have an instinctive wariness against anyone who expresses it. In my experience, faith has been a poison corroding the places a mother’s love should be. Keeping my distance from the faithful has become an instinctive survival mechanism for me, and I think it’s one a lot of queer Black Americans share. 

So my celebration of imani probably doesn’t align with the rest of the Black American diaspora today; it’s one where I accept I may be on the fringes of the community, where I’m mindful of my place. On the border, with few who share this perspective, but still with something of value for the collective. 

What do I have faith in? What is the thing that keeps me from despair, time and again? I suppose, that any border that separates one being from another is an illusion, and that if we removed all illusions our natural response would be to love one another as kin. And that the greatest work we can do is learn more about the ways in which delude ourselves, to slowly and carefully look through the illusions that have been layered over our perspectives — to help others do the same. 

I have faith that love is a fundamental state of the universe, that love is ultimately an expression of pure connection, and that building a world in which this connection is made easier is the best livelihood I can think of. Anything that makes us more loving, more connected beings is a worthwhile endeavor.

It has taken me a long time to believe that religious faith was something that could actually do that, but it can — with a little guidance. From the fringes, I remind the rest of the community that your queer and non-Christian kin exist, and that you must have faith in us too. We are in this struggle together, and we all want to be loved, to be granted dignity. 

What do you have faith in, family? What keeps you from despair, and gives you hope for your people and your future? Let’s celebrate it!