Embracing all of who we are: Opening Remarks for Austin Seminary

Before we begin, I would like to take a moment to remember the ancestors on whose shoulders we stand. For me, ancestors like Miriam Jiménez Roman, Juan Flores, and my father, Floresmiro Perea Renteria. These are just a few of the many people who have paved the way for us, and we are eternally grateful for their encouragement and leadership. Who are those ancestors for you, I ask you to take a moment and think about them.

I also want to offer Gratitude to the student leadership group that put on this Hesed lecture here at Austin Seminary.

From the bottom of my heart, I want to express my deepest gratitude for your partnership in bringing our film, Faith in Blackness, here. Your dedication, passion, and commitment to discussing spirituality and its vibrancy in our lives and the affirmation of our film have made us incredibly grateful for the opportunity to share our story with this vibrant community.

When I saw the theme for this Hesed lecture, “Reclaiming our stories” I knew immediately that our film would be a powerful addition to the series. Hesed has many meanings but one that I like is steadfast love. And that is what reclaiming our stories does. Reclaiming our stories, as a theme, but also as a deep spiritual practice is absolutely necessary. It allows us to undo the damages done by all sorts of hate, whether that is Racism, sexism, ageism, elitism, homophobia, and we can go on and on, these hates all have only one goal and that is separation. And so, we need to reclaim our stories to undo the distortions that these hates do in the world and in our own lives. Audre Lorde says that “It is a lifetime pursuit for each one of us to extract these distortions from our living” but also that we must “explore what these differences can teach us about the future we must all share.” She goes on to say that this is urgent, because the distortions are endemic in our society and will lead us to downfall.

But when we reclaim our stories, we embrace all of who we are, and all of whom everyone else is and this allows us to live intensely, because as Audre Lorde also says “there is no separate survival” we need each other. And we need each other to undo negative stereotypes of God.

As James H. Cone argues, our ideas about God are not separate from life, but arise from our lived realities, Frantz Fanon reminds us that the evidence of Blackness is the lived experience of the Black person. These two ideas then allow us to understand that “Traditional” depictions of God, often as a white male figure, can become so ingrained that they lower the lived experiences of Black people.

This film invites us to see with a transformative lens, allowing us to hear stories by Black lives and therefore embrace a more expansive, inclusive understanding of God. and this not only enriches our own spiritual lives but also empowers us to combat injustice and embrace the diverse stories of humanity.

So, I am thankful that you are here to watch “Faith in Blackness: An Exploration of AfroLatine Spirituality” which is a short film that shows the dynamism of Black Faith and I hope by learning this from an AfroLatino perspective this can help us to embrace our uniqueness and as you see the participants in the film reclaim their stories, that you feel inspired to reclaim yours as well.