Black History

COMMENTARY: Is Religious Freedom Free?

In 2019, a federal appeals court ruled that the school board in Washington State was correct when it fired Coach Joe Kennedy for praying publicly. A judge of the Ninth Circuit said, “A coach’s duty to serve as a good role model requires the coach to refrain from any manifestation of religious faith — even when the coach is plainly not on duty.” Where does freedom start and stop? Kennedy’s case has sparked controversy, landing in the Supreme Court this past week debating just how far can a person express religious freedom in public spaces.

Published

4 years ago

May 5, 2022

Oakland Post

On June 25, 1962, the Supreme Court decided that praying in schools violated the First Amendment by constituting an establishment of religion. The following year, the Court disallowed Bible readings in public schools for similar reasons.

By Rev. Dr. Martha C. Taylor, The Oakland Post

The late Fannie Lou Hamer said, “If I am truly free, who can tell me how much of my freedom I can have today?” That is the question that The United States Supreme Court wrestled with last week in the case of Joe Kennedy, who was fired by the school board in Washington State for praying at the 50-yard line after the high school football game ended.

Kennedy defended his position saying the school board violated his rights to free speech and the freedom to exercise his religion. Kennedy, a Christian, said he felt compelled to give thanks through a silent prayer at the conclusion of each game.

Where does freedom start and stop? Kennedy’s case has sparked controversy, landing in the Supreme Court this past week debating just how far can a person express religious freedom in public spaces.

Long before the Supreme Court’s ruling in 1962 and the current Kennedy case, we are reminded of a very dark period in U.S. history; it was legal that enslaved Africans were forbidden to express religious freedom in any form including reading, writing and praying.

The late Dr. Albert J. Raboteau, an African American scholar, gave meaning to what Africans had to endure to worship. The hush harbors, known as the invisible church, was a secret worship place built with tree branches in the deep woods out of ear shot and eyesight of slave masters. The secret call to worship used codes. One such code was the spiritual, “Steal Away to Jesus.” If enslaved Africans were caught worshiping, they were subjected to vicious beatings or could be murdered for exercising religious freedom.

During the secret worship, the African preacher sermonized how God delivered the Hebrews from slavery to freedom. The ancestors believed and trusted that the same God who told Moses to go down in Egypt land and let my people go was the same God that was going to set them free. The enslaved Africans practiced their African rituals knowing the spirit of the ancestors was with them, encouraging them, that slavery was not their destiny. C. Eric Lincoln reminded us in the epic book “The Black Church in the African American Experience,” that “The term ‘freedom’ has found a deep religious resonance in the lives and hopes of African Americans.”

Colin Kaepernick refused to stand for the Star-Spangled Banner, National Anthem. He said he did so to protest police shootings of African American men and other social injustices faced by Black people in the United States. The Star-Spangled Banner is a lyrical prayer – “and this be our motto, “In God we trust.”

Kaepernick was punished for expressing his freedom by refusing to engage in what he sees as hypocrisy. Is it time for a new national anthem? Near the Rotunda of the Capitol, a room is set apart for prayer. In light of the controversy, should the prayer room be removed? In 2009, I gave the opening prayer as a Guest Chaplain for the U.S. House of Representatives that was aired on CNN and other networks.

Is the opening prayer possibly up for elimination? On April 17, 1952, President Harry Truman signed a bill proclaiming the National Day of Prayer into law in the United States. Will it be reversed? Tim Tebow often knelt and prayed at football games. Steph Curry has a line of tennis shoes with a biblical scripture, “I can do all things…”

Ms. Hamer raised a critical inquiry, how much of my freedom can I have today? Are you willing to contend for your faith?

Oakland Post

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Arts and Culture

COMMENTARY: Black Music is the Sound of Black Freedom: Let Us Reclaim Both This Juneteenth

Black Music Month started when Black Music Association members Ed Wright, Kenny Gamble and his wife, journalist and radio host Dyanna Williams were able to persuade President Jimmy Carter to establish the observation on June 7, 1979.

Published

22 hours ago

June 9, 2026

Oakland Post

Robert Johnson (1911-1938) is thought of as the godfather of blues music, especially Delta blues. The 29 songs recorded by him during his short life have been of massive inspiration to guitarists and musicians over the last 80 years. Public domain photo.

By Wanda Ravernell

Black Music Month and Juneteenth are inextricably linked – Black music is the sound of our freedom.

From the plaintive moans of the enslaved Africans’ ‘sorrow songs,’ to the fields of Civil War battle where Black soldiers picked up abandoned bugles, to the upright piano played in juke joints on Saturday night and churches come Sunday morning, our ancestors’ innovation in the face of want, fear, degradation, and hopelessness has yielded genres of music imitated ’round the world.

In 2000, Congress made it official. In 2009, Pres. Barack Obama changed the name to African American Music Heritage Month and in 2023, Pres. Joe Biden changed it back to Black Music Month, two years after he declared Juneteenth a national holiday, the result of a movement led by Opal Lee.

Our ancestors battle for freedom over these last 400 years and the music that allowed them expression of their humanity deserved to be honored.

But we may be losing sight of the value of their sacrifices.

‘Sing a Song Full of the Faith That the Dark past Has Taught Us…’

Along with the long-known exploitation of Black musicians whose recordings were stolen by record companies, the commercialization of Juneteenth feels like another kind of theft.

I had never heard of Juneteenth until I moved to the Bay Area from my hometown of Philadelphia. I didn’t know it was one of many freedom festivals celebrated by descendants of enslaved people in the United States.

Emancipation Day was Jan. 1 in Pennsylvania, April 16 in Wash., D.C., May 20 in Florida, and Aug. 8 in Kentucky. But Juneteenth, June 19, has the most renown, known in Texas as the ‘colored peoples’ Fourth of July.’

It was marked by parades, beauty pageants, rodeos, backyard barbecues and church picnics.

Yes, church.

The formerly enslaved began the day praying in thanks for their freedom just as they had prayed for Jubilee – the day of freedom – when they had chains on their feet and hands. They ‘testified’ about their past suffering and how they had managed to overcome.

And they sang.

Although, we will not hold it this year, Omnira Institute’s Juneteenth Ritual of Remembrance recalled this part of Juneteenth with prayers in the languages of the African captives. In the middle of the ceremony, a soloist would lead us in singing “Many Thousand Gone” while we took turns reciting portions of the Emancipation Proclamation, the news of freedom that took more than two years to reach Texas – two months after the Civil War ended.

“Many Thousand Gone” was famously recorded by Black luminary Paul Robeson in 1947:

“No more auction block for me,

No more, no more

No more auction black for me

Many thousand gone.”

Other verses refer to the ‘pint of salt’ and the ‘driver’s lash,’ the realities of enslavement that they had survived.

‘Sing a Song Full of the Hope That the Present has Brought Us’

All of the genres of African American music have at their root songs like that, the essence being, as Stevie Wonder, wrote, “the joy inside our pain.” So Black music is not just music. It is our story, our history, our very strength.

During the Civil Rights Movement, which peaked 100 years after slavery ended, the people testified that it was the freedom songs – based on spirituals – that gave them the heart to march, face attack dogs, fire hoses, beatings, and shootouts with vigilantes.

The music reminded them that power was in the people. That music, our music, can do so again. We don’t have to accept the commodification of the products of our culture.

The power of those songs is showing a resurgence across the South as we battle again for the right to self-determination through the ballot box.

Those songs are the voices of our ancestors, voices forged in their blood, their sweat, their tears, joy and, above all, faith. Those songs, those prayers live in our blood and our very breath.

This Juneteenth, let us reclaim those holy voices expressed in Black music for ourselves. It is our birthright. It can neither be bought nor sold. No more. Never again.

Wanda Ravernell is the executive director of Omnira Institute, sponsor for 18 years of the Juneteenth Ritual of Remembrance and Oakland’s 11^th Annual Black-Eyed Pea Festival, which will take place on Sept. 12.