Church

Sometimes when people in New Orleans say, "That's Church," they mean that's the truth, that moves me, that makes me feel deeply. We've had two "Church" events the past two days. One was literally church. We went to Mass at St. Augustine's in Treme, the oldest Black Catholic church in the USA, where the choir is accompanied by keyboards, a saxophone, an electric guitar, and drums, and where half the choir beats tambourines in rhythm with raise-the-rooftop singing. The homily was powerfully delivered by a priest who was all about service, about how we live our daily lives in community, about social justice.

The other Church experience was a theatre event, a one-woman play written and performed by Dr. Kimberly J. Chandler, a professor at Xavier University. She has a face of astonishing plasticity and expressiveness, a voice capable of the complete range of vocal expression, and a poetic sensibility that elevates speech but sounds perfectly natural. Her play, Confessions of an Ex-Superwoman, is her denunciation of the "Strong Black Woman Myth" which she describes in her program as "a set of mythologies and stereotypes that identify Black women as superhumanly strong, yet inherently evil." She goes on, "Black women are perceived as threatening yet supportive, strong yet emasculating." She asks, "How does a Black woman live life on her own terms, engaging a liberating identity as her way of being in the world?"

Performing her story is one way she is answering her question. The play is unabashedly centered in her embodied experience of being a Black woman in a racist society, accused of being "too much, too loud, too fat, too smart" having too much "attitude," too much anger. One of my favorite lines is, "Maybe I'm not too much; maybe you're too little."

Tonight it will be Church again. We're going to hear Germaine Bazzle live at Irvin Mayfield's Jazz Playhouse. If you don't know who she is, Google her or go on Youtube. She is amazing.

*I should mention, no photography happens during the Mass, but when Mass is over, the choir keeps singing and photography is allowed.