We love a celebration here at Cura, and right around the corner are two significant ones—significant as in worth being very intentional about.
A couple of our very favorite people in the world are dads … and/but Father’s Day can often be a little complicated (right?). It’s that way for our friend and colleague Laura Sullivan Cassidy - who told us that after her father died in 2016, she began using the yearly pre-solstice tradition to get extra curious about the divine masculine.
Just like people of any gender can fulfill the role of father, people of any gender can represent divine masculine energy. We’re 100% here (with gratitude!) for rightly used determination, physical strength, and logical engineering (and other divine masc ways of being) – and there’s a lot to celebrate in those qualities, especially as we get close to June 21 —------- the most fiery, masc, and yang day of the year.
And/but, we’re also thinking about the ceremony and tradition of Juneteenth, which falls on Sunday, too.
Our Black community will know exactly how they want to celebrate what is also called Emancipation Day, but those of us who are non-Black have an opportunity (and a responsibility) to observe the newly minted federal holiday and forge our own connections and actions based in thoughtful respect and participation.
At this stage of the game, recommending yet another reading just doesn’t cut it … but maybe part of your yearly Juneteenth tradition could be revisiting Ta-Nehisi Coates’s hugely important 2014 study, The Case for Reparations from The Atlantic (a paywall-free PDF is available here).
Still though, right action is where it’s at.
For that, we recommend beginning with these short, practical, and direct suggestions just-out from the Washington Post. In it, the “Grandmother of Juneteenth,” Opal Lee, and others share wisdom and guidance on making Juneteenth something that means something to you and your family—because that’s how you make meaningful change in your life and your community: With commitment, with respect, with the desire to be a part of powerful material and cultural change.
Another way to make meaningful change is to let yourself be changed. And for that we recommend this list from a 2020 anti-racism blog post. It’s provocative, evocative, on-point, and necessary – and we hope it’s something you’ll read and be moved by.
And then, of course, let’s celebrate.
Here’s to peace, love, family, and chosen family.
And equity and pride for all.