Thomas wrote: “This Court should never have interpreted (Section) 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 to effectively give racial groups ‘an entitlement to roughly proportional representation.’ … By doing so, the Court led legislatures and courts to ‘systematically divid(e) the country into electoral districts along racial lines.’ … ‘Blacks (we)re drawn into ‘black districts’ and given ‘black representatives’; Hispanics (we)re drawn into Hispanic districts and given ‘Hispanic representatives’; and so on. That interpretation rendered (Section) 2 ‘repugnant to any nation that strives for the ideal of a color-blind Constitution.’ … Today’s decision should largely put an end to this ‘disastrous misadventure’ in voting-rights jurisprudence.”

Critics argue the ruling is not colorblind in effect because race-neutral districting can dilute minority voting power. But this assumes a) non-black and non-Hispanic voters would not vote for black or Hispanic candidates; and b) the interests of black and Hispanic voters can only be pursued by black and Hispanic members of Congress.

For Democrats, the effect of this ruling could be politically catastrophic. A report from Fair Fight Action and Black Voters Matter Fund said: “Combined with Republicans’ mid-decade gerrymandering, a ruling gutting Section 2 could help secure an additional 27 safe Republican U.S. House seats when compared to the 2024 House maps — at least 19 directly tied to the loss of Section 2.”

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said: “Instead of protecting the ability for American citizens to freely cast their ballot, Republican extremists have embraced voter suppression and racial gerrymandering to desperately cling to power. The corrupt conservative majority on the Supreme Court appointed by Donald Trump has taken a blowtorch to the Voting Rights Act. Why? The extremists need to cheat to win.”

It is not clear how removing race as a criterion in constructing congressional districts amounts to “cheating.” Nor is it clear how this majority of justices, nominated by Republican presidents, renders the court “corrupt.”

As for “Republican extremists embracing voter suppression,” Jeffries presumably means voter ID laws. But polls show a large majority of blacks support voter ID by percentages close to those of whites. Georgia, in 2021, enacted voter ID and voter-integrity laws called by President Joe Biden “worse than Jim Crow — it’s Jim Eagle.” But the percentage of blacks who voted exceeded the black voting percentages of most pre-2021 Georgia elections.

Let’s turn to Jeffries’ accusation about Republicans’ supposed use of “racial gerrymandering.” In 2017, Politico wrote: “Former (Obama) Attorney General Eric Holder on Thursday officially launched the National Democratic Redistricting Committee … as the center of Democratic rebuilding in the era of President-elect Donald Trump and as Democrats’ main hope to roll back Republican gains in state legislatures and prepare for redistricting in 2021. The end goal: House majorities in Congresses elected after 2020.”

To that end, Eric Holder supported race-conscious redistricting efforts designed to increase black electoral influence. About a district in Alabama in 2024, for example, the Associated Press wrote: “The National Democratic Redistricting Committee, which Holder chairs, supported the legal battle that led to the district being redrawn into a competitive seat where Black voters have the opportunity to influence the outcome.”

Finally, about voters voting based on race, there are four black Republican members of the U.S. House, none of whom represents a majority-black district. Even Democrat Maxine Waters, a harsh critic of the court ruling and a co-founder of the Congressional Black Caucus, represents a district that is only about 20% black. Rep. Steve Cohen, who is white, succeeded Rep. Harold Ford Jr., who is black, in representing a majority-black district. And a recent Gallup poll finds Trump approval rating among blacks at 16%, up from 12% in his first term.

Contrary to what many Democratic politicians say and how they act, this is not their grandfather’s America. But many Democrat politicians do not want a colorblind society. They want a color-coordinated one — as long as they oversee the coordination.

My advice to Democrats after this ruling is simple: calm down. The days of poll taxes, literacy tests and grandfather clauses are long over. As Thomas Sowell says, “When people get used to preferential treatment, equal treatment seems like discrimination.”

Columnist; Larry Elder

Official website; http://www.larryelder.com

Nana Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s mother and father, of the same spiritual faith and a similar generation as my mother and father, taught him the dignity and worth of work in its service to humanity, as my mother and father taught us, drawing from a long and honorable tradition of work. In his classic speech on this topic in Memphis, supporting the strike and demands for decent wages and working conditions of the sanitation workers, Dr. King reaffirms this position, saying to the striking workers and their supporters, that they are rightfully “demanding that this city will respect the dignity of labor”. And he noted that “So often we overlook the work and the significance of those who are not in professional jobs, of those who are not in the so-called big jobs. But…whenever you are engaged in work that serves humanity and is for the building of humanity, it has dignity, and it has worth”. Thus, in the best of our ethical sensibilities, thought and practice, all workers deserve respect, just pay, appropriate conditions of work, and the right to organize and assert their interests.

We stood and stand in active solidarity with the millions in this country and around the world who participated in marking May Day (International Workers’ Day) in demonstrations, deliberations and resolute commitment to continue the struggle against war, ICE, genocide, injustice, fascism and all forms of oppression. For at the heart of all these labor and other struggles must be, and is for us, the collective and collaborative commitment to achieving a shared and inclusive good for everyone, everywhere and the sustained well-being of the world and all in it.

What I want to do here, then, in uplifting and linking Mother’s Day and May Day is to center the legacy of labor struggles in our history, especially those led by Black women that form a core of  our larger struggle for freedom, justice and a shared and inclusive good and those that are caringly attentive to the overlooked, undervalued and vulnerable, as my mother and father taught. Let us first pay rightful homage to our ancient ancestors, the original world builders, working their will on the world to extract and share good from the earth – the early gatherers, farmers and fishermen and fisherwomen, herbalists and healthcare workers, the builders of houses and temples and all other workers who worked to bring a shared good in the world. We pay homage also to the workers who launched the first strike in recorded history at a worksite in ancient Egypt called Set Ma’at, the Place of Justice c. 1170 BCE. Indeed, artisans and ordinary workers stopped work, sat in, marched, petitioned and disrupted the regular order of things. They told the officials that they were not only striking because of the late wages and the hunger that this caused for them and their families, but also because “There is injustice in this place”. Their concern was beyond the essential need for wages and centered the issue of the dignity of the worker and the respect and just compensation due to them.

We pay rightful homage also to the women and men free of mind and heart who did not accept their status in enslavement and resisted being objects of labor, sex and entertainment by striking, breaking tools, destroying crops, escaping and returning to free others, and exercising the right and responsibility to revolt and be free. And we pay homage to the Black washerwomen or launderers who built a labor union, the Washing Society, and organized a strike in Atlanta, Georgia in 1881 to win higher and uniform wages; and to Nana Nannie Helen Burroughs, an educator and organizer, who founded the National Association of Wage Earners in 1921; and to Nana Rosina Corrothers Tucker, labor organizer, civil rights activist, and educator who worked as a union organizer for the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters and served as the first president of its International Ladies Auxiliary, 1938. Also, we pay homage to Nana Dorothy Bolden, founder of the National Domestic Workers Union of America in 1968; to Nana Clara Day who co-founded the Coalition of Labor Union Women in 1974; and to all other labor and life waymakers and bridges who carried us over and led us forward.

Finally, we pay homage to the labor leader and activist Nana Fahari Jeffers who with her husband, Ken Seaton-Msemaji, co-founded the United Domestic Workers of America in 1977. They were grounded in Kawaida philosophy and its organizing thought and practice and linked their work to the United Farm Workers movement given that both were primarily composed of women, people of color and immigrants and not rightly valued by the larger labor movement. Indeed, Nana Fahari said in being inducted into the San Diego County Women’s Hall of Fame, “It’s an honor as a woman and it’s an honor as an African-American woman. There are many women who make groundbreaking, enormous contributions to our community that we will never meet or hear of, and I want them to know that their work is valued and recognized and that it has made a difference”.

Here she reaffirms the dignity, centrality and sustaining character of Black women’s labor and our need to recognize and respect them, their work and their role in bringing good into the world. And I thought here of how my mother was both a domestic worker and a farmworker, and I remembered and rejoiced in the many other roles and responsibilities she joyfully assumed for our family and our community. And I reflected again about our moral obligation to seriously and joyfully honor and live the legacy of our foremothers and forefathers by continuing the sacred work and struggle for freedom, justice and a shared and inclusive good for all of us and for all the earth.

Written by Dr. Maulana Karenga

Official website; https://www.maulanakarenga.org/

Staff Writer; Lee Walker

This brother is a fitness trainer with 12 years of experience, focused on building strength, clarity, and real health within the Black community. Through his writing, Mr. Walker hopes to uplift younger Black men and men in general through honest conversations about fitness, financial pressure, fatherhood, discipline, mental wellness, and the importance of brotherhood.

Have questions? Reach me at LeeW@ThyBlackMan.com.

Pro-life Americans were not passive supporters of Donald Trump. They worked for him, prayed for him, and voted for him in numbers that mattered. They did so because he gave them reason to trust him, and he delivered.

That is precisely why the conduct of FDA Commissioner Marty Makary demands scrutiny and accountability.

Let’s be honest about who Marty Makary is. His record on life issues is not only disappointing but also disqualifying. His instincts on healthcare policy track far closer to Bernie Sanders than to the voters who put this president in office. Anyone who followed his career before his appointment shouldn’t be shocked. His handling of abortion-related pharmaceuticals at the FDA has made clear that the pro-life community is, at best, an afterthought to him.

People sometimes treat the FDA as a technical backwater, a place where scientists argue over approval timelines and label language. That is a mistake. When it comes to life issues, the FDA may be the most important regulatory body in Washington. Chemical abortion drugs, prescribing guidelines, distribution rules — these decisions flow through that agency. The person running it shapes outcomes that no single piece of legislation can easily reverse. Right now, the wrong person is running it.

President Trump has earned the trust of the pro-life movement, but Makary is squandering it. Through a pattern of sloppy management and decisions that have left pro-life leaders questioning his basic commitment to the cause, Makary has become a liability to the very president who appointed him. SBA Pro-Life America has called for his immediate termination, with President Marjorie Dannenfelser warning that he is “severely undermining President Trump and Vice President Vance’s pro-life credentials.” The pro-life movement did not fight for decades to put a careless, unreliable FDA commissioner in charge of the most consequential drug decisions in America.

And the timing could not be worse. Pro-life voters are not a special interest group that shows up every four years and goes home. They are the backbone of Republican turnout operations. They knock on doors in October. They write checks when the cause calls for it. They drag their neighbors to the polls. What drives them is genuine moral conviction, which means they are also paying genuine attention. You cannot take them for granted and expect them not to notice.

When a cabinet appointee signals that their priorities don’t matter, they notice. Enthusiasm doesn’t collapse all at once. It bleeds out slowly, through a series of small disappointments that add up to the conclusion that nobody in power is fighting for us. Commissioner Makary has been delivering those disappointments consistently, and the political damage lands on Republican candidates across the ballot in 2026.

The White House built something real with the pro-life movement. That relationship took years of kept promises and hard fights to develop. It would be a serious mistake to let one bureaucrat destroy that trust. Pro-life Americans were asked to be foot soldiers for this administration. They showed up. They deserve a commissioner who shares their values, not one who treats those values as an inconvenience.

President Trump should consider replacing Dr. Makary with someone who understands that protecting life is a governing responsibility, not a campaign applause line. The movement that delivered for this president is still watching. The question is whether this administration is still listening.

Written By Ken Blackwell

Official website; http://twitter.com/kenblackwell

 The gaslighting and lies are at tsunami strength and energy levels; if we don’t think for ourselves, we will be permanently bamboozled and lobotomized into falling for their Bizzaro World okey-doke. For example, take the war in Iran, Trump is telling us the US is winning, the US and Israel have obliterated Iran’s war making capacities and crippled its ability to fight back. But the reality on the ground is, prior to the ceasefire, Iran was pounding Israel relentlessly, hitting Gulf state allies who host military bases in the region with devastating accuracy and inflicting massive infrastructural damage on all of them.

Trump and Netanyahu, in their arrogance and hubris, thought their sneak attacks and decapitations would render Iran fully discombobulated, in total disarray, that their attempted color revolution would topple the regime and they could install compliant compradors as their vassals.  The warmongers thought their initial attacks would be so devastating, Iran would collapse, crumble and capitulate.

Alas, they thought wrong! Iran circumvented the CIA and Mossad’s color revolution by disconnecting the country’s Internet and blocking the Starlink satellite signals the CIA and Mossad were sending to their provocateurs inside Iran. The protests immediately fell apart and fizzled. This enabled Iran to track, locate, arrest and neutralize them as they needed to do to preserve their national security and sovereignty.

Iran has ingeniously changed the rules of engagement and innovated modern warfare against a superior arrogant military force. By designing and manufacturing thousands of low-cost military drones and highly accurate supersonic missiles Iran has successfully neutralized the advantages the US and Israel presupposed they had! Iran has destroyed the GCC’s early detection radar and defense systems provided by the US; thus, rendering them defenseless against Iran’s blistering attacks!

Now the US can’t protect the GCC and they see Israel is America’s top priority which will not bode well for the US as this war rages on or when it finally ends. The Iranians have rendered US aircraft carriers totally ineffective due to their fear of Iranian missiles and drones! If Iran destroyed a US aircraft carrier in the region, it would be a devastating psychological blow to the US Empire. The US hypes their aircraft carriers as their invincible global projection of military force; if one or several were destroyed that would be catastrophic for the American Empire’s image.

 Trump is so desperate to extricate himself from this fiasco, he had to press for a ceasefire because of the immense pressure Iran has put on the global oil, LNG, petrochemical trade supply chains! The economic aspect has proven to be Iran’s trump card and they are playing it to the hilt! Iran has Trump over the proverbial barrel with his pants down around his ankles. Trump’s options are limited so in his frustration don’t be surprised if he resumes military action.

The fact Iran survived the massive assaults on its leadership, civilian infrastructure and Iran has fought back so valiantly totally surprised the Israeli and American aggressors who thought this war would be a wham- bam type operation. Iran’s lethal military and economic strategies have shaken Trump to his core. He is unable to rally NATO, Europe, Japan or any of his erstwhile allies to come to his aid. (One reason is his trade wars and tariffs against them have come back to bite him) This has also devasted his narcissistic psyche.

 The economic shock coupled with Iran’s uncompromising resilience have taken the bully’s heart. Now Trump is trying to find a way to extricate himself from his war of choice.  But Israel will not allow it! Israel is seething, the ceasefire is a major setback for them, even though they are being pounded relentlessly (and rightly so) by Iran, Hezbollah and the Houthis.

Young brothers, let an older Black man tell you something from experience.

Do not let temporary pain convince you to walk away from permanent responsibility.

I know life can wear a man down. I know what it feels like to stare at the ceiling late at night while everybody else is asleep, trying to figure out how you are going to keep carrying everything on your shoulders. A lot of us grew up watching men suffer quietly. Nobody asked them how they were doing mentally. Nobody checked on their spirit. They just kept working, kept stressing, kept aging right in front of everybody.

That kind of pressure leaves marks on a man.

Some of you younger fathers are carrying things your friends do not even know about. Trying to provide while feeling emotionally exhausted. Trying to stay calm while your mind feels crowded. Trying to be strong while secretly feeling like you are drowning. That does not make you weak. That makes you human.

There is a difference.

I think one of the biggest lies Black men were taught is that suffering in silence somehow makes you stronger. All it really does is make you feel alone. Then once a man feels alone long enough, he starts disconnecting from the people who need him most.

I have seen it happen too many times.

A father starts pulling away little by little. He stops talking as much. Stops laughing as much. Stops being mentally present. Physically he is still around, but his mind is somewhere dark and heavy.

That is why I wanted to speak directly to the brothers carrying that kind of weight.

Your children need your presence more than your perfection.

Read that again if you need to.

A lot of young fathers think being valuable means having all the money, all the answers, all the control. But children remember something deeper than that. They remember who was there. They remember who listened. They remember who stayed around even when life got hard.

Years from now your child may not remember every gift you bought, but they will remember your voice. They will remember car rides, conversations, jokes, lessons, and those random moments that seemed small at the time.

That stuff matters.

I learned that as I got older.

When my children were younger, I thought being a good father mostly meant making sure material things were handled. Keep food in the house. Keep bills paid. Keep clothes on their backs. That is important, do not get me wrong. But now that I got some age on me, I realize emotional presence carries just as much weight.

Sometimes more.

Kids can feel when a father is emotionally checked out.

They notice when you stop engaging.

They notice when your patience disappears.

They notice when stress changes your tone.

Even when they cannot explain it with words, they feel it.

That is why you cannot keep ignoring your mental state and expect everything around you to stay healthy.

One thing I had to learn myself was how to slow down before reacting. I did not always get that right. Coming up, most of us were raised around yelling, tension, frustration, and people carrying anger they never dealt with. If you are not careful, you end up repeating those same patterns without even realizing it.

I caught myself doing that before.

Not because I wanted to hurt anybody, but because certain habits become automatic when you grow up around them long enough.

That realization humbled me.

It forced me to start paying attention to how I spoke, how I handled stress, and how I responded when life frustrated me. A child learns emotional behavior by watching adults. That means your son is learning manhood from watching you. Your daughter is learning how men handle pressure from watching you.

That responsibility is serious.

But do not let that thought scare you. Let it wake you up.

A lot of fathers are trying to build healthy homes while carrying wounds they never healed from themselves. Some brothers never had real guidance growing up. Some barely knew their own fathers. Others grew up watching addiction, violence, emotional distance, or nonstop struggle. Then society expects those same men to magically become emotionally balanced overnight once they have children.

Life does not work that way.

Healing takes time.

Growth takes honesty.

And becoming better requires effort every single day.

I know some brothers feel embarrassed because life did not turn out how they imagined. Maybe the relationship with the mother failed. Maybe finances are rough. Maybe mistakes from years ago still follow you mentally. Some fathers carry guilt so deep it changes how they see themselves.

Do not let shame turn you into a stranger around your own children.

That is a dangerous road.

Kids do not need a flawless father standing in front of them pretending to have everything figured out. They need somebody real. Somebody who keeps trying. Somebody willing to grow instead of disappear when life gets uncomfortable.

There were times I had to apologize to my children. That was not something older men talked about much when I was younger. Back then fathers were expected to always appear right even when they were wrong. But I learned something important over time.

Children respect honesty more than ego.

Saying I handled that wrong does not make you less of a man.

It makes you accountable.

And accountability is something young people desperately need to see nowadays.

Another thing I want younger fathers to understand is this. Stop trying to carry everything alone. Too many Black men isolate themselves when life gets heavy. They stop talking. Stop reaching out. Stop connecting with people who care about them.

That silence can become dangerous after a while.

You do not need a crowd around you, but every man needs somebody he can talk honestly with. Could be an older relative. Could be a close friend. Could be another father dealing with similar pressure. Just having one solid conversation can lighten your mental load more than you realize.

Sometimes another man reminding you that you are not alone can help pull you out of dark thinking.

I wish more brothers understood that earlier.

I also had to learn how important rest is. Not laziness. Real rest. Mental rest. Emotional rest. Some fathers are running on fumes every day and wondering why they feel disconnected from everything around them.

You cannot keep pouring from an empty cup forever.

Take care of your health too.

Go for walks.

Get outside sometimes.

Pray if that brings you peace.

Turn the noise down when your mind feels overloaded.

There is nothing weak about protecting your mental stability.

Matter of fact, your children benefit when you are healthy enough emotionally to truly be present around them.

And let me say this too.

Do not underestimate how much your child watches you fight through difficult seasons. One day they may look back and realize their father was carrying way more than they understood at the time. They may realize you kept showing up even while struggling internally.

That example stays with children.

Strength is not pretending nothing hurts.

Real strength is continuing to show love and effort while dealing with life honestly.

I know some days fathers feel unappreciated. Society talks about Black fathers like they barely exist unless something negative happens. Meanwhile millions of brothers are waking up every morning trying to hold their families together quietly without recognition.

I see you.

A lot of older men see you too.

Do not let negative stereotypes make you forget your value.

Your child seeing you stay involved matters more than public opinion ever will.

There is power in a father being present consistently.

Power in a father listening.

Power in a father teaching.

Power in a father simply staying.

That presence shapes lives in ways you may never fully understand while your children are young.

One conversation can stay with a child forever.

One moment of encouragement can change their confidence.

One father staying around can completely alter the direction of a family.

That is real.

So to every Black father sitting somewhere feeling mentally exhausted, emotionally drained, or questioning his worth, hear this clearly from an older brother who understands life a little more now.

Do not give up on yourself.

Do not walk away from your children emotionally.

Do not let hard seasons convince you your life has no meaning.

Keep going.

Even if all you can do some days is take things one hour at a time.

Keep showing up.

Your children do not need perfection standing in front of them.

They need love.

They need effort.

They need presence.

And whether you realize it right now or not, that matters more than you think.

Staff Writer; Lee Walker

This brother is a fitness trainer with 12 years of experience, focused on building strength, clarity, and real health within the Black community. Through his writing, Mr. Walker hopes to uplift younger Black men and men in general through honest conversations about fitness, financial pressure, fatherhood, discipline, mental wellness, and the importance of brotherhood.

Have questions? Reach me at LeeW@ThyBlackMan.com.

It is to be hoped that the reader of this article is sober, and serious, and mature, and willing to face existential truths.

The precipitous decline of humanity through the ages has landed us with a situation that can be frightening, and many are wondering if we are near the brink of extinction.

Let us be honest, neither you nor I can fully evaluate the full depth to which humanity will fall at the end of our sojourn on this earth. We know that at the end, things in general, will be abysmal, earth will become a living hell, and those alive will regret not being long dead.

All of that is clear from the only reliable source of truth that has proven itself through the ages – the Scriptures; especially as recorded in Revelation.

What is less clear is what happens in the interim, the near future, perhaps in the next decade or two. It does not require any special skill of forecasting, or gift of prophecy, to see where we are heading; for the Bible gives us a clear road map to assist us in our determination.

We, as believers, need to be SOBER as forewarned by the Scriptures, “Be SOBER, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour.” (1 Peter 5:8)

In today’s degenerate world believers need to examine, and if necessary re-learn, some sobering truths.

Sobering Truth 1. These are the last days.

This bold statement, that these are the last days, has always puzzled some people, because we were born hearing this statement, and yet decades later things are going on much as before. Our grandparents heard this very statement, as well as their grandparents before them.

What is certain is that Jesus is coming soon, or so we believe and teach, but how soon is soon nobody can really determine. Jesus warned us not to be caught napping when he said, “Therefore be ye also ready: for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh.” (Matthew 24:44). Jesus also said, “But of that day and that hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels which are in heaven, neither the Son, but the Father.” (Mark 13:32)

Some believers in Paul’s time thought Jesus was returning during their lifetime, some think that these same believers abandoned their work, families and took to the hills awaiting His return. Others were not clear as to when and how Jesus would return. Whatever their state of mind, Paul had to set them right on the matter of Jesus’ Second Advent, and he did so in 1 Thessalonians 5:1-11.

Some believed that Jesus meant it literally when he said, “Verily I say unto you, There be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom.” (Matthew 16:28).

The truth is that all references to end times, whether in Daniel, the Gospels, the Epistles or Revelation, can be interpreted literally or figuratively, spiritually or naturally. One should not allow specific interpretative approaches to cloud the fact that the period of time between Jesus’ First and Second Advents is factually, theologically and biblically the last days.

The onus is on us then to be ready, live as if Jesus will appear any moment, and waste no time on pettiness, harbour no grudges, let love fill our hearts and souls and live at peace with God and our neighbour. In such a spirit we can say, “Even so, come, Lord Jesus.” (Revelation 22:20)

Sobering Truth 2. Humanity will progressively get worse

There are many things that will improve with time because our knowledge, and hence our technology, will enable us to do more and do them better. Who can doubt the real, laudable benefits that have accrued to us because of the improvements in medical science, science generally and technology?

But improvements in man’s ability to understand and manipulate his environment do not necessarily translate into a better, more humane, more moral, more livable society.

About 6,000 years ago humanity was generally quite poor but equal, apart from highway robbers and the odd tyrant. Today you have billionaires co-existing with starving people, billionaires and millionaires who throw in the garbage what could feed thousands for weeks if not years, and they are subsidised in their exorbitant lifestyles by tax breaks and loopholes by corrupt, fawning governments. Today’s inequality is staggering.

In Moses’ time (about 1600 BC) laws were made to prohibit and, where found root out and punish, the evil practice of homosexuality. In 1075 BC the Assyrians passed similar laws with respect to the military. Across the civilised world sodomy laws were made and enforced with vigour, Europe first sodomy laws were made around the late antiquity. Even a young country like the United States had sodomy laws that in 1963 according to Wikipedia “…the penalties for sodomy in the various states varied from imprisonment for two to ten years and/or a fine of US$2,000.”

Today some countries are falling over themselves to legalise sodomy, they seem to have lost their sense of what is clean and unclean, and gay marriages are a trendy response to the immoral confusion.

Believers should prepare for things to get worse. Whatever the degenerate hordes may say now, let there be no doubt that their agenda of moral recklessness is only just beginning. They will push for and, with dirty money behind them, get incest legalised, then pedophilia made respectable, and then they will say, “so why can’t I marry my dog, or horse or pig” or whatever.

At some point, this world would have degenerated to the same place the world was at, just before the Great Flood.

Sobering Truth 3. Few will be saved

It would be foolish for anyone to assign numbers in respect to those who will be saved, i.e. find salvation through our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. 20 million might seem a lot but that number is a handful (.003%) of the world’s population. Even 60 million is just 1% of the current world’s population, and 1% of anything is pretty minor.

We know that few will be saved because we have the evidence of our own eyes, the trends recorded in history, and above all the reliable word of God that tells us this; “Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.” (Matthew 7:14)

Even in the churches there are many who will fall away from the faith, turn their itching ears to false doctrines (we are witnessing this phenomena now) and deny the very God whom they have served, “And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.” (Matthew 24:12)

Sobering Truth 4. Preaching will become increasingly ineffective

This truth should not be misunderstood, whenever the gospel is preached God will reach out and call his own. Some people refer to this as irresistible calling but in truth God knows those who will accept him and the Holy Spirit will always do his job effectively.

Preaching is meant to be twofold; it certainly calls people to repentance, builds them up and encourages them but it also warns people.

As time goes by and as fewer people are saved, more and more preaching will just be the word being preached as a witness and warning so that degenerates are without excuse. Preachers have to be faithful to their mandate regardless of visible results, “Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long suffering and doctrine.” (2 Timothy 4:2)

Sobering Truth 5. Some you know and love will go to hell

Talking about hell is, for some people, the hardest reality of all. It gets even harder when the staggering truth, that some of our love ones and friends will suffer everlasting torment, is fully taken on board.

God gives every human being a chance to choose his destiny. The Golden Text of the Bible tells us, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” (John 3:16)

Believers need to remember that Hell is not God’s choice for humans, for He is “…not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.” (2 Peter 3:9), but if humans exert their freewill to say no to God’s offer of salvation then believers everywhere must respect that choice.

Truth is often like that, not glorious and exciting at times; often sober and demanding, sometimes discomfiting, sometimes touching a chord that you do not want touched (remember what Jesus said to the rich young ruler, “go and sell all you have and give to the poor and come and follow me – Luke 18:22-23)

Believers must not be like that rich young ruler who turned away in pique and sadness but on the contrary show determination as advised, “Wherefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” (1 Peter 3:18)

Staff Writer; Henderson W.

You can contact this Christian brother at: HWard@ThyBlackMan.com.

Now the federal government is trying to make her disappear again.

I teach in Philadelphia, a short walk from the site of the President’s House. George and Martha Washington lived there when the city was the nation’s capital. Nine enslaved people lived there too.

My own family fought in the American Revolution. We descend from the youngest boy to carry a musket at Lexington. So I grew up believing the American story belongs to every American. Not the cleaned-up version.

Ona Judge was one of those nine. The promise of the Revolution lived in that house. So did the cruelty of slavery.

That is not a footnote. That is the American story.

For fifteen years, visitors to Independence National Historical Park could learn that story at an exhibit called “Freedom and Slavery in the Making of a New Nation.” It told the truth about the people Washington enslaved there. It told the truth about Ona Judge, who chose freedom in 1796 and refused to return. It told the truth about a country that promised liberty while permitting slavery.

Then the Trump administration took the panels down.

In January, the National Park Service removed the exhibit on White House orders. The administration calls this kind of history too “divisive.” Empty bolt holes marked the brick where the panels used to hang. Only nine names remained, engraved on the wall. Austin. Christopher Sheels. Giles. Hercules. Joe Richardson. Moll. Oney Judge. Paris. Richmond. Someone left flowers.

The city of Philadelphia sued. A federal judge ordered the exhibit put back. The administration appealed. The case is now before the Third Circuit.

This is a fight over whether America is strong enough to tell the truth about itself.

And in that fight, we need heroes.

One of them is Judge Timothy K. Lewis, a retired Black federal appeals judge. President George H.W. Bush appointed him first as a district judge, then to the very Third Circuit now hearing this case.

Judge Lewis came up through the Republican legal world of Western Pennsylvania. His mentor was Wendell Freeland, a Tuskegee Airman who became a leading civil rights lawyer and a lifelong Black Republican in Pittsburgh.

That lineage matters.

In 2006, Judge Lewis testified at Samuel Alito’s Supreme Court confirmation hearing. The two did not agree on much. Lewis told the committee he was “openly and unapologetically pro-choice.” But he stood up for Alito’s character because integrity mattered more than politics.

That kind of judge does not lend his name to easy fights.

A friend-of-the-court brief from the African Methodist Episcopal Church and historian Dr. Erica Armstrong Dunbar makes the stakes plain. Take Ona Judge and Bishop Richard Allen out of this story and you erase something we cannot afford to lose. Enslaved people and free Black people helped shape the conscience of this nation.

Allen was born into slavery. He bought his freedom. He founded the African Methodist Episcopal Church in Philadelphia, the first independent Black church in the United States. He built a free Black community that pushed America closer to its own promise.

But what is divisive about telling children that enslaved people dreamed and planned and ran?

What is divisive about telling tourists that George Washington was both the father of his country and a man who held people as property?

The real division comes from the lie.

It comes from asking Black children to walk where their ancestors’ suffering has been scrubbed away. It comes from asking white children to grow up on a fairy tale. It comes from saying that loving America requires forgetting.

Real patriotism does not fear Ona Judge.

Real patriotism can stand in the President’s House and say: Here lived George Washington. Here also lived the people he enslaved. Here a young woman named Ona Judge saw her chance and took it. Here the promise of America was broken. Here it was also pushed forward by people who refused to be owned.

This year America turns 250. The fight over how we tell our story will only get bigger. Pressure to turn the founders into marble and the enslaved into ghosts. Pressure to call love of country a cleaned-up script we must recite.

But Ona Judge already showed us another way.

She told her own story with her feet.

She walked away from the President’s House. She made herself free. Washington tried to get her back. He failed.

More than two centuries later, no government should be allowed to do what Washington could not.

Ona Judge did not ask George Washington for freedom.

She took it.

The least we can do now is refuse to let anyone take her story away.

Written by Ben Jealous

Official website; https://twitter.com/BenJealous

Some of it helped me. Some of it did not. That part matters.

A lot of us grew up learning how to deal with life by just pushing through it. No real space to talk things out. You just keep moving. Keep it inside. That might work when you are younger, but once you have a child looking at you, it hits different. They see more than you think. The way you talk, the way you react, even when you go quiet. They feel all of that.

I caught myself one day responding in a way that felt too familiar. Not something I thought about, it just came out. That is when it hit me. If I do not check myself, I am going to pass that same energy down without even trying to.

That was not sitting right with me.

One thing I had to start doing was slowing myself down. Sounds simple, but it is not. Taking a second before reacting. Not letting emotion run everything. That one change alone saved me from repeating a lot of things I am trying to move away from.

Being a father will make you slow down whether you want to or not. It is not just about taking care of responsibilities. Anybody can pay bills. It is deeper than that. It is how you show up when it is just you and your child. No audience. No pressure from outside. Just you.

Are you really there or just in the room.

I had to check that too.

Another thing that helped me was putting the phone down more. Sounds small, but it is real. You cannot say you are present if your mind is somewhere else. Sitting down, listening, actually hearing what your child is saying. That builds something you cannot fake.

I used to think I had to have everything figured out. That will wear you out quick. Truth is, you do not. You just have to be honest and consistent. Kids know when you are trying. They pick up on that.

Talking was not always easy for me either. I did not grow up in a space where everything got discussed. It was more about doing what you were told and moving on. As a father, I had to learn how to explain things. Not just say do this, but break it down in a way that makes sense.

That changed a lot.

It opened the door for real conversations instead of just giving orders.

There were habits I had to catch myself on too. Tone. Patience. The way I respond when I am stressed. Life does not slow down just because you are trying to do better. It keeps coming. So you have to learn how to move through that without letting it spill over onto your child.

That part takes work.

I also had to learn how to say I was wrong. That was not something I saw much growing up. But it matters. Going back and fixing it when you miss the mark. That shows something real. It shows accountability.

And kids remember that.

At some point I realized I am not just raising a child. I am shaping how they see the world. The way I handle things now is going to show up later in how they deal with life. That thought alone made me move different.

Not perfect, just more aware.

I used to think I had to carry everything on my own. A lot of us think like that. But having somebody to talk to, even just one solid person, makes a difference. You do not have to put everything on display. Just having a place to let some of it out helps.

That is something I want my child to understand too. You do not have to hold everything in to be strong.

Strength looks different than what we were taught sometimes.

Consistency is what really changes things. Not big moments. Not speeches. Just what you do day after day. Being there. Paying attention. Following through.

It is not exciting, but it works.

There are going to be days where you feel like you got it right. Then there are days where you know you could have handled something better. That is part of it. You do not ignore it. You learn from it and keep going.

That is how growth happens.

I also started creating small routines without even thinking too hard about it. Checking in. Talking. Spending time without distractions. Nothing complicated. Just being intentional with the time we have.

Those moments build something over time.

You do not always see it right away, but it is there.

For me, a lot of this came down to deciding I was not going to just repeat everything I came from. Not throwing it all away, but being real about what needed to change.

Keeping the good. Letting go of what did not help.

That balance is not always easy, but it is necessary.

I had to learn patience with myself too. You are not going to fix everything overnight. Some things take time. Some things you do not even notice until later. That is why you stay aware and keep working.

Being present became one of the biggest things for me. Not halfway there. Fully there. Listening, engaging, paying attention. That is what builds connection.

Not money. Not gifts. Time.

I want my child to feel seen. That matters more than anything else. Feeling heard. Feeling supported. That is something I did not always have, so I make sure it is there now.

That is part of doing things different.

Creating something stronger for them to build from.

And it does not have to be complicated. Simple things done consistently go a long way. Conversations. Time together. Showing up when it counts.

That is what sticks.

At the end of the day, this is about growth. Not just for them, but for you too. Being a father will push you in ways nothing else will. You either lean into that or you fight it.

I chose to lean into it.

It starts with awareness, but it does not stop there. It is what you do after that matters. The choices you make, the effort you give, the way you keep showing up.

It is not easy, but it is worth it.