About 40 years ago, I had an intense conversation with a man whose name I don’t remember, so I will just call him Paul. Both of us were nearing completion of our graduate coursework in psychology, and we met while interviewing for a clinical internship at a south Florida university. Following those interviews, Paul announced …
One of the many gifts I received from my mother is a healthy skepticism about religiosity. Although she was a deeply devout, churchgoing, Bible-loving, Sunday School teacher, she was intensely suspicious of anything that felt like performative spirituality. I remember a neighbor who would routinely greet her with “Praise the Lord!” – instead of a …
“Biblelistically” Blessed: Liberating Christianity from White Supremacy Read More »
Nothing has as much durability as a racialized trope. Memories of 60’s television include racing downstairs with my cousins to see the “Negro” who had been spotted in a soap commercial. Believe me, it was a race-worthy event (pun fully intended). At that time, Black bodies were rarely represented in the media except in highly …
This recent spate of patriotic holidays has got me thinking about country music. It’s not that I’m an aficionado of that genre by any stretch of the imagination. It’s just that the songs brilliantly capture the anguish of “somebody done somebody wrong”. For me, the anguish is that spiritual-emotional space where the personal meets the …
Oh, Say Can You See… Somebody Done Somebody Wrong… Read More »
In gratitude and memoriam for Erica Garner, Heather Heyer, Fannie Lou Hamer, Coretta Scott King, Dorothy Parker, Ida B. Wells, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg I know. I can hear the indignant objections now. Somehow in the past two years, what was a “comical” media meme is now loaded with racialized invective, evoking everything from …
All this talk about history and statues reminded me of my third-grade lessons in Mrs. Bennett’s class. It was there that I learned to recite this little ditty: In fourteen hundred ninety-two Columbus sailed the ocean blue… October 12 their dream came true You never saw a happier crew! At seven …
Try to imagine this scenario. You walk into your home and see that it has been plundered by burglars. You even know who the burglars are; after all, they have ransacked your home and stolen your property many times before. Since you know who the burglars are and how they operate, you decide that it’s …
That’s a fairly long title, I know. However, it quite accurately captures where I found myself when Reverend Mary Ann Macklin invited me to share the pulpit at the Universalist Unitarian Church of Bloomington (UUCB) over the Martin Luther King weekend. Of course, I felt honored; there are few privileges more satisfying than having a …
From the Fig Leaf to the Burning Bush: Who Are We Called to Become? Read More »
Sometimes when bad things happen, the need to do the right thing becomes all the more urgent. The election of the 45th president (which I unequivocally experienced as a bad thing) shattered any illusion that just “getting along” as racialized beings is enough. “Just getting along” does not and cannot foster an expansive imagination of …
Among polite circles, there seems to be an agreement that there is no such thing as a stupid question. While I remain wholly unconvinced of that notion, one thing I know for sure: There is such a thing as a useless question. How anyone of any political stripe can ask if Donald Trump is a …
Maureen Walker, PhD, Licensed Psychologist
508-205-9841
maureen@maureenwalker.com
875 Massachusetts Avenue, Suite 65
Cambridge, MA 02139
