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“The details and symbols of your life have been deliberately constructed to make you believe what white people say about you. Please try to remember that what they believe, as well as what they do and cause you to endure, does not testify to your inferiority but to their inhumanity and fear.�� �� letter from James Baldwin to his nephew

This slim novel speaks volumes. It shouts and exhorts. It’s filled with passion, despair, and hope. The Fire Next Time is essentially a set of two letters, or essays, written at the centennial of the Emancipation Proclamation. The first is a letter written by James Baldwin to his nephew, titled “My Dungeon Shook: Letter to My Nephew on the One Hundredth Anniversary of the Emancipation.�� The second, “Down at the Cross: Letter from a Region in My Mind,�� delves further into American racism, religion and spirituality, and Baldwin’s encounter with the Nation of Islam. Both are stunning and beautifully written. When reading something that stirs me this much, I often want to yell “Enough, my heart can’t take anymore!�� In the case of Baldwin, it feels like a punch in the gut, but one that makes me cry “Do it again, please. I need more!��

“We are controlled here by our confusion, far more than we know, and the American dream has therefore become something much more closely resembling a nightmare, on the private, domestic, and international levels. Privately, we cannot stand our lives and dare not examine them; domestically, we take no responsibility for (and no pride in) what goes on in our country; and, internationally, for many millions of people, we are an unmitigated disaster.��

James Baldwin speaks a truth that may make one turn his or her back in denial. His words are uncomfortable in their clarity and authenticity. Others, while recognizing the veracity of his words, will want to crawl back into their cozy dens of innocence and ignore such naked truth. I often wonder why it is so difficult for others to recognize inhumanity and the pain of another. We watch movies, listen to music, read books and then cry about injustices. We go to church and lament over the treatment of our saints and saviors; we bow down and pray and claim to love everyone. But when we are faced with reality, somehow we convince ourselves that this is perhaps all just some sort of fiction that doesn’t really apply to us.

“Something very sinister happens to the people of a country when they begin to distrust their own reactions as deeply as they do here, and become as joyless as they have become. It is this individual uncertainty on the part of white American men and women, this inability to renew themselves at the fountain of their own lives, that makes the discussion, let alone elucidation, of any conundrum �� that is, any reality �� so supremely difficult.��

James Baldwin incites us to act. He does not breed hate or support lawlessness. He promotes awareness and self-evaluation. He urges for consciousness, brotherliness, and progress. He advocates love. His words may have been written decades ago but are timeless and vital to our healing as a nation and as human beings. One thing that struck me is that he turned down an appeal to join the Nation of Islam after a meeting with Elijah Muhammad and his followers. He recognized why and how such an organization developed and flourished, but he feared this: “�� the most dangerous creation of any society is that man who has nothing to lose. You do not need ten such men �� one will do.�� Rather, Baldwin’s vision was for each man and woman, black and white, to recognize that we need one another to create the greatest nation and to live our best lives right here in America.

I can’t seem to get enough of this brilliant man’s writing. His intensity, his humanity and his forgiving nature are something we so desperately need to see more of in our fellow citizens. Perhaps these past several months would not have felt quite so brutal otherwise.

“If one cannot risk oneself, then one is simply incapable of giving. And, after all, one can give freedom only by setting someone free.��