Category Archives: Relationships

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Soul Mates: Jessie & Tangie Henry…

Hello World!

Yay! It’s still summer! 

About a year ago, I said on this blog I would feature different Christian couples who have been married 10 years or more so that they can share the secrets of their success. I actually don’t think we have enough positive examples of happy and whole marriages out there so I want to showcase them here on my blog…And so I am finally making good on my intention….Presenting the first installment of “Soul Mates…”( Note: This is simply an introduction to this couple not a public display of all their bizness…lol…)

Jessie Henry, 39, musician, social media strategist, blogger, no children

Tangie Henry, 38, registered nurse, certified life coach, no children

Anniversary: June 24, 1995—Married 15 years.

1. Please describe how the two of you met.

Jessie: We were at Ft. Stewart, and we were introduced by a mutual friend.

Tangie: (Shaking my head…LOL!)  Yes, we were at Ft. Stewart. (We both were in the Army stationed there; Ft. Stewart, GA) But we were not initially introduced by the friend he is speaking of.  We had another mutual friend that initially introduced us, but we never really interacted because he told me that he didn’t like “Army girls” and I had “another interest” as well.  Anyway, one night after I had gotten out of the Army, one of my friends(the mutual friend) and I were on post and we ran into Jessie.  She stopped him and asked him about his keyboard-playing skills at church (Jessie is an excellent piano, keyboard and organ player), and he said, “Prayer & practice.”  I was smitten!  I, then, began to see him in a whole new light! LOL!  I was thinking, “This brother has those kinds of skills and he acknowledged the Lord.”

After that night, I couldn’t get him out of my head, so several weeks later I went back on post to talk to him by myself…and the rest is history!  We were 21 and 22 years old at the time…WOW!

2. Were you Christians when you met?

Jessie: Yes.  My parents are pastors.  I grew up in the church, but I had to ultimately make the decision for myself.

Tangie:  Yes.  I’d given my life to the Lord about 2 years prior.  We had a few different beliefs, though, that we had to work through…

3. Share a happy time in your marriage.

Jessie: When we took a vacation to California.  I enjoyed the scenery and the activities.  Oh, and I enjoyed being with my baby, too.  LOL!

Tangie:  I would have to say a “happy time” in our marriage is now.  We have matured as individuals and as couples, and I’m enjoying the groove we’re in now.

4. Please share a difficult time & how you coped.

Jessie:  In the summer of 2001 we had been doing a lot of arguing, and neither one of us wanted to give in.  I was scheduled to go work out of town, and I left with us being on bad terms.  Things started to get better after September 11th.

Tangie: I agree about the time period, but I don’t feel like we really reconciled after September 11th.  As a matter of a fact, I was very hurt, angry and upset well into the following year.  The turning point for me was when Jessie began to show me that he wanted to stay in the marriage and that he was committed.  I also prayed a lot, and I really wanted to do the right thing from a Christian perspective because I know that God hates divorce.  I kept asking myself, “If I get a divorce, then am I saying that God can’t heal my marriage?”

5. What are the secrets of success to your marriage?

Jessie: I would say maturity and communication.  Advice:  People should have some type of pre-marital counseling before getting married.  Whatever little things that may be concerning you now, go ahead and get it out on the table so that it won’t show up again in the marriage.  People don’t get to drive a car without some type of training, and you shouldn’t get married without being trained either.

Tangie: I would say that we are committed to the marriage.  Having realistic expectations of your mate and marriage, in general, cuts down on half of the problems.  Oftentimes, we create a fantasy of what we think marriage is supposed to be like and when it doesn’t play out like it does in the movies, we want out.  But understanding that marriage is a covenant and knowing the significance of that puts things into perspective.  So then you’re more focused on the things that really matter and not worried about who didn’t put their dishes in the dishwasher. LOL!

Jessie and Tangie Henry work diligently in pursuing their purpose both collectively and individually.  He is the founder and president of Tangible Concepts, LLC a multi-media education and entertainment company whose mission is to educate, inspire and empower, featuring products and services of the highest standards.  Visit him online at www.TangibleConceptsLLC.com. Tangie is the founder and president of InspiredSistah, LLC a company dedicated to “inspiring women to live on top of the world” through personal development coaching, inspirational workshops and inspirational literature.  You can visit her online at www.InspiredSistah.com or www.MarriageAintforWimps.com.

Any thoughts? (If you know of any married couples that need to be featured in “Soul Mates,” please comment and let me know.)

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So is the black church keeping black women single and lonely?

Hello World!!!

Happy Hump Day! Now that I have offered that nicety, let me get into the not-so-nice business at hand of the day…

I have been trying to ignore this topic for weeks (Black women and our dating and mating woes seem to be the topic du jour of 2010, huh?) , but Facebook friends and other friends have e-mailed this article to me one time too many, and now, I feel compelled to respond…

Dating expert, Deborrah Cooper, through her Web Site, Surviving Dating, has written an article that has the blogosphere buzzing…

The Black Church: How Black Churches Keep African American Women Single and Lonely…

Tadow…she’s really trying to hit us in the kisser huh?! If you criticize the black church, you may just be taking on an army of Christian soldiers anyone would be hard pressed to beat…

But she does make some interesting points…I won’t rehash it all here but below are a  few excerpts from her controversial article…

An examination of any congregation of the average Black church shows that single Black females fill the pews. Results of a recent study “African Americans and Religion”by the PEW Research Center’s Forum on Religion and Public Life found that “African Americans are markedly more religious on a variety of measures than the U.S. population as a whole.”

The PEW study also reported that “Men are significantly more likely than women to claim no religious affiliation. Nearly one-in-five men say they have no formal religious affiliation, compared with roughly 13% of women.”

Single Black women trying to live a sanctified lifestyle won’t be caught dead in the places where men are likely to be found. These church women refuse to go to parties, sports bars or sporting events, or clubs where there is drinking, card playing, domino throwing, s*$t talking and cussing – you know, the things that most men who enjoy life like to do. Instead these single Black women sit at home alone, or get together with their friends and read the Bible, then pray that God will bring them a husband.

Some women will argue that there are lots of “nice” single men in church and that I am being harsh. Okay, I’ve been to dozens of churches around the country and looked hard at those guys. Without a doubt I can tell you flatly that the vast majority (I’m saying 98%) of them fit into one of four categories:

  1. A loser working a 12-step program. These guys are in church looking for structure and something to believe in besides themselves, because they are weak and confused. They need help getting their lives back on track and are seeking solace and comfort in church. If they can hook up with a woman looking desperately for a church-going man of any ilk, they’ve got it made.
  2. Openly or in the closet gay men, neither of which is interested in marrying. Some gay men are wrestling with severe guilt and confusion about their desires, which they hope to pray away. Others are openly gay and attend church seeking acceptance from a community which turns its nose up at homosexuality; they are also seeking forgiveness for their sins. Whatever may be this guy’s issue, he is emotionally and psychologically unavailable.
  3. Opportunistic players on the prowl. Every player I know goes to a couple of different churches… some of them go quite regularly. They have easy pickings amongst the hundreds of horny, lonely single women that will cook and give them free meals and satisfy his sexual urges (though these players have no intention of marrying and committing to anyone). Since sex amongst unmarried singles is a sin, it is easy for him to gain the assurance of the women that they keep things secret and not speak of their “transgression” lest they feel the wrath of the Pastor. This secrecy makes it easy for him to hide the fact that he is bed hopping with four or five single ladies, right under their respective noses.
  4. Elderly reformed players. These guys have played themselves so hard and so long, they’re worn out. Their old butts finally realized that the end may be near and playtime is over. Worried about dying alone, they bring their behinds back to church to find a “good Christian woman” for marriage. Essentially they are looking for a free nursemaid and bed warmer… someone to provide comfort and take care of their old broken down a$$@s before they die.

In spite of these facts, Black women go to church week after week, hearing over and over again the message that they should be seeking “a God-fearing man.” Sistahs in church are instructed by their Pastor that there should be no room in their lives for a man without faith in The Lord.

But with so few Black men attending church, and those that are in church being largely unsuitable as marital partners, what is it that single Black women are looking for in church?

Why do Black women run to church in droves and willingly put themselves in the position to be dictated to, harshly judged and instructed like a child on how to live their lives by some man that is not their father and to whom they are not married?

Cooper also includes a YouTube video from a pastor that she believes is contributing to this issue…

Hmmm….I get what this pastor says, but I cannot agree with his premise of being hidden…The very notion of hiding suggests that one does not want to be found…This pastor seems to be saying that unless you are at church or at home or doing something obviously religious, you are setting up yourself for failure in the dating game…

But on the other hand, I don’t think a woman should chase men either…I think there is a happy medium that can be achieved…What is wrong with dating Web sites like eHarmony or going out with your girlfriends to dance at a club? God has been known to work in mysterious ways and you may meet that man through the Internet or on Friday night instead of a Sunday morning…

But I submit this whole notion of being hidden is a fallacy being promoted throughout the church in general – not the white church, not the black church, not the Asian church, not the Hispanic church, etc…

In the book “How to Get a Date Worth Keeping,” Dr. Henry Cloud, a white Christian psychologist, describes a similar scenario in which a woman, Lillie,  was waiting on God to bring her a man. When he asked her how it was going, Lillie confessed to him she had not been on a date in TWO years.  He felt compelled to help her at that point…

“Her lack of dates had to be a combination of her sitting back and waiting for the man of her dreams to come and find her and some personal dynamics interfering with her desire to be married. I could think of no other reason someone who actually wanted to have a man in her life would be that stuck.”

Within several months of counseling, the woman in Dr. Cloud’s book was in a significant relationship and eventually, some months later, she got married….And Lillie met her Christian husband through a dating website.

Below is another excerpt from Dr. Cloud’s book.

“Many people have been taught to view dating similarly to the way Lillie did: ‘God will bring the person to you. Just wait.’ And they think this approach is spiritual. But in reality, it negates the dual track of the Bible that teaches God will guide the way, but we have to actively walk in that way and fight the battles.”

Now on to Cooper’s belief that if one does meet a black man in church, he falls into one of the categories above…

Again, it’s not just black women that seem to be frustrated with men in church, white  Christian author and actress Susan E. Isaacs, describes her hilarious dating life in her book,  “Angry Conversations With God: A Snarky But Authentic Spiritual Memoir.”

“I also spent time with loads of Christian men who were funny, emotionally present, and not threatened by my intelligence. Men like Mark who were gay or trying not to be. The rest of the single men at my church were perpetually on the healing conference tour. And who has time to date when you’re at the healing conferences, getting healed? (Or taking notes about getting healed?)”

Hilarious huh? Yes, a good man is hard to find in church —and sometimes the church promotes ideologies that keep men of all races outstide of the church….

— but the real truth of the matter is a good man is hard to find anywhere…just ask your girl that is not a Christian…

Any thoughts?

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Color Him Father, Color Him Love

an old school passport photo of my dad...

an old school passport photo of my dad...

Hello World!!!  (Note: I originally posted this last year, but since I love this post, I thought it would be okay to post again. Happy Father’s Day! )

Happy Father’s Day to all of the fathers out there!!!  In my Mother’s Day post, I mentioned that my mother is the heart of my family, but I am unquestionably a daddy’s girl!  I can think of all sorts of sweet childhood memories of my dad. First of all, my daddy is the ultimate Renaissance man. When my brother and I were young children, he would take us for long walks in the woods. We would feel the bark of the trees,  gaze into the sky and listen to the sounds of what we hoped were far away animals. Sometimes, he would walk ahead of us and we would hear him pronouncing different words over and over again. Diction is very important to my scholarly daddy.

On Saturday mornings, back in the day, I swayed to the old school reggae music my father played as he washed his car. Later in the day, he would wash my huge afro before sending me to my mother for her to plait it. Sometimes, we would go to arts festivals at Piedmont Park. At night, my father read Disney books to us before we went to sleep. I credit my father for awakening my desire to be a writer. I remember when my mother was pregnant with my youngest brother David, she had to go into the hospital for several months. She got pregnant with him when she was 40 years old so it was considered a high risk pregnancy. At any rate, the summer before my brother was born in October, my daddy was responsible for making  lunch for my brother Delvall and me.  Thankfully, the women at the church made our dinners. (My father has been the pastor at Central Christian Church for nearly 30 years – since I was six years old.) Anyway, my father, who can’t cook, boiled hot dogs and toasted buns almost every day for our lunch during that summer. I couldn’t even look at a hot dog without feeling sick for years after that summer…

My father has never been afraid to show his faith in public which was the source of utter embarassment to my brothers and me.  Whenever we would go out to restaurants to eat, the three of us would start to cringe as he asked us to bow our heads to pray. And then my father’s deep voice made more obtrusive by his Jamaican accent made us want to hide under the table. I used to get into a lot of fights with the neighborhood kids when I was a little girl. I think they used to pick on me because I went to a private school instead of the elementary school in the neighborhood. I think it was named Kathleen Mitchell Elementary School…Anyway, I may have been small but I had a mighty mouth, and I “wrote checks with my mouth that my actions couldn’t cash.” When my father got wind of these fights, he would sit down with the two of us on the front porch and talk to us about being peacemakers. I used to wish that my father would be the like the other fathers in the neighborhood who encouraged my friends to fight those who picked on them. But now I know it takes much more control to be a peacemaker than it does to lash out verbally and physically…still working on that lesson daddy…

I remember when my first high school boyfriend and I broke up. My father, who has always worked from home, heard me wailing in my bathroom and asked me what was wrong. With my red face and swollen eyes, I tearfully explained how Imani and I broke up before homeroom that morning. My father looked in my eyes and said, “Well, this kind of thing happens in life, and it won’t be the last time.” Those words weren’t exactly comforting words, but I recognized he was trying to comfort me. In hindsight, he was probably a bit surprised that I was finally old enough to be wailing over a boy.

I was on the drill team in high school. Being on the drill team was one of the ways I got out of the house on weekend nights because I wasn’t allowed to go to parties and dances until I went to college. (I was allowed to go the prom though.) One year, I really wanted to go to my school’s homecoming dance in the gym. I asked my father to go, but I was not surprised when his answer was simply,”No.” So I got to scheming. When we had away games, we often didn’t get back to the school grounds until midnight or after. So I lied and told my parents that we had an away game (although it was homecoming) and that he shouldn’t pick me up until at least midnight. I figured that would give me some time to enjoy the dance plus I never invited my parents to come to the games because I knew they would not appreciate some of the provocative dances that the drill team performed.

My dad and my nephew DeAnthony probably crying about not getting his way...

So I thought I had the perfect plan in place as I sat on the bleachers in the gym talking to my one of my high school hearthrobs, Brian. I swooned over him as he talked and enjoyed watching people dance. The gym was so dark it was hard to make out everyone until without warning, a door to the gym opened and light flooded in. Looking like Al Bundy from the hilarious but now defunct sitcom,” Married… with Children,” there stood my father in the middle of the light. You are not going to believe this. All the way from the bleachers, I could see that my father was wearing pajamas covered by his trench coat.  I felt like a deer cornered in the headlights. I could not move as my father looked around for a few minutes before getting to me.

Right in front of Brian, my father finally came up to me and said we had to leave. He escorted me out of the gym and to his car. To this day, I don’t know how my father figured out I was at the homecoming dance instead of the game. I don’t know what happened at school in the weeks afterward. I think I blocked it out of my memory I was so embarassed.

My father celebrating his 65th birthday...whew Dad, you gettin' old!

I have a vault of memories I could share, but I won’t. Consider yourselves lucky if you have a father that is in your life because I have learned that many of us did not grow up with fathers including my own father. He often shares that he met his father once in his life after he was already a grown man. I feel sad when I think of my father not having a father like the father that he has been to me. My father, who is by no means perfect, has enabled me to feel secure and cherished and I love him dearly for that…

Any thoughts?

There are countless songs about mothers but not as many, it seems, about fathers, but I have included two here. “Color Him Father” by The Winstons is about a stepfather’s love and the other song, “Daddy,” by Beyonce’ is about being a daddy’s girl…enjoy!