Birthing Purpose (Nia): Mary's Resilient Visionary Leadership
7 she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no guest room available for them. 8 And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. 9 An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. 10 But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. (Luke 2:7-10, NIV)
The gospel narrative introduces Mary of Nazareth as a young peasant girl suddenly faced with the astounding revelation that she will miraculously conceive the long-awaited Messiah. As womanist theologian Delores Williams articulates, “Mary has an awesome responsibility given to her by God” as special guardian of incarnate prophecy fulfilling Israel’s hopes (Sisters in the Wilderness, 29). Overshadowed by Divine encounter, this unwed teen must navigate threats from betrothed husband, skeptical clergy, hostile political powers and treacherous journeys to safeguard a unique purpose.
Mary’s faith-fueled determination models the Kwanzaa concept of Nia (NEE-ah), prompting collective realization of a righteous vision and unique communal calling against many obstacles. As African American women, we navigate complexity in pursuing purpose today. In this way, Mary’s resilience speaks to us.
What pregnant possibility stirs within our souls, awaiting nurture toward our own destinies? How do we steward our often tenacious vocations under the strain of external pressures, limited resources and fragile support structures? How can we deal with the many Herods who stand across from us in pulpits on Sunday mornings, or who refuse to hire us in religious scholarship – threatened by the gifts we have yet to birth?
Threatened Purpose, Threatened Promise
Among the seven Kwanzaa celebration principles, Nia represents the communal call toward shared mission and collective realization of transformational vision conquering difficulty. Mary, the mother of Jesus, models singular purpose persisting through overwhelming circumstance. Likewise, Nia suggests, we seek ancestral inspiration to create focus for our own purposes (Kwanzaa website).
After the visitation from the angel, Mary embraces courage to carry promise into being (Luke 1:28-38). The unanticipated pregnancy endangered her survival within a traditional communal context. She risked everything from social exile and abandonment by her betrothed, to stoning and death.
Persisting through Perplexity
The perplexity of this gift, is God’s incarnation through Jesus. For the incarnation is the “enfleshed” presence of God. Isn’t it peculiar to consider God taking on human flesh? It certainly would be peculiar to consider God defying the laws of nature to bring forth life through a virgin.
Not that long ago, it was also peculiar for women to proclaim God’s word. Mary Magdeline was strange in running to tell the disciples that Jesus had arisen (Jn. 20:18).
Jarena Lee (1783-1864) caused consternation when she insisted that God’s word was in her belly, becoming the first woman preacher in the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME) – against the wishes of her Bishop, Richard Allen.
Anna Julia Cooper (1858-1965) bore a peculiar gift of scholarship with a fire in her belly that prompted her to obtain her doctorate at the University of Paris-Sorbonne (1925) – which she wrote in French! She was the first Black woman to complete a doctorate at that university.
Today, Black women often stand as an endangered species – under constant threat of isolation, withdrawn support, and ultimate death. The possibility of death cannot be overstated with Black women in scholarship suffering tremendous health issues, and recent deaths that have shocked academic communities in the US and throughout the world. The preciousness of the gifts we carry are still under threat. Though there are shepherds and wise men who came to celebrate the birth of Jesus, there was also Herod who indicated that he wanted to worship the child, but his statement was deceitful. The wise men knew that he was being dishonest and, when returning home, went another way.
16 When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi (Matt 2:16, NIV).
Just like the New Testament Herod, we have "Herods" in our lives today. They continue to proclaim an acceptance of our gifts while seeking our destruction. We must continue to surround ourselves with people of integrity and wisdom who will protect us and our gifts from harm.
Leadership Emerging through Relationship
Rather than rage or retreat from misunderstanding, Mary stands grounded in relationship with Joseph. Many of us today, must continue to offer alternate visions to patriarchal structures until solidarity becomes a better option than separation.
Mary’s own emotional intelligence with bold envisioning creates room for her own purpose and mutual dialogue. By converting confusion into willing partnership, Mary’s purpose gains an ally rather than forfeit the future for failure to communicate beyond tradition.
So also must our callings, often at odds with the status quo, foster empathic persuasion to enlarge understanding when our pathways might otherwise diverge. Leadership is realized by awakening hunger for growth in reluctant companions. As Black women carry our callings, still questioned by prevailing culture, we transform our own experiences in the stables into a sacred space for God’s incarnate being.
Realizing Purpose Under Renewed Threat
Today, there are many, like Mary, who carry purpose under threat. Midnight marches through Ferguson streets declare #BlackLivesMatter while disrupting assumptions of disposable lives, and inaugurating a new civil rights era. Young climate activists in Indigenous communities blockade fossil fuel pipelines carrying poison through stolen lands. Fasting food workers sleep on corporate doorsteps singing protest hymns, awakening living wage movements.
Unlikely voices vocalize hope from the borderlands of brokenness. Death threats will not deter their delivery time. Nia stirs resilient purpose. The cosmic Christ still arrives through their daring, his vulnerable flesh passed fragile through a fearful world in need of radical incarnation.
Guarding New Life in Exile
Warned of Herod’s murderous political threat to the Divine promise embodied in her miraculous child, Matthew presents Mary as an asylum-seeking refugee fleeing to Egypt to safeguard purpose under great duress.
So also must mothers fleeing domestic abuse, or LGBTQ youth thrown from rejecting households, carry sustained care for emerging identity not yet mature to withstand crushing blows. Presumed ignorant, Black women and girls continue to fight against imposter syndrome in Ivy Halls where they work twice as hard for half the credit.
When doors slam in our faces, telling us there is no room for our gifts, how will we birth God’s promise on the margins? How do we transform the stables of rejection into a sacred space for God’s incarnate love birthed anew? How do we embody the enfleshed love, power and promise of God in our callings today?
Mary sings and magnifies God. Your magnification may look like the stubborn celebration of God by publishing your article after Reader 2 said you come from an inferior people. Your magnification of God may occur by stubbornly standing behind the sacred desk, Sunday after Sunday, knowing that the men continue to shun your presence in varied and subtle ways. (See "Men in the pulpit, women in the pew," Hendriks, et al, 2012)
And, if you have changed from the insecure woman who bangs on doors and begging to be let in, to one who creates splendor and magnificence where you are, then perhaps those options will no longer suffice.
Perhaps, instead, you may actually open up your mouth, lean your head back, and let out a squalor that would put any American Idol to shame.
I know I’ve been changed.
I know I’ve been changed.
I know I’ve been changed.
The angels in Heaven done .. signed my name!
Dr. CL Nash for the Misogynoir to Mishpat (M2M) Research Network © 2023
Resources
Hendriks, H. Jurgens, et al, "Men in the Pulpit, Women in the Pew," Sun Press, 2012
National Museum of African American History & Culture
Williams, Delores S. Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist God-Talk. 1993.