Kindness

“I Chose You Over Forever”

Dr. Celucien Joseph Joy, Kindness, Peace, Poetry

“I Chose You Over Forever”

I traded eternity for your presence.
Loving you became an act of rebellion,
rewriting every law I knew
costing me everything I had
bending the universe against me.

I carved two hearts into the sun
so the world would know our love exists.
I sailed a hundred thousand miles
through warring storms and thunder
just to find you,
just to bring you home.

I traveled backward through time,
changing myself to return
to the first steps we ever took together,
to know what you were thinking,
to relive our first kiss
exactly as it fell.

I think of nothing at all
so I can be free to think only of you.
I stayed perfectly still
to quiet the anxiety in your heart.
I tasted the sweetness of your soul
inside a dream,
just to be sure
you would be alright.

“Letters for the Hidden Face”

Dr. Celucien Joseph Amour, Joy, Kindness, Light, Love one another, Peace, Poetry

“Letters for the Hidden Face”

As a bee searches for nectar,
she trusts the flower that nourishes her.
As a parrot learns the language of humans,
she risks error,
the fragment of sound:
mispronunciation,
misunderstanding,
the ache of being heard imperfectly.

I search for you
in hidden places,
not because I do not desire safety,
but because love has taught me risk—
how to loosen my grip on comfort,
how to call surrender devotion,
how to rename control as connection.

I give myself away
in small poetic gestures,
sacred ways
to hold you once more,
to touch your face,
If only for a moment
you refuse to name.

Why do you keep hiding your face from me,
when you know this love,
though imperfect,
is honest,
and stands naked before your eyes,
asking only to be seen?

You choose secrecy.
I make my love known.
You choose silence.
I answer with poetry.
You love in whispers
and call it protection.
I write you love letters
and risk the world
knowing my name through yours.

You let this love burn inside me
without asking
how much it hurts—
how this passion unravels me,
how heavily it weighs,
how much of myself
it consumes.

Like a house set ablaze
from the entrance room,
like a burning bush
that devours my flesh.

It suffocates my breath,
drains my ability
to love anew,
to write the poems
that would keep you
living.

“Love’s Quiet Language”

Dr. Celucien Joseph Daily Devotion, Freedom, Kindness, Love one another, Peace, Poetry

“Love’s Quiet Language”

She watches him from a distance,
tracking his storylines, moment by moment.
She admires how deeply he feels,
loves with unrelenting passion,
shows his vulnerability.
She respects his courage,
his consistency.

He reaches out
through lyrics,
through poetic gestures,
trying to rekindle love.
Yet she avoids him,
refuses direct communication.

They are still connected,
emotionally entwined,
yet unwilling
to fully engage.

She wants to be seen.
He wants to be seen.
Both hold back,
protecting themselves.

They express their feelings,
without true vulnerability,
avoiding the risks of rejection
and the honesty that love requires.

But love cannot survive in hiding.
It cannot remain invisible.

We have one life to live.
Love asks to be named.

“Shadows and Names”

Dr. Celucien Joseph Human solidarity, Humanism, Identity Politics, Islam, Justice, Justice as Love, Kindness, Love one another, Peace, Poetry, Police brutality

“Shadows and Names”

When it’s not Jews, it’s Arabs.
If it’s not Muslims, it’s Mexicans.
When it’s not Mexicans, it’s Haitians.
If it’s not Haitians, it’s Somalis.
After Somalis, it will be a new shadow,
a new name,
a new narrative,
but the same fear.

Someone is always the other.
The “uncivilized” is always to blame.
Fear changes faces:
geography, location, cultural identity,
but never leaves the room.

When we see ourselves in them,
when empathy comes first,
until love triumphs over the face of evil,
when repentance breaks us,
until reconciliation rises over division,
until we recognize our humanity in others,
until we see the face of God in their experience and pain,
the next scapegoat waits.
The cycle of violence and dehumanization never ends.

Brief Thought 0n Steps toward Racial Unity and Reconciliation in Contemporary American Churches and society

Dr. Celucien Joseph American Evangelicalism, Black Lives Matter!, Evangelical Ethics, Human solidarity, Justice, Justice as Love, Kindness, Love one another, Uncategorized , , , , ,

Brief Thought on Steps toward Racial Unity and Reconciliation in Contemporary American Churches and society

A lot of people in the Church want to talk about racial unity and reconciliation in American (Evangelical) Churches, but they do not want to talk about the sins of racism and racial injustice and the historical causes leading to racial disunity and ethnic division in contemporary American churches and society.

How could American Churches and Christians be cured from the racial wound if they avoid the diagnosis and the painful history of race?

How could American Churches and Christians be healed from the great legacy of racial rift if they avoid discussing the historical pain and effects of racism?

Racial unity and reconciliation in contemporary American Churches and Evangelicalism is a critical and urgent project that requires a thorough investigation on how the historical causes and sins of racial injustice have pervaded every aspect of the Christian life and altered social dynamics and human relationships in the American society.

The Christian ministry of racial reconciliation and unity acknowledges how the practice of racism in our churches and society has contributed to human death, suffering, social alienation, dissociation, xenophobia, and the degradation of human dignity and the image of God in man and woman in our society and churches.

Genuine racial reconciliation ministry also looks at how race and racism in America and American churches have impacted the spheres of family, romance, economics, market, education, employment, leadership in society, leadership in the church, pastoral ministry, seminary education, residential zone, friendship, etc.

If contemporary American churches and Christians truly desire racial unity in their midst, they must embody and live the Gospel and should be ready to address these sensitive matters and the most challenging issues of our historical past. The Christian church in America will be healed from the poison of racism if American Christians are willing (1) to confront their own contribution to the problem of race and (2) to acknowledge the pain of the victims of racial oppression and violence, make reparations for historical wrongdoings, repent of their sins, and finally, genuinely seek and practice racial unity and reconciliation in their churches and in society.

 

A brief note on Nationality, Religion, and the Question of the Muslim Immigrant

Dr. Celucien Joseph Abrahamaic Religions, Human solidarity, Humanism, Islam, Kindness, Religion, Uncategorized ,
A brief note on Nationality, Religion, and the Question of the Muslim Immigrant
 
Abraham, the founding father of ancient Israel, was not a Jew by birth. He was an” immigrant,” a Chaldean from the land of Ur/Babylon (Modern Iraq). Abraham became a Jew and the fountainhead of the Abrahamaic faiths: Judaism, Islam, and Christianity. Jews, Christians, and Muslims claim him as both their spiritual and physical father.
 
Abraham, the immigrant from what is known today as the modern Iraq and the Hero of the Jews, Muslims, and Christians, just like the founding fathers of the United States of America were illegal aliens and undocumented workers. Yet, Abraham would become the greatest immigrant who has ever graced human history. He would also become the model of religious piety and faithfulness.
 
This message is for my Evangelical Christian brothers and sisters, those who call themselves children of Abraham and Abraham their father, and those who claim this country as their own–and no one else’s– should love all children of Abraham. The Muslims are also the seed of Abraham, and they are your brothers and sisters! Love them, care for them, and extend kindness and hospitality to them!

Dr. Joseph Talks about his new book on Soyinka’s “Radical Humanism and Generous Tolerance” (2016)

Dr. Celucien Joseph African Literature, African Traditional Religion, Comparative Religion, God, Humanism, Kindness, Non-Abrahamaic Religions, Religion and Violence, Uncategorized

Dr. Celucien L. Joseph, Assistant Professor of English at  Indian River State College‬, talks about his new book on the Nigerian public intellectual, social critic, and esteemed playright Wole Soyinka, Radical Humanism and Generous Tolerance: Soyinka on Religion and Human Solidarity (Hope Outreach Productions, 2016).

Happy Father’s Day! “Those Winter Sundays”

Dr. Celucien Joseph Father's Day, Fatherhood, Kindness, Meaning of Father

I would like to wish all the fathers a Good and Happy Father’s Day!

Fathers: please allow me to dedicate to you  “Those Winter Sundays” (1966), a poem by Robert Hayden (1913-1980).

Those Winter Sundays

Sundays too my father got up early
and put his clothes on in the blueblack cold,
then with cracked hands that ached
from labor in the weekday weather made
banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him.
I’d wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking.
When the rooms were warm, he’d call,
and slowly I would rise and dress,
fearing the chronic angers of that house,
Speaking indifferently to him,
who had driven out the cold
and polished my good shoes as well.
What did I know, what did I know
of love’s austere and lonely offices?
father
Fathers: Be the best dad, leader, and friend you can be!