MEMPHIS YOUTH AMBASSADORS PROGRAM

Memphis Youth Ambassadors Program Application

The 2012 Application Process for the Memphis Ambassadors Program will begin on Monday, February 13. This is a year-round enrichment program that targets area youth, grades 10 - 12. http://www.cityofmemphis.org/framework.aspx?page=1083 to learn more.Preparing the Youth of Memphis
for a Prosperous Tomorrow

City of Memphis Youth Ambassadors Program is a year-round enrichment program that targets area youth in grades 10, 11 and 12. MAP operates in nine sites covering the seven Memphis City Council Districts. Each site will be supported by a community cluster. Each cluster will include: Faith-based institutions, businesses, schools, neighborhood organizations, non-profits, government agencies, parents and volunteers. MAP participants are paid a quarterly stipend based on participation and attendance. For FAQs, click here.

CORE VALUES
Education
Health
Civic & Social Responsibility
Employability

Objectives
Youth Leadership Development
Post Secondary Preparation
Community Partnerships & Collaborations
Cultural Enrichment
Green Initiatives
Life Skills Training
Career Exploration
Financial Literacy
Parental Involvement
Fellowships

Selection Process
Applicants must complete an online application (Feb 13th - March 16th, 2012)
Learn How To Register And Apply Here: http://www.cityofmemphis.org/framework.aspx?page=1292

Using a random computer-based lottery process, applicants were selected by City Council Districts, and given a rank on March 22, 2012.


The highest ranking applicants per City Council District will be invited to an interview. At which time, he or she (along with a parent) will provide proof of Memphis residency, sign a program commitment letter and other applicable paperwork. Interviews will occur during the month of April.
See Frequently Asked Questions
MAP Locations: Community Centers
District 1 Raleigh
District 2 Hickory Hill
District 3 Whitehaven
District 4 Glenview
District 5 Gaisman
District 6 Westwood
District 7 Bickford
At Large Site Gaston

ANNOUNCEMENTS FOR THE WEEK OF FEBRUARY 12-18

THIS WEEK'S ANNOUNCEMENTS FOR FEBRUARY 12 - 18, 2012

**Announcements must be submitted to Min. Bernestine Sanders no later than Wednesday evening at 10:00 pm @ bernsanders@att.net or 730-0155.


Please contact the church office to select dates for any ministry activity. YOU MUST BE ON THE CALENDAR TO HAVE AN EVENT. Please schedule your event during the times in which the building is open.

If you are in need of a van ride to church on Sunday mornings, please call CaSandra Bradshaw at 859-5922 by Thursday night at 9:00 pm.

The Young Masters are looking for a few good adults who are interested in seeing young people succeed to join the BPC "BOOSTERS & PARENTS CLUB" The BPC will be committed to providing support to the Young Masters as well as all young people within their reach. Please call Rev. Glenn Carter-Ministry Leader 272-7337 or Alonzo Gwynn & Alphonzo Gwynn-Coaches. The Young Masters is a ministry designed to teach young people about the word of God through basketball and caring. Sports and athletics teach kids about the discipline and control needed in everyday life as well as when they are in friendly competition.

Election 2012 is approaching quickly. TN law now requires you to have State/Federal issued ID in order to cast your vote. If you don't have ID, please begin the process now... If you have any questions, please see First Lady Lisa Jones Johnson.

The Klondike Smokey City CDC receives job posting on a regular basis. These job listings will be posted on the Bulletin Board in the Fellowship Hall. For more information, please contact Quincey Morris at the Klondike Smokey City Resource Center, 901-527-9491.

The new job listings are posted on the Bulletin Board in the Fellowship Hall.

On February 18th, Whitney Houston Repast @ 5:00 p.m. This will be a potluck event. Please come out and celebrate this legendary singer's HOMEGOING!!!!

On Sunday, February 19th @ 11:00am our church has been invited to Liberation Community Church for a Black History Worship Service. Pastor will preach & the choir will sing.

On Sunday, February 26th @ 10:30 a.m. Black History Program

Rehearsal for Easter, Saturday, March 3 promptly @ 12 noon (1st Saturday in March)

Get Ready for SUGAH Retreat, July 14th Registration begins @ 9:30am Rev. Dr. Rosalyn Nichols, will be our Unity Speakers- "Sisters Gone Wild, Seeking Wisdom"

Kirk Franklin Exposed on Video: The Black Church's Failure to Protect Their Youth

Please read this blog and check out the video and tell us what you think!!!

Read the article and see the video here:

Celebrating Black History Month – Black Medical/Scientific Achievements!

1500 BC-1721 AD: Egyptians used poppy as a source of opium to make morphine to relieve pain; honey was used to treat wounds; Ethiopians began removing tonsils and in 1721, Onesimus, a slave in Massachusetts, provided Americans with the antidote for smallpox.

Onesimus (fl. 1706 – 1717), slave and medical pioneer, was born in the late seventeenth century, probably in Africa, although the precise date and place of his birth are unknown. He first appears in the historical record in the diary of Cotton Mather, a prominent New England theologian and minister of Boston’s Old North Church. Reverend Mather notes in a diary entry for 13 December 1706 that members of his congregation purchased for him “a very likely Slave; a young Man who is a Negro of a promising aspect of temper” (Mather, vol. 1, 579). Mather named him Onesimus, after a biblical slave who escaped from his master, an early Christian named Philemon.

This Onesimus fled from his home in Colossae (in present-day Turkey) to the apostle Paul, who was imprisoned in nearby Ephesus. Paul converted Onesimus to Christianity and sent him back to Philemon with a letter, which appears in the New Testament as Paul’s Epistle to Philemon. In that letter Paul asks Philemon to accept Onesimus “not now as a servant, but above a servant, a brother beloved” (Philemon 1.16 [AV]). Mather similarly hoped to make his new slave “a Servant of Christ,” and in a tract, The Negro Christianized (1706), encouraged other slave-owners to do likewise, believing that Christianity “wonderfully Dulcifies, and Mollifies, and moderates the Circumstances” of bondage (Silverman, 264).

Onesimus was one of about a thousand persons of African descent living in the Massachusetts colony in the early 1700s, one-third of them in Boston. Many were indentured servants with rights comparable to those of white servants, though an increasing number of blacks–and blacks only–were classified as chattel and bound as slaves for life. Moreover, after 1700, white fears of burglary and insurrection by blacks and Indians prompted the Massachusetts assembly to impose tighter restrictions on the movements of people of color, whether slave, servant, or free. Cotton Mather was similarly concerned in 1711 about keeping a “strict Eye” on Onesimus, “especially with regard unto his Company,” and he also hoped that his slave would repent for “some Actions of a thievish aspect” (Mather, vol. 2, 139). Mather believed, moreover, that he could improve Onesimus’s behavior by employing the “Principles of Reason, agreeably offered unto him” and by teaching him to read, write, and learn the Christian catechism. (Mather, vol. 2, 222).

Read more here

Is Eddie Long’s Church Actually a Cult?

After the crowning of Bishop Eddie Long that took place at the New Birth Missionary Baptist Church, some are asking if Long’s church is better defined as a cult. To help answer this question, Dr. Boyce Watkins speaks with Rev. Mika Edmondson, an expert in Systematic Theology. The video is below and will begin after a brief commercial.

View video here

THIS WEEK'S ANNOUNCEMENTS FOR FEBRUARY 5-12, 2012

**Announcements must be submitted to Min. Bernestine Sanders no later than Wednesday evening at 10:00 pm @ bernsanders@att.net or 730-0155.


Please contact the church office to select dates for any ministry activity. YOU MUST BE ON THE CALENDAR TO HAVE AN EVENT. Please schedule your event during the times in which the building is open.

If you are in need of a van ride to church on Sunday mornings, please call CaSandra Bradshaw at 859-5922 by Thursday night at 9:00 pm.

The Young Masters are looking for a few good adults who are interested in seeing young people succeed to join the BPC "BOOSTERS & PARENTS CLUB" The BPC will be committed to providing support to the Young Masters as well as all young people within their reach. Please call Rev. Glenn Carter-Ministry Leader 272-7337 or Alonzo Gwynn & Alphonzo Gwynn-Coaches. The Young Masters is a ministry designed to teach young people about the word of God through basketball and caring. Sports and athletics teach kids about the discipline and control needed in everyday life as well as when they are in friendly competition.

Election 2012 is approaching quickly. TN law now requires you to have State/Federal issued ID in order to cast your vote. If you don't have ID, please begin the process now... If you have any questions, please see First Lady Lisa Jones Johnson.

The Klondike Smokey City CDC receives job posting on a regular basis. These job listings will be posted on the Bulletin Board in the Fellowship Hall. For more information, please contact Quincey Morris at the Klondike Smokey City Resource Center, 901-527-9491.

Meet the Candidates Forum: Monday, February 6, 2012....You are cordially invited to meet the candidates in the 2012 Shelby County Primary Election 5:45 pm- 7:45 pm @ Benjamin L. Hooks Central Library, 3030 Poplar Avenue (Meeting Room C). This is free and open to the public; email candidate questions to: electionquestions@live.com or call 901-396-6300.

MONISA SWEETS-- VALENTINE'S DAY SALE......Chocolate covered strawberries ($20.00 per dz.), chocolate covered strawberries w/champagne ($25.00 per dz.), chocolate roses ($8.00 per rose or $30.00 per dz.), cupcakes (strawberry, vanilla, chocolate, red velvet- $10.00 per dz.), heart cake w/wo chocolate strawberries- $ 40.00. Email/call all orders to 770-990-2118/Tanya Harris (MonisaSweets@yahoo.com). All orders must be paid by February 10, 2012.

On February 12th at 3pm, our own Bessie Christian will preach her first sermon.

On Sunday, February 19th @ 11:00am our church has been invited to Liberation Community Church for a Black History Worship Service. Pastor will preach & the choir will sing.

Why Even Go to Church?

By Richard Flory

Yesterday, Jeremy Rhodes wrote about a new survey from Barna Group that shows that almost 50% of regularly attending American churchgoers say that their lives haven’t changed in any way as a result of their churchgoing habits. In the interest of full disclosure, David Kinnaman, President of Barna, is a former student of mine, and while I am proud of what he has done (and he’s taking Barna in good, new directions), I can’t take any credit for his success. Now back to the issue: church attendance doesn’t do much for half of those who go to church regularly. Without challenging Jeremy’s perspective—which I don’t disagree with at all other than I have absolutely no love for anything Disney—here is perhaps another way to think about the survey and what it might mean for churchgoing Americans.

Now, if I’m a pastor and I read the results of this survey (which I’m not, although I did grow up a pastor’s kid, a fact that probably goes a long way toward explaining why I’m a sociologist interested in religion), I’m thinking that these results suggest that about one-half of my congregation either doesn’t listen to the sermons, or maybe doesn’t understand the key points, or worse, that they find what I have to say completely irrelevant to their lives. Indeed, fully 60% said that they could not recall an important new religious insight from the last time they attended church, and 50% couldn’t remember any insight from the previous week’s service. That has to hurt the pastoral ego.

At the same time (and obviously), about one-half of church attenders do find that their lives have changed in some way as a result of church attendance and involvement. Even better, two-thirds of respondents said that they felt a “real and personal connection” to God while attending church. The pastoral ego is reinflating…barely.


Read more here

Black History Month: Debunking the 10 biggest myths about black history

By David A. Love


February is here, which means that it's Black History Month. Black history is an integral part of U.S. history, with African Americans making important contributions to the lifeblood of this country in all fields of endeavor. But there are many misconceptions and mischaracterizations when it comes to the public's general understanding of black history. They say that the truth will make you free. Well, here at theGrio, we thought we'd kick off February the right way by debunking the 10 biggest myths about black history.

1. The Civil War was not fought over slavery:

If you want to know whether the Civil War was fought over slavery, just read the words of Alexander Stephens, vice president of the Confederate States of America in 1861:

The prevailing ideas entertained by...most of the leading statesmen at the time of the formation of the old constitution, were that the enslavement of the African was in violation of the laws of nature; that it was wrong in principle, socially, morally, and politically.... Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races. This was an error...Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner-stone rests upon the great truth, that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery -- subordination to the superior race -- is his natural and normal condition.
Most historians agree that slavery was one of the primary issues leading to the Civil War. South Carolina seceded from the Union because of the clash between slave states and free states over the expansion of slavery. The Republican Party, then a new political party, made the fight against slavery in U.S. territories a key issue.

Historical revisionists have tried to whitewash history and improve the image of the Old South by eliminating slavery from the mix. And groups such as the Sons of Confederate Veterans insist the war was fought over self-governance and states' rights. The war was about states' rights, the right of Southern states to own black people.

Read more here

Controversy Over Jay-Z's 'Glory'; Black Fathers Will Stick Around?

Controversy about Jay-Z’s “Glory”; black fathers will stick around after hearing the famous rap mogul dedicate his love to daughter claims a columnist.

Joanna Molloy wrote a piece in The New York Daily News, suggesting how Jay-Z’s lyrics may inspire a new generation of African-American Fathers to “stick around.” While this generalization is coming under scrutiny by those who have “stuck around,” is the columnist wrong?

According to the Daily Mail, Ms. Malloy stated that “Jay-Z’s joy could encourage a whole generation.” Encouraging a whole generation is a “good” thing – not offensive.

This is true, but was the generalization of black fathers offensive? Centers of Disease Control and Prevention, 72 percent of black babies were born to unwed mothers in 2010.

Read more here

Black Churches: Are They Addressing Our Concerns?

By Bene Viera

Church used to be the cornerstone of all activity, what is it now?

In the past decade the black church’s image has been one of mega churches with its Bentley driving pastors. In addition to saving the souls of thousands, pastors branched out to embark on other endeavors outside of the church such as books, production companies, movies and columns in popular Black magazines. The visibility of the Pastor’s brand took precedence over the actual work being done by the church. But prior to the uber successful publicized mega churches, the black church has always been the cornerstone of the black community.

With the dire ills plaguing the black community—mass incarceration, institutionalized racism, HIV/AIDS infection rates, unemployment, health disparities, failing education systems—it’s hard not to wonder if the black church has abandoned the Social Gospel that was once the backbone of the Civil Rights Movement. In the early 20th century the Social Gospel was popular throughout Protestant Christian churches where social issues were addressed with Christian principles. Due to the lack of resources and institutions blacks had in the 50s and 60s, the black church, in many ways, served as the hub for organizing and vocalizing the social, political and economic desires of blacks in their efforts to gain equality.

Read more here

Black History Extends Beyond February

By Keona Gabbadon


Gabbadon points out that many of the contributions of African-Americans are left out of American history.

Black History Month is the shortest month of the year. During this month, grade schools all accross America teach about Rosa Parks, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Harriet Tubman. Schools usually base their curriculum on the same historic episodes: Rosa Parks’ refusal to move seats on a bus, Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “I Have A Dream,” speech and Harriet Tubman’s work with the Underground Railroad.

While social studies is a main subject during the entire school year, there aren’t any mentions of African-American contributors, except for this one month. Social studies textbooks do not tell you about all the great things blacks did throughout history and without the work of African ancestors, America would not be what we know today.

In an interview with CNN, Michael Eric Dyson, a professor at Georgetown University said, “If we’re talking about American history and being – shying away from the history of oppression, we’re not talking about American history.”

Read more here