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Inspiration Blog (Page 5)

Upping my game to confront racism

 By Annie Turner   There are so many ways I need to up my game. I hope to explore a few of them including: exercise, gardening, cooking, but the most important is digging out the deep well of racism I am confronting in my 74th year.  It doesn’t matter that I dated a Man of Color while at college. It does not…

White People, I’m Talking To You

The Rev. Dr. Andrea Ayvazian, associate pastor at Alden Baptist Church in Springfield, and former pastor of Haydenville Congregational Church, was a speaker at a Black Lives Matter rally in East Longmeadow on June 7. Here is her speech. Thank you Angela Thorpe, my sister at the Alden Baptist Church, for extending the invitation for me to speak at today’s gathering. You…

No Justice, No Peace

Kenneth L. Samuel “Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.” – Matthew 10:34 (NIV) The lethal asphyxiation of George Floyd by police in Minneapolis, is just the latest in a series of black fatalities brought about by overzealous policing, racial profiling, and white vigilantism. When peaceful protests…

God’s love is visible every day in this pandemic

By Rev. Dr. Andrea Ayvazian God is not angry. That is my professional opinion as a member of the clergy. We are living through a frightening, uncertain, sorrow-filled time so having bad theology circulating wildly on the internet — and that seems to be what is happening — only adds a further burden to our already heavy load emotionally and spiritually. Several…