Do you ever ponder the societal and cultural impacts of sex and sexuality? In this week's episode Rauel and Antowan tumble down that rabbit-hole together. They confront various beliefs and perceptions, specifically addressing the misconception of promiscuity within the African American community. In the process, we unravel the intertwined threads of primal instincts, societal assumptions, and personal responsibility regarding sex, even drawing parallels with a biblical tale of a temple brothel.
As we delve deeper, we explore the intricate relationship of sexuality with religion and the challenges posed by our lustful temptations. We reflect on the consequences of a disrupted family structure and how it fosters a lack of understanding and education. Turning our lens towards the church's role in society, we find a scenario worth contemplating; has it become a networking platform instead of a space for worship? While we delve into sensitive subjects like generational rape, we emphasize the importance of teaching the truth about Jesus and the potential it holds to bring about change.
Lastly, we discuss profound issues like poverty, inequality, and the need for compassion. We highlight the story of a single mother and the many hurdles she faces, underscoring that with the right resources, education, and much-needed compassion, the cycle of poverty and despair can be broken. Remember, these discussions are not about passing judgment but understanding the complexities of life. Join us on this journey of exploration and find a fresh perspective on these pressing issues.
Thanks for listening. Please check out our website at www.forsauk.com to hear great conversations on topics that need to be talked about. In these times of intense polarization we all need to find time to expand our Frame of Reference.
Do you ever ponder the societal and cultural impacts of sex and sexuality? In this week's episode Rauel and Antowan tumble down that rabbit-hole together. They confront various beliefs and perceptions, specifically addressing the misconception of promiscuity within the African American community. In the process, we unravel the intertwined threads of primal instincts, societal assumptions, and personal responsibility regarding sex, even drawing parallels with a biblical tale of a temple brothel.
As we delve deeper, we explore the intricate relationship of sexuality with religion and the challenges posed by our lustful temptations. We reflect on the consequences of a disrupted family structure and how it fosters a lack of understanding and education. Turning our lens towards the church's role in society, we find a scenario worth contemplating; has it become a networking platform instead of a space for worship? While we delve into sensitive subjects like generational rape, we emphasize the importance of teaching the truth about Jesus and the potential it holds to bring about change.
Lastly, we discuss profound issues like poverty, inequality, and the need for compassion. We highlight the story of a single mother and the many hurdles she faces, underscoring that with the right resources, education, and much-needed compassion, the cycle of poverty and despair can be broken. Remember, these discussions are not about passing judgment but understanding the complexities of life. Join us on this journey of exploration and find a fresh perspective on these pressing issues.
Thanks for listening. Please check out our website at www.forsauk.com to hear great conversations on topics that need to be talked about. In these times of intense polarization we all need to find time to expand our Frame of Reference.
Let's have it.
Speaker 2:So good morning, good evening, good afternoon. Wherever you are listening to Frama reference coming together, it's me, raul Lebrouche. And who are you against, sir? I, I. Why can't I remember your name?
Speaker 1:Antoine Hallman senior.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, that's right, that's fine, that is your name. I'm glad you remember your name. I just I can, you know, help me, antoine, I cannot figure out a way to segue from I'm Raul Lebrouche. Maybe we just I'd say, if I say Raul Lebrouche, you just right away say I'm Anton and I'm Antoine Hallman. Or if you say I'm Anton, I just remember saying I'm Raul Lebrouche. Would that work?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it'll fit, we'll figure it out, man. Okay yeah, just nice to be up, man.
Speaker 2:We're still new at this. I mean what we've been doing this for almost what? Four or five months or something like that.
Speaker 1:I think yes, I got probably like a fifth, sixteenth episode or something like that yeah.
Speaker 2:Something, something around there, which is, I mean that means we've got 16 hours or so, maybe more, involved in talking with each other, and the good news is we are still talking to each other. I think you know we haven't said, oh man, what the hell does he think he's talking about? Or whatever happens with most people. I can't think of many people I could have a 16 hour conversation with, Can you?
Speaker 1:So no, no, my wife, you know.
Speaker 2:But yeah, but those are sometimes you have to have them, right, I guess we have to have those used to. But so we were talking beforehand, we were actually going to, we kind of wanted to hit on the Black Lives Matter some more, but I mean we need to hit on that as well as everything else we've talked to up until this point. But we started talking about the big S yes, the big S, and I don't mean safety, I don't mean socialism, I'm not talking about any other S than sex and the impact that sex has on our world today, and I think there's a different perspective of sex. I can start out from things that I've heard, things that I know are believed by people from my side of the racial spectrum or skin color, let's say skin color spectrum. Okay, that sex in the African American community is much more promiscuous than it is in the white community. That you know, the, that you know.
Speaker 2:Black people have kids, you know, because it gives them more of a financial advantage, because they can collect more AFDC or whatever they're calling welfare for for families. These days it seems like that program changes regularly. Anyways, that that, to me, fundamentally, is disrespectful, because it doesn't equate the humanity of the situation to the reality of the situation. Are there people that collect more? Is it possible to collect more aid for the community, aid for family dependent children If they have more kids? Of course it is. Each of those kids is worth a certain amount of money and the government recognizes that it costs money to raise them. But the quote unquote. You know, welfare queen or whatever, you know people want to categorize that that that is not by any means the majority. That's a small, you know. Look at the statistics. Don't. Don't just believe that. You know that's a thing that gets you pissed off. So you're going to spread it around. The statistics do not support that as being the reason. Black people, or people of color in general, have a lot of babies. It's more about. You know what you were talking about earlier. You know our view towards sexuality, our view towards our primal. You know it is.
Speaker 2:I mean, the little known secret in the biblical community is, back in Old Testament days there was a temple brothel. There was a temple prostitute that was available outside of the places of worship. So now, whether that was every community, the Bible doesn't say, but it's one of the reasons that one of the central characters now let you read it and figure it out. You know that he was convicted of the fact that he was responsible for a woman that had been married to one of his sons and was no longer alive and she very much, and very rightfully so, tried to convince him that he needed to take responsibility for her. You know, she didn't have any other means of supporting herself. So she asked for him to please take care of her, and he didn't want anything to do with that. So she convinced her, you know, got an idea that she would pose as a temple prostitute and in the process of that she collected, I believe, a ring and one other piece of his personal possessions that somehow she was able to get away from it.
Speaker 2:I forget that part of the story, but basically that was used then as evidence. Down the road she veiled herself in a way that he couldn't see who she was. But he had sex with her and you know she was able then to. I think, if I remember maybe you remember this story, antoine, and how she then was pregnant and came to him and said you know, you're the father of this baby now. And he said give me a break, how could that possibly be? And she showed him then his signet ring and the other.
Speaker 1:Yes, yeah, of course I know exactly what you mean. The story you're talking about in the course of what it was, is the young lady that posed herself as a prostitute. She was actually the wife of one of his sons, but his son died before they had children, and so she needed a child.
Speaker 2:Okay, okay, to continue his lineage. Okay.
Speaker 1:Right. And so what she did? She posed herself as a prostitute and, of course, the man, he came into a town. He didn't have any provision to pay her, so he gave her something to hold until he came back. And then, of course, she came, and then she told him about, you know, the thing that he had given her. I'm trying to think of the name, but I know the story, yes.
Speaker 2:And it was a fairly prominent character within biblical history. And the reason I tell that story too is because it tells you something about our recognition of the importance of sexuality and our you know, our recognition as men, the need to provide a means for, you know, satisfying those desires. Right, they recognize that, so much so that a temple prostitute was an acceptable provision. And, being a theater person, I just I have this, you know way of thinking about things. It's like, you know, imagine if today we were going to church and we said to our wife okay, honey, you and the kids go ahead, I'm just going to stop here with Bertha, and you know we're going to, you know, or you know Janey, or you know fire, whatever. And you know, I just I got a little something to take care of it. You said, and you know, just be a couple of minutes. And the wife turns back and says, yeah, with you, it'd be like 35 seconds. You know what I mean. Can you imagine what that would be like today if we continue to do that?
Speaker 2:But it was a part of the whole process of religiosity. At one point it was. So let's, let's deal with the reality of where this thing comes from, how far back it goes and instead of just you know, brushing it off as a well, they're just promiscuous or they're, they're just, you know, whatever, they don't care. Well, you know, yeah, it. Probably you knew some education about the importance of when you take your, when I put it out there, when you pull your zipper down, you better be in a position to be able to support the possibility of what might happen. Or you know, even if you're doing protection, that that still may not protect you in every instance, as it doesn't take responsibility for that. And marriage hopefully provides an opportunity for that child to have some protection and for that family to have some protection of surviving After that life is brought into the world. That's the core of it.
Speaker 2:So if we don't recognize, for whatever reasons, whether it's, you know, I have the right to do whatever I want sexuality as part of who I am. I need to be able to explore that. Okay, right, no one's denying that. But again, with our eye really big on this, we have rights, yes, but every single right you have carries with it a responsibility. I have the right to protect myself and my family, but if I shoot somebody in what I perceive as being a threat to my family. I now have a responsibility for that action I do, whether I can justify it or not, and that's what this particular issue sex is not about the physical act With for some men takes 35 seconds to get through right it's about the longer lasting responsibility that that act entails, and God knew it. God, right away, said this is something that it needs to be held as holy. This is something that needs to be done as a glorification, and we don't, we don't, we don't glory. We sully it by our Irresponsibility and how we deal with it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know what what's sex was supposed to be? No, according to biblical standards, is the act between a man and a woman To replicate guys image throughout the earth. You know, and of course, we look back to what you were saying earlier. Just, uh, you know, we talk about sex today, you know, I think it simply starts with the lack of education of about sex. You know the importance of what it really means and you know, course, when we talking about impoverished communities, whether it's white or black, you know, I think just the education is missing. You know, course, like you know, we can see these things Prominent in bigger cities, but you go to a place like Kansas, nebraska, iowa, you'll see the same thing in the white community. So it's not.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because because, as a whole, we know no stats show, as a whole, we know that there's more white people on welfare than black, and but you know, the thing is, you know, now it's like people are saying that oh no, they'll say that the black, black people have, black women have babies for the sole purpose of Receiving welfare. I say is, is, is, is, is a, is a laughing. I can, you can laugh at it with pain because of the lack of you have to have like a bird's eye view of the thing you know when you live in these impoverished communities. Right, there's no resource, there's no Education, there's no hope. What else is it to do but mess around? Do it out of boredom.
Speaker 2:I know what we can do, right now, whoa, what man wouldn't go for that.
Speaker 1:Come on, you know Like again, it's like out of boredom, out of education, it's out of, you know, out of a, out of not having enough exposure to do something different. You know, when you feel your time with things of a Self-building or biblical knowledge or spiritual growth or something like that, it takes away those physical urges, you know, and of course that's where I think it starts, you know the lack of it. And I think these things and again just me personally, I think these things are systematic and deliberately done. The resources are taken out of a black communities, like you see, you drive around Chicago, you drive around Milwaukee. There's really no clinics anymore. And of course, this whole thing against Planned Parenthood, this attack on them, where they are First forced to close a lot of their things, and then, of course, it says there's no education.
Speaker 1:And then, of course, like, sex education has stopped being talked about as a sex between a man and woman, but it become more of a sexuality thing or Sexual identity thing than actual the education of sex. And then, of course, even going beyond sex, the, the, the, like you said, the responsibility of the, the act. There's a strong chance that you will have a baby or you will get pregnant, and then it's like then what? But again it starts in the church because now and no, things have become so secular that you know the Bible says no, no, he's a goddess against fornication, meaning premarital sex of people that's not married living together. Hey, let's face it, because we all done it. You know. Thing is, you know I, prior to our knowledge in the Bible, we all had sex without before marriage. Both my sons were born out of wedlock or before I was married. And the thing is I didn't know the truth then. But now that I know the truth, I know that it's wrong to do. Yes, I've changed my values, I've changed my lifestyle, I've changed just my overall view on the matter.
Speaker 1:And the thing is, in the church today, you make it okay to do what you wanna do, like humanism it says, hey, do whatever feels good to you, and that goes against the knowledge of God. But you know, and the thing is, when it comes to sex, and particularly sex in the black community, yes, it's, I wouldn't say a matter of it's, again out of boredom, you know, lack of education, lack of exposure to new things, you have like say, you may have too much time on your hand, because again, all these things come down to a boiling point of the have to have, nots right, you know, I can't get a bus pass to. The jobs that are available are miles away from where I live. You know, then, of course, I have two children already. So, in order for me to take this job, you know, of course, that black woman, she wants to take that job.
Speaker 1:But you know, the thing is now it's childcare. Then, of course, you're battling and just I've seen this with my own eyes. You know where no women, white and black, they battle with these state agencies over benefits. Well, if you do this, you can't have that. If you do this, you can't. If you go to work, we're gonna cut your pay. If you go to work, unfortunately we can't give you this and we can only give you this for childcare. It's always that thing that stops the full blown growth, and I think it's by, I believe it's by design.
Speaker 2:And so when we're talking about this, how can it not be by design when it incentivizes staying in that situation? I mean, you've talked about that before, how it's also incentivization to not have the father live at home. So we talk about you know all these kids that are growing up without dads.
Speaker 2:Well, our programs for supporting the kids incentivize that. And let's face it, even when the father's working and being a part of the home, they still are at the lowest level of wage, earning many, many, many, many, many times. And let's just not even talk about that spectrum for a moment. Let's talk about the spectrum of our church, and you know both you know, antoine and I talk enough about God from a perspective of we're not people that haven't run through the Bible a couple of times. Okay, it is a wonderful work and it is a living word of God. And if you don't accept that as a reasonable hypothesis, read it yourself. Until you know, and have read it from cover to cover, you won't understand what that means. So okay, that out of the way.
Speaker 2:What I am against, against and will be against is religiosity, because religiosity has been ferocitical since way before Jesus's time where there's a set of things that have been decided upon as being the way to behave. It's, you know, it's a code of behavior, a code of ethics, a code of morality and propriety, and that when you think that that's what makes you closer to God and believe that those things are what make you closer to God, you are completely missing the boat, because Jesus Christ is the way to God. It's the. He is the way, the truth and the life, and that's not. That's not trying to say friends of mine, listeners, that are Muslim, need to. You know, I'm not judging, I can't judge, it's not my job to judge. But I say all that because there are plenty of instances in which Christian men have not for any other purpose than because they lust after someone who is not their wife, who is attractive in some way, who says the right things to them and you know it takes advantage of their personal vulnerabilities, who is availing themselves and it could be a man just as easily as it could be a woman who is dissatisfied in their marriage. And, oh my gosh, doesn't it happen periodically that they are leaders, pastors, head pastors, willow Creek, the Bakers, jimmy Swagger we are replete with examples in contemporary society that are men of God that have succumbed to something that is so powerful, and that's what we need to realize.
Speaker 2:Sexuality is so powerful in the desire for what sex provides, and you know we can go into that if you want to about the whole power play that's, you know, present in sexuality, in sex with people, but let's not go there quite yet. The thing that really gets me with all that is we don't realize that this is not a black and white problem. This is not a black. People are, you know, bad because they do this. We all get hung up on sex and we all want to treat it like it's. You know you're such a dirty person for doing that.
Speaker 2:Now, you know it's education, it's accountability. When a religious leader can say things like you don't understand because you're not at the spiritual level that I'm at, you know that I this is okay for me because of where I'm at with my spiritual walk, that's nothing more than arrogance. Come on, and where are the people, where are the Christian brothers and sisters that sit and say whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. You don't get to pull that card on me, no, let's look at the Bible together, okay, and you show me your advanced spirituality and how that holds up in the context of this verse and this verse and this verse.
Speaker 1:How does that consist? You know, the Bible says, yeah, that God is not a respect to a person's right. And so we are at all treat people the same. And of course, when it comes to leaders in the church having sex, I would be with lay members. That is the ultimate no, no, you know. And.
Speaker 1:But the thing is, you know, of course, like again, the Bible continuously talks about, particularly the apostle Paul talks about, you know, living in the spirit and not in the flesh, you know. And that's where a lot of things go wrong. Of course, no, the Bible tells us, hey, there's no temptation, that's not common to man, and the Lord will make a way out of it, you know. But the thing is, you know, we succumb to lustful desires. He said when we Bible also says when we let ourselves go to lustful desires, that's where sin abounds. And but the thing is, when it comes to those things, it comes back to the education piece.
Speaker 1:You know, of course, that's why you see the breakdown in the country as a whole. You know, it's going to start with the individual. You know, it's going to start with the family and of course, the family structure these days has changed. You know, it's no longer the man and the wife living in the home together is is no, a single parent, is a two of the same sex, or is a dysfunctional man and woman living together? And they're young, they are very, they're getting younger and younger, and so what it is? There's no education there, and so what happens? You know, there's a lot of, there's a lot of. You heard that old adage. You know people, a lot of couples, they fight, and the other F word, that's all they do, that's all they do is fight and the other F word, what it's only rhymes with truck, no doubt.
Speaker 1:So that's all they do. And again it comes back to lack of education, it comes to lack of resources, it comes to, you know, just not knowing, lack of exposure. And again it starts in the individual, it starts in the family, then of course, it starts in the community and then it leads right back to the church.
Speaker 2:And it perpetuates things.
Speaker 1:It's hard. And that's where, you know, you start to see the. You know, lately you are starting to see the biggest melting pot of problems the division in the church. You know, and of course now, from a standpoint of ministry, where my wife and I are, it is getting harder and harder. To this I won't say this, I won't say it, I'm just gonna say it. Yeah, it's getting harder and harder to disciple people because they see how the church behaves now, or that's what they see is the image of how the church behaves. You know so, like.
Speaker 1:But instead it's like you know how they say it with oh, it's one like, with bad cops, it's one bad app, don't let one bad apple destroy the whole bunch. The same applies to churches. You know, like, yes, you see what you see on TV and the news, but you can't put us all in the same boat, right? And you know, of course, like you know, as a practice in my ministry is, you know, men minister to men and women minister to women. A woman will come to me with something. I'll say, hey, let's talk to my wife or our senator, one of them, minister Tanisha or pastor Luanne, I'll send them there. And same with men coming to my wife or one of the other lady people in authority or in position in our ministry. That's how we do things to minimize that very thing, because we've seen it happen real time, with our own eyes, where a lead pastor or pastor has had an adulterous affair with one of his members of his church. We've seen it and that's also another reason why my wife and I we go out in tubes. You rarely see me without my wife. You rarely see me without my wife, and it's just because you see these things and say that. You know we thank God for Jehovah Nisi, who is our banner, our protector. He protects us against the world, he protects us against our own flesh, he protects us against our minds. He fights this battle for us.
Speaker 1:But you know, when we're talking about sex in the church, it's very real. You know. Of course, like you know, we a lot of pastors dismiss, talking about the things that hurt the harder God. And that is the look at Romans one, starting around verse 16 all the way through the end, and then of course he's talking about fornication, same sex stuff. He's talking about just having a wrong mind and he says if you continue these things, I'll leave you to a wrap up a mind to do those things that are not convenient for you.
Speaker 1:Now, me as a person, just me as a pastor, I'll say this I believe every single word of the Bible, pertaining to every single area of life, and I strongly believe when the Bible says in Luke six, starting around verse 30, that I am not a judge. I am not a judge, and so it's like, regardless of what a person does or has done, we love them. How can? Because, whether it's a because I've seen churches shun a single mother because all she had a baby without a husband and so she can't participate in church activities, or she shows up pregnant and she's not married, but so the church shuns her, that is, oh my goodness, it's like you basically turning away someone that's seeking God.
Speaker 1:And that's what Jesus, when he ripped the Pharisees apart, he was saying hey, people are trying to enter the kingdom of God and you won't stop them and you yourself won't even come in. And so it's like we are not judges, we love people, because deliverance only comes by love, and so when we can get to a space of love, it'll diminish a lot of the problems that we have in this world today, whether it's the preconceived notions, whether it's the misinformation, the disinformation, the misconceptions, the flat out lies. When we start loving people we'll get to the love is. The lack of love is at the root of every problem.
Speaker 2:Well, in this problem of pro-life versus pro-choice, pro-birth, really pro-women's rights versus pro-life, there are all those complex interactions of behavior and needs and all of them boil down to lack of love.
Speaker 2:When it comes down to, we as a church have caused the problems that there are in this promiscuity issue and this sex issue and the issue of who has the right to their own body. We have caused that by, for hundreds of years, if not thousands, treating women and men who didn't have a right understanding of sex or who, put into a situation, as you know, say they can't even afford Netflix. So what are they gonna do? There's only so much time in the day, and if I had the difference between sitting on the couch and watching television and having sex with my wife, I know what would win 100% of the time. But we're also in a position that, because we're married, if something happens, we can do the right thing for that baby and there's just so many ways to treat that, and it's complex because it all comes down to well, where are the support people for that?
Speaker 2:That's gonna say, how can I help you?
Speaker 1:Exactly, and so it's like the support should be coming in before the child is even conceived. Again, the lack of education, the lack of resources. Because, again, when you have education, with the education comes better decisions and with those better decisions comes a change in trajectory in your life and of course it's a lot of things that affect that. And again it's like we were talking about Black Lives Matter and of course that's what they are fighting the systematic and targeted demise of Black people. And that's where, again, a lot of resources, a lot of education, a lot of things are being taken out of clinics, are being taken away out of communities. You gotta travel X amount of way, or if you go to a space and you get mistreated so bad that you don't wanna go back.
Speaker 2:Or you make it more necessary to have that baby. I mean you, just what are you gonna do so that perpetuates? It's a property grader, makes the children's lives more horrible.
Speaker 1:And even if a say, a young couple decide to have an abortion, there's no money to pay for it. There's no money to pay for it. And so it's like, again the problems, again they all stem back to know the have and have nots, know that poverty, stricken areas. Yes, you're gonna see more children, then you're gonna see more poverty, you're gonna see more hungry children, and then again it's just like this perpetual hole that's being dug. And then, of course, like you know, we were talking about the distribution of wealth in the country.
Speaker 1:No one, everyone's saying they hate the most. People are saying like they're just doing it to stay on welfare. I don't, I've known some to do that, yes, but we also know in my ministry, my wife and I's ministry, because when her ministry is shined and she deals with teen you know BIPOC, you know black indigenous people, color women she deals with black, even in the shelter. She deals with a low income white women, and the struggle is the same lack of resources, lack of education. It's perpetuated and it's, I think it's deliberate, and you know, of course, and then it's like only one side of the problem is actually pointed out oh, they're having babies to stay on welfare. No, they stay on. It's like we know women in our ministry are saying that they want change, they want, they want to change, and then, unfortunately, like in most impoverished communities, the family structure is so messed up that you know it's hard to find a babysitter, or you don't trust your baby with certain people. You know what I mean. So you're stuck, you are just stuck, and it's like there's no hope. And then that's why you see the suicide rate where it is.
Speaker 1:You know cause people are losing hope, and people that, like you said, this is the richest country in the world. There's no way that you know the way some people live in certain areas of the country should be living. And it's just again. And then so like when you have a group like Black Lives Matter that points these things out, they are targeted and it's now it's reverse racism, it's a you know, oh, white lives matter too. And it's like, oh, you say all lives matter. Then, of course, and it's just like, well, if all lives matter, then it wouldn't be, you don't need, for black lives matter, then it's just. It's almost like you pick a fight to take your focus off the bigger problem. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:And that's where, of course that's where we are, and then, of course, even in this discussion, where are the people having this discussion?
Speaker 1:Right, yeah, you know, and it's like man, it's like you know, when you expose a problem, when you expose the issue, you become the problem, and that's where we are. And it's like you know, when now, the fact that there's a young, young Caucasian or young white people wanting to know more about black history, they are now being targeted, they are now. Now it's like this woke thing, this and that and the other, it's like I wish people would just wake up and understand that the spirit of division is real. They got to understand that thing. This is a spiritual battle, you know, and that's where we really need to get people. I want to say that's what we were talking about the church.
Speaker 1:There's so much things going on in the church that people are doing churchy things, thinking that they are going to be saved. It's all if I joined this group, if I joined that group, if I joined a choir, if I joined it. That doesn't get you saved, cause, when people start joining all these different things and saying, oh well, I'm a part of this at the church, I'm a part of that at the church, I do this at the church, you're basically saying, oh well, these are the things that I need to take to get me saved, when it actually is Jesus Christ who saves you. And if it's him who saves you, if he's your salvation, if he's your redeemer, if he's your trust, then you would live according to his principles the best that you can, because again, we all fall short of the glory of God. But if we're trying our best to strive to have that Christ-like-mindedness, a lot of these things wouldn't exist.
Speaker 1:But of course, in the church now we got churches actually that have a militias. There's white churches in the South that have militias. They're teaching the wrong things and of course the church used to be the beacon of the community. People that needed help would actually run to the church for help. But now the church is a hookup spot. The church is a resource center, the church is a networking event. Everybody come to church but for the reason to know Jesus, and that's where it's a sad day. That, of course. Again, individual, family, community church. And then you got town, city, village, state, country, and that's where we are. And but you know the church.
Speaker 1:Yeah, of course I love the body of Christ, I love them all, but there's a group that is perpetuating they're not perpetuating the very nature of Christ and so I argue about the wrong things too Exactly, and so that's where you know, again, a lot of these things stem from you know, of course, like you talk about community resources, but then you also talk about the church teaching the right things.
Speaker 1:And of course you know we as FaithWorks Ministries. You know we when we have these other groups to teach about life and finance and things like that. But it's like before, it's like when, dependent on the person or where they are in a life, you got to teach them about Jesus first, because, again, it's like when they know Jesus and accept Jesus as their Lord and Savior, the Holy Ghost comes upon or the Holy Spirit comes part of their lives or comes into them and he will guide them into all. Truth is what we hope and pray for, and so it's just we have to get back to the basics of teaching Because, again, like parents are getting younger and younger, like grandparents are now grandparents. When you say grandma, right, you used to think, oh, 70, 60, 70, 80 year old grandma. Grandma is now 28, 29 years old and the life lessons that used to be handed down got lost.
Speaker 2:And so you see, that Seriously 28 or 29, you've seen that young, so that means the kids are having sex at 12,.
Speaker 1:for God's sake, 12, 13, 14, yep, and that's where we are. And then the 28 year old grandma. She didn't have the knowledge that, again, they started to get younger and younger. She had to have kids at 15, 16, 14 herself. So that's you know.
Speaker 2:That's not even talking about generational rape, which is a whole another spectrum of problems that causes the same physical problem, but it's again that generational lack of education, the lack of resources, the lack of exposure to new, exciting things.
Speaker 1:And that's what my wife and I try to do with these young people is exposing the new things. We try to talk about places you know like. What are you like? No, besides, you know, of course it's easy to say what do you want to be when you grow up. Then it's like you had to take it a step deeper. Really, where would you like to live? How would you like to live?
Speaker 1:What do you do you see yourself with children later on in life, you know, do you see yourself in a different? What do you love to do? What do you see yourself? And then you try to spark some thought. You try to spark some something within them to make them strive to one of them Some hope. And then you bring in some subject matter experts to speak on certain things, to again to give them hope. You know, and of course, my wife and I's lives. You know we can talk, we share our darkest, dirtiest testimonies. To show a kid that, hey, just because you were born into a situation doesn't mean you have to end up there. And that's the same with, you know, with the single mothers. You know we.
Speaker 1:You know there's a doctor, you know I can't remember her name we talked to her she had. We talked when we were in the Baraboo church we were at before the church soul. We had her come in from Illinois. She was a single mother of three and she dug, she put her claws in, dug her way out of poverty and started going to school. She was working there and going to school taking care of three kids and she became a doctor well, a psychologist, but she did it. And so we had her come and talk to the young Native American women and the black women as well as the low income white women that were in the community. And we've seen the fruit of that. You know, it's like a lot of these young ladies have gone off to college. One of the member of our church, she's about to go into UW Oshkosh as a freshman and it's like man, look at that, look at God. You know, just with the right resources, the right education, you can change lives.
Speaker 2:The right compassion the right love, the right caring. I mean, if we otherize them and say those dirty black people, they're just a bunch of sex animals, you know? I mean, do you knock up when our little small community, here we have people living out of their vans and 90% of them are single women living with their kids, that they don't have a support structure to live and work and make enough money to have a decent house? They have to live out of their cars and their vans? Do we? Why don't we go up and knock on their windows as Christian believers, just knocking and say you know, you wouldn't be in this position if you had been less promiscuous or more forgiving of your husband or whatever?
Speaker 2:I mean the reasons, whatever we have in our brain, instead of being compassionate, like a lot of the members in our community, to their credit, are, they're trying to do something to help those people. They're trying to do like your ministry is trying to help, ways that they can do, things that will give some hope, that will give the people that are in those position a reason to believe that someone else gives a darn about them and wants a better thing for them, wants to help them achieve and, as you're saying right, what do you see yourself? As Well, a lot of these kids don't see themselves as anything except trash.
Speaker 2:you know, just for trash that can be thrown away by the rest of the world and there's no one out there that's gonna help me. No one cares. So why should I? Why, what does it matter? I might as well have sex. At least I feel good for, you know, a couple of minutes. That's something better than I have otherwise, or they're just you know. What other thing do I have? Except at least, if I do this I could get a little more money. Maybe we could afford an apartment.
Speaker 1:That's all they know.
Speaker 2:My sister had multiple kids and you know I ended up she had a husband that was abusive and left her. You know she actually kicked him out because he was so abusive and then all she had was aid for, you know, for children with dependent children. So she lived on AFDC and because of that didn't have the time or the resources to learn a trade. So when those kids were finally all gone she didn't have that money coming in. She had to take jobs. As you know, she worked at a motel, you know, cleaning things. She could do that.
Speaker 2:But I don't know if any of you have tried to have that kind of job and live on the pay scale that those jobs you know afford to pay or you know warrant to pay you can't live with. You know where's the rent that's gonna be affordable? Where are the vehicles that are gonna be affordable to be able to get you reliably back and forth to work? Where are the you know groceries that need to be put on the table? How do you afford all that? I've done studies of that. If you make, you know, even $15 an hour, which are pushing for, you know, to be the new minimum wage, and getting pushed back on it even at $15 an hour. When you start looking at all the things that a person needs to have in order to get along, you know, and when you can say to people that you'll make more money, you'll have a better lifestyle by having more kids.
Speaker 1:And that's where people turn. Like you said, the compassion piece, people turn a blind eye. So, like, what do people do? What do cities and towns and state do? They'll start they say, oh, we're finna, build some housing, right, but it's not affordable housing. And so what do they do? They turn a blind eye by pricing people right out of their community.
Speaker 1:You know I've seen that in the town that I lived in. I look at Baraboo. You know they're pricing people right out of the community. You know like all these great new apartments are coming up but no one can afford them on $15 an hour. And you know it's like if you don't see the problem, there is no problem, cause people take blind eyes to such things as poverty cause.
Speaker 1:If you poverty, homelessness, hunger, you know you turn a blind eye to it. Because if you see it as a city, state, municipality, you gotta address it. And when you gotta address it, that means it's gonna cost you money. And then, of course, depending on who's on the city state governing boards or who's the mayor or whoever, whatever, they have other agendas. Oh, we wanna build this, we wanna do that, you know. But everything but acknowledged the poor and impoverished. You know the Bible says hey, you know we need to look out to the widow and the poor and the fatherless, we have to look after them. But people, these are towns and places where there's like 50 churches but yet no one really wants to do a thing about it. You know.
Speaker 2:And the people that do wanna do something about it are so few and, you know, are sometimes even misdirected themselves in terms of what the best thing to do is. You know what would help. Where are the groups? Of homeless people that are, you know, consulted as a focus group, if you will. You know what would help the most.
Speaker 1:Exactly, you know that's a great point. There's always focus groups on poverty, but majority of those focus group participants aren't actually in it. You know they can testify to what they've seen, or I know someone. There may be a couple sprinkled in there, but you know it's like I tell you, one of our biggest struggles is, you know, as a ministry, is financial help.
Speaker 1:You know, of course, a lot of people, these corporate donors, they give to these major things. But and we're saying, hey, you know, we wanna provide for the homeless, we wanna provide, you know, we wanna address hunger, we wanna address homelessness, we wanna address these issues. You know, like, again, like with a social, racial, economic inequalities, we wanna address these issues. But you know what they note. They're out when it comes to giving us what, donating money to us. Well, you're a church. And again, it's like if you look in these, like I'm taking my bylaws, our church bylaws everywhere, like look, this is written into our bylaws, what we do. We're not a church, we're a ministry. And of course, a lot of people have a different problem differentiating ministry, outreach ministry and a church, and so that's there, out from giving us money, like you know, love, you know just people can donate tens of thousands of dollars to the zoo, but you know, and then they'll give a few hundred bucks to homeless people, and I have a problem with that. And so you know, of course I can't I won't call people out by name, but I know of people that do that. You know, they'll give tens of thousands of dollars to zoos and art museums and all these different kinds of things that are, you know, but they won't, they'll give very minimal to people in the world.
Speaker 1:And again, and that's sad, you know, and you know, even when it comes to grants for these things, the grants go to the same people. Now, you know, of course, like they're putting a loophole in grants where it says, oh, these are reimbursable grants, meaning that you buy or pay for something and then we'll reimburse you. If we had ten thousand dollars to put a program in place, we wouldn't need the grant, you know. So that, again, it's like these systemic and systematic ways of pushing black minority, even low income white people, to the bottom or out of the picture. And so is.
Speaker 1:And again, what do you do when you are? When the doors have been shut, it's just you and your old lady laying in an apartment that you're about to get kicked out of. Y'all go and mess around. What are you going to do? And it's almost it's like not for the sake of even having you know, because, again, it's a lot of homeless women with children that don't even qualify for AFDC because they don't have the proper address or they can't get the proper identification or it's something that would. It's few things that prohibit, but it's a few that don't qualify and so, and it's like it's just a sad thing. So, you know, we again addressing the root cause, you know, of a matter which is a resources education, you know, in a non-discriminate, you know thing.
Speaker 2:Well, you know, as always, when we start these conversations and today, if you've missed it, we've been talking about S-E-X. That's right, s-e-x. So this can be now called the sex episode, which you know they'd say in Hollywood the things to really get people going. You got to have sex and you got to have dogs. You want people to watch, you got to have those two things. So maybe we'll talk about dogs sometime.
Speaker 2:But, as always, those conversations are not as simple as the thing, the word itself. You know I hope I think we've touched on a whole bunch of the surface things that each one of those is a topic in itself, but there's, it's not as simple as just, oh, those people need to get the zipper shut. Or oh, those people need to realize that. You know, I worked for a living too. Or those people you know those people there's the problem right there too those people instead of Cassandra, instead of you know, lily, instead of Ann, whatever, you know Ann, have you met Ann and her little baby, Chuck, little Chucky, he's cute as saying, yeah, she, they don't have a, she doesn't have a dad. The dad isn't with them anymore. Oh my, how can we help? No, that's far too often. That is not the response to that thing Far too often.
Speaker 1:Well, they should have cut a wooder, right, yeah, they should have did this, they could have it, and it's like, yeah, it's like if they were afforded that education again, just resources and education leads to better decisions. And you know, of course, when education and resources are taken away from people, you know it's gonna it's gonna lead to another path. And, of course, and of course, when we're talking about sex, just well, the flesh is something else. The flesh leads us to do some really bad things. You know the natural sex, right, just say, really, I guess, when you're having really good SEX, right, it's gonna lead to people doing some really bad things to get that, you know. And, of course, you know the old adages and old jokes. I don't want to, I don't want to say again, but it's just simply, sex is, has, can be used as a weapon on both sides, men and women. They use it for, they use to get what they want and need in the course of sex is to be enjoyed in a responsible manner. And that's where you know.
Speaker 2:The oldest profession in the world?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's. Sometimes you have sex as a profession to some, you know, in a, because we're talking about people living, people living in the flesh and not in the spirit, corporate world and all use it Search, as always.
Speaker 2:so another rousing talk that you know it spurs people to have about how big the problem is and what the roots of it are. And if we're wrong, we'll talk with anyone. That doesn't agree.
Speaker 1:It's a great chance. We are right. Exactly, I mean that's what we are all the time.
Speaker 2:Just I'm, you know, I'm just a guy with an opinion. But you know, check it out. Check out if my opinions hold water, check out if Antoine's opinions hold water. That's the real test. We used to say proof is in the pudding, right? So look at the pudding.
Speaker 1:Research for yourself.
Speaker 2:Research for yourself. We have this thing called the internet. Now I hear the internet thing that you know. You don't believe everything on the internet. Do some research. It's not just one source, it's not Carl thinks or Raoul thinks, it's not, it's about, you know, looking at the big picture and thinking about the big picture Always. Yes, hopefully some things resonate with you, right? So All right, antoine, always, always, one of the best parts of my day is getting happy talks with you. So here on Frame of Brothers Same year. So, and I'm Raoul Lebrash.
Speaker 1:Antoine Hardman senior.
Speaker 2:Hey, we're getting the thing right. We're going to get that. It's going to be like yeah. I'm Raoul Lebrash, and you know we can develop some kind of personality or something. So hey, man, you have a good day. Okay, you too, man.
Speaker 1:Thank you. Thank you, you as well, man. Just love and prayers are always to you and your family, man, so we'll talk to you soon.
Speaker 2:And you as well. You give my best to Ramona and hope everything goes well and you have a great week and a great weekend and folks, thanks for listening, thanks for watching us on Frame of Reference. And, raoul, like I said, hope gets you thinking and talking. That's really what it's all about Peace to you. Listen, it's well for you. You see me and my stupid beard. I don't know what it is, more than that, probably. Huh. Just thanks, brother, take care, see you next week.
Speaker 1:Hey, you too, man, Thank you.