Christmas Can Be A Revolution (with Rev. William H. Lamar IV)

Back in 2020, members of the violent group The Proud Boys jumped a fence and defaced the Black Lives Matter sign at Metropolitan African Methodist Episcopal Church. They filmed themselves destroying the sign while chanting racial epithets.

Metropolitan AME wasn’t the only Black church in D.C. to be attacked that night, but their response to the violence was unique. They sued the Proud Boys for damages, and when the group failed to pay, the church won the rights to their trademark. Now, they’re selling merch using the PB logo to raise money for their Community Justice Fund.

It’s an amazing story, but it’s only the backdrop to our conversation this week with Reverend Lamar. Katie and LaFonda’s conversation with him spanned so many topics, from the importance of storytelling to the power of love to how to have conversations with our family members at the holiday table. They discussed how the far-right has tried to co-opt Christianity but progressive pastors like Rev. Lamar are still fighting for justice and love — you know, actual Christian values.

Rev. Lamar has a book coming out next year called Ancestors: Those Who Bless Us, Curse Us, and Hold Us. He’s more directly connected to the past than most—Metropolitan AME is the oldest continuously Black-owned property in D.C and held the funerals of Frederick Douglass and Rosa Parks—but we’re all shaped by our ancestors. In recognizing our ancestors, we recognize the stories we tell about ourselves.

This conversation is a great way to get in the Christmas spirit, but even if you don’t celebrate, his humanity and leadership are inspiring. We hope you enjoy it.

And if you'd like to join us for our virtual "Pre-Gaming 2026" event, you can learn more and RSVP here.

For a transcript of this episode, please email comms@redwine.blue.

You can learn more about us at www.redwine.blue or follow us on social media! 

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Transcript

HTNLYS E13: Christmas Can Be A Revolution (with Rev. William H. Lamar IV)

Katie: Hey everyone, and welcome to How to Not Lose Your Shit. I'm Katie Paris and I'm the founder of Red Wine and Blue. 

LaFonda: And I'm LaFonda Cousin, a part-time yoga instructor, self-care advocate, and the chief people officer here at Red Wine and Blue. 

Katie: All right, today LaFonda and I are super psyched to be joined by Reverend William h Lamar iv, the pastor at a church in Washington DC who recently won the trademark to the Proud Boys logo. He's the author of an upcoming book called Ancestors: Those Who Bless Us, Curse Us and Hold Us. 

It was a really incredible conversation I am thrilled that we get to share. I don't think that people usually expect, LaFonda, to hear about a pastor, like, pulling one over on The Proud Boys. His story is so incredible to hear. What did you think of our conversation? What was your big takeaway? 

LaFonda: I thought our conversation was great. It is always a little bit fun to hear a pastor say that he is not offended by us using the word shit in the title of our podcast. Um, so I was a little bit worried about that this weekend.

I thought the conversation was amazing. There's just a lot of great information there. There's a lot of great inspiration. Um, I'm excited for people to listen to it and I don't know, I just, I feel like hearing that great balance between a religious leader and a political activist is probably my favorite part. And, you know, having the, having the trademark to the proud boys, I mean, that's like the ultimate gotcha, right? 

Katie: Bad-ass.

LaFonda: Like that's, that just that makes my day.

Katie: To me, first of all, the reverend's got a great voice. It's just like, it kind of lulls you. It makes you feel held. It makes you feel like, okay, let me come closer and hear this wisdom. 

And then when you come closer and what you're gonna hear, he is just a strategic powerhouse. He talks a lot about the importance of storytelling, and we have got to make sure we are telling a better story than the other side, a story that people wanna come and be a part of. And to me he is such an emblem for that. Like I wanna be a part of Reverend Lamar's story and the story that his congregation is telling. 

I think that this idea that you can only be religious or, or you know, put faith at the center of your life, or there's politics over here, in many ways when you combine them... I think that so many of us have gotten to a place where we have a scared, negative reaction to that because we have seen such an abuse of religion in political life, weaponizing religion in order to achieve certain political ends that generally have to do with excluding people. 

And I think that what's so compelling to me, and I, you know, I just, I'm so excited to get to amplify his voice, is that Reverend Lamar is actually speaking to the long held important tradition of speaking up for those who are marginalized, underserved in our communities, in a pretty… I mean, it shouldn't be radical. It shouldn't be seen as radical. It is like the truest form of following the example of Jesus. But making this spiritual voice and political voice one in the same on behalf of those who are excluded… that is the true tradition in terms of, I mean, that was what I was taught from the Bible at a very young age. 

But those aren't the voices that we hear amplified. But what I'm so excited about with, with Reverend Lamar is that he is making this story so compelling. And so more people need to hear it. And my great hope would be that Reverend Lamar's voice and other voices like his became the voic of religion, of Christianity, of faith when it comes to our politics. Imagine. Imagine what a different world we would live in, a different country. 

LaFonda: Yeah. I think a lot of people experience a lot of, just, not even just right now, I think a lot of people experience a lot of church hurt. 

Katie: Yeah. 

LaFonda: For a lot of different reasons. And if we had more voices, more experiences, more churches, more reverends, like Reverend Lamar really bridging this gap or speaking more life into people, more love...

I mean, he talked about love is just not this feeling like this, this gushy, squishy feeling, right? It's, it's about a lot more than that, but. If we had more voices like Reverend Lamar's amplified in a way that the far right is amplified, I think we would have far more people that felt the love of Christianity versus the hate of Christianity.

There's a saying that's like, “there's no hate like Christian love” and like, I hate that saying so much because I grew up in a Christian church. I have a grandfather that was a reverend and like that is not how it's supposed to be. And what I felt from our conversation with Reverend Lamar is like, this is what Christian love should be. And if we had more voices like that and we had more pastors like that that were being amplified, I think people would feel what Christian love is supposed to be. And it kind of makes me sad that that's not what we're feeling and seeing and experiencing that just made me so sad. 

Katie: The thing is, is that so many of the loudest voices, when it comes to religion, they are driving people away from religion. Because who wants to be a part of that? Of something that's, that's hateful. It's exclusionary, et cetera. That's not something I know I'm, I'm gonna be drawn towards. But I'm drawn to a voice like Reverend Lamar's.

And so figuring out the ways to have voices like his be louder than these exclusionary ones, I think that's the challenge. Like how do we have the religious voices who are not building up Project 2025 but trying to tear it down? How can we make sure those voices of faith that are heard? 

And he pointed to the challenge, he said that, you know, the stories – we talked about this some in our conversation with Jessica Yellen. It can be hard to get across the information people need to know because whatever is causing the rage causes the clicks, and so that's what gets the amplification, the negativity, the outrage. As opposed to, you know, stories of love and connection.

But I love the way Reverend Lamar frames it. I mean, I'm, I'm gonna start talking to my kids about Christmas as a revolution. We're here to celebrate the revolution on December 25th. Right? And what does that mean in terms of who we serve and prioritize in our own values in our lives? And I think that he's onto something in terms of the importance of storytelling.

But not just that, the way he is telling this story on the Proud Boys by showing us how Christmas is a revolution. Like that's a story that I think a lot of people could actually wanna be a part of. And so all of us who feel that way, just like working together to put forward that better story… I, I, I think that that's the project here. I think it's the task and I think Lamar has given us, Reverend Lamar has given us a lot of hints on how to do that and is modeling that and I get excited about a future where we see faith playing a very different role. 

Like so most Americans are, you know, still say that religion and faith are at the center of their lives somehow. You know, like there's a lot of, there's a lot of power there. And I think people do want something much better than the religious right is offering. 

LaFonda: I mean, people say that faith is the center of their lives right now, but I don't see people always acting it out. And I love that, like his church and Reverend Lamar are acting it out in a way that like feels very real to what people are experiencing, right? To what people wanna see. When you hear a pastor talk about standing up for the rights of all people, including transgender people, that is not something you hear pastors on the right talk about. That's not something you hear pastors talk about in general, and I think people wanna hear and, and see that.

And I just, I just love that it feels like a real person talking to you that feels like they love all people. And that does not come all the time from pastors. So it just, it, it feels like you're talking to a real person. And I just, I got very full from this conversation. It makes me wanna go listen to more sermons from Pastor Lamar.

Katie: Yeah. We'll have to go next time we're in DC we'll have to go check out his church. 

LaFonda: Yeah. I feel like we should. Well now we are going to take a quick break and when we come back we'll have our amazing conversation with Reverend Lamar. 

BREAK

LaFonda: So today we are joined by the Reverend William H. Lamar IV. He's a pastor at Metropolitan African Methodist Episcopal Church in Washington, DC and the author of Ancestors: Those Who Bless Us, Curse Us and Hold Us. Reverend Lamar, thank you so much for being on the podcast and welcome. 

Rev. Lamar: Thank you. I'm excited to be here. And again, the name of your podcast gives me deep religious and theological joy, so thank you.

LaFonda: Yay. We were just talking, Katie, about how we were hoping that the name of the podcast wasn't offensive before. 

Katie: My 7-year-old told me two nights ago, mom, can you change the name of your podcast so it doesn't have that bad word in it? And I'm gonna tell him Reverend Lamar said it was okay. Yeah. Alright, so we're moving forward.

Rev. Lamar: Tell your 7-year-old that if you cannot have some humor in the midst of all of the dehumanization and challenges that we see tell him he'll grow into appreciation. 

Katie: Amen to that. And this child is not without humor, so we'll just need to expand his mindset. 

LaFonda: I definitely had my moment of panic this weekend. I was like, should we? Wait. Is this right? Should we do this? Okay. 

Well, Reverend Lamar, one of the reasons that we wanted to talk to you, or one of the reasons why I think that you're inspirational is back in 2020, the Proud Boys jumped the fence and burned the church's Black Lives Matter banner. And now you own all the rights to the Proud Boys trademark. Can you tell us a little bit about how that happened and can you just sort of walk us through it? 

Rev. Lamar: Be glad to. So this happened in 2020, the end of the year after the elections. And Mr. Trump's supporters were emboldened by his rhetoric, by his lies about the election. And he was whipping up their criminal activity, just to be completely honest. Now, the difference between what happened at our church and others is our, our Black Lives Matter banner was not burned, but it was destroyed, and they videotaped the destruction along with racial epithets and awful chants, and put that out on their social media channels and through their networks.

But there were multiple signs destroyed that evening. Uh, ours was destroyed and we decided to sue them, we decided that they needed to be punished. We decided to use the full weight of the law and we partnered with the Lawyers, Washington Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights. We partnered with Paul Weiss, the law firm to sue them, and we won the suit.

They refuse to pay. So then we sued them for their intellectual property. So now we own their trademark. We're also going after their cryptocurrency and Bitcoin. So we want to be clear that you'll not treat us nor anyone else like that without there being repercussions, and that we've been willing to withstand some of the backlash that comes, but it is necessary.

LaFonda: How is the church right now using the trademark? And can you tell us a little bit about why that's important? 

Rev. Lamar: Oh, sure. So if you win a trademark and you do not use it, the courts could indeed take that privilege, that right, that ownership away from you. And so what we did early on is we printed shirts that took the Proud Boys insignia logo and flipped it. So we, we, we talked about “proud to be Black.” We talked about pride from a different lens. We talked really more in a universal, hospitable way as opposed to their narrow white supremacist construction of the way the world should be ordered. 

And so we did that. Uh, and we're also envisioning other ways that we might leverage their logo to really fund the work that they stand against. And that is the work of justice, the work of liberation, the work of freedom. The work of true democracy. So it's taking what was meant for evil and using it for what is good. 

Katie: Your work reminds me so much of the Bible verse, “be wise as serpents, and innocent as doves.” The Proud Boys are a violent organization, so fighting back as directly as you're doing that does not come without risk.

Rev. Lamar: No. 

Katie: What made you decide to do it anyway and why in this particular way? 

Rev. Lamar: Well, to use my wife's language, it is an ancestral blood debt. So we have been fighting as long as we have been here to be considered citizens. We have been fighting to ensure that our rights are upheld, they're respected by courts of law and in every jurisdiction in the nation. And so when this happened to us, one of the things that came upon me was an immediate resolve that this is our moment. Our time to continue a fight that has been going on for 400 plus years. 

So we think of Elizabeth Freeman who was known as Mabe, who sued for her freedom in Massachusetts in the 1780s and won. We think of other Black mothers who sued after their sons were lynched, one of whom gained ownership of clan property and clan resources. And so there is a long line of people who have used the courts from Charles Hamilton Houston and Pauly Murray, Thurgood Marshall. The list goes on and on where we've used the courts from, from very early in the history of the United States, to protect rights that executives, be they presidents, governors, legislators, senators, members of the House of Representatives… they refuse to protect our humanity, and so we continue to strategize.

Even today, we strategize anew as to how we can protect our humanity and how we can protect the humanity of all persons who, even in today's discourse, are considered less than, whether you are an immigrant or a transgender person. Uh, whatever the category of human being that the power structure wants to demean in order to hold onto its power, we want those persons to be protected. That's who we've always been and that's who we are. 

And it does come at at a great cost. Our security costs – I won't mention the number, but we pay quite a bit to secure the facility, to secure leaders in the facility, but the investment we think is worth it. People need to know that there are many people across the nation, around the world who are standing up, and that is what we are called to do and that's who we are.

Katie: I love how you are continuing a tradition, but making it new again for our moment that we're living in. Can, can I just like… where did you come from, Reverend Lamar? Like this is, you're like the combination of a pastor and a political strategist. It's just the greatest of social justice traditions, you know? Have you always been a minister? Did you always want to be one? 

Rev. Lamar: So this is, this is a great question. I am… some people will call it nerd, I like to call it bibliophile. So I've always, I've always been surrounded by books and reading about people who model this kind of life in service. So from Fannie Lou Hamer to Prethe Hall, Martin and Coretta to Malcolm and Betty, there's a long list of those who understood that to be in faith leadership, theological leadership, religious leadership means nothing short than the changing of our social reality, the revolutionary repositioning of democracy, of justice, of freedom for all persons.

So I've always admired people who did that work. So I think of Frederick Douglass, who attended the church that I now am privileged to pastor. His funeral was there. He delivered one of his last addresses there. And Frederick Douglass is one who had been born enslaved. One of the last, one of the last things he did was to fight against the Chinese Exclusion Act. He fought against the United States government's notion that Chinese people could be excluded. 

Now, this was after Chinese labor was exploited to build railroads and other things. You think about even today, the labor of many of our brothers and sisters who are here from Mexico and from central, their labor is exploited for agricultural purposes. And then when they are no longer of political or economic use, they're cast aside and they're dehumanized in a program to build political power. 

So I came directly from that lineage and from the love of my mother and father of my grandparents and great-grandparents who positioned us to in all things, always be human. Always recognize your humanity and never diminish the humanity of others. I come from that grand tradition and I am exceedingly grateful. 

Katie: I wish that that is how we could all collectively understand ultimately what politics is, you know? Like trying to work together to get to that place that reflects our actual humanity. You're modeling that for me. 

Rev. Lamar: And, and you're modeling even in your design. Like those hearts. Love is very interesting. Uh, love, love is a revolutionary force. I remember in my teen and early twenties because I only had kind of the American notion of love as a sentimental feeling. I, I rejected that. But love is strong. Love is sinewy and love is… love is muscular. Love pushes against, love will fight, love will protect. 

Love is the very antithesis of much of what we see politically today. Why would you have a system where human beings do not have access to healthcare? A system where education is determined either by you having enough money to live in an exclusive neighborhood or enough money to pay tuition. It is because you do not value human beings equally. And you know, I'm no fan of Thomas Jefferson, but I think Thomas Jefferson was right when he said that he trembled when he thought that God was just, and that God's justice could not sleep forever. This nation continues to swim in the propaganda of being democratic and free while denying freedom, liberty, and democracy and democratic participation to large swaths of, of the nation.

And it will cost us very little. We've got the money to do what needs to be done, but we do not have the political will and we want to be a part of that. I think that your conversations, I wanna encourage people who listen to know that you don't just have to sit back and be the recipient of these awful politics, but you can be a trailblazer in your community to move things in a different direction. And that, that's who we are.

LaFonda: Let me ask you a question about something that I often see online. Um, so you talk a lot about the ancestors and you know, the ancestors being able to like lift us up and move us forward and all of those things. And I actually saw it online this weekend and it comes from this idea that the nonviolent movement is, I think, sort of looked down upon, I think, by younger people at some point. And so I hear this saying that like, “we are not our ancestors.” 

And while I get the sentiment, it feels sort of empowering in this way, like we're willing to stand up and sort of physically fight… On the surface, it sounds empowering, but to me it feels a little bit disrespectful because our, our ancestors sacrificed so much of themselves for our freedoms and for this country. And I'd love to hear more about the power of our ancestors and what you might say to some of those young people or to somebody who has that mindset and how you balance the two of those things. 

Rev. Lamar: Well, I think when young people say, “we are not our ancestors,” my abiding answer is definitely we are not. We are, I think in many ways, nowhere near as wise. Nowhere near as strategic. Nowhere near as connected. And made something from nothing. I mean a lack of material resources. They couldn't get grants, they couldn't bank. They were completely excluded from the mainstream economy, the white supremacist economy, other than to be commodified and for their labor to be taken. 

So let's talk about this. It, it really arises from the fact that we do not know history. And if you're paying attention to the political moment, they're ensuring that we will not know it by taking the stories away. So what they don't know, they don't know about the revolts. Revolts happened from the very beginning. They don't know about the New Orleans revolt when the enslaved waited until Christmas Eve, when those “owners” would be drunk and asleep, and they rose up and cut a swath through Louisiana, destroying those people fighting for their freedom. They don't know that we have pushback with multiple revolts here in the United States, revolts across the Caribbean. 

We have always fought and we've always had multiple strategies. Some people pursued military and marshal kinds of revolts. Other people had more theological revolts, nonviolent revolts. But we have always revolted. We have never been at peace with this circumstance. And my argument to them is the ancestors, with very little material resources, without the technology that we employ, actually built democracy in America. 

Because, to be truthful, the quote unquote “founders” never believed in democracy. Their version of democracy was the diseased Aristotelian version of democracy, which excluded slaves and women. An American democracy today still wants to exclude women because even when women are clearly the best candidates, they can't get elected. And, and even, even today with this new trad wife stuff and this new stuff coming from the far right, trying to take away the liberation and liberty that women enjoy, they also want to diminish the political power of Black, brown people, immigrants, people that come from different cultures. 

So America has not gotten over its cancerous, diseased, death dealing form of democracy, and it finds a way to reject those who have a vision of democracy that includes every human being. But those in power who reject that democratic reality will continuously have to fight those of us who will never be still, never be silent and never be satisfied. So we've gotta be clear. That what we call democracy and that root word democracy, the “demos” in Greek means “the people". Democracy means the power is vested in the people. 

But look, look, today and power seems to be invested in, in tech technocrats and techno authoritarians and the billionaires surrounding, I mean, America's always been oligarchic and plutocratic. But today in the revised version of the Gilded Age, we see even more stratification between the classes and even those early diseased strategists and theorists of democracy understood that if power were accumulated only with the wealthy, you could not have democracy. And we've gotta keep fighting and we've gotta fight strategically, joyfully, but we gotta fight.

Katie: Reverend Lamar, people often say that, “why aren't we hearing more religious leaders or faith-based voices speaking out against,” you know, whether it's MAGA or Christian nationalism, or these far right, what I would say are sort of co-optation or weaponizing of faith for political ends. Why do you think there is that perception?

Because Reverend Lamar, look, I, I actually, I come from the Christian faith community myself. I've done a lot of organizing with religious leaders and I know there, there's you and there's so many others out there speaking up. But yet we continue to have this perception that somehow, you know, Christianity, religion in the public square equals right wing. That equals right. 

So why do you think that perception persists and how do you view your role or advice to others who also are people of faith and share this frustration of how religion, but you know, Christianity in particular, is represented in the public square? 

Rev. Lamar: That's a wonderful question. And I've been working with a group that I'm a part of, we've been working with a strategist around storytelling. Storytellers control the world. So there is a difference between the biological anthropologists who call human beings “homosapiens” and the cultural anthropologists who call us “homo-narrans.” The “homo-narrans” categorization says that human beings are marked not by wisdom and tool making, but by storytelling. We are different than the other creatures in the world. As far as we know, I, I don't think this is true. I'm sure that dolphins tell dolphin stories and, and birds tell bird stories, but as far as we know, we are the species that tell stories. 

Now, the way this connects to your question is this media consolidation keeps certain stories from being amplified. Right now, six corporations control the majority of news that we get, the majority of posts that we read, and they are not invested in telling this story. Let's be very clear. The stories that people tell are always affiliated with some political vision of how the world should be. So Fox News is not going to tell my story. And it may be difficult for others to believe, but kind of middle of the road media too. They don't want to tell our stories. They wanna tell the stories that whip up the worst sense and sensibility in us because what sells is rage. Love does not sell a vision of human beings. Together does not sell. 

Why? Look, look, look at the, the movies that we watch, the Marvels and all this kind of stuff, this, that centers what the late scholar, his name is escaping me, it'll come back to me, called the, “the myth of redemptive violence.” We're always entertained by a belief that a good guy will rise up and beat the bad guy, and the world will be at peace. Well, the world has never known peace through violence. Violence will not get us to peace. Peace gets us to peace. Justice gets us to peace. Something that this nation has not been committed to trying with any kind of seriousness. 

I am committed… first of all, I'm grateful to people like you all who amplify stories like ours, and then we've got to figure out how to make sure that the thousand flowers that are blooming in isolation can bloom in concert, because I am not the only one. We are not the only ones. Many are fighting in their venues, in their corner of the garden, but the garden needs to be connected through storytelling and communication. And we need to understand that, you know, a Mighty Mouse Superman person is not gonna save us. What will save us is collective understanding that we're all together.

And I thought that COVID had taught us how connected we were biologically, but even seems like we've forgotten those lessons, that what happens to one happens to us all. And that is not the kind of story that we get from those who are invested in telling us a certain story so they can hold on to their power.

Katie: This circles back to where we started this conversation. I think that you, what you have done with the Proud Boys trademark and getting attention with that to tell a different story, a story of love and connection with our past to pursue justice in our future. I just, it's so smart. It just goes back to, I think that that's, that's the brilliance of your approach is finding these new and creative ways to tell a better story. And I think that you've really shown us how to do that. 

Rev. Lamar: Well, I appreciate that, and I really want to, to, to give thanks to our attorneys who came up with the strategy who continuously work in, you know, in difficult circumstances, risking themselves, their families, their careers to fight on our behalf. So there are a lot of people in the background who are doing very brave things. And very intellectually sophisticated things to press our claim. And, and I'm thankful to be a part of the team. 

LaFonda: We're getting ready to close for the holidays. And I have a, a question about people who are going to meet with their families here in a couple weeks.Cause it's the holiday season and next week some of us are going to experience a Christmas sermon and then we're going to have a dinner conversation with our family that reflects the opposite values. Some of us are gonna have dinner with our families, and it's gonna be very different than the sermons we hear at church, of peace and love and all of those things. How can we bridge the gap in those conversations? 

Rev. Lamar: Oh, that's, that's a wonderful question. So the, the first thing is to not let the propaganda of Christmas erased the power and truth of Christmas. So like so many other things in this nation around the world, Christmas has become a perfect handmaiden, a perfect butler to capitalism and corporate excess, and more commercialization and commodification.

So let's start here. I talk often about the scandal of Christmas. Christmas does not smell like cookies and trees. The first Christmas smells like one of the words your son said should not be in your podcast. And, and, and literally, I, I have said if you read the story with an eye toward the text and not an eye toward what people are telling you the story is about, when you take three deep Christmas breaths, you smell shit. You smell the animals in the barn. God comes into the world surrounded by animals and excrement if you take the story at face value. 

What it tells us is that we can have real stories about human pain and possibility and not propaganda. Not these curated lovely churches with 18 trees and polished people singing these wonderful anthems, but what one of the children being born in squalor today. Here's another one. Christmas presents a lovely heteronormative image of what a family is. A husband that looks like the Marlboro man. A woman that looks like she's from a Maybelline commercial, and three or four little kids. Well, Mary is an unwed teenage mother. What if we told that story? What if we said that God shows up within and for these people and we shatter this mythology that casts upon us this perfect vision that does not even exist for those of us who think we have it? And we told really human stories of where to find the divine.

Like, Christmas is a revolution. It is a revolution that pierces all of the ornamentation and the beauty that we demand. What if we saw those in squalor as God's children? What if we saw those who were unwed preteen mothers as holy in God's sight? And what if with the angels, when we see that child born in a stall and we see those mothers, we rejoice and sing that this is the salvation of the world? That's what Christmas can be. And for those who don't want to hear it, you just look, if you got some biblical literalists say, “Take out the book. Let's read it.” Jesus was not born in Neiman Marcus, or he was not, he was not born on Sea Island. Let's talk about how we are treating people who are in those circumstances, and if you really wanna honor this day, lavish all of what we have to lift those people up and in lifting them up, we'll all be lifted up. 

Katie: Amen to that. I am looking forward to a Christmas revolution break. That's how I think we need to rebrand it. Love it. Reverend Lamar, I think that people, after hearing you, are gonna want to learn much more. It's so nice to, it's been a gift to have you with us. Where can folks find out more about you and about this book that you have coming out?

Rev. Lamar: Thank you very much. So the book is entitled Ancestors: Those Who Bless Us, Curse Us and Hold Us. And the entire premise is that we will never supersede the moral, political, or theological vision of the ancestors whom we venerate. That we have to tell different stories and we will live into those stories. Telling the stories of the founders will only allow us to keep building a democracy that's not really a democracy. We need to tell a different story of people whose vision included all people. So this story of ancestors, I, I try to get at that.

The book is found easily on Broadleaf, or if you just Google “ancestors” and my name, William H. Lamar IV, the book is there. Pre-orders are available. We're easy to find at Metropolitan AME church in Washington, DC, uh, all of our worship. And if you are having problems with insomnia and you want to hear my sermons, you can go to YouTube, you can go to Facebook, and a whole lot of stuff that, articles and podcasts and all kinds of things. But yeah, and also William H Lamar IV is my handle on social media. So I look forward to engaging with your audience and thank you also very much for your interest. Thank you.

LaFonda: Thank you so much for joining. 

Katie: Thank you so much. I don't think you're gonna help my insomnia. I think you're gonna get me even more awake. Like let's go. We're ready to go.

Rev. Lamar: There you go. 

LaFonda: Thank you for joining us. 

Katie: Thank you so much.