You're listening to the new evangelicals podcast.

Friends, what's up?

Happy Thursday.

Happy June 10th to all of you.

This is a very special podcast episode. I am here to introduce to you,

Melinda Hale. She is an amazing human being. She's on the board of the new evangelicals. She's a

singer, a songwriter, producer. She does so many amazing things. She's a visionary. She is so

wise. I've had the privilege of working with her in a closer capacity over the past few months as we've started to rethink and imagine what we're calling is TNE 2.0. I have more to say about that in the future. And Melinda, I'll just tease this, is a part of that in some capacity. And we're going to announce that soon. But that's not what this is

about. Today, I want you to listen and learn and hear what Melinda has to say about Juneteenth,

what it means to her and why it's so important for American history. Have a great rest of your day.

Talk to you all later.

Every year when Juneteenth comes around, I feel a mixture of pride, grief, and deep reflection.

And for me, it's more than just a celebration, it's a reckoning, and a remembering.

So for the history, June 19, 1865, that was the day the last enslaved black people in Galveston, Texas,

were finally told that they were free. But this was more than two years after the Emancipation Proclamation when they were legally freed.

Two and a half years of their lives, their labor, and their dignity stolen.

And that truth never really gets easier to sit with.

But it's something that we need to sit with. You know, for me, Juneteenth is not

just a black holiday. It's an American one. But far too often, especially in white evangelical

spaces, it's met with silence, or reduced to a token acknowledgement. But luckily for me, I didn't grow up in that

silence. I did grow up in a predominantly white town in California, but I was raised in the black church

in a deeply pro-black household where knowing our history wasn't optional.

...