Braxton Institute Reparations Leaders Featured in NBC4 Special

The Braxton Institute continues to lead the conversation on reparative justice and community restoration, as highlighted in a recent NBC4 special. The segment featured Dr. Joanne Braxton, founder and President of the Braxton Institute, alongside Maxine Gross, College Park Reparative Justice Commission Chair and Braxton Institute’s Reparations for Lakeland Now! initiative. 

Testimony on SB469

Today was a long but good day. I had the honor of giving testimony before the Maryland Senate Committee on Education, Energy, and Environment on MD SB469 – the Harriet Tubman Community Investment Act (Maryland Reparations Study for Black Descendants of Enslaved Individuals). We were required to submit our testimony in advance, and I thought I was being slick by submitting mine as “written testimony” instead of “oral and written testimony'“; My plan was to have my testimony on the record and then sit back and watch the activities unfold.

From the Library of Congress, featuring our CEO and President of the Board Rev. Joanne M. Braxton, PhD: "At the Crossroads of Health and Spirituality."

"The 'Tree of Life' project examines the ways in which people of African descent create pathways to achieve resiliency and sustain health through their responses to the legacies and impacts of slavery and structural inequality. Scholars suggest that spirituality emerges as a protective factor for physical and social well-being (Chao 2010; Crowther, et. al. 2004). What can be learned from the legacies and traditions of African American communities as sources of survival and healing for body, mind and spirit? What particular challenges do African American civic and religious leaders face in the pursuit of health for their communities and themselves? How might answers to these questions shape clinical practice and the future training of physicians, ministers, and spiritual activists? I offer three case studies that utilize unique documents at the Library of Congress to help answer these questions."

Read the full interview here.

From Colorlines, featuring attorney and Braxton Institute Board Member at-large, Richael Faithful: "Meet Richael Faithful, a Queer Black 'Street Shaman.'"

“I was seeking a spiritual cleansing, but I didn’t know that that was what I needed,” says Heidi Williamson, a black social justice activist who recently saw Faithful for a session. “The talk therapy alone was not working. The exercise, diet, meditation alone was not getting it either. I needed something else.” Faithful says this is a common thread among the people who seek out her services: “Sometimes I’m the person that folks seek out last because they’ve tried everything else.”

Read the full interview here.