The Most Reverend Desmond M. Tutu, OMSG DD FKC
Anglican Archbishop Emeritus of Cape Town

Archbishop Tutu said, “In a happy family, you don’t receive in proportion to your input. You receive in relation to your needs.”

“If we could but recognize our common humanity, that we do belong together, that our destinies are bound up in one another’s, that we can be free only together, that we can survive only together, that we can be human only together then a glorious world would come into being where all of us lived harmoniously together as members of one family, the human family.  We can be human only together.” 

In order to meet the Archbishop’s call to humanity, we must stop judging and instead start looking for ways to meet each other’s needs.  As we face a new wave of the pandemic, it may be easier to sit back and point to what others have or have not done to reduce its spread and impact as it rages. Instead of criticism and scrutiny over vaccination statuses, I challenge you to ask: Do you care about me, and if not, why not?  The pandemic continues to teach us that we need each other.  So, how do we meet each other’s needs?  If you find yourself in a place where you don’t care about your fellow man, what happened to you that created a space where you don’t care, and how can WE-together heal that space?  It starts with our caring for each other.  “We can only be human together.”  Maybe another way to say and think of this is not fighting for our humanity but loving for it.  We must love for our humanity, which means love each other. 

Thank you Archbishop for your life, your sacrifice, your teaching, your leadership, and your love.

With love,

Dr. Lisa Toppin

Our theme song is “I Need You To Survive” by Hezekiah Walker