{"id":19812,"date":"2021-02-10T10:20:05","date_gmt":"2021-02-10T15:20:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/?p=19812"},"modified":"2021-02-10T10:34:52","modified_gmt":"2021-02-10T15:34:52","slug":"im-on-my-way-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/?p=19812","title":{"rendered":"I&#8217;m On My Way"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/swfG8MndQNU\" allowfullscreen=\"\"><\/iframe><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><em>In prayer we trust \/<\/em>&nbsp;<em>By hope we live \/ On truth we stand \/ From our heart we give \/ Love. \u2014<\/em>Sweet Honey in the Rock<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Dr. Bernice Johnson Reagon founded the iconic African American a cappella group, Sweet Honey in the Rock, which has been performing for over forty years. In her book&nbsp;<\/em>If You Don\u2019t Go, Don\u2019t Hinder Me<em>, Dr. Reagon recounts how many of the songs of the Civil Rights Movement had their origins in the spirituals of the nineteenth century. The first verse of the title song of her book goes, \u201cI\u2019m on my way to Canaan land \/ I\u2019m on my way to Canaan land \/ I\u2019m on my way to Canaan land \/ I\u2019m on my way, great God, I\u2019m on my way.\u201d She writes:<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>During the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s, we sang this song but changed the word \u201cCanaan\u201d to freedom:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&nbsp;<em>I\u2019m on my way to freedom land \/ I\u2019m on my way, great God, I\u2019m on my way.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>One word, \u201cfreedom,\u201d documents the time period. One would not have been able to sing freedom during the time when slavery was an integral part of this country. By the twentieth century, the 1960s, we had cleared enough space with our living and struggling and dying and going on that, no matter what, we could say and sing: \u201cI want my freedom now!\u201d . . .<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Whether you sang \u201cfreedom\u201d during the sixties or the older traditional text with the word \u201cCanaan,\u201d in essence the song says, I must leave or change where I am, and I want you to go with me:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote\"><p><em>I asked my mother come and go with me \/ I\u2019m on my way, great God, I\u2019m on my way.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote\"><p>Brother, sister, pastor . . . I want you to go, but if you don\u2019t go, get out of my way:<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote\"><p><em>If you don\u2019t go, going anyhow \/ I\u2019m on my way, great God, I\u2019m on my way.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote\"><p>If you don\u2019t go, don\u2019t hinder me. . . .<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>During the nineteenth century, being on your way out of slavery usually meant leaving a place to go to another place, covering geographical territory. You actually had to put distance between where you were and where you were headed. During the twentieth-century Civil Rights Movement, being on your way often meant staying where you were and wreaking havoc in your local community, insisting on its transformation so that a new construction could be possible. Black people were determined to rearrange space for themselves and their future. We knew that as tax-paying citizens we deserved access to opportunities and resources provided by our organized governing bodies. It really was well overdue, this standing up and taking up new space\u2014we had to move! . . .<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Richard again: This is the power of the spirituals! Such sacred songs transcend time, still bringing solidarity, hope, and freedom to people today.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"500\" height=\"314\" src=\"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/image-3-500x314.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-19815\" srcset=\"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/image-3-500x314.png 500w, http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/image-3-300x188.png 300w, http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/image-3-768x482.png 768w, http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/image-3.png 1972w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In prayer we trust \/&nbsp;By hope we live \/ On truth we stand \/ From our heart we give \/ Love. \u2014Sweet Honey in the Rock Dr. Bernice Johnson Reagon founded the iconic African American a cappella group, Sweet Honey in the Rock, which has been performing for over forty years. In her book&nbsp;If You [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19812"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19812"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19812\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19818,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19812\/revisions\/19818"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19812"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19812"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19812"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}