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{"source_url": "https://www.theroot.com", "url": "https://www.theroot.com/free-cyntoia-it-was-her-faith-that-made-it-so-long-be-1840761753", "title": "Cyntoia Brown Was the Personification of Imani in 2019", "top_image": "https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/c_fill,f_auto,fl_progressive,g_center,h_675,pg_1,q_80,w_1200/cvfnuppysmxl9mb9xvzq.png", "meta_img": "https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/c_fill,f_auto,fl_progressive,g_center,h_675,pg_1,q_80,w_1200/cvfnuppysmxl9mb9xvzq.png", "images": ["https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/c_fill,f_auto,fl_progressive,g_center,h_675,pg_1,q_80,w_1200/cvfnuppysmxl9mb9xvzq.png", "https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/c_fill,f_auto,fl_progressive,g_center,h_200,q_80,w_200/kwtueajkkxrpcpjyw9nq.png", "data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw=="], "movies": [], "text": "Photo : AP\n\nIt is most appropriate that we open on this Sunday morning \u2013it\u2019s Wednesday afternoon, you say? Oh. Excuse me, er, that we open on today, in the Christian tradition, with this quote from the King James Version of the Bible: \u201cIf ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed\u2026 nothing shall be impossible unto you.\u201d\n\n\n\nAs Jesus noted above, faith is a powerful thing, and it has been mighty powerful for black people in this country under years of oppressive conditions. It is that which has \u201cgotten us through.\u201d And so it is with faith that we end Kwanzaa, the seven-day African American cultural tradition started more than 50 years ago.\n\n\n\nAdvertisement\n\nImani, or faith, in Kwanzaan lore is defined as believing with all our hearts in our people, our parents, our teachers, our leaders, and the righteousness and victory of our struggle. Last year, the person who exemplified faith was Stacey Abrams; in 2017 it was the black women of Alabama.\n\n\n\nLet me tell you a story: in August 2019, a young woman named Cyntoia Brown walked through a Tenessee prison\u2019s gates a free woman, after being exonerated for killing a 43-year-old white man when she was 16 years old.\n\nCyntoia Brown Granted Clemency Tennessee Governor Bill Haslam, in one of his last acts in office, has granted clemency to\u2026 Read more\n\nCyntoia was sex trafficked by said man and said she feared for her life when she took his. She shot him and was convicted of murder, her sentence ensuring that she would never again see a day outside of a jail\u2019s walls.\n\nAdvertisement\n\nYet, it was Brown\u2019s faith, detailed in her memoir, Free Cyntoia: My Search for Redemption in the American Prison System, that kept her sane, kept her grounded, and kept her knowing in her heart of hearts that she would be free. She also spoke of freedom in spiritual terms shortly after her release.\n\n\u201cI just want to let you know before I was physically in prison, I was bound up in prisons in shame, prisons in anger, prisons in feeling like I had to do things to be accepted by other people. God saved me from that,\u201d said Brown. \u201cThere is freedom in Jesus. When I live for him and to be accepted by him, I have to do absolutely nothing. Just be myself.\u201d\n\nAdvertisement\n\nSo whatever your spritiual practice\u2014even if you don\u2019t subscribe to one\u2014let us bring our faith into 2020, our belief in ourselves and the forces of good to get us through. This year is going to be a doozy, and we can learn from Cyntoia Brown and others like her, that it\u2019s about emancipating our minds and hearts first and foremost and having the courage to continue to believe in the might of right in the face of all that is formed against us.\n\nAmen, Ase, and hells yeah.", "keywords": [], "meta_keywords": ["Imani", "Faith", "Kwanzaa", "Kwanzaa 2019", "cyntoia brown", "cyntoia brown long", "The Root"], "tags": ["Filed to: Imani"], "authors": [], "publish_date": null, "summary": "", "article_html": "", "meta_description": "It is most appropriate that we open on this Sunday morning \u2013it\u2019s Wednesday afternoon, you say? Oh. Excuse me, er, that we open on today, in the Christian tradition, with this quote from the King James Version of the Bible: \u201cIf ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed\u2026 nothing shall be impossible unto you.\u201d", "meta_lang": "en", "meta_favicon": "https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/c_fill,f_auto,fl_progressive,g_center,h_80,q_80,w_80/f5zr3vuc90hrpnmx0nme.png", "meta_data": {"google-site-verification": "P13oAn8o8LB6FVCJWKsHWXvxfbR-SJrmvox6EgULpUs", "ir-site-verification-token": "-1270174611", "viewport": "width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0, minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=10.0", "ROBOTS": "INDEX, FOLLOW", "msapplication-square70x70logo": "https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/c_fill,f_auto,fl_progressive,g_center,h_80,q_80,w_80/f5zr3vuc90hrpnmx0nme.png", "msapplication-square150x150logo": "https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/c_fill,f_auto,fl_progressive,g_center,h_200,q_80,w_200/f5zr3vuc90hrpnmx0nme.png", "keywords": "Imani, Faith, Kwanzaa, Kwanzaa 2019, cyntoia brown, cyntoia brown long, The Root", "news_keywords": "Imani, Faith, Kwanzaa, Kwanzaa 2019, cyntoia brown, cyntoia brown long, The Root", "twitter": {"url": "https://www.theroot.com/free-cyntoia-it-was-her-faith-that-made-it-so-long-be-1840761753", "card": "summary_large_image", "site": "@TheRoot", "title": "Free Cyntoia: It Was Her Faith That Made It So, Long Before She Left Prison", "description": "It is most appropriate that we open on this Sunday morning \u2013it\u2019s Wednesday afternoon, you say? 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