Love, Auntie: Parables and Prayers for Sacred Belonging (HC) (2024)

Where can we go when the world refuses to see us in our fullness? When culture reduces us to categories and stereotypes and even our churches make us feel like we don't fit in? If we're blessed to have an Auntie--someone who, like Jesus, welcomes us wholly and calls us beloved--then we have glimpsed the liberation and divine affirmation of sacred belonging.
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Time and again, Aunties have offered a model for undoing, becoming, and embracing our identities and deepest beliefs. Auntie culture, particularly in Black spaces, is immediately recognizable as an embodied experience where nieces, nephews, and "niblings" feel safe, heard, and seen. Whether we are biological or simply beloved kin, Aunties welcome us in.
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In Love, Auntie, Shantell Hinton Hill--aka Reverend Auntie--offers tender testimonies to a flock of loved ones who have been led to believe they do not belong. Through modern-day parables, prayers, and prompts for reflection, she invites readers to sit alongside the wisdom-bearing of Black women, lovingly known as Aunties, as they carve out space for doubts, questions, and spiritual expression that honor intersecting identities of race, gender, and class. Because trust and believe, Aunties always know how to turn mess into miracles.