Kwanzaa today, day 3, is about (Collective Work and Responsibility)

Photo courtesy U.S. State Dept. Stamp issued by the U.S. government in 1997.

Today, the daddy is feeling the Kwanzaa holiday and the principle of Ujima. This principle is a pledge "to build and maintain our community together and make our brothers and sisters problems our problems and to solve them together."

The daddy is thinking that the principle Ujima (collective work and responsibility) and Nia (purpose), when put together, clearly makes the Kwanzaa a collection of principles that remind us, that call upon, to pledge, or re-pledge, to work toward the betterment of our families and communities. But what does the founder of Kwanzaa, Ron Karenga, have to say? Here are some of the comments he made in an interview with Beliefnet.

Beliefnet: Why celebrate Kwanzaa in December among the religious holidays that are celebrated in the same month? Do you feel it might add to the misconception that Kwanzaa should be celebrated in place of Christmas or other December holidays?

Maulana Karenga: The first reason for the choice of date of Kwanzaa was for cultural authenticity. A central model for Kwanzaa is umkhosi or the Zulu first-fruit celebration which is seven days and is celebrated about this time. Other first-fruit celebrations were celebrated at the end of the old year and the beginning of the New Year such as Pert-em-Min of ancient Egypt. So Kwanzaa's model is older than Christmas and Hanukkah and thus does not borrow from them or seek to imitate them in the or manner.

People may celebrate either or all of the year-end holidays. And it makes little sense to attribute Kwanzaa's date of celebration to misconceptions about its replacing Christmas or Hanukkah when it is simply following a pre-established season for African first-fruit celebrations which precede both Hanukkah and Christmas.

Moreover, Kwanzaa is a cultural holiday not a religious one. And it builds on African commonality, not on the religious, political and other choices we make which often separate us and cause us to focus on difference rather than similarity. In the final analysis, it all depends on personal choice; people choose holidays to celebrate, religions to practice and philosophies to follow. We do not show proper respect for diversity if we blame personal choice and change on one holiday or another.

Beliefnet: While many of us know that Kwanzaa is drawn from ancient African culture and tradition, how much of it comes from African religions? Lately it has been connected more closely to religion by many observers.

Maulana Karenga: Kwanzaa does not come from African religions, it comes from African culture. But no serious student of African culture - ancient or modern, continental or diasporan - can deny that African spirituality pervades African life.

Religion as an organized body of doctrine, practices and structures differs from spirituality. Spirituality is intense rational and emotional appreciation of and commitment to the Transcendent and the Ultimate. This can be approached in various ways, theologically, ethically or a combination of both. Kwanzaa self-consciously avoids theological emphasis, for it is this emphasis that reveals and cultivates differences. What Kwanzaa does stress is the ethical which brings forth the best of African and human thought and practice and offers a basis of common ground. So when Kwanzaa draws on ancient Egyptian teachings from the Husia or teachings of the Yoruba from the Odu Ifa, it is not to teach theology but to urge that we speak truth, do justice, honor our elders and ancestors, cherish and challenge our children, care for the poor and vulnerable among us, have a rightful relationship with the environment, constantly resist evil and always raise up and pursue the good. This ethical focus finds common ground in all religious or spiritual traditions I know. So why would someone be threatened by the stress on bringing and doing good in and for the world?

Also, as a celebration of family, community and culture, Kwanzaa is a time of ingathering of the people to reaffirm the bonds between them; a time of special reverence for the Creator, in thanks and respect for the blessings, bountifulness and beauty of creation; a time of commemoration of the past in pursuit of its lessons and in honor of its models of excellence, our ancestors; a time of recommitment to our highest cultural ideals in our ongoing efforts to be the best of what it means to be both African and human in the fullest sense; and a time for the celebration of the Good, the good of life and indeed, of existence, the good of the awesome and the ordinary, in a word, the good of the divine, the social and the natural. Who would find fault with these ethical practices?

Finally, Kwanzaa brings a cultural message which speaks to the best of what it means to be both African and human in its stress on four pillars of African ethics: the dignity and rights of the human person, the well-being and flourishing of family and community, the integrity and value of the environment, and the reciprocal solidarity and cooperation for mutual benefit of humanity. All these above emphases are ethical and at one level spiritual, but belong to no particular religion. And it is their inclusive character that allows people of good will to embrace them as essential elements of common ground for the common good.

Cearly, Karenga is saying that Kwanzaa is all about family, culture and a commitment to care of community. The principle of Ujima, collective work and responsibility, clearly suggests that Kwanzaa is about family, community and keeping the best of our culture alive.

What do you think about when you read "collective work and responsibility?"