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Phyllis Griffin interview transcript, December 21, 2004
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Yandan Wang PG: They met at Fisk University. So here mom and dad were in the Carolinas, and my father is becoming deeply depressed, and my mom says, I think she says, "you need to see if there's any other place in the country where you might be able to follow your patients into the hospital." And he found Still Osteopathic College in Des Moines, Iowa. I suspect my mother found it. Which mean that he had to go back to school. So my father has 2 medical degrees. NL: If I recall, this was a relatively celebrated, uh, invitation to Des Moines. The Bystander had an article where it was welcoming Dr. Stanely Griffin to Still Osteopathic College PG: Really? NL: Yeah, I'm sure I have it notes somewhere, I'll have to look for it later. PG: Ok. I believe you. NL: Um, did your family regularly attend church? And can you describe how important religion was to the family. PG: Yes, we started out a, uh, a church of my fathers religion, which I believe was Baptist, and uh, African American. And then we have always grappled with this issue about, about hell. And we find Hell to be a rather useless concept. NL: How so? PG: It promotes guilt. And guilt it what keeps people in place, and inactive. And so we switched over to my mothers religion, which was Unitarianism. NL: And how much would you say that religion or spirituality was a part of the inspiration for your families activism? PG: It was more, um, it inspired me to argue about God. Because it was like, uh, no, you cannot make a statement that God is white. So then, um, Sunday School...matter of fact, I think I was eleven, when that question was put to the group, "What color do you think God is?"And every single person going around the table said "god's White, God's white," And she went up to me, and I went, "I don't think you can say that God is white. I think you can say that God may be a rainbow color, but definitely you can't say that God is white, and uh, I think we were off to the races from then on as far as my interaction with the Unitarian Church. I believe my mother inspired the Unitarian church. I believe my mother inspired the Unitarian church to action...and uh, really talked about the importance of ending the War in Vietnam, which included public demonstration against the war. She had ongoing forums about, um, discussing the philosophy of non-violence. I think she struggled with it herself, because she didn't believe people should just suffer violence being perpetrated
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Yandan Wang PG: They met at Fisk University. So here mom and dad were in the Carolinas, and my father is becoming deeply depressed, and my mom says, I think she says, "you need to see if there's any other place in the country where you might be able to follow your patients into the hospital." And he found Still Osteopathic College in Des Moines, Iowa. I suspect my mother found it. Which mean that he had to go back to school. So my father has 2 medical degrees. NL: If I recall, this was a relatively celebrated, uh, invitation to Des Moines. The Bystander had an article where it was welcoming Dr. Stanely Griffin to Still Osteopathic College PG: Really? NL: Yeah, I'm sure I have it notes somewhere, I'll have to look for it later. PG: Ok. I believe you. NL: Um, did your family regularly attend church? And can you describe how important religion was to the family. PG: Yes, we started out a, uh, a church of my fathers religion, which I believe was Baptist, and uh, African American. And then we have always grappled with this issue about, about hell. And we find Hell to be a rather useless concept. NL: How so? PG: It promotes guilt. And guilt it what keeps people in place, and inactive. And so we switched over to my mothers religion, which was Unitarianism. NL: And how much would you say that religion or spirituality was a part of the inspiration for your families activism? PG: It was more, um, it inspired me to argue about God. Because it was like, uh, no, you cannot make a statement that God is white. So then, um, Sunday School...matter of fact, I think I was eleven, when that question was put to the group, "What color do you think God is?"And every single person going around the table said "god's White, God's white," And she went up to me, and I went, "I don't think you can say that God is white. I think you can say that God may be a rainbow color, but definitely you can't say that God is white, and uh, I think we were off to the races from then on as far as my interaction with the Unitarian Church. I believe my mother inspired the Unitarian church. I believe my mother inspired the Unitarian church to action...and uh, really talked about the importance of ending the War in Vietnam, which included public demonstration against the war. She had ongoing forums about, um, discussing the philosophy of non-violence. I think she struggled with it herself, because she didn't believe people should just suffer violence being perpetrated
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