Ristina Gooden, Associate Director of Spiritual Innovation, Faith Matters Network
Definition: Spiritual innovation is the creative, transformative, and subversive ways that Black women engage with and reinterpret spiritual practices, beliefs, and traditions that affirm their dignity, resist oppression, and cultivate communal and personal liberation.
I am a queer, Black woman living in the South — birthed, nourished, and disciplined by Black folk with deep southern roots; lover of Black folk across the diaspora; and one who is guided by Black ancestors. Though raised in the Black Baptist Church, I now identify as a Black humanist who is accountable first to Black people across the globe, and then to all others. I haven’t always been this way. Becoming is a process, and I am still in it. Context matters.
As I sat down to write this reflection, I felt… empty. The heaviness of the world has taken up residence in my mind, body, and spirit. I asked myself: What could I possibly have to say about spiritual innovation that would stop a genocide in Palestine? Undo the violent grip of capitalism and imperialism in the Congo and Sudan? Halt the deportation of hope-filled humans who, like their condemners, arrived on stolen land? Silence the cries of babies, parents, and beloveds as stomachs swell from hunger and pockets shrivel from the myth of not enough? Negotiate with Mother Earth to cool just a bit so my sweat isn’t the only water my garden receives?
In that moment of helplessness, I turned to the closest ancestral technology available on my desk, a deck of oracle cards. A 35th birthday gift from a beloved sister-friend, the Dirt Gems deck was given in honor of the garden I began this spring. It has quietly held me ever since.
I asked the question: What do we need to guide us in the work of spiritual innovation?
Card One: Aloe Vera
This card jumped out the deck—literally. Its grayscale art, child-drawn stars, and dancing squiggles made me chuckle. And that’s the point. Aloe vera reminds us to create good out of the bad. Yes, we live in brutal times. Yes, our ancestors endured horrors we pray never return. And yet, that doesn’t diminish the weight we carry now. And it is in that weight that we find the balm—ancestral technologies like spiritual practices, communal care, recipes, oral traditions. Spiritual innovation blends these with our present realities to build new worlds where all can flourish. It might look like abortion doulas, mutual aid on Instagram, co-leadership, indigenous wisdom circles, or pole dancing ministry. The form doesn’t matter—the function is survival, joy, and forward movement. Aloe reminds us not to be so serious that we forget to laugh. Innovation demands play. Ask Black TikTok.
Card Two: Aconite
This card showed up bold and bright, its lines sharp, its symbols intense: arrows, a door, a scorpion, aconite—the Queen of Poison. Where aloe soothes, aconite confronts. Poison plants mark the edge of what’s possible. They force clarity. In a world wobbling on its axis, we are called to choose: To whom are we loyal? Systems or people? Comfort or integrity? Innovation isn’t neutral. It may cost us convenience, relationships, or even safety—especially for Black, Brown, and Queer bodies. That’s not to glorify martyrdom. It’s to name the stakes. And still, we must choose. Not perfectly, but faithfully. We’ll get it wrong. But choosing to do nothing out of fear of being wrong? That’s the real danger. Innovation requires us to act from our commitments, to teach, to build, to disrupt. In that choice, transformation becomes possible.
Card Three: Wild Yam
This one took its time. Maybe because it’s the hardest. The card is gorgeous—hearts, rainbows, hands open wide, a house, a ladder. It invites balance. Cue the eye roll. Who has time for balance when the world is on fire? How am I supposed to sleep eight hours, go to therapy, drink water, raise babies, fight fascism, and answer every group chat meme? I can’t. We can’t. And that’s the point. We are not meant to do it all alone. Wild yam reminds us that balance isn’t about perfection—it’s about interdependence. Spiritual innovation isn’t sustainable without community. Someone teaches, another cooks. One protests, another rests. One holds vigil, another holds the baby. We rotate. We share. We honor seasons. This is how we make life possible. Not through individual grit, but through collective rhythm. That is the only way we survive.
Spiritual innovation isn’t about novelty for novelty’s sake—it’s about remembering, reimagining, and reclaiming what keeps us alive and connected. It invites us to listen deeply, risk boldly, and build lovingly in the face of chaos.
Read More Definitions of Spiritual Innovation
- Sandy Hong, Spiritual innovation trainer and practitioner focused on the US and Korean diaspora
- Edina Leković, Muslim thought leader and community builder
- Noosim Naimasiah, Pan-African scholar-activist
- Sid Schwarz, Jewish thought leader and convener of spiritual innovators
- Susumu Shimazono, Japanese sociologist of religion
- Cristine Takuá, Maxakali Indigenous philosopher and educator
- Brandon Vaidyanathan, Catholic sociologist and spiritual innovator
