It goes with out saying that 2025 has been a hell of a 12 months for Blackfolk. So, how are we approaching the vacation season? Some say they’re doing completely nothing, in protest of the insanity. Others say they’re doing all of the issues… additionally in protest of the insanity.
What insanity, you ask? The checklist is lengthy and sobering:
Eradicating instruments to problem discriminatory housing, lending, employment, and schooling practices.
Firing and furloughing large quantities of presidency employees, leading to over 300,000 Black ladies professionals dropping their jobs.
Dismantling federal DEI packages.
Criminalizing the instructing of Black historical past.
Slicing public housing and renter protections.
Ending SNAP advantages.
Detaining and deporting immigrants and residents alike with masked ICE brokers and no due course of.
Deploying militarized troops into U.S. cities as if they have been international battlefields.
Partaking in overt racial gerrymandering that multiplies the facility of white votes whereas erasing Black and Brown political power.
Ending ladies’s bodily autonomy.
Undermining democracy and the rule of legislation.
Killing almost 100 folks in worldwide waters with out trial.
Waging tariff wars which have raised the worth of all the pieces.
And that’s only a snippet of the Trump- and Abbott-led insurance policies which have battered Black life in 2025.
But in response to this Venture 2025 actuality, Black Houstonians are discovering artistic, restorative, cultural, and deeply religious methods to have fun the vacations.
Conventional celebrations
For some, returning to custom is the protest.
“Throughout this Thanksgiving season, my household will collect in my house the place we are going to prepare dinner, grill, and bake much more meals than we may ever eat,” mentioned Rev. Dr. Angela Ravin-Anderson, director of Wheeler Avenue Baptist Church’s Social Justice Ministry. “In a time marked by political upheaval and uncertainty, these moments of togetherness matter greater than ever. Our household traditions floor us, heart us, and remind us of what’s actually most vital: loving each other.”
Equally, Angie Stubbs says her household is holding tight to connection.
“We’re spending the vacations targeted on household as at all times,” shared Stubbs. “We’re spending Thanksgiving with my facet of the household and a part of Christmas with my husband’s facet. On the day earlier than Thanksgiving, we’re volunteering on the Houston Meals Financial institution so we may be of service to those that have wants throughout this season.”
In years previous, the Stubbs household typically celebrated the vacations overseas, however 2025 is totally different.
“This 12 months, we actually wish to relaxation and simply spend time collectively. The 12 months has been mentally taxing, and prioritizing peace, relaxation, and quiet is paramount,” Stubbs added. “We’re shopping for fewer merchandise this 12 months, however supporting small or minority-owned companies and companies that worth my group.
“There are some shops that completely gained’t see my {dollars} as a result of the positions they’ve taken publicly on points have been opposite to what we imagine.”
Cultural focus
For others, the vacations stay a time to honor ancestors and affirm tradition, not a mythologized Pilgrim narrative.
“Like most Black households, we don’t have fun Thanksgiving for the standard causes,” mentioned Adrianne Walker. “We use this time to mirror on how grateful we’re and to honor our ancestors. This 12 months, my sister and I’ve determined to bake collectively by way of FaceTime. We’ll be making our gran’s rolls and our mom’s cheesecake, each now ancestors.”
Walker mentioned the nation’s political local weather after the November 2024 Presidential Election immediately impacted her household’s method to the vacations final 12 months.
“There was such a powerful feeling of doom and gloom. Nervousness was excessive, everybody was tense and the world appeared to have gone loopy,” recalled Walker. “We determined to start out the Christmas season slightly early. We put up and embellished our Christmas tree after Thanksgiving dinner. I assumed it will be an amazing alternative for us all to embellish collectively whereas everybody was house for Thanksgiving.”
“Like most Black households, we don’t have fun Thanksgiving for the standard causes. We use this time to mirror on how grateful we’re and to honor our ancestors.”
Adrianne Walker
Her household plans to take that very same method this vacation season.
“We have to come collectively and have fun the nice at any time when we will. We begin adorning our house a lot earlier and rather more than we’ve got in earlier years. The vacation season simply makes you are feeling good. We want extra vacation pleasure for so long as we will,” she added.
Some households are navigating much more layered histories.
Dr. Ruth Allen Ollison, pastor of Beulah Land Group Church, is rethinking Thanksgiving in gentle of her grandchildren’s Wampanoag heritage. The Wampanoags are the Indigenous People who first encountered the Europeans, who finally colonized the Americas.
“How can we honor their a part of the household, the Wampanoags, and in addition have fun Thanksgiving? Someplace in that historical past, the folks they confirmed reside circled and stole their land,” mentioned Ollison.
Nonetheless, she is obvious.
“As Black folks, we’ve got different points. However we’re grateful to God. We’re not grateful concerning the issues occurring within the nation. We’re not grateful about folks attempting to chop us in a foreign country. We’re not going wherever. We’re grateful to God that we’re robust, wonderful, fantastic folks, minimize from wonderful material.”
New approaches
Some try one thing utterly totally different.
“We’re doing one thing we’ve by no means executed earlier than,” mentioned truck driver and minister David Marshall. “We leased an Airbnb for your complete quick household as a result of we’ve got a big household, and we’re all coming collectively underneath one roof.”
His spouse, Susan Marshall, says politics didn’t drive the shift, however by a want to be absolutely collectively.
“Normally, throughout the holidays, the children come by in units as a result of we don’t have a big house,” mentioned Susan. “This time I mentioned, let’s do one thing the place all of us may be there collectively. It’s not about gift-giving. Being collectively… that’s our Christmas.”
The Marshalls additionally lead their church’s Christmas Toy Drive and take part in Houston’s Kwanzaa traditions.
For others, “all of the issues” is the best way ahead.
“We’re leaning extra towards all of the issues, however in a communal manner,” mentioned Dara and David Landry, house owners of CLASS Bookstore. “This can be a season to circle the wagons… to be with your loved ones by blood or by creation.”
The Landrys will spend Thanksgiving with Dara’s household in East Texas, after which return to Houston for Christmas and past.
“We will’t wait to be with our folks for Kwanzaa. We’re higher once we’re collectively,” Dara added.
Some are doing a lot much less.
“I will likely be resting,” mentioned activist Aisha Shahid. “I’m solely going to at least one household home, no stress. Imaginative and prescient board and planning for subsequent 12 months.”
Houston goes large
Regardless of tens of hundreds of pledges to take part within the Black Friday Mass Blackout—and plenty of voices vowing to dramatically cut back 2025’s festivities—many Black Houstonians are selecting resistance by way of fervent celebration.
Please tell us the way you and your family members are spending the vacations. And share your vacation pics at information@defendernetwork.com (put HOLIDAY PICS within the information line).
Options to take advantage of the 2025 vacation season
Prioritize relaxation and psychological wellness by scheduling downtime.
Store deliberately: help Black-owned, native, or values-aligned companies.
Create or strengthen cultural rituals, comparable to ancestor tables, storytelling, and recipe sharing.
Volunteer with group organizations serving susceptible households.
Arrange small-budget or no-budget gatherings targeted on connection, not consumption.
Take part in Kwanzaa or different cultural celebrations to reaffirm group unity.
Set boundaries to keep away from vacation stress and political exhaustion.
Use the vacation break to vision-plan for 2026 with household or a trusted group.
