An episode of “Changing the Conversation” podcast
Minister Randy Muhammad and Brother Jeffrey Lewis discuss supporting recovery for Black, Indigenous, and other people of color (BIPOC) including peer support and community engagement strategies with host Ashley Stewart.
May 20, 2024
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Ashley Stewart, Host (00:05): Hello, everyone, and welcome to Changing the Conversation. I’m your host, Dr. Ashley Stewart, the director of the Center for Health Equity at C4 Innovations. This episode is the second in a series focusing on the Recovery Education Collaborative, also known as the REC. I’m so grateful to have two amazing guests on the podcast. Minister Randy Muhammad, the executive director of Torchlight Recovery, Incorporated.
(00:35): How are you feeling today, Minister Randy?
Bro. Randy Muhammad, Guest (00:38): Oh, Dr. Stewart, I’m so good and happy to be here. Excited about having this conversation.
Ashley (00:43): Me, too. Also, we will be having this conversation with Brother Jeffrey. Brother Jeffrey is the supervisor of Torchlight Engagement Team.
(00:53): How are you feeling today, Brother Jeffrey?
Bro. Jeffrey Lewis, Guest (00:55): I’m feeling too blessed to be stressed, Dr. Ashley, and ready to talk to you again.
Ashley (01:00): I love that. We had a great conversation last time, didn’t we Brother Jeffrey?
Bro. Jeffrey (01:04): Excellent, excellent.
Ashley (01:06): First, Minister Randy, can you tell us a little bit about what the REC is?
Bro. Randy (01:12): The REC is the Recovery Education Collaborative. It is truly a collaboration of four organizations that are providing recovery support services in the state of Massachusetts. We are charged with providing recovery education and training for recovery coaches and recovery coach supervisors.
Ashley (01:33): I hope that folks also have the opportunity to learn more about the REC and the work that REC is doing all across the state. Folks play a lot of different roles within the REC. Each organization has its own area of focus. Can you tell me a little bit about what Torchlight does within the REC?
Bro. Randy (01:51): Yes. Torchlight became a strategic partner within the REC to expand the workforce development among the BIPOC community. Torchlight, having an extensive history and deep roots within our community, our role is to work within the BIPOC community to expand the workforce development, an d also to provide outreach services to make sure that the BIPOC community is receiving the information, and the trainings and the services that the REC is providing.
Ashley (02:27): Minister Randy, can you tell us a little bit about Torchlight Recovery, Incorporated? What is Torchlight, what do y’all do? What do you represent?
Bro. Randy (02:37): Sure. Torchlight Recovery is an organization we formed two years ago in 2022. We officially received our 501C3. But it’s the brainchild of myself and a group of us, that we’ve been really thinking about this work and how we could expand our capacity to serve our community. We are an outgrowth of my ministry, Muhammad Mosque No. 11. We’ve been serving our community for decades. We’ve always been thinking about how we can really expand our capacity to provide these services to our people in the BIPOC community.
(03:24): We know that our community has been suffering with the scourge of addiction for decades before it became a buzzword. Before it was really looked at and considered a disease, when addiction was criminalized in our communities. Going back to the ’60s, but definitely through the ’80s with the crack epidemic that hit our community. We were devastated. Many in our community were not really provided service or support. They were sent to prison. I did a lot of years as a Chaplin, doing prison ministry. Inevitably, that’s who I was servicing, were a lot of our people who were incarcerated due to substance use disorders.
(04:14): Torchlight is an outgrowth of the ministry. We decided to come together to really organize and to be able to serve our people, not only in the prisons, but we wanted to really engage in doing some preventative work. Really providing them services to our people on the street, trying to prevent them from going into prison and really helping them as they’re dealing with addiction. That’s Torchlight. We provide services. We have an outreach engagement team that’s doing a lot of great work in the Nubian Square, the neighborhood in Roxbury. We also provide prison ministry. I’m excited that we are now opening up a recovery support center in Grove Hall, which is located in the heart of the Black community. We’ll be opening up a recovery cafe will be opening up in June.
Ashley (05:10): That’s so exciting. The work that you’re doing, both in this unique subset of focus area, working and touching multiple populations. But then, also this amazing recovery café, which to my understanding is the second recovery café in the state of Massachusetts. Can y’all tell us a little bit about the vision behind that and how that got started?
Bro. Randy (05:33): I’m a minister, a man of faith, so obviously I believe in God. When you have a desire to do something, you know what you want to do, you may not know how you’re going to do it. But if you have this sincere, honest desire to do it, God will provide the way and the resources.
(05:55): As we formulated Torchlight Recovery, and began to do our work and outreach, the state of Massachusetts was looking to really increase its BIPOC representation, looking at the lack of representation from the BIPOC community in the peer workforce space and in recovery coaches. They had reached out to us, knowing our decades of work, and really let us know what kind of opportunities were out there. Massachusetts was expanding its recovery support centers. We were blessed to receive, to be awarded the grant and to be accepted as a new recovery support center.
(06:39): As we were thinking about providing these services, we looked at several models. There’s the traditional model of a recovery support center. The recovery café is a particular model of a recovery support center. We really liked the model because it really is about loving accountability. It’s a membership model that allows us to hold our members lovingly accountable for their recovery. We provide a meal. We provide our space and programming, and the recovery circles, and access to recovery coaches, and access to the school of recovery that includes several programs to increase their recovery capital. It’s a beautiful space.
(07:30): The membership is free, but three things are required. It requires that, one, you’re sober in the space. Two, it requires that you make a commitment to attend your recovery circle at least once a week. Every member will be assigned to a recovery circle and they would be required to attend that recovery circle every week. Everyone will be required to give back to the café in some meaningful way, volunteering in whatever capacity they’re able to. I liked that model as it really does hold people accountable and it’s really geared to those that are really trying to be sincere and actively participating in the process of recovery.
(08:19): We had a chance to go and visit the first recovery café in Massachusetts, which is in Lowell, the Lowell Recovery Café. It’s a beautiful place. When we went there and we seen how it was run, and the people there, and the membership, it was really a beautiful model. We knew that we had to bring that model to the Black community, to Boston, to Grove Hall. We also became a part of the recovery café network.
Ashley (08:49): it’s so amazing and profound to have this work be led through the ministry.
(08:555): Brother Jeffrey, can you talk a little bit about what it means for this work to be led by ministry for you?
Bro. Jeffrey (09:01): Absolutely. Where I’m at today is a product of coming into that ministry. If I didn’t hear the words that I heard, if I didn’t see the example that I had in front of me, then I wouldn’t be able to be of assistance in the way that I am today. People continually tell me that I’m impactful and well-spoken, and all those type of things, but that is a direct correlation to what was given to me. I’m definitely duty-bound to give back. A lot of what I got was through that ministry.
(09:35): If you’re talking about the work that’s been done, I think you’ve mentioned Nubian Square. When we went down there, we were giving food away. On that day, there was an area that almost a block long. In that block, there was everything happening. There was people using drugs. There were people fighting. There were people that were being sold. When I was standing across the street, it had a major impact on me. The thought that came to mind was it being the Sea of Sin, reference to the Sea of Sin and the depths of Hell. These things came into my mind, we’re looking at that.
(10:12): From that point forward, we were dispatched to go down there and engage the brothers and sisters that were down there. To try to just share whatever we could share, whether it be resources, whether it be a good word, whether it be example. No matter what it was, to try to help aid them to come out of the condition that they were in, try to connect them to things that would help them in the woes that they were dealing with.
(10:36): Another component of us being down there was businesses closing early because they were either scared to do business after a certain time, unable to do business because of the different things that were occurring down there. Also, the youth, it wasn’t a safe area for the youth who have to go to that location in order to get on buses to go to their different parts of the city where they live. We were able to come in and just come from a perspective of understanding. Come from a perspective of love, non-judgement and engage the community, and make a major impact immediately.
(11:15): The ministry, the engagement, and the line of thinking and the manner in which we look at our people, which is one of love and respect as a brother or a sister. It had a major impact. The ministry had a major impact on my life. In turn, I’m able to go out there with the brothers, and we’re able to engage and have a major impact on the communities there. Torchlight is amazing. The engagement team is essential for the area. That’s what I got.
Ashley (11:44): Absolutely, absolutely. The work that you all are doing, particularly as we get into this engagement work that you’re doing in Nubian Square, really centering in the heart of Black and BIPOC communities, is something that listeners can connect to all across the nation. I’m wondering, what are some of the things that you find to be so important to focus on in terms of a system perspective, as it relates to the amazing work you’re doing in the Nubian Square neighborhood?
Bro. Jeffrey (12:16): I think some of the major things to focus on is the collaboration of resources. Also, holding organizations accountable to that which they say that they’re going to bring to the table. Because the people in the community, they don’t know what resources are supposed to be allotted to them or what funds from organizations was earmarked for Nubian Square, or whatever area you work in. But by us having that knowledge and information, we’re able to not only bring the resources but also talk to the organizations that have these resources and connect them to the people that they’re supposed to be connected to.
(12:55): I think that’s a major component because when we first started going out there, the main question was, “What are you guys doing out here? What do you have to offer? What is it?” Initially, we had information and knowledge of some resources. But after getting that question over and over again, it was made abundantly clear that we had to go and engage the different resources, and bring them back to the area that we were working.
Bro. Randy (13:22): Yeah, if I could chime in on that. One of the things that’s important is, and I think that we’re building … I think Massachusetts is doing a relatively good job, no one is perfect. The biggest room in any house is the room for improvement, but I think that we’re doing a pretty good job in creating. What we’re talking about is creating what is called ROSC, a recovery-oriented system of care. I think that the Nubian engagement team demonstrates that.
(13:50): When we began, we were reached out to from members of the business community who were really concerned about the population that was encroaching in their business, which was an outgrowth of the Mass and Cass area. Mass and Cass is an area in Boston where there were a lot of the recovery support services were being provided. However, what it turned into, it looked like an opening a drug market where a lot of those that were in addiction were just gathering, there were tents. They were getting high in the open. What it was, a lot of the services were centralized in one area so it was attracting folks with substance use disorders from the entire state were coming to this one place. It was over-spilling. As it continued to grow, it was encroaching into neighborhoods and community where those who were struggling with addiction were out there, creating the environment that Brother Jeffrey just talked about.
(14:56): They had reached out to us, the brothers from the mosque, Muhammad Mosque No. 11, almost as a security force where they wanted us to go down there and clean it up. I remember being in one of the initial meetings and pushing back on that. Letting them know, particularly in Nubian Square, because the population was a little bit different than what we were seeing in Mass and Cass. Where in Nubian Square, those were actually folks from that community, from the Black and brown community. Nubian Square, which was formerly known as Dudley Square historically, has been a Black community. Like I said earlier, our communities have been ravaged with addiction for years.
(15:37): We went down there not with the mind state of muscle and moving our people out, but we were adamant to make sure that we held the city accountable and everybody accountable to provide the same type of services that were being offered other places. And that a lot of these agencies were saying they provide these services, whether it was rehabilitation, whether it was food, whether it was housing, we wanted to make sure that our people in Nubian Square area received those resources. We went and as a result of that push, what developed was a collaboration which brought many service providers. The community health centers got involved. Hospitals, Mass General Hospital got involved. We brought in law enforcement, the MBTA police because there’s a major MBTA station in Nubian Square. We got homeless shelters. Really, a lot of the service providers began to come and meet on a weekly basis and seeing how we could mitigate the circumstances.
(16:43): I think that all of that played a role in changing the landscape. I think, again, I’ll reiterate the importance of continuing to build on a recovery oriented system of care. Not looking at it as we’re trying to criminalize our people who are dealing with addiction, but creating this system of care that brings many different agencies to bear to bring that support.
Ashley (17:09): Yeah, that’s so important. That work is deeply rooted in essential community values, which I think align so much with recovery values. I know that you all are engaging in this work around a recovery café. Can you talk a little bit about the role of peers and why peers are integral in uplifting equity in the peer workforce?
Bro. Randy (17:33): One word I’ll say is authenticity. Peers bring authenticity. In truth, that’s what started my journey in the ministry. When I was a young man coming into the nation of Islam, I came from a checkered past. I was a juvenile delinquent, if you will. I was involved in and I was a member of a gang. I was in the streets. I was getting high, drinking and smoking, and living that lifestyle before I accepted Islam and changed my life. When I did change my life, those of my leaders in the mosque who understood and knew where I was coming from, they sent me into the prisons because they felt, “Who better to minister to those in the streets than someone that come from the streets?” That was peer support. What that brings is authenticity.
(18:27): When people see us and they see that we are folks with lived experience, we are folks that have walked the same streets that they walked and come from the same circumstances that they come, what it brings is authenticity. It brings credibility because what people are seeing is if you was able to make it, if you can change, then I can change. I think it’s very important to the peer workforce that we have those with lived experiences that can be on the frontline, reaching back to serve those that are still in the trenches.
Ashley (19:01): Yeah. Thank you so much, Minister Randy. Brother Jeffrey, do you have anything you want to add about the importance and that integral nature of equity in peer work?
Bro. Jeffrey (19:12): When you’re having a conversation with someone and you have lived experience … There’s something else I wanted to share that I’m intentional about sharing no matter where I go is that I have eight years of recovery time. I am a person that has lived experience as well. When you go and you’re communicating with somebody whose trying to get on the road to recovery, and you’re looking at them directly in their eye and having that conversation, they’re able to identify how genuine. He spoke of authenticity. They could identify even the words you say, your body movements, it brings a sense of comfort when engaging somebody. It breaks down barriers and defenses that are established, just because the stigma attached to addiction. The different things that are said or the different lines of thinking that one may have of being judged.
(20:03): It breaks down the walls and barriers, and it allows the person whose at a point where they’re trying to get on that road to recovery to do it in a way that may be less stressful. Especially if you’re dealing with somebody who maybe doesn’t have lived experience or can’t really connect directly with the person they’re dealing with, that could be a hindrance and that could actually lead to one going back down away from recovery and back into addiction. When someone is at a point where they’re trying to start down the road of recovery, or up the road of recovery I should say, every second matters, every word matters. It’s really a delicate situation. I think that the peers’ role is an essential aspect. I believe, in the state of Massachusetts, it’s starting to be recognized as that.
Ashley (20:53): One of the things that’s really resonating with me and sitting with me is that you all are taking a very connected and authentic approach. You’re utilizing and meeting people where they are in a way that speaks to the cultural nuances and attunedness that’s needed for us to have genuine impact. I’m really grateful for the work that you all are doing. I’m grateful for the REC. And really want to uplift the impact that Torchlight has been able to have, not only on individuals and also the community at large, and I think creating a really awesome model that folks can access and learn from at a national level. Thank you, Minister Randy and Brother Jeffrey, and everyone at Torchlight, and the collaboration of folks at the REC for the work that you’re doing in your communities.
Bro. Randy (21:50): Thank you.
Bro. Jeffrey (21:51): Thank you.
Ashley (21:50): For our listeners, join us next time on Changing the Conversation.
Erika Simon, Producer (21:57): Visit c4innovates.com, and follow us on LinkedIn and YouTube for more resources to grow your impact. Thank you for joining us. This episode was produced by Erika Simon and Christina Murphy. Our theme song was written and performed by Peter Hanlon. Join us next time on Changing the Conversation.
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