Recommended HLLN Link:
"Except for Haiti all the present African nationalities are the results of
colonial strategies. Haiti is not. At Bwa Kayiman the amalgamated African
tribes named themselves - Ayisyen - and that union has NEVER wavered. Manman Ayiti is not the product of capitalism. Haitians are the descendant of a people-centered race, as opposed to a profit-centered race, who are mystically evolved and live in harmony with nature and the forces of nature. Both the Taino-Ayisyen and the African-Ayisyen worshiped nature, and have always had the respect for nature that is only now referred to as "living green"." [The Union in Haiti that's Never Wavered.]

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In Remembrance of Francois William Mitchell


- Kenbe Djanm, Margaret, we stand as one at this moment, to honor you, one of ours at Ezili's HLLN, we honor your father - François William Mitchell.

-HLLN letter to Margaret expressing our condolences

- Margaret Mitchell Armand's letter announcing her father's transition

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In Remembrance of Francois

William Mitchell

Kenbe Djanm, Margaret, we stand as one at this moment, to honor you, one of ours at Ezili's HLLN, we honor your father - François William Mitchell.

Below is a letter from HLLN expressing our condolences and love to one of ours, Margaret Mitchell Armand of HLLN, whose father passed away on August 18, 2009.

Margaret has asked that we share HLLN's letter and her announcement with the Network. Margaret, wrote: "I respect your work and dedication to our ancestors. Instead of flowers, I rather received a donation in his name to HLLN network to continue the work for Haiti's less represented. My father's wish was to be cremated and his ashes to go to Grand Goave his hometown. He did not want to have a viewing as he felt it was unnecessary. We are having a family celebration at my home this Sunday at 2:00 pm." (Plantation, Florida).

Friends, colleagues and family who know the Armand family, may call Margaret at 954-478-7510

François William Mitchell is a fallen Mapou among all the Mapou that are keeping Haiti strong. Dlo a tombe, Kanari a la, kle hounfo a lan men nou, Ayiti pap tombe. Ago, Agosi, Agola

Donation to HLLN may be made on-line by going to:
http://www.margueritelaurent.com/donate/donate.html

If you'd like to see our work continue, please support us financially by making a donation. Thank you.

Who is HLLN's
Margaret Mitchell Armand:

Margaret Mitchell Armand is a religious leader, conflict mediator and
peacemaker. She is a Vodouist priestess (manbo), a poet, mother, wife, grandmother, board member at the Broward Cultural Council in Florida and beloved daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Francois William Mitchell. For quite some time now, Margaret has been the caretaker for both her elderly parents and our network wishes to lift her up today for all that she is and does.


With all that has been happening in Haiti, with all the distress and crisis, which, as an active member of HLLN, Margaret takes part in, both as witness and participant, she still found time to be in pursuit of her PHD in Conflict Analysis and Resolution. Margaret lives in Florida, and travels often to Haiti.

Her dissertation, of course, is on Haitian indigenous culture and history - reconnecting past events and reclaiming knowledge. It addresses the problem of doing research in Western academia from an indigenous prospective and sets a indigenous healing framework for decolonization, conflict resolution and peace building. That is how Margaret is doing HLLN's work. She is not only a student of Ezili Danto work, but is suggesting a Vodun framework for healing the mental colonization of the schooled Haitians. To teach, of course, is to learn. So I too am a student of Margaret Mitchell Armand. For, to give the miracles we've receive from the Ancestors means not only reinforcement of them in ourselves, but to receive more. The circle of life - se yon chèn ki paka janm kase. Nou se Ginen, nou fè yon sèl kò.

And, as I've written elsewhere, Vodun is so rich in its intellectual clarity, if the world, and even some Haitian adherents (houngan/manbo) actually understood it, there would be no confusion about its value and efficacy as a path to self-reliance, wholeness and to our interconnectedness - to the rhythm of nature and to source.

In her own words, Margaret Mitchell Armand's academic work and teachings center on "religious peacemaking and interfaith dialogue in a spirit of sharing that includes individual respect, love and understanding." Our Margaret is a certified Interfaith Conflict Resolution mediator from the United States Institute of Peace and often appears on national and international panels to advocate for religious freedoms and explain the importance of Vodun in Haitian identity and culture. Recently, Margaret wrote:

"Religious conflicts may have to do with economic and political power, with real and perceived injustices, or with disagreements over land, water, energy sources, and the like. But all these conflicts also have a religious element, if only because religion frequently provides the ultimate source of a group's identity and reason for being. And in all of these conflicts religious leaders can play a central role in advancing the cause of peace.

Within most religious traditions, peacemaking is considered a sacred duty. Religious traditions and beliefs tend to encourage adherents to look beyond self-interest to a greater good, a tendency that can encourage conflicting parties to seek common ground. In most societies, there is a general expectation that religion can and should contribute to peacemaking, an expectation that often helps open doors for religious peacemakers."

Ezili Danto/HLLN
August 21, 2009

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HLLN letter to Margaret expressing our condolences

On Thu, Aug 20, 2009 at 10:22 AM, zili danto <erzilidanto@yahoo.com> wrote:


Dearest Margaret,

Honorable daughter of François William Mitchell.

What a wonderful tribute you've paid to your father in your announcement email in this time "of celebration of his life." A truly beautiful testimony of a father who "open his heart wide unto the body of life." You've named his lineage, Margaret, like in an African griot naming ceremony. The earth may have claimed his limbs, but you, as a true Vodouist, have done the resurrection.

You've re-membered your father and your grans. Ayibobo, Manbo! They are resurrected in you, and now in us, the witnesses! Ayibobo.

"For life and death are one, even as the river and the sea are one...

For what is it to die but to stand naked in the wind and to melt into the sun?

And what is to cease breathing, but to free the breath from its restless tides, that it may rise and expand and seek God [Go(o)d - Bon Dye ]  unencumbered?

Only when you drink form the river of silence [Anba Dlo, Lan Ginen ] shall you indeed sing.

And when you have reached the mountain top, then you shall begin to climb.

And when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly dance." (Gibran, the Prophet \ items in parenthesis added)

Margaret, for me personally and on behalf of us all at Ezili's HLLN, I extend deepest sympathies to you and your family for the physical lost, but celebrate your father's return to source and his eternal life as re-membered herein and forever more by you and yours. Mapou sa a kite yon gwo tras atè...[Yon Mapou Tonbe.]

One love,

Ezili Danto/HLLN


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Margaret Mitchell Armand's letter announcing her father's transition

--- On Wed, 8/19/09, Margaret Mitchell Armand, wrote:

From: Margaret Mitchell Armand
Subject: My father
Date: Wednesday, August 19, 2009, 9:28 PM


Dear Friends,

This e-mail is to announce the death of my father on August 18, 2009.

My father, Mr François William Mitchell passed on during the night with all the family members by his side. He transformed into the spirit world with the universal love we all share. He was 85 years old. He emigrated in the U.S. from Haiti in 1967 where he worked all his life. My mother Anne-Marie is with me and suffered the illness of Alzheimer.

My father's spirit is strong. A Vodouist, he also studied be a part of the
Rosicrucian Order. He was also a natural healer.

Born in Haiti in 1924, He is the descendant of long line of emigrants to Haiti. His great grandmother was an enslaved African woman taken from the Nago-Oyo Empire at that time known as Dahomey today then Nigeria by the bank of the river of Ogou Badagris. Her name is unknown because the colonizers erased the name of those people they were enslaving. Our family DNA took us to the area.

His maternal grandfather was a Corsican from Adjacio (Jean Vesperini) that came to Haiti during the second world war in Europe to get riches and his paternal grandfather Francis William Mitchell was an Irish American nominated as a Consular agent to Haiti in the 1880's. The family also found American Indian lineage as well lineage from India. My father' spirit of love and tolerance for all humans transcended race, color, social class, religion and economic class. He believed of the equality of the human race. He was a role model for all of us and proved that love and tolerance has a great healing power.

He is joining my son, his grandson Lucien (Loulouce) Armand Jr, his mother Adelina Jean Vesperini and his father Camil Mitchell.

We all miss him very much in person, but in Vodou we know that the spirit lives on beyond the carcass of the body.

I appreciate your understanding in that time of celebration of his life.

Thank you for your support during that time.

Margaret

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Forwarded by Ezili's Haitian Lawyers Leadership Network
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"If we had even the names of our great men! If we could lay our hands on things we've made, monuments and towers and palaces, we might find our strength. While I live I shall try to build that pride we need, and build in terms white men as well as black can understand! " H.R.H King Henry Christophe


‘...Hayti (is) the glory of the blacks and terror of tyrants...I hope that
she may be united, keeping a strict look out for tyrants, for if they get the
least chance to injure her, they will avail themselves of it...But one thing
which gives me joy is, that they (the Haitians) are men (and women) who would be cut off to a man before they would yield to the combined forces of the whole world---in fact, if the whole world was combined against them it could not do anything with them...' ---David Walker from: David Walker's Appeal, 1829

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Letter from Cynthia Mckinney asking you to support Ezili/HLLN's work


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