The Greenleafs have returned for a second season in episode 201,”A House Divided,” and quite frankly, the Lord is not smiling down upon them. Despite the heaps of sexual abuse evidence against Uncle Mac, he’s walking free after getting his father Henry to testify against Bishop James. Apparently, back in 1983, James burned down his original church, First Baptist in order to collect the insurance money and build Calvary. Unfortunately, the church’s caretaker, a man named Darryl, was still inside the structure as it burned to the ground.
Three months after Mac’s release from jail, things are only sliding further downhill for the Greenleafs. Grace is barely holding it together at the pulpit with her sermons boring everyone to tears. The church’s donations are down forty percent, and it’s not because of the investigation into the Bishop or the allegations against nasty Uncle Mac. Nope! Apparently, people are more worried about the gay choir director and his husband (hey Kyle from “Living Single”) and not the fact that an apparent murderer and child rapist are running around on the loose. <INSERT SIDE EYE HERE.>
We learn that Grace’s baby sister Charity has lost one of her twins, and though she gives birth to a healthy baby boy named Nathan, she and Kevin are still on the outs. Props to her for not going to that horrible pray the gay away therapy group with him. Honestly, Kevin needs to be real with himself, and come out so they can co-parent and move on.
Speaking of moving on, Grace’s brother Jacob has been given the reigns over at Triumph’s new location. Triumph is Calvary’s rival church so this puts further strain on Jacob’s relationship with Bishop. At least he’s finally moving out and becoming his own man. In the midst of all of this, Aunt Mavis is having her own downward spiral. Without a club to tend to, Auntie has set her sights on being a talent manager when she’s not preoccupied with drinking herself into an early grave.
Horrified by the state of her family and her dwindling status in the community, Lady Mae goes to her sickly father, Henry and begs him to retract his statement about Bishop ordering him to burn down the church. He agress, but it becomes very clear here that Henry sexually abused Mae during her youth. I wanted to vomit watching their interaction. As the episode wraps, we learn that Triumph’s Pastor Skanks has a good reason for his continued antagonization of Calvary and Bishop Greenleaf. Apparently, his father was Darryl, the caretaker who died in the arson over at First Baptist in 1983.
So what did you think of the series premiere of “Greenleaf”? I have several questions.
- Has Grace given up on going after her Uncle Mac for sexually abusing her sister and other young women? We see sex offender posters in her car during one scene, but there is no other mention of it.
- As someone who was presumably sexually abused herself, do you truly think that Lady Mae didn’t know what Mac was doing to her daughter Faith, or did she simply turn a blind eye?
- Is Charity truly done with her marriage to Kevin, or will she try and make it work in order to save face? It looks to me like she may have found a new bae in that producer Jabari Johnson she just hired.
- With little money coming into the church and a lack of inspiring sermons, do you think Grace will speak out against openly gay people attending Calvary, or will she preach about acceptance and love?
- It’s obvious that Mac isn’t done trying to destroy everyone that is coming for him. What other dirt do you think he has up his sleeve?
Let’s talk about it in the comments below!
“Greenleaf” airs Wednesdays at 10 PM ET on OWN.
Aramide A Tinubu has her Master’s in Film Studies from Columbia University. She wrote her thesis on Black Girlhood and Parental Loss in Contemporary Black American Cinema. She’s a cinephile, bookworm, blogger, and NYU + Columbia University alum. You can read her blog at: www.chocolategirlinthecity.com or tweet her @midnightrami
