- The Church of the Messiah on Detroit's east side, is celebrating the young activists in its congregation, who are promoting peace and unity here in the city.

During this year's 17th annual Arise Detroit Neighborhoods Day, the church held an event where youth leaders presented their strategies for creating a better Detroit.

"American Black Journal" contributor, Deja Moss was there, and has the story.

- Today is a Arise Detroit neighborhood' Day.

And we are celebrating all of the positive things happening in the city of Detroit.

Primarily for the young people, a lot of you do great things.

But the media only want to report the bad things.

The bad things make the news.

But the good things that happen with young people in the city of Detroit sometimes don't do it.

But, today we celebrating all of the positive young people doing great things in the city of Detroit.

So, this is your day.

We here to celebrate you all and the things that you do.

- PPM, that's Peace & Prosperity, Youth Action Movement, which is an organization geared towards young, amazing individuals through the ages of 12 to 18 and 18 to 25.

We talk about and organize around all things, such as identity building, speaking truth to power, and learning how to turn a lot of that pain into purpose, to ultimately help them become the best version of themselves.

- We represent Peace, Prosperity Movement, Youth Action Detroit, AKA, PPM.

We are a youth organization group supported by One Love Global.

We network with another, build collective power, and improve community year 'round.

And our priorities are community safety, ending violence, environmental justice, and education justice.

We recognize these interconnected issues, with racial justice at the heart.

We are here today because we believe youth voice is important when it comes to elections, leaderships, and ending all violence in all forms.

Our opinions matter, even if we can't vote yet, because decisions are being made to impact our future generations and our lives right now.

- Our young people are not just our future, they are our today.

As one of the young ladies said, "A lot of our older people are getting older."

You know.

And so it's time for our young people to stand up, it's time for our young people to have a voice, and it's time for them to move and shake.

What I've learned throughout some of this work, most of this work, is that the youth that we have are brilliant.

We just have to figure out ways to bring that out of them.

If we figure out the right systems and mechanisms to bring out the intelligence, our youth in our communities will flourish.

- As a youth of Detroit, you know, I've seen myself come through the roughs, I've seen other children come through the roughs and make something of themselves when I've seen others give up on us.

And I'm never giving up on Detroit.

- We are intentional on investing in our youth, and building them up to be the best versions of themselves from their own perspectives.

Not how the world sees them, not how society molds them into being, but how they are created, and God's gifts and Gods talents.

- PPM is giving me a opportunity to be someone I really wanna be in life, giving me an opportunity on, I can grow more than just school.

And to be in a classroom, and just sit down and listen and learn.

It's actually given me a lot of room to walk around, look at things from a different perspective.

- PPM has helped me because I was a person who struggled with staying out of, like an angry, as like an angry person.

I was a angry person, and I used to have very bad anger issues.

And PPM has helped me grown to be able to control my anger, and to help me mature as a young lady.

- What I learned is how to communicate.

Communicate is a big part, 'cause usually I just be like, "I'm just gonna stay quiet."

But now I get to (sighs) basically use my voice, and that's basically what PPM about, hearing the youth voice.

- So it's very hard to become what you don't see, right?

And so it's very, very important.

At first, I think that we provide good examples to the youth of what peace and unity looks like.

Because ultimately the only, the backside of that, if you don't do these things, is destruction of your own communities.

So it's very important for the longevity of our communities, for the progression of our communities, that the youth understand these things very early on about why this is essential, for us all to move forward as a community as a city, as a culture, as a people, everything.

- I believe that as we watch our elders, and as we watch leaders from the past, I think it creates an opportunity for young people to step up and see the pitfalls that they have taken, and be able to lead in a place, from a place of integrity and honesty, and transparency.

- I think action is more important than anything.

That's just my, my personal opinion, I would say.

Anytime I've been in a meeting with Pastor Barry, I'm always the one who's like, "Okay, we've talked, what's next?"

Like, all I care about is next steps.

What are we gonna do next to make sure we get our plans into fruition, to actually come out and and be seen in the world?

- Let's go people!

- Oftentimes, the stereotype is that young people don't care about their community, young people are not involved in their community.

Young people are just out being violent, and doing things that are egregious to the the community.

However, today, Pastor Barry called forth a lot of young people who are in the community doing some great work, whether it's in real estate, whether it's in education, whether it's in political aspect, whether even in ministry.

There are a lot of young people here today, who are doing some great things that Pastor Barry is showcasing and highlighting.

- I feel like our youth is facing that, not being able to speak without like an adult bringing them down.

And with PPM, we are allowed to do that, 'cause we have adult speakers for us.

So even if that adult does try to like fight us back or whatever, we know we have people to back us up for it.

- I love to learn this thing called life, alongside our youth organizers and our young adults, and just be the story in a sense that, I wish I knew of, or the story that I wish was read to me, when I was a young black woman from inner city Detroit, who also didn't have many folks in my corner to help me find my way.

- When I'm older, I want my kids to be how I was when I was younger.

I want them to be a part of the PPM and everything, and just show 'em the right way.

Start 'em, start 'em on a good path like I was.

- I am peace.

- I am peace.

- And I am Detroit.

- I am Detroit.

- And I'm making it happen.

- And I'm making it happen.

- We applaud you all today.

God is good.

- Thank you.

(applause) - That's gonna do it for us this week.

You can find out more about our guests, @americanblackjournal.org.