" into whitemalegod’s hands. Interestingly, we didn’t fast and pray for anything other than marriage. By putting marriage on a pedestal, my parents taught me that my main objective in life was to please God by pleasing men. First, I was to please my dad, who enforced the fasting, and then I was to please my future husband, who was the prize for fasting. "

― Christena Cleveland , God Is a Black Woman