"FINDING EYES TO SEE"

 “FINDING EYES TO SEE” 

I wrote last week about the metaphor of “having eyes to see” and what a gift it is to be able to see realities and patterns that often are blocked from our vision.  As I think of this, the story of Saul (who became Paul) on the road to Damascus comes to my mind (and sight) in Acts 8.  As he goes to Damascus to arrest followers of Jesus (yes, he still has not been able to “see” the risen Jesus), the Lord’s Spirit strikes him, and he loses his literal (and spiritual) vision.   He is taken to Damascus, and there a trembling follower of  the risen Jesus comes to him (as instructed by the Spirit).  Ananias tells Paul who he is, then touches him, and the “scales fall from Paul’s eyes.”  He then becomes the most famous follower of the risen Jesus.

I always wonder about the Biblical metaphors of sight – not using it, losing it, and regaining it.  The Biblical approach is that most of us do not “have eyes to see,” that our perceptual apparatus is captured by the systems of domination and power that make us see others as less than human.  I certainly have been (and continue to be) captured by those systems, such as race, gender, sexual orientation, materialism, and many others.  But, I do have my eyes opened on occasion, and I am grateful for the intervention of God’s Spirit when that happens.  

As we think about how we begin to “have eyes to see,” it is important to remember a couple of points.  First, it is helpful to put ourselves into new places and people who can challenge us and widen our views of others and of ourselves.  In saying this, I am not speaking of the idea of everybody’s opinion being the same, that all truths are relative.  Rather I am speaking of being open to hearing a new and different story, a story that will likely widen our vision, but if it is truthful, it will be a story that challenges our point of view.  The acclaimed author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie made a famous Ted Talk on this – here is the link to it, if you have not seen it

https://www.ted.com/talks/chimamanda_ngozi_adichie_the_danger_of_a_single_story?language=en

Caroline any my kids will tell you that I am notoriously conservative in my approach to life.  Early on in our marriage, Caroline developed the “Three Day Rule,” especially in our ministry together.  When she would bring new ideas to me, I would almost always say “No”.  So, she told me one day that we were adopting the “Three Day Rule” in our marriage – when she brought a new idea or project for discussion, I could not say “No” for three days.  After I had thought about it for three days, then we could discuss it!  And, it largely worked.

The second point about finding eyes to see is the importance of seeking to be open to new voices.  My long tenure as pastor at Oakhurst Presbyterian taught me that -  the multicultural nature of the church kept calling me out of my provincial self with a single story.  That community asked me to see different worlds, different realities – and to see myself in a new way, to have eyes to see.  The community becomes such an important part of helping each of us and all of us to find eyes to see.  Without Ananias coming to Saul to heal him, we would not likely have the New Testament in the form that we have it, and it would have taken a long time for the “country” gospel of Jesus of Nazareth to make it to the cities.  Paul found eyes to see, and the urban church was born.  Let us all pray and be open to those kinds of interventions, so that we, too, may “have eyes to see.”

"HAVING EYES TO SEE"

“HAVING EYES TO SEE”

When David and Susan were young children, they loved to hunt for Easter eggs.  We had a HUGE egg hunt at Oakhurst after worship on Easter, and when we got home, we would again hide the eggs for the kids to try to find.  This process of hiding and finding could go on for two weeks after Easter (we learned quickly not to use hard-boiled eggs for this lengthy process).  One of the more memorable parts of this game was to hide the eggs “in plain sight,” where they were both visible and invisible.  Our favorite quote for this part of the game was: “You have to have eyes to see,” meaning that the egg was sort of visible in its hiddenness, but the seeker had to see it in just the right way in order to “see” it and find it.

I was reminded of this saying during the journey of my first cataract surgery this week.   I give thanks that it seems to have gone well, but I am even more aware now of what a gift is sight, both literal and figurative sight.  A day after the surgery, as the cloudiness in my right eye began to clear, I reminded myself of how much I have taken “seeing” for granted, even though I have worn glasses for almost 60 years.  I still have blurriness in reading, and that is frustrating, but I know that can be corrected.  Yet, still, having eyes to see is such a gift.

When I have been resting my eyes this week, I have listened to some cassette tapes (yes, I still have those and the player that accompanies them).  I recorded these tapes in the fall, 2003, when I read to my mother, who was staying with us while she underwent chemotherapy for lung cancer.  She had macular degeneration and could no longer see well enough to read. She loved to read, and this loss of sight was a terrible affliction for her.   She was a big fan of the writing of Marcus Borg, and his latest book on the Bible had just been published.  So, I got the book and read it to her.  As usual, she interrupted me often to ask questions and make comments.  And, I’m so glad that she did, because I can still hear her voice, 17 years after her death.  

    The Bible frequently uses this image of having eyes to see, usually in a negative sense, meaning that those of us captured by the powers and principalities have eyes but cannot see.  In his book, Borg uses this image of “having eyes to see,” meaning having (or being given) the ability to “see” things or structures that had previously been hidden from us.  Mother and I talked about my having observed Black people as a boy, but I had never “seen” them as human beings until my eyes had been opened through several conversion experiences.  She also noted that she had never really seen LGBTQ+ people as people until she discovered that one of our beloved family relatives was gay.  Then her eyes were opened.  We noted in our discussion that this is the dynamic that Jesus and the prophets used when they talked of people who are “stubborn” and refuse to see, even though they have eyes to see.  I’ve thought of this discussion often in these days of Covid denial and anti-vaxxers, as something that seems so simple has become so complicated and so deadly.

As I think about this metaphor of “seeing” this week, I am noting that it is both literal and figurative.  My literal, physical vision has been altered this week by my cataract surgery, and in just this small way, I give thanks for the gift of sight.  I also think of people like my mother and many others who lost most or all of their sight.  A terrible, terrible thing to experience.  Yet, I’m also reminded of the many people who have survived and even thrived with limited or no ability to physically see.  

Listening to the tapes of Mother and me this week recalled the stories of Jesus’ healing many blind people, both literally and figuratively.  Indeed, in Luke 4, in his first sermon at his home synagogue in Nazareth he told of his mission, which included “bringing sight to the blind.”  Those stories are reminders of the depth of our captivity to many powers which seek to blind us and to bind out hearts to death and domination.  They also remind us that conversions, including cataract surgeries, are available, if “we have eyes to see.”  And, of course, that is the major question for our time, and for every time:  “How do we find eyes to see?”  More on that question next time.

 

"IDA WELLS IS IN THE HOUSE!!!"

 “IDA WELLS IS IN THE HOUSE!”

This has been quite a time for Ida B. Wells.  Catherine Meeks and I wrote a book on her in 2019 “Passionate for Justice,” which the Georgia Center for the Book named as one of ten books that all Georgians should read.  Last year Ida Wells was awarded a special Pulitzer Prize for her pioneering work in investigative journalism.  Michelle Duster, her great-granddaughter, published a fine book on her entitled “Ida B: The Queen.”  On June 30, a monument, sculpted by Richard Hunt, was dedicated to her in her adopted hometown of Chicago.  The powerful Nikole-Hannah Jones spoke at that occasion, along with the mayor of Chicago and Michelle and her brother Donald, who were the driving forces in getting the funds for the monument.

Wells’ 159th birthday is this Thursday, July 16, and on that occasion, a park and monument will be dedicated in her honor in Memphis, Tennessee, the town which ran her out in the early 1890's.  Wells had just completed and published a long and definitive study of the avalanche of lynchings that were happening all over USA, but mainly in the South.  In her study she noted that the cause of this racial terror was not the sexual predation of Black men on white women, as was usually stated by the White people who were doing the killings.  The real reason, Wells concluded, was the White desire to control Black people and to return them to slavery as much as possible.  The white response was to firebomb her newspaper offices in Memphis and to threaten to lynch her if she returned to Memphis.  She was an exile first in New York and then in Chicago.  She would not return South until 31 years later in 1921 to investigate the massacre of more than 230 Black people in my home county, Phillips County, Arkansas.

She came down to Arkansas in disguise in order to investigate the Phillips County killings that had occurred in 1919.  Black men had defended themselves and their families and their neighbors, killing some white marauders in their efforts.  Twelve Black men had been convicted of these killings and were given the death penalty.  Wells helped the NAACP pick up the case, and a superhero African-American lawyer named Scipio Jones took their case.  The twelve men were waiting on death row to be executed when Wells came to see them, posing as an aunt of one of the men.  She found them dispirited and forlorn, and she decided to speak prophetic words to them in her approach to comforting them in the midst of this huge injustice that had been visited upon them.

Here’s what she said to them:  “I have been listening to you for nearly two hours.  You have talked and sung and prayed about dying, forgiving your enemies, and of feeling sure that you are going to be received in the New Jerusalem because your God knows that you are innocent of the offense for which you expect to be electrocuted.  But why don’t you pray to live and ask to be freed?  The God you serve is the God of Paul and Silas who opened their prison gates, and if you have all the faith you say you have, you ought to believe that he {sic} will open your prison doors too.  If you do believe that, let all of your songs and prayers hereafter be songs of faith and hope that God will set you free; that the judges who have to pass on your cases will be given the wisdom and courage to decide in your behalf.  That’s all I’ve got to say.”

As usual, Wells did more than talk about such freedom.  She worked with Attorney Jones and the NAACP to publicize the cases and to make sure that their case was heard on the Supreme Court level.  Those efforts paid off in 1923 when SCOTUS ruled 6-3 in Moore v. Dempsey that the twelve Black men had not been given a fair trial.  Their convictions were overturned, and eventually all twelve were freed from prison.  Wells had been a lever for another mighty work, using her courage and skill and tenacity to help pull these men out of the jaws of the racist death penalty.

Wells did her work during horrible years in American history, when white Southerners were using all their powers of legislation and violence to move Black people back into neo-slavery.  She fought a powerful battle against the tidal wave of racism that swept across the country.  Her life is an example to all of us of how to do this and of the focus that is needed for such a battle.  Though we are not in the 1890’s when neo-slavery was established, we are in a time when the forces of white supremacy are re-gathering their strength.  It is up to us to respond to this rising force with a sense of equality and strength and vision, as Ida Wells did.

Few of us are Ida B. Wells, but as my colleague and friend Catherine Meeks always says about Wells:  “She was a human being just like the rest of us.  She was an ordinary person who accomplished extraordinary things.  She was able to do this because she  decided to try to be brave, and through that bravery and her tenacity, she was a powerful witness.”  As we think about her birthday this week, let us give thanks for her ordinariness.  Let us give thanks that she decided to be just a little braver one day, and in so doing, she became a light for the rest of us who were coming and who are coming.  As she noted so well, we are the ones we have been waiting for.

"FROM JUNETEENTH TO JULY 4"

 “FROM JUNETEENTH TO JULY 4”

Last week I wrote of two powerful forces in American history that are at odds with one another:  the idea of equality, and the idea of slavery/white supremacy.  These two ideas are not compatible with one another, but they continue to co-exist in the history of the USA.  The tradition is that Frederick Douglass never spoke about equality and justice on July 4, because he saw July 4 celebrations as a mockery as long as people were enslaved in America.  In his famous and powerful speech about Independence Day in 1852 in Rochester, he said these words:  “What, to the American slave, is your Fourth of July? I answer:  a day that reveals to {him}, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which {he} is the constant victim.”

Douglass finds the essence of the struggle in the tension between the idea of equality and the idea of slavery/white supremacy.  How can we celebrate the idea of equality while still holding onto the idea of white supremacy?  Douglass and others knew well how we do it:  we deepen and refine the idea of race and racism.  How could we believe in equality and still hold people in enslavement?  We developed the idea of “white supremacy,” the idea that people of color, and especially those classified as “Black,” were not full human beings in the same way that those classified as “white” were.  The idea of equality, then, does not apply to those classified as “non-white.”  Jefferson and most of the other “founding” fathers did not believe that those classified as “Black” and “Native Americans” were equal human beings.  It was this belief that led them to hold human beings as slaves and to kill and remove Indigenous people from their lands.

After the Civil War, this idea was revived and deepened even further in order to repudiate the outcome of the Civil War (and to deny the value of the 700,000+ lives lost in that War) and in order to re-establish “slavery by another name,” to use Doug Blackmon’s powerful phrase.  This idea of white supremacy retains its power today, as we have seen in the rise of the Party of Trump, dedicated to the idea that white males should be in charge of everything, not because we are greedy and insecure, but because God and nature made us that way.  Those of us classified as “white” are watching the demographics, and we are aware that the time of plurality is not far away in the future, the time when there will be no majority racial classification in USA.  We are willing to support a despot like Trump because he is telling us what we want to hear:  those classified as “white” should always be in charge, especially white males.  This fear of the demographics is driving the Big Lie of the stolen 2020 election, voter suppression acts, censorship on “critical race theory,” and anti-immigrant work.  

We have had several tipping points in our history in this struggle between equality and white supremacy.  We saw it in the rise of the abolitionist movement in the 1840’s, in the tumultuous decade of the 1850’s that led to the Civil War.  We saw it in Reconstruction when the idea of equality seemed to be gaining strength.  We saw it in the development of the counter-revolution which pushed the Big Lie of the “Lost Cause,” an idea that pummeled the idea of equality.  We saw it in the 1890’s, when political power combined with violence to re-establish the priority of white supremacy.  We saw it in the 1940’s and 1950’s, when Black veterans returning from World War II were determined not to go back to neo-slavery.  We saw it in the 1960’s, as equality once again gained strength, and slavery was finally ended in 1965 with the passage of the Voting Rights Act.

Since the Supreme Court eviscerated that Voting Rights Act in in its Shelby v. Holder decision in 2013, we are once again back in that same struggle between equality and white supremacy.  Last week we noted how powerful is the idea of equality, how many different groups - who were intended to be subservient by the system of race developed in USA – have heard and believed that the idea of equality applied to them also.  We are now at that tipping point again in the struggle between equality and white supremacy.  As we celebrate both Juneteenth and July 4, let us remember the tension between them.  Indeed, in the years to come, let us set aside the two weeks between these two national holidays to be in dialogue on the struggle between these two powerful ideas in American history.  May the profound vision of equality – a vision so frightening that its very authors immediately repudiated it in American history – may this vision go to our own core as individuals and as a nation, and may we live out its creed for all of us.

"JUNETEENTH AND THE MEANING OF AMERICA"

 “JUNETEENTH AND THE MEANING OF AMERICA”

The recent federal recognition of Juneteenth as a national holiday was a pleasant surprise, and as we approach the July 4 holiday, it is worthwhile considering the meaning of those two national holidays.  What does Juneteenth mean in the panorama of America?  What does it mean in dialogue with July 4th? First, a slight but important note – while “America” has come to mean North America, it originally referred to the “New World” of European explorers. It was named after an Italian merchant and explorer who understood that Columbus was mistaken in thinking that he had discovered a route to India.  For now, however, I’ll use “America” as the word for the USA.

The recognition of Juneteenth means that in one small way the equality of Black people is acknowledged, while at the same time acknowledging the terrible legacies of slavery and neo-slavery in our history.  It is no coincidence that many state legislatures are seeking to limit the teaching of the history of racism in our shared history.  They know that it is deep and profound, and once we go down that road, it will be difficult to go back.  The recognition of Juneteenth is a start on that road.  Many of us will celebrate the birth of our nation on this July 4 weekend, but the recognition of Juneteenth reminds us that one of the powerful seeds of our nation goes back into the 1500’s and especially 1619, when the first record of African people being brought here as slaves was found.  The 1619 Project of the New York Times is a reminder that the seeds of our nation are found in that year rather than in 1776.

The recognition of Juneteenth is a reminder of two of the most powerful forces in American history, forces that are opposed to one another.  One is the idea of equality, and the other is the idea of slavery and the white supremacy that undergirds it.  These have been warring ideas in American history, and over these next two weeks, I’ll take a brief look at each of them.  Today – the idea of equality.  Next week - the idea of slavery and white supremacy.  The idea of equality – the vision that all human beings are created with equal dignity – is a powerful one in American history.  It was born in Europe, but it found its deepest expression in the colonies of America.  This idea of equality is one of the great and unexpected gifts of the American experience.  It is a revolutionary idea, and it calls out to all structures -  class structures, racial categories,  gender categories – that their time is winding down, that a new way of looking sat ourselves and at one another is emerging in the world.  That way is the idea of equality, the idea that we are all created with equal dignity.  That way is the idea that the institutional and structural foundations of society should be reformed to reflect this radical idea.

There is no small irony that those who developed this idea of “equality” in American history meant it only for white males of property.  They meant it only to stand against the old, class structures of Europe, but this idea of equality is so strong that they could not contain it.  The very people who were enslaved as the living contradiction of equality – they heard this idea, and they believed that it applied to them.  The people whose land was stolen from them by Europeans in the very name of equality – they heard this idea and believed that it applied to them.  Women, long since seen as property of the white males – they heard it and believed that it applied to them.  People who loved people of the same gender, long penalized and persecuted because of whom they loved – they heard that it applied to them.  This list could go on and on, because the idea of equality undercuts so many repressive and oppressive categories of the world. It will continue to call out to people who are not yet recognized as people, as equal siblings in the world.

The idea of equality is so strong and so radical that the European founders immediately began to qualify it after it appeared in the Declaration of Independence in July, 1776.  The battle over it in the Constitution was huge and dramatic, and as we know, the idea of equality was erased from the Constitution, with Africans and Indigenous peoples being recognized as only 60% human.  It is why those on the right wing love the “originalist” theory of the Constitution – they know that it was “originally” meant for white men.  Even the primary author of the Declaration of Independence backed off from it, as he needed the woman held as his slave, Sally Hemmings, to be available to him on many levels.  

Yet, to use Maya Angelou’s powerful phrase, still the idea of equality rises.  It can’t be held back or controlled – it has arrived.  We white men hope to curtail its teaching in our schools and in our culture, but still it rises.  As we gather this weekend to celebrate this idea of equality, let us remember this dialogue between Juneteenth and July 4.  Let us remember these two weeks between June 19 and July 4, and may our future celebrations remember the tension and the possibilities between them.

"ON FATHERS"

 “ON FATHERS”

This time last year I was beginning a manuscript on my mother and me and her raising me as a single mom in the land of white, male supremacy in the 1940’s and 1950’s.  She went on this journey because my father abandoned my family when I was a small baby, and I never met him again until I was 24, and then only for a brief moment.  I have just completed that manuscript, and I am now looking for a publisher – the tentative title is “Mother and Me:  A Memoir of Agency, Race, and Gender.”  All this is to say that I have no trouble with Mother’s Day, though I understand why so many people do.  My problem comes with Father’s Day.

I grew up feeling a deep sense of anxiety about my father’s absence in my life, but a bigger problem for me was the sense of abandonment.  My father never contacted me, never came to see me.  Our meeting in 1971 was accidental, but that is a story for another time.  As a boy, I was always wondering why my father never contacted me, why he never acknowledged me.  I internalized a sense that his absence and his refusal to contact me was my responsibility:  I was simply not good enough to be acknowledged as his son.  Fortunately for me, my mother and other people filled in the breech, and I began to hear that while my father might not acknowledge me, God and many others did.  I am grateful especially to my mother for stepping into the gap, and I am grateful to all those men and women who stepped up to help me hear that I was somebody.  On this Father’s Day, I say “Thank You!”

Because I was unsure of my status as a father’s son, I was hesitant, even scared, of becoming a father.  Caroline wanted to have children, but I was much more hesitant.  How could I be a good father when I had no models of being a father? How could I do it when my feelings for my own father were so ambivalent:  longing for him, knowing that he was never coming, hating him for his abandonment, blaming myself for his absence.  She reminded me that because of my mother’s dedication to me, because of my own work in therapy, and because of so many people who had stepped up to father me, that I had become a fine man: strong, compassionate, loving, responsible.  And, of course, I enjoyed the activity which led to the creation of children!  So, we set out on the adventure of trying to get pregnant.  We were one of the early pioneers in women’s waiting until later to have children.  After many fits and starts, we had our first child David in 1980 when Caroline 33 years old.  Then Susan came along 30 months later.

And, what gifts they have been to us!  I have learned so much about fathering from being a father.  In a great surprise to me, I have also received gifts as a son by being a father to our children.  It is a great irony to me that I have received some of the blessings that I needed as a son from fathering our children, and I am so grateful to Caroline, David, and Susan for enabling that in my journey.  I have learned that while I had a biological father, it took a whole village, including my own children, to bring me the blessings that I needed as a son abandoned by my biological father. 

So, in this time of celebrating fathers, I’ll offer some humble advice about the gift and the task of fathering.  First, I was raised by a loving and powerful single woman, but fathers are absolutely necessary in the raising of children.  This is not a slap at my mother or at any of those many women (single or otherwise) who are raising children without a father around.  This is a reflection of a son with a powerful and good mother, who still experienced that large absence.  To all those biological fathers who have stayed and raised and loved their children, I say “Thank you, thank you, thank you!”  Thank you for showing children what a man is meant to be:  loving, nurturing, protecting, challenging, simply being present.

    Second,  to all those biological fathers out there, be sure that you complete the biological process of fathering and become a “daddy” to your children.  For most of my youngish life, my perception was that my father simply chose not to contact me.  While I still think that is the case, in working on the memoir on my mother, I have to come to understand that my mother may not have been inviting to my father, that he may have wanted to come to see me but was hesitant because of my mother.  I don’t know what the truth is, but as the son on the receiving end of an absent father, if you are divorced or absent from your children, make sure that they know that you love them, no matter how complex it is or how big the obstacles are.

    Finally, to all those adults, whatever your status may be, please step into the breech with the children in your families and communities.  Even in nuclear families that seem to do well, it takes a village to raise our children, to be fathers and mothers to so many children who feel abandoned and lost because of the destructive forces in this world.  I had many fathers and mothers who stepped into the breech, so on this Father’s Day, let us give thanks for our fathers who loved us, let us be part of that village of people who helped to raise us.  Let us step into the breech.  It made so much difference my life, and I have tried to pass it forward.  Let us all seek to be fathers one to the other.

"JUNETEENTH"

“JUNETEENTH”

On one level, it is odd that there is no nationally recognized day that celebrates the end of slavery in the USA.  Such a huge event in American history, and there is no universally recognized day for it.  Part of that lack is the fact that slavery did not really end until the Voting Rights Act was signed into law on August 6, 1965.  Between the 13th Amendment which officially banished slavery in USA (except for those in prison, a HUGE exception) and the Voting Rights Act, neo-slavery filled in for white supremacy.  This latter period is often called “Jim Crow,” but that title does not allow the full depth of the depravity of racism and white supremacy to be revealed.  Indeed, calling the period from 1870 to 1965 “Jim Crow” allows us to obscure the real history of oppression in that period.  Neo-Slavery is a much better name for that period.

On June 19, many folk will celebrate the Emancipation Proclamation on “Juneteenth,” the name given to the event in Texas, where news of the Proclamation  and the Union defeat of the Confederacy did not reach African-Americans held in slavery in Texas until June 19, 1865.  At that time, U.S. General Gordon Granger arrived in Galveston with 2,000 federal troops and made this General Order #3:

    “The people of Texas are informed that, in accordance with a proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all slaves are free. This involves an absolute equality of personal rights and rights of property between former masters and slaves, and the connection heretofore existing between them becomes that between employer and hired labor. The freedmen are advised to remain quietly at their present homes and work for wages. They are informed that they will not be allowed to collect at military posts and that they will not be supported in idleness either there or elsewhere.”

            Juneteenth has become the most recognized national celebration of the end of legal slavery in the country.  Many other dates could qualify, and some are celebrated:  watch night services in African-American churches on December 31 of each year, similar  to the ones in 1862, right before the Proclamation took effect;  January 31, when the 13th Amendment abolishing slavery passed Congress;  December 6, when the states ratified the 13th Amendment. Yet, Juneteenth has held on for many reasons. 

            Perhaps the biggest reason that Juneteenth has held on is that it expresses both celebration and ambivalence.  Celebration that there was finally some recognition of the humanity and equality of people of African descent.  Ambivalence because there was so much reluctance to get this news to the people of Texas.  The racism, that would eviscerate the Union victory over the next 40 years after the Civil War,  could be seen in the last sentence of Order #3 – though African-Americans had built the wealth of much of America, they were still seen as being “in idleness.”  The order arrived over 2 years after the Emancipation Proclamation and two months after the Confederate surrender at Appomattox.  As WEB Dubois put it:  “The slave went free; stood a brief moment in the sun; then moved back again toward slavery.”

We are now in a time when white supremacy is seeking to re-assert its traditional hold on American consciousness.  The passage of so many state laws seeking to limit and to confine the vote is a direct response of white supremacy to growing numbers of voters of color.  The desire to suppress the teaching of “critical race theory” comes from the hearts of the white mentality that destroyed Reconstruction and re-established Neo-Slavery.  This is a dangerous time in our history, as the forces of oppression and white supremacy are re-gathering strength.  But, there are so many witnesses to a different way!

            So, on June 19,  celebrate Juneteenth, and celebrate all those witnesses who have worked for equality and justice for all.  Find a way to celebrate the great American vision of the fundamental equality of all people.  Find a way to acknowledge how deeply white supremacy still has a hold on our hearts and vision.  Find a way to work against that captivity, as did Frederick Douglass and Abby Kelley and William Lloyd Garrison and Harriet Tubman and Ida Wells and Anne Braden and Martin Luther King, Jr., and Fannie Lou Hamer and Ella Baker and many others have done.  As June Jordan put it in her powerful “Poem For South African Women:  “we are the ones we have been waiting for.”