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Bending Toward Justice January 16, 2005 The Reverend Susan Davison Archer Cedar Lane Unitarian Universalist Church Bethesda, Maryland REFLECTION “Bending Toward Justice” I am sometimes asked why we continue to celebrate this day with our children in church. Don’t they learn all this in school? There are many reasons we need also to speak of Dr. King and the civil rights movement in religious community. This is a holiday that speaks to the very core of our UU values. But, why do we need to do this each year? A good question. I remember one child asking me one year after telling the story of Passover, Hey, didn’t you tell that story before? Why yes, we have told that story each year because it is important to us. And this story of civil rights in the 20th century is not so different from the exodus of Jews from Egypt, from the birth of hope in a baby at Christmas, from the moving story of Flower Communion. These are all stories that should be told over and over again. Consider the words of Antoine de St. Exupery: “Let us build memories in our children, lest they allow treasures to be lost because they have not been given the keys. We live, not by things, but by the meanings of things. It is needful to transmit the passwords from generation to generation.” These are indeed the stories that not only tell of the past, but also inspire us to meet the future. It is needful to transmit the passwords from generation to generation. In preparation for today I invited members of our congregation to share memories of the civil rights movement, of that time of such intention, pain, and hope. I know that many in this congregation were part of it in some way. One of us remembered the March on Washington and shared these words: “It was a beautiful morning, and we left our baby with a sitter who worried that there would be violence, we would be shot, and she would be left with our son. It could hardly have been more peaceful, however . . 250 thousand people were full of smiles and greetings and love. . . . . Afterwards, our hearts were full of the Lincoln Memorial and the Reflecting Pool. And the day that we could have got shot, but didn’t.” Unfortunately, not all of our memories were this peaceful. Another of us remembered what it was like to visit the Loraine Motel in Memphis. She said, “It was one of the most compelling and moving experiences of my life. To stand on the balcony where MLK was shot and then to go across the street to where James Earl Ray stood was incredibly real—put you right back there in time. It gave me a feeling that I will never forget.” Several members of this congregation participated in events in Selma, the Reverend Bob Zoerhheide, religious educator, Stevie Backus, and a dozen or so more. Tommie Miller took a contingent from LRY, the youth group. I am sure that there are many other stories among us. I hope that this weekend we will continue to share those stories, not only among those who were around during the fifties and sixties, but with those who were not, and especially with our young people. So, this morning, welcome to everyone here, welcome into our celebrating and our remembering of the work that in the Ware Lecture in 1966 at our General Assembly meeting King characterized as being part of a “universe that bends toward justice.” Anastasia: (This prayer is based on the actual dreams of some of our RE students.) We pray today for our dreams: Mariah: We have dreams that one day: Anastasia: People will be able to work together and we will have better leaders, Mariah: War will be a thing of the past and there will be peace and harmony, Anastasia: All people will have pets and there will be no species endangered by pollution, Mariah: There will be justice, Anastasia: There will be more pedestrians, and all cars will run on electricity, Mariah: More trees and plants will not be cut down and everyone will recycle, Anastasia: The poor will become rich and no one will be hungry or without homes, Mariah: There will be less urbanization and more open land, Anastasia: There will be more people working at Martha’s Table, 7 days a week, Mariah: There will be better tsunami predictors, Anastasia: There will be no crime and no terrorism, Mariah: There will be no segregation, prejudice or racism or hating of any kind. These dreams we have in reverence for all that is noble, just, beautiful and true. Amen REFLECTION “The Children’s March and Other Acts of Courage” The picture I have up here is one that usually hangs in my home. It is a Norman Rockwell painting, originally published in Look magazine in 1964 (“The Problem We All Live With”). It shows a small girl, dressed up in clothes, like some of us like to or used to like to wear on the first day of school. But this little girl is not walking into school with friends as is often the case with schoolchildren. She is going to school alone, will be the only one in her class, and she will suffer the unkindness, the hate of others, just for her being there. This small girl is flanked by four men, US marshals. The contrast between her innocence and the presence of these four large “protectors” is stark indeed. There is a wall with racial slurs and hate language, tomatoes thrown against it, and here walks a six-year old girl. She must have been a brave child who had brave parents. There were many brave African American children during the fifties and sixties, the ones that integrated schools, the ones that protested with their elders and Dr. King. One story about this is from 1963, from Birmingham, AL, at one time one of the most strictly segregated cities in our country. Dr. King and the leaders there were setting up all kinds of plans to show their resistance to the segregated lunch counters, restrooms, movie theaters, buses, and on and on. Resisters, mostly black, were marching to show their resolve to change the laws, but it was getting more difficult to find those who would resist. Hundreds would show up for meetings in evenings in church; only a couple of dozen would come in the daytime to march in protest. People were very scared. Sheriff Bull Conner was the reason. He used hoses and dogs on protesters. He arrested many and took them to jail. Reverend King was discouraged; one night when he asked who would help in the protest the next day, it seemed that there was no one who stood up, . . . until, in one corner, a whole group of people stood up! They were children. Adults told them to sit down. King thanked them but told them he couldn’t ask them to go to jail. The kids wouldn’t sit down. Later, it was a hard long night for the leaders. They had to strategize about the next day, and they had to decide if they would let the children march with them. Rev. King was of a mind not to use them. It was just too dangerous.. All the other leaders agreed except for Jim Bevel, “If they want to, let them!” Others said they were too young to protest. Bevel replied: “Are they too young to go to segregated schools? Are they too young to be kept out of amusement parks? Are they too young to be refused a hamburger in a restaurant? Then, they are not too young to want their freedom.” That night, they decided that any child old enough to join a church was old enough to march. Children, teens and college students came in droves. Sheriff Connor arrested many of the children. But the next day there were even more kids marching and, finally, lots of adults joined in. Eventually, there were a couple of thousand children arrested and the jail had no room for anyone else. And that was what brought out the media, the news cameras, like never before. Bull Connor continued using police dogs, and fire hoses which rolled the children down the street. But now there was a whole country watching. No one could claim ignorance about any of what was happening. People were horrified. It was this children’s crusade that marked the turning point for desegregation in Birmingham and the beginnings of it for the country. I have often thought about this decision to allow children to demonstrate in such dangerous times. Would we want children to risk getting hurt? Last week I asked some of our own children if they thought King’s decision to use children was a good one? Several thought that it was right, that alternatives were few. Some thought it was too dangerous and were afraid the children would be hurt. It was a hard question. But, Bevel did make some good points. It wasn’t good for children to live with inequality either. We at Cedar Lane are fortunate that we have access to many different ways to change things. That is because WE have access to power in ways that African Americans in Birmingham in the 1960’s did not. Although I have heard some of us wishing that we had more power than it seems we do over the issues of the day, we still do have power: social, political and economic. In Birmingham, AL there was for blacks no power except the power of the people, including children, made powerful because the media showed what was happening. Those children were weary of the world they lived in and they were very brave. Children played other roles in achieving desegregation. Toni Morrison, an African American author who has won both the Pulitzer and the Nobel Prize for literature, has written her first children’s book, using actual news photos of children from the civil rights movement and imagining what those children were thinking and feeling. Some of our own young people will share a bit of that book with us. Each photo will be described and then we will hear what the child in it might have been thinking. CHILDREN’S ACTS OF COURAGE SCRIPT From: Remember: The Journey to School Integration, by Toni Morrison Washington, DC, 1942: African American students read in a segregated school. “The law says I can’t go to school with white children. Are they afraid of my socks, my braids? I am seven years old. Why are they afraid of me?” ********************************************************** Topeka, Kansas, January, 1954: The daughters of Oliver Brown on their route to school. Their father joined a group of parents organized by the NAACP to challenge the Topeka school board to let their children go to the neighborhood schools rather than more distant segregated schools. This Kansas lawsuit went to the Supreme Court with similar cases from Delaware, Virginia, South Carolina, and Washington, DC. “Our parents sued the board of Education not because they hate them, but because they love us. They are full of hope but they are determined, too. No matter how narrow the path or how long the journey, all of us are on it together.” ********************************************************** Fort Myer, VA, September, 1954: African American and white children are together on the first day of integration in their school. “I think she likes me, but how can I tell? What will I do if she hates me?” ********************************************************** Englewood, NJ, 1962: African American students sit in a school boycotted by white students protesting its recent desegregation. “When they let us in the school, none of the white students came. Their parents made them stay home.” ********************************************************** Hutchins, TX 1954: A group of children with their parents stand outside a school that would not admit them because they were black. Though the Supreme Court ruled that segregated schools were illegal, Texas law made segregation compulsory at the time. “No, no, they said. You can’t come in here. Get away from the door. This school is for white children. Only them.” ********************************************************** Sturgis, KY 1957: On the fourth day of desegregation at a Kentucky high school, African American students walk through a crowd of white students jamming the school’s entrance. “Walking through a crowd of people who hate what we are—not what we do—can make us hate them back for what they are and what they do. A lot of courage and determination are needed not to. We try . . .” ********************************************************** Little Rock, AK, 1957: Members of the Arkansas National Guard turn Elizabeth Eckford away from Central High School. “Soldiers with rifles stop me. Who knows? Will they shoot me if I don’t obey? I eat alone. No one looks at me. I can’t (won’t) look at them.” ********************************************************** Virginia, 1958: Students attend a party to make school integration easier. “I see in her face just a girl. She sees in my face another girl. Maybe not friends, but simply girls together.” ********************************************************** New Orleans, 1960: Ruby Bridges attends first grade under US Marshal escort. Ruby was the only black student at her school and the only child in her class, because many white parents took their children out of school to protest integration. “They are trying to scare me. I guess they don’t have any children of their own. But didn’t grownups used to be little kids who know how it felt to be scared.” ********************************************************** Selma, Alabama, 1965: Civil rights activists marched from Selma to Montgomery to demand voting rights. This young marcher wore a helmet for protection against state law enforcement officials who might try to stop the marchers. “I am not confused. I don’t want to be treated as though I am equal, but because I am.” ********************************************************** Birmingham, AL 1963: A boy looks through a jail yard fence. He was arrested with hundreds of other young activists who marched for freedom and equality. City authorities attacked the demonstrators with police dogs and fire hoses. So many marchers were arrested that they clogged the local jails. “I’ve never been arrested or jailed before. I’m scared but not afraid . . . Because if I ever feel helpless or lonely, I just have to remember that sometimes all it takes is one person. Then the loneliness melts away.” ********************************************************** Boston 1975: Students, black and white, put their arms out the windows and clasp hands on the bus ride to their integrated school after local unrest over using busing to desegregate the schools, “Anything can happen. Anything at all. See?” REFLECTION “Civil Rights and Unitarian Universalism” The Unitarian and Universalist history in relation to advocacy for racial equality and civil rights is mixed. There are many stories that range from Unitarians and Universalists who held slaves, to Dr. Benjamin Rush, Universalist signer of the Declaration of Independence and famous physician, who founded the first anti-slavery society in America in Philadelphia in the 1790’s. In the first half of the 20th century, we have had denominational leadership that did everything it could to discourage blacks from becoming clergy in our movement. And, we also had some of the first integrated churches. We have had internal dissent about what black power meant in our UU governance and whether we should let go of long treasured dreams of integration and shared power. We also have had more than a few moments in which we have provided outstanding leadership and hard work to make things better. Right now, we will only tell the story of Unitarian Universalists in Selma, Alabama, located in a county where by 1965 only 1% of black voters were registered to vote. African Americans were turned away from voter registrars by the use of literacy tests, often including ridiculous questions that would be impossible for any person to answer (e.g. Dick Leonard’s host in Selma had been asked how many bubbles would be made from a bar of soap). Dr. King and other black leaders were organizing protesters. Let us start that story by remembering the killing of Jimmy Lee Jackson near Selma, AL on February 17th, 1965. A young black man, he had been trying to protect his mother from police during a march for voting rights. He was shot and killed by state troopers. This young man was a Vietnam veteran and a church deacon. Unfortunately, such violence was not new to black Americans. Three weeks later came these words from the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr, in a telegram sent to the governing bodies of faith groups all over the country: In the vicious maltreatment of defenseless citizens of Selma, where old women and young children were gassed and clubbed at random, we have witnessed an eruption of the disease of racism which seeks to destroy all America. No American is without responsibility. The people of Selma will struggle on for the soul of the nation but it is fitting that all Americans help to bear the burden. I call therefore on clergy of all faiths to join me in Selma. Thus began one of the most important periods of civil rights history, and indeed one of the most important epoch’s of our Unitarian Universalist history. Clergy did come; at first, there were only around 20 of them who were Unitarian Universalists. One was the Reverend Jim Reeb. Reeb had been a youth minister at All Souls Church, Unitarian and had moved back to Boston to begin work as a community minister. He was very troubled by what was happening in Alabama and hearing King’s “call” he decided to go to Selma. The night he arrived in Selma he went out to eat with two other UU ministers, Clark Olson and Orloff Miller, and upon leaving the restaurant they were attacked. Jim Reeb took the biggest hit, by a plank of wood to the back of his head. He was unconscious and obviously hurt very badly. The old ambulance for the black side of town came to take him to a hospital in Montgomery, but it broke down and thus delayed his urgent trip for medical attention. No white medical personnel or vehicles would help. Eventually, he did get to the hospital, but it seemed likely that it was too late. While Reeb lay dying in the hospital, protesters back in Selma continued their nonviolent marches, hoping to get to the courthouse, and eventually across a bridge and on to Montgomery. They were resolute and stood their ground through the day and night, although they didn’t move any closer to the courthouse or to the bridge. With Reeb’s death, many more clergy descended on Selma. It happened that this was the same time as a UUA meeting of our Board of Trustees in Boston. All of them, about 30 people, agreed to get up and go immediately to Selma, both for Reeb’s memorial and to show their support. One hundred and thirty-one UU clergy and many lay-people also came, to join the ranks of Selma residents, the leadership of black civil rights groups, and many others who felt called to Selma. Dick Leonard, one of our UU ministers who had gone to Selma when Reeb did, after that moving telegram, describes his mixture of feelings and what happened at the service for Jim Reeb in Brown Chapel, the home base for the protesters. He was feeling the weight of what he saw as tokenism among some of his white fellow clergy. [FROM LEONARD’S BOOK, “CALL TO SELMA”] From the balcony I saw a sea of dignitaries clearly unrelated to the events in Selma. Many faiths had come to pay tribute in this memorial to Jim Reeb. There was a certain uplift that came from the broad spectrum participating in this ecumenical service. But beyond that, until Dr. King himself spoke, it is hard to imagine a more jumbled collection of prepared prayers and speeches rattled off in a patronizing way. It was ecclesiasticism at its worst. James Reeb’s death was described as the most monstrous example of brutality, when in fact it was one more instance in a long series. Men who had not taken the time to meet any young people praised them for their courage. The men and women who had come “thousands of miles” for the memorial were extolled. I thought that it was not too difficult to come and go in 24 hours and have the vicarious experience of heroism through singing a few freedom songs. When King began to speak, however, it suddenly seemed right that we should all be there. Everyone moved a bit in his or her seat when King asked rhetorically, who killed Jim Reeb?” He answered: A few ignorant men. Then he asked, “What killed Jim Reeb?” and answered: An irrelevant church, an indifferent clergy, an irresponsible political system, a corrupt law enforcement hierarchy, a timid federal government, and an uncommitted Negro population. He exhorted us to leave the ivory towers of learning and storm the bastions of segregation and see to it that the work Jim Reeb had started be continued so that the white South might come to terms with its conscience. . . . That night, President Lyndon B. Johnson addressed a joint session of Congress. By 9 o’clock every television set in the Carver Houses, the public housing project where many of us stayed with host families, was banked with as many persons as could squeeze into the room. Johnson began: At times history and fate meet in a single time in a single place to shape a turning point in man’s unending search for freedom. So it was at Lexington and Concord. So it was a century ago at Appomattox. So it was last week in Selma, Alabama.” Forty-five minutes later he concluded his ringing address, in which he had urged Congress to help him pass a new voting rights bill. Everyone in the room where we had stood throughout was crying, men and women, old and young, black and white. There are other stories of the role of UUs in those critical times. The march from Selma to Montgomery concluded successfully by March 25. UU activist from Detroit, Viola Liuzzo was killed that night by Klan night riders while she was driving marchers back to Selma. Those were hard times. But we must also lift up that now citizens of all races have the right to vote. Before we conclude our story about Selma I would invite you to look at the photo on the front of our order of service. There you see people marching for something they know is right. You also see that many of them are marching arm in arm. That is not only a friendly way to be with each other. In those days it was a tactic of nonviolence resistance. If you were walking arm in arm, one person couldn’t be plucked from the crowd by the police. When we sing our closing song, try it with your neighbors! For King, the key was to work together. What we cannot make happen by ourselves, we can make happen with others. Looking back to the time of Selma, one UU minister, Irene Murdock, wrote: “For me, Selma was a high point, an unforgettable experience, but for all of us it is an historical time, never to be forgotten. We have come a long way, but there is still much to be done, and it sometimes seems we take one step forward and then two steps backward. The struggle goes on . . . May we hold fast to our dreams and be eternally vigilant in order that the battle may one day be truly and rightfully won.” HYMN “We Shall Overcome” CLOSING WORDS “I have the audacity to believe that people everywhere can have three meals a day for their tired bodies, education and culture for their spirits. I believe that what self-centered humans have torn down, other-centered-humans can build up. I still believe that one day humankind will bow before the altars of God and be crowned triumphant over war and bloodshed, and non-violent redemptive goodwill will proclaim the rule of the land, ‘and the lion and the lamb shall lie down together and every person shall sit under their own vine and fig tree and none shall be afraid.’ I still believe that we shall overcome.” - MLK
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