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Justice and change ... I chose this topic because it has been on my
mind.
Change.
It has been in the air here at this church over the past several
months. As a staff member here at CUUC, I knew the creation of the
survey we just took was a serious focus for many of our key leaders.
Compiling the data, sharing the results, really reading the results
carefully, digesting there significance: very critical tasks. There has
been lots of talk about our vision and a plan of action. So I can feel
the ferment of change in the air.
I heard someone quote Gandhi, ”Be the change you wish to see in the
world.” We must each be the change … We must be the change … We must be
the change we wish to see at this church. As your employee, I take this
very seriously. I have a mandate to meet the needs of this
congregation, so change has been on my mind.
It has been about a year and a half since I uprooted myself from a
predictable way of life in Shreveport, LA, and transplanted myself here
in this unknown and seemingly endless frozen but beautiful landscape …
almost a year to the day when I first visited this very church and felt
what many of you have felt: A sense that this was the place for me. I
belonged here. It fit just right. You offered what I needed. This is
what I had been searching for. I can find my place in this community of
seekers who are right on the cusp of growth. We are between a small,
”Everybody’s in on everything” one-room country school house kind of
church and a medium sized” Come on it’s time to get organized” kind of
church which is searching for ways to empower committees, learning to
direct more than actually create church programming.
My efforts to put down roots here in the west have brought into
sharper focus some differences between life here and the life that
surrounded me during my forty-some years in the south. These differences
came more acutely into focus in the shadow of MLK’s birthday. PBS again
aired portions of that wonderful civil rights documentary “Eyes on the
Prize.” Each time I see those images, much of what I experienced
in the Mississippi delta in the mid and late 60’s always gets stirred up
inside me. I find myself reliving -- rethinking -- much of what life was
like back then. I contrast experiences from the 60’s against my
later 30 years of life in Louisiana’s North West corner.
Shreveport hovers on the edge of east Texas but it always felt like the
Deep South to me.
My very first trip to south came in 1965. It was my first
exposure to real poverty. Not just the “We don’t have the money
for the mortgage on the house” kind of poverty but generational,
institutionalized poverty where everyone around me-the wealthy and the
very poor-all seemed to have a sense that this is the way it has always
been. “We can’t envision any other way of life.”
Black Hawk, Mississippi in 1965: Somewhat between Memphis and Jackson
in mid-August. Picture this: Shack after shot-gun shack in the middle of
a cotton patch under full sun with 95+ humidity, no electricity, no
running water, chickens out back pecking through what was the family
bathroom, kids and mama and granddaddy, along with a poor old dog, all
on the porch out front with no place to go and nothing to do. Young and
old who had never once in their lives been out of Black Hawk or Carroll
County, Mississippi.
In 1965 I went south from my home in Wisconsin, as part of Project
Understanding: a grass-roots effort to link up counties in Mississippi
with rural, all white counties in Wisconsin to prepare for the day when
small rural Wisconsin towns would be integrated, hoping these efforts
could change biases and preconceived ideas into actual friendships and
cultural understandings. We knew that the more diverse a community is,
the more it can offer all of its citizens the very best of what human
kind can offer. We knew we wanted to welcome -- not just tolerate --
newcomers into our community. We really wanted that, in the lily white
communities surrounding the Madison area in south central Wisconsin in
the early 60’s.
So there we were: three young white women, all elementary school
teachers from St. Joseph’s Catholic School in Waterloo, Wisconsin,
spending two weeks of our summer vacation in Blackhawk, Mississippi in
1965. We were representatives of the northern white communities, on a
cultural exchange, inviting young black students to come spend two weeks
with a white family back home in Wisconsin. We had set up pen–pals,
families had sent pictures and letters back and forth for initial
introductions. Most adults in that poor, uneducated, black community
couldn’t write a letter but prior visitors had helped wit that,
connections had been established and now it was time for the children to
come visit.
Because it was not safe for any white children to come south and stay
with a black family, we three were the token representatives. We were
asking the local people to entrust their often one and only possession
of wealth -- their most precious "all I have is you" children to us,
whites -- and to allow us to carry their children off 1,000 miles north,
trusting we would keep our word and bring them back safely in two weeks
time. I marvel at their courage. They made a choice to trust us.
Sight unseen, they allowed themselves to trust these strangers who were
white. They had always prayed for some way their babies would know more
than just Black Hawk. They wanted their children to have hopes and
dreams beyond the Mississippi Delta. They knew this summer trip would be
one way to do this.
For the 500 plus children who did participate during those years,
this was their first step out of their known world and they were scared,
too. But they went anyway.
By the local white standards, in rural Mississippi back then, we
Yankees were not representatives of a welcoming northern community. We
were the enemy. The status quo was all that counted. We were agitators.
We were a threat. The very thought of foundational changes shook the
white community to its core. The local constable came to the door of the
shack we three shared with 80-year-old China Terra. She had offered us a
place to stay and in return, she had the police at her door. The
constable’s words to us: “You have 24 hours to get out of town.”
The look in his eye is what I recall most of all. I saw tremendous fear.
Under the hatred- such deep-seated hatred that I had never seen before-
stood frantic fear. “No way. Not here. Not now. Never. We don’t want
none of you and your trouble. Y’all just get out of here.”
We did leave -- for fear of what might happen to China Terra -- and
we did leave town. We found refuge with two Franciscan nuns working in
the neighboring town of Lexington. We left China’s house; a shot-gun
shack. There we had brushed a day’s collection of moths off the bed
sheet before crawling in at night. We had bathroomed outside like she
did. We were offered the chicken she butchered and boiled for us -- the
very chicken we had seen scurrying around in back as it cleaned up the
bathroom area behind the house. We had looked at the stars through the
weathered planks that served as her walls. We hung our clothes on the
nails that jutted out from those planks- where all the clothing she
owned normally hung. It was a rude awakening for this naive little gal
from Wisconsin. I had seen it on TV but now I smelled it. I felt it. I
tasted it. Fear. Hatred. Poverty. Love. Each became very real to me.
Head Start was just being introduced in central Mississippi at this
time. Being an educator, I naturally gravitated toward that cause,
giving me the opportunity to help get several centers up and running.
Everyone in the black community was talking about it: a program that
picked up preschoolers -- gave them breakfast and lunch, that invited
momma to come along, that trained some moms to be leaders and others
even teachers -- a place that had books, actual picture books, to see
things no one had ever seen in their lives but had heard about. I
remember watching a group of moms look at their first picture book of
zoo animals, so shocked and amazed to see what they actually looked
like. THEY were the head starters with their first look beyond Black
Hawk, Mississippi. I recall a little boy named Precious Dinkens, who
loved to slip off to the bathroom to flush and reflush a wonder he had
never before observed. Three and four year-olds turned the light switch
on and off to marvel at the miracle of what happened when they did. Such
were the amazing graces I witnessed back then.
Below all the changes which came with opportunity, deep seated
attitudes were slow to unfurl. In the beginning, in 1965 through 69 or
so, it was rare that anyone of color would ever look me in the eye. I
was “yes, ma'amed” to death. Even though I became a familiar face in the
Black Hawk area, there was that ingrained fear, that automatic response
that I was somehow above them and they could not be equal. I saw the
flip side of that, too, in the white community.
Once I was asked to take a little boy from the Head Start Center in
Black Hawk to a medical clinic in Lexington. The boy had tripped, cut
his chin open, and needed a few stitches. We drove there, he, sitting
low in the back seat of my car so we would not look like a family. We
ventured toward the white receptionist in the front office. I remember
the ceiling fans grinding above, stirring the oppressive heat and
humidity, mixing with that somewhat sick medical smell. The receptionist
looked at me with utter amazement and puzzlement. I recall that same
look of fear in her eyes and the look that said she was far above me-
way far above the child with the bleeding chin. We were sent out back to
the black waiting room which had no fan, no chairs. The examining table
had no cushions or paper covering- just a metal frame where we waited,
standing, until all the white patients had been seen. The doctor who did
the stitching would not meet my gaze either. There was no “yes, ma'am”
from him to me. I had crossed a line and “ma'am” no longer fit but I do
remember being impacted by this experience of status in the south.
Knowing one’s place and stepping out of one’s place often meant the
difference between life and death. I had heard a grandmomma say to her
small grandson -- (he was perhaps four or five and had looked up at me
and grinned) -- she shook him hard: “Don’t you ever look no white lady
in the face, boy.” The same paralyzing fear I saw in the black community
was present in the white community as well, dressed in different colors,
but the face of fear in the face of change. It seemed to go on every
such journey.
By the mid 80’s I was a married woman with two small children. As a
transplanted Yankee I had adapted well to my southern suburban home
outside of Shreveport, Louisiana. Having Barksdale Air Force Base in our
back yard brought noise but in our neighborhood it also powerfully
influenced attitudinal and cultural change. We were surrounded by
military families of all colors from all over the states. I could almost
see attitudinal changes creeping in. Locals shifted from saying “that
black family…” to “Go ask Jared’s mom…” or “that’s a black cub scout
den” to” I want my son in Mr. Metcalf’s den…” I heard parents who once
said things like “My son has that black math teacher.” shift to “he’s in
Mr. Scott’s math.” Somebody’s yard boy became Mr. Washington who was
taking night classes and wanted a profession equal to his abilities and
his dreams. Attitudes DID change -- slowly, very slowly in many cases --
but change happened. I had the privilege to see it unfold.
I went back to Black Hawk in 1990 for the funeral of L.C. Smith, the
father of 10 who had been the Mississippi co-chair of Project
Understanding in the 60’s. He lived in Black Hawk all of his 70 some
years. Long ago I had warmed my hands by the fire in his potbellied
stove in the one room shack which housed his entire family of ten. There
we had laughed together, told jokes together, heard stories of what all
had happened in the dark of night when crosses were burned in an effort
to scare folks like L.C. I learned to sing one of L.C.’s favorite hymns:
I shall not, I shall not be moved. Like a tree, planted by the water, I
shall not be moved.”
L.C.’s children came with their children from all over the country,
way beyond the confines of Carroll County Mississippi for their Dad’s
funeral. Because it was 1990 they stayed in the same Holiday Inn where
my family and I slept. They were checked in by the same gracious hostess
who attended to us. We ate breakfast together in the same Waffle House.
None of this ever would have happened in the 1960’s. What I loved most
of all -- and L.C. would have loved this tremendously -- he, the
trouble-maker of the 60’s who withstood the threats, the cross-burnings,
the hatred- he had a police escort- a mixed-race police escort to his
final resting place. My daughter, Kiva, tells me now that she remembers
his service well-being in his small rural Bethel AME Church with its
rough-hewn benches and the walls seeming to vibrate with the intensity
of the choir and the presence of L.C.’s powerful spirit. What I remember
most now, however, is the long drive back to Shreveport, past
Mississippi’s rolling hills and Cudzoo vines; and my recounting -- in
sheer amazement -- all the changes I had witnessed; how bits of hate and
bias had dissolved as we passed places where signs once hung determining
where and who could or could not eat or drink or bathroom.
Frederick Wirt, in his book We Ain’t What We Was, affirms the
tremendous changes in the south when he writes:
"In 1865 the officers of the federal army that had entered
Mississippi, finally left. The agents of Washington, seeking
control, would not again walk Mississippi’s hot town roads and
country lanes until 1961, when officials of the Department of
Justice set foot there. Both federal appearances brought enormous
upheaval in the South. They brought excoriation from the whites who
saw the federal agents as invaders. BUT they also brought hope to
black people as their secular saviors. Both interventions changed
cultural traditions so basically that in each century the old south
became a new south with both black and white citizens having to
adapt to new lives. The writings and actions of both periods shout
to us across time of fear and hate and hope and change."
In 1965 I would never have believed that such deep change could
happen so quickly. I know that a few weeks back the Denver Post ran a
long article about the rise, again, of the KKK but now Mexicans are
their new target. I know, too, that just a few weeks back the newly
elected first-time black mayor of a small Louisiana town was gunned
down. They made it look like a suicide but everyone in the community
knew the truth. Hate and resistance to change do exist; we know that,
but I did get to see first hand that hate could dissolve. Change can
happen. I experienced the terrible feeling of knowing you are definitely
NOT welcome and I have seen that attitude pass. I know people who moved
from an attitude of toleration to one of acceptance.
Change is such a powerful force. Every small change has huge,
reverberating effects beyond our knowing and our seeing. The smallest
rock can be a catalyst for change. You long-time Coloradans know first
hand that the tiniest thing can trigger an avalanche.
We don’t have to fear any of the changes we face. We don’t have to
face anything with fear. Susan Jeffers wrote the book, “Feel the Fear
and Do It Anyway.” I love to quote her: "Fear goes on every journey we
take and always has bad advice.” Those who stay afraid and angry and
negative choose it. There are many other healthier, viable options
filled with courage, love, excitement, empathy, understanding and
compassion. They are free for the taking and it is a choice.
May we, as a congregation, stand tall to accept the challenge to
welcome change, to roll up our sleeves in the small context of this
church, at this time, on this planet. We must allow ourselves to see the
changes here as equal to the changes within society during civil rights
times. These changes are not on the same monumental, sociological scale
BUT, again, the tiniest pebble can cause an avalanche. What we face here
in our congregation at this point in time is exciting. It is a good
thing. It will bring us and future members of this church to a better
place.
There is no room for discouragement in this effort. Only optimism.
Only positive energy. We are dealing with realities that pulsate with
hope and constructive energy. Southwest Denver needs us. We are a beacon
of hope. We are here ready to face the issues of our times. We stand
with an open door to all people. Social issues that drive us toward
change have shifted from African Americans to Mexican immigrants, to
charged political issues like this crazy war, gay marriage rights, the
homeless in our own city. There will always be critical issues. The
issues will change; but this church must be here to take a stand, to get
involved. We must let nothing hold us back from that challenge. We must
be the change we hope to see.
And so I end with this pastoral prayer:
Spirit of light and love and energy
Stir us up.
Inspire us with the courage of those who have gone before.
Lead us to action.
Push us to make a choice to embrace change,
To welcome it
As an ever present guest at the table of life.
Lead us toward deeper and broader horizons
So that in the span of the next 15 years of life at this church
We too can celebrate the positive effects of our befriending change.
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