Urban Soul Connect

Fwd: Damian Lillard on what he wants to teach the kids attending his Formula ...

2022-08-24T19:31:00.001-07:00

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Begin forwarded message:

From: Fred Moore jr <showersahead@icloud.com>
Date: August 17, 2022 at 4:03:45 PM PDT
To: bethestrong1@icloud.com
Subject: Damian Lillard on what he wants to teach the kids attending his Formula ...

https://youtu.be/QGEjoabUpL8

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2022-05-21T19:36:00.001-07:00

https://twitter.com/mehdirhasan/status/1527832841303863296?s=20&t=Wp4EJOvjIKgVrl6LoVLTaQ

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2022-05-20T08:26:00.001-07:00

https://twitter.com/CNNPolitics/status/1527641311536373760?s=20&t=H8ccaHBqvxyiq_S0iblpNA

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Fwd: A photo of Florida students spelling out a racial slur is under investigation

2022-05-20T07:44:00.001-07:00

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Begin forwarded message:

From: NPR <email@nl.npr.org>
Date: May 20, 2022 at 7:41:58 AM PDT
To: fredmojr@gmail.com
Subject: A photo of Florida students spelling out a racial slur is under investigation
Reply-To: NPR <reply-fe8c10777d61017977-72490_HTML-581183559-6425781-480580@nl.npr.org>

Sent to you by Fred (Fredmojr@gmail.com)

Fred (Fredmojr@gmail.com) thought you would be interested in this story.

A photo of Florida students spelling out a racial slur is under investigation
In the photo, each of the six students is shown holding up a large letter that spells out the N-word.

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This email was sent by National Public Radio, Inc., 1111 North Capitol Street NE, Washington, DC 20002

Privacy Policy

2022-05-18T14:55:00.001-07:00

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1029456430478682&set=a.896103553813971&type=3

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2022-05-18T14:52:00.001-07:00

https://www.facebook.com/100049631345649/posts/pfbid02WramKDevLQVHiWzD7VKkYwWtHerdsKY2TdrqoiAQGKz6kEM4ey3KZzjP3Sb6Nm75l/?d=n

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Poetry Foundation

2022-04-26T08:54:00.001-07:00

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/50465/thanatopsis

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2022-04-07T20:33:00.001-07:00

https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamiecartereurope/2022/04/02/see-the-jaw-dropping-new-83-megapixel-photo-of-the-sun-sent-back-from-a-spacecraft-halfway-there/amp/

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The Discipline of Disappointments and Failures

2022-03-17T13:30:00.003-07:00

Some of the most valuable leadership lessons to be obtained are those that emerge from disappointments and apparent failures. I know that failure is not the most popular topic for discussion, especially for those of us who are focused on making a success of life. But we need to talk about our failures and disappointments more than we do because many of us are missing the fertile ground for growth in leadership that our disappointments and failures provide.

Photo credit: Ray S.
I think about how I first learned to ride a bike. It was not an easy process. When my father removed the training wheels from my two-wheeler and pushed my bike down the sidewalk, I frequently fell off my bike as I furiously and frantically peddled in vain to keep rolling. But each time I fell off, I got back on my bike again. I didn't tell my father to put the training wheels back on. I was prepared to get back on the bike and keep trying and failing and trying again until I could finally master riding my bike. It was painful; it didn't feel good; I cried as I lay crumpled up on the ground with my bike on top of me. But when I finally could ride without falling, the joy of reaching that milestone far surpassed any pain and tears I shed during the learning process! So it is with growth in leadership. We are going to make mistakes along the way, and it's going to be embarrassing, it's going to be painful; some days we're going to shed some tears of disappointment from our failures. But we cannot give up nor give in to discouragement. We are to study where we made a left when we should have turned right, and learn the lessons that are there for us to learn, and get back on and try again and again until we succeed! Just about every leader that we admire for their successes, experienced failures and setbacks on the way to their great success. It is the lessons that they learned in darkness, leadership skills that they picked up in times of adversity and hardship, that prepared them for achieving and managing their later successes. Those failures may have appeared at the time to feel like curses; but those curses prayerfully placed in God's hands became blessings in disguise!

The following quote from Seventh-day Adventist Church prophetess and pioneer Ellen G. White captures the essence of the sentiments expressed above. It is copied and pasted below for the readers' (and my) benefit.

(Mt 20:26-28; Lk 9:46-48; 22:24-27; Jn 12:24) Christ has given to every man his work, and we are to acknowledge the wisdom of the plan He has made for us by a hearty cooperation with Him. It is in a life of service only that true happiness is found. He who lives a useless, selfish life is miserable. He is dissatisfied with himself and with everyone else. True, unselfish, consecrated workers gladly use their highest gifts in the lowliest service. They realize that true service means to see and to perform the duties that God points out. There are many who are not satisfied with the work that God has given them. They are not satisfied to serve Him pleasantly in the place that He has marked out for them, or to do uncomplainingly the work that He has placed in their hands. It is right for us to be dissatisfied with the way in which we perform duty, but we are not to be dissatisfied with the duty itself, because we would rather do something else. In His providence God places before human beings service that will be as medicine to their diseased minds. Thus He seeks to lead them to put aside the selfish preferences which, if cherished, would disqualify them for the work He has for them. If they accept and perform this service, their minds will be cured. But if they refuse it, they will be left at strife with themselves and with others. The Lord disciplines His workers, so that they will be prepared to fill the places appointed them. He desires to mold their minds in accordance with His will. For this purpose He brings to them test and trial. Some He places where relaxed discipline and over-indulgence will not become their snare, where they are taught to appreciate the value of time, and to make the best and wisest use of it. There are some who desire to be a ruling power, and who need the sanctification of submission. God brings about a change in their lives, and perhaps places before them duties that they would not choose. If they are willing to be guided by Him, He will give them grace and strength to perform the objectionable duties in a spirit of submission and helpfulness. They are being qualified to fill places where their disciplined abilities will make them of the greatest service. Some God trains by bringing to them disappointment and apparent failure. It is His purpose that they shall learn to master difficulty. He inspires them with a determination to make every apparent failure prove a success. Often men pray and weep because of the perplexities and obstacles that confront them. But if they will hold the beginning of their confidence steadfast unto the end, He will make their way clear. Success will come to them as they struggle against apparently insurmountable difficulties; and with success will come the greatest joy. Many are ignorant of how to work for God, not because they need to be ignorant, but because they are not willing to submit to His training process. -8MR 422, 423 • TMK 44-The Pattern Man; UL 62-A Living Connection With the Living God

Pause to Process Your Pain

2022-02-21T22:13:00.001-08:00

I published this short video for someone who has experienced or is experiencing grief and loss or something else resulting in emotional hurt and pain. Be well.

Martin Luther King Jr. Day 2022 Is Taking on a Different Tone - And For Reasons Vital to Democracy

2022-01-15T22:49:00.008-08:00

On this Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday, the family of Dr. King is asking for a different kind of observance, which is to say, they demand that their father's legacy is best honored by restoring voting rights.

Please share this quote from my father through #MLKDay2022:

“I think the tragedy is that we have a Congress with a Senate that has a minority of misguided senators who will use the filibuster to keep the majority of people from even voting.” @LeaderMcConnell @SenatorSinema pic.twitter.com/uLmHyEqTTU
— Be A King (@BerniceKing) January 14, 2022

Martin Luther King Jr.’s family is calling for no celebration of #MLKDay without action on voting rights legislation.

When you see Republicans, Sinema, and Manchin celebrating MLK Day on Monday, just remember that they are BETRAYING his legacy. pic.twitter.com/ZE3gzi0i89
— Brave New Films (@bravenewfilms) January 14, 2022

It may be news to some that voting rights in America has been under attack - again. But to those who have been paying attention to what has been happening to the American electoral process since the conservative-dominated United States Supreme Court intervened in the closely-contested 2000 presidential election and made George W. Bush the 43rd POTUS, despite his Democratic opponent, Sen. Al Gore, winning the majority vote, this is not revelatory. Key SCOTUS decisions have collectively undermined the core principle of our democracy - election by a majority vote in a free and fair elector process. In 2008 and 2012, the United States made history by electing and re-electing its first African-American POTUS, Barack Hussein Obama. This monumental success of democracy was achieved largely because of record African-American voter turnout in both of those elections. But in the conservative "white backlash" to this triumph of American democracy, the still conservative and activist SCOTUS went to work to eviscerate the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which, along with the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, was the crowning achievement of the Civil Rights Movement led by Dr. King. The ruling of the court in Shelby County v. Holder (2013) was based on the circular logic that the preclearance requirement of section 5 of the Voting Rights Act was an obsolete "racial entitlement" [yes, the Court used this racist dog whistle] that had no place in a "post-racial" America.

Preclearance protects voters.
The heart of the VRAA restores the requirement for jurisdictions with a long history of voting discrimination to “pre-clear” future changes to their voting rules.https://t.co/USrL4DvdHe
— RopeaDope (@rope_adope_) January 16, 2022

With the SCOTUS ruling that rescinded the protections of section 5, state legislatures in Texas, North Carolina and other red states immediately introduced and passed the most restrictive package of laws aimed at suppressing minority voting rights. And that effort to suppress votes has only intensified since that time. Congress must pass the Voting Rights Advancement Act and the John Lewis Freedom to Vote Act to restore the full protection of voting rights of all Americans, because in a democracy, every vote counts.

GLP Playbook: Why Is Prayer Not Trending?

2021-12-06T09:42:00.002-08:00

Why Is Prayer Neglected?
Recently a client shared a paraphrase of this gem about prayer:

I don't often spend more than half an hour in prayer - but I never go more than half an hour without praying #prayer #Wigglesworth
— Wigglesworth Quotes (@S_Wigglesworth1) May 14, 2014

I immediately heard this as the kind, merciful invitation of the Holy Spirit to a deeper, more meaningful and fruitful life of prayer. I must confess that I find it unsurprisingly easy to fall away from a life of effectual, fervent prayer. When we lose focus in this area of spiritual development, we leave the door open for the busyness of life to preoccupy us and crowd out the believer's main business of relationally connecting with God through prayer.

I know for many of us it is a genuine struggle to find the proper balance between work and life. And because we look at the mountain of things to do and the scarcity of time and resources in which to do them, we tend to dive into work mode - because it all depends on "me" - and neglect let the most important aspects of our living, which is having a healthy relationship with the Lifegiver and with our family.

Work, as valuable and important as it is, requires a conditional commitment of time and labor that we can control to a greater or lesser degree. Life requires a larger and unconditional commitment of our whole selves, which dictates that we, in a sense, must yield control over our lives to Someone and something that's greater than us. Please prayerfully ponder this before hastening on to the next paragraph.

The Value of Being Still

On one occasion, Jesus was invited by Martha to come and break bread with her and her family. "Now it happened as they went that He entered a certain village; and a certain woman named Martha welcomed Him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who also sat at Jesus' feet and heard his word. But Martha was distracted with much serving, and she approached Him and said, 'Lord, do You not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Therefore tell her to help me.' And Jesus answered and said to her, 'Martha, Martha, you are worried and troubled about many things. But one thing is needed, and Mary has chosen that good part, which will not be taken away from her.'" Luke 10:38-42. Jesus valued relationship above labor. Which is to say, Martha's labor was good, but Jesus required her to be with Him, be present with Him. That is not putting down what Martha was doing, but putting it in perspective in the larger picture: never should labor get in the way of relationship. The first couple, Adam and Eve, were so preoccupied with their labors that Adam lost track of Eve long enough for her to become distracted and to meander by the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the middle of the garden, and they soon lost themselves in the garden. We do more or less the same when we lose sight of our relationship with God and get lost in a forest of preoccupation with ourselves and our self-directed search for meaning.

Answering the Call to Spiritual Rest

But thanks be to God through Jesus Christ, Jesus faithfully calls us to rest from our own labors and to sit at Jesus' feet, to learn from Him and have our careworn spirits revived and renewed. The human spirit needs rest. Not merely physical rest, but rest for our spirits. Connection with God through prayer is an important part of that spiritual rest, for by prayer we connect with God by sharing our burdens, our joys, our cares and our fears. We call out to Him in worship, in adoration and humble dependence, realizing that He is the Vine, and we are the branches, and we can accomplish nothing without Him. When we connect with God relationally, through prayer and listening to his word, we grow in faith and in trust and we learn to place our heavy burdens on the only One Who can help us. Then we are cooperating with God and not depending on ourselves. "Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light." "I can do all things through Christ Who gives me strength." Matthew 11:28-30; Philippians 4:13. Prayer takes it out of our hands and puts it in God's hands.

Keeping it in Perspective

To be clear, prayer is not a substitute for the labor that we must do. Rather, when we pray first, we receive divine grace and favor to help us in our labor and keep the labor in proper balance with seeking relationship with God first.

White Supremacist Violence Against Black and Minority Elected Officials is Really Old News

2021-12-02T06:53:00.001-08:00

As our nation rounds the November-December peak of the holiday observances - Thanksgiving, Hanukkah, Christmas,and Kwanzaa - we are painfully and sadly reminded almost daily in the news cycle that white supremacist domestic terrorism against Black and minority elected officials is always in season. We note below the heartbreaking press conference in which Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), the first African refugee elected to Congress and the first woman of color to represent the state of Minnesota, in which she played a graphic recording of a death threat that she received [warning: threat of violence]:

The Recount

⁦‪@therecount‬⁩

Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) plays a horrific death threat she received following Rep. Lauren Boebert's (R-CO) recent Islamophobic attacks on her.

Warning: It's incredibly graphic. pic.twitter.com/5PGODcaJOu

11/30/21, 3:50 PM

Sent from my iPhone

This disgusting voicemail was preceded earlier in one of the darkest weeks of the year by incendiary, Islamophobic comments directed towards Omar by Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.), words which she later apologized for, but showed no remorse for when called to accountability by Omar. But what we must understand about Boebert's demagoguery is just part of the larger and undeniable pattern of dehumanizing and denigrating racist political rhetoric that precipitates white supremacist terroristic violent attacks targeting Black elected officials. We've seen this over and again throughout the blood-stained history of American politics, where duly-elected Black officials and people exercising their Constitutionally-enshrined rights as citizens are lynched, sometimes politically and metaphorically, sometimes literally, oftentimes both. Today marks the 147th anniversary of the very bloody Vicksburg Massacre of 1874,in which unruly mobs of white people murdered Black citizens who had just elected the first Black sheriff of that town.

On this day in 1874, white mobs attacked and killed dozens of Black citizens in Vicksburg, Mississippi, who had organized to help a duly elected Black sheriff regain his office. To overcome racial inequality, we must confront our history. https://t.co/cIxWbUWGAk
— Equal Justice Initiative (@eji_org) December 7, 2021

Some who are ignorant of this historical pattern of racist violent white backlash against Black progress may be surprised by any or all of this. But those of us who are African-American and relatively conscious are painfully aware of the exorbitant price that our ancestors before us paid and we continue to pay for daring to exercise the power of our votes and our voices to reach for precious civil freedom and equity - for all of us! We have not bought into the narrative that, with the election of its first African American POTUS, Barack Obama, somehow America suddenly became "post-racial." We understood that as a myth as we witnessed the predictable white backlash that promised to make Obama a one-term president; that pushed the false and dangerous "birther" narrative that he was not really born in American or an American citizen, but a pretender from his father's native Kenya. Donald J. Trump, relying on the same political calculus that many white politicians or would-be politicians have used to attempt to derail the campaigns and political aspirations of Blacks and other minorities, hoped to win the GOP nomination. He would fail in that initial attempt. However, Trump turned that failure into political win in the 2016 Presidential Election, rebundling the racist rhetoric in a campaign promise to "Make America Great Again," a slogan which purposely hearkened back to the days when the Ku Klux Klan violently lynched and terrorized Blacks and other racial and ethnic minorities in a white backlash to minority ascension to nascent civl freedoms and political gains. White nationalist politicos like Trump and Boebert are not as ignorant of American history as some would have us to believe. They are representative of the new proto-fascist GOP, by design about as far-removed politically and ideologically from the party of Lincoln, the Great Emancipator.

Spilling the Tea on Racism

2021-11-14T20:23:00.001-08:00

Greetings to all my caucasian friends! How about we have a nice cup of chamomile tea and some long overdue, candid conversation about racism?

I assure you that this is not your tall, ice cold class of southern-style sweet tea conversation. Oh no, this tea is hot and is about to be spilt.

Oh wayment, you say that you not feeling that right now?
Do you ever?
I mean, let's just keep it 100. I don't like talking about racism, either. But the problem is, I can't help but think and talk about it because as an African-descended American living in a country that has yet to confront its original sin and the ongoing injustice of systemic racism that is literally killing folk whose skin and hair look like mine, it is a matter of our collective well-being and survival. Real talk. So yes we shall have to have a good sit down - and strategic engagement afterwards - to finally face the inevitable and unavoidable.
In the words of thee great James Baldwin,
"Not everything that is faced can be changed. But nothing can be changed until it is faced."

Let me give you the worst news first. Structural racism and its ongoing adverse impacts for African-descended American citizens is definitely one of those ugly and unpleasant family business items that needs to be faced and changed, whether we're talking about your uncle's bloviating everyday racism;
the toxic and racially discriminatory workplace environment you may find yourself in, and where your Black co-worker has to fend for herself;
your granddad's loose affiliation with the Ku Klux Klan, the White Citizens' Council and the lynch mob;
or your great-great grandad's kidnapping, abuse, rape and enslavement of my African ancestors.

But you say that your direct ancestors didn't own slaves and were not racist. O.K. that's all fine and dandy. But you cannot deny that they directly and indirectly benefitted from the institution of slavery, and that you both inherited and continue to enjoy the benefits derived from the institutionalized systemic inequality. That's a conversation that must be had, and it will not be a pleasant one. Not only will we have to revisit the inhumanity and immorality of chattel slavery, America's original sin, we'll also have address how the culture of whiteness, anti-Blackness and white silence in the face of injustice perpetuates and deepens the injustice and wounds of racism, wounds that have yet to be acknowledged and salved.

I am going to reasonably assume that you have more capacity for human empathy and compassion than your ancestors possessed. This racial reckoning could possibly lead to feelings of anger; shame; genuine remorse; and even guilt, fear and tears. I witnessed quite a bit of that in the immediate aftermath of the horrendous extrajudicial killing of #GeorgeFloyd last year. I have never seen white people so affected by the police killing of a Black man! But do not be alarmed by any of that. Those feelings are a natural, human responses to being forced to reckon with the enormous physical, mental, spiritual and emotional trauma that your ancestors and you, by extension, have inflicted upon your Black brothers and sisters. Yes, we are all brothers, and yes, we are each others' keepers [at least that's what the best traditions - Judeo-Christian, Muslim, humanist and other - hold as sacrosanct]. And that emotional response is healthy. What's even healthier is when the emotionals reach beyond mere sentimentality and passing regret and give rise to principled and decided anti-racist action to address and correct the ongoing harm caused by oppression. That's what some of y'alls' ancestors did during the belated abolitionist movements of the mid-19th century, nearly three centuries and ten generations after the first Africans were brought to Jamestowne, Virginia colony.

But I have good news! The only thing of yours that potentially can and will get hurt, is your feelings. You won't ever have to experience the long, dark and bitter night of racist repression,dehumanization and humiliation on the basis of your skin color. Your blood pressure will never rise at the sight of a patrol car flashing its lights and sounding its siren behind you while you lawfully navigate your vehicle to your home in your gated community. You won't ever have to have pray and cry real tears at night for your children encountering a system that is engineered to police, contain and even kill their bodies, even when they are just

just trying to walk home while Black #TrayvonMartin
crossing the street while Black #MichaelBrown
playing in the park while Black #TamirRice
selling loosies or CDs while Black #EricGarner #AltonSterling
shopping in Wal Mart while Black #JohnCrawfordIII
eating ice cream in their own apartment while Black #BothamJean
driving while Black #SandraBland
walking while Black and having a mental health crisis #LaQuanMcDonald

You get the picture? And all those unfounded, hysterical fears of racist reprisal and harm at the hands of vengeful Black and brown "superpredators" are myths, ghosts of a fearful white-identity consciousness created to keep Black and white divided and promote and protect the American oligarchy's self-interest. But that's another conversation for another time, God willing.

As for me and my Black s/kinfolk, however, the news ain't all that good. You see, I cannot begin to describe for you the individual and corporate, existential suffering of being treated unfairly and inhumanely and hated for no good reason, but for the accidence of my birth, background and heritage. I can't run and hide from who I am. I can't, nor do I desire to, change the skin that I am in. I desire to be seen, heard and fully accepted, loved and appreciated for who I am and all the humanity that I represent. I turn again to Brother Baldwin [have you read him? I invite you to pick up and read one of the greatest writers and social critics of the modern era; you can also watch a pretty good documentary about him and his work following the quote below], who had a way with words and capturing the essence of Black pain:
"To be a Negro in this country and to be relatively conscious is to be in a rage almost all the time."

The wounds, the hurt and the pain of racism are ongoing and real, and Black folks like me are tired, and in the words of Fannie Lou Hamer, we're sick and tired of being sick and tired. We just want to live the best natural lives that we can, to breathe, heal and be free to pursue the American dream of "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."

No More Hiding

2021-11-12T20:27:00.000-08:00

Sometimes, you just reach a place where you've just had enough. No more wasting time trying to persuade the unpersuadeable or convince the unconvinceable of our humanity and our rights. No more "you've got to give 'equal time' to both sides." There is no "both sides" to racism, bigotry and oppression. Also, tick-tock time's up.

I keep thinking about this Stokely Carmichael quote: “If a white man wants to lynch me, that's his problem. If he's got the power to lynch me, that's my problem. Racism is not a question of attitude; it's a question of power.” pic.twitter.com/QDOAhpTOCz
— Danté Stewart (Stew) (@stewartdantec) November 12, 2021

No more denying that the violent and deadly Jan. 6 Capitol riot was a coordinated and orchestrated plot by the twice-impeached, former POTUS Donald J. Trump and key players in his administration to overturn the results of a free and fair election and violently overthrow democracy. And no more pretending that this was not connected to the white backlash to the recent significant electora gains secured in large part by record BIPOC voter turnout, and that despite strenuous bad-faith efforts by the GOP to suppress or cancel those votes. No more performative allyship, such as corporations who financially supported groups and politicians that were connected and or involved in the insurrection, pledging to divest their support, only to increase their support post-01/06/2021. No more curated and memed moments of racial reckoning and social justice protest followed by extended periods of studied indifference, then retraction and return to the racial status quo, as if #GeorgeFloyd deserved to have the knee of white supremacy and state-endorsed lynching on his neck for eight minutes and forty-six seconds, despite his heartbreaking cries for his mother and his painful and callously ignored pleas of "I can't breathe"; as if #JacobBlake should've just complied and he wouldn't have been shot in the back by the police; as if it was perfectly normal behavior for 17 year-old Kyle Rittenhouse to illegally purchase an AR-15 assault rifle, leave his community and be driven for hours by his momma across several state lines to a protest that didn't concern him, where he sought out and violently confronted protestors, shooting two of them dead and seriously wounding a third, an actual paramedic. No more videos of allies crying tears of shame at gross racial injustice followed up with... nothing. No real effort to dismantle white supremacy and racism, or to shift the balance of power in favor of liberating the historically marginalized and discriminated against. No more complicit mainstream media proffering strained narratives of white grievance while little Black girls are targeted for racist harassment and bullying by their white schoolmates and pushed over the edge to commit suicide:

A few days ago, @CBSNews posted a question: "How young is too young to teach kids about race?" By tragic coincidence, a 10-year-old black girl named Izzy killed herself two days later after facing racist bullying. My new column offers some thoughts:https://t.co/KAE33R4tgt
— Leonard Pitts, Jr. (@LeonardPittsJr1) November 12, 2021

No more justices wearing black robes but rendering "whites-only" justice. Nah. Enough is enough! In the words of the oft-quoted but perenially and perilously-unheeded prophetic voice of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.:

From ‘Letter from Birmingham Jail’ pic.twitter.com/tSMNuEvQVU
— Be A King (@BerniceKing) November 13, 2021

Stand

2021-03-17T20:35:00.000-07:00

I know that you’re Tired, Weary and Worn. You’ve done all that you knew was right to do; And have soldiered on and gone Above and Beyond even that. Yet there remains Just one more thing Left for you To be complete. What else is left? You may be asking, After you’ve left Zero stones Unturned; After you’ve drunk The heavy cup of sorrow Down To its dregs; After you have prayed, And cried, And then prayed and cried again and toiled on at your thankless post of duty, Turning Abaddon’s bitterest Hostilities into the Sweetest Lemonade; Not rendering evil for their evil, But finding kindness and empathy Where were none to be found; patiently watching, working, Waiting and hoping for your Divine Promotion, Keeping faith and hope alive, And acting the part of the Good Samaritan’s disciple. I give you simply One More Thing to add to your To Do list. I implore you to Stand. Stand and do not waver. Stand and do not falter. For Your labors and burdens That you have borne, The Cross you have carried As you walked in the Lord’s Footsteps, Are not in vain. Stand, for your day of Rejoicing is fast approaching. Those shoulders have borne burdens, and That head that has been bowed long nights in earnest prayer Will look up and see Jesus In all of His glory, And hear Him pronounce those words of Jubilee, “Well done, thou good and faithful servant. You have been faithful in a few things, and I will make thee ruler over much; enter thou into the joy of the Lord.” So after all that has been said and done, take courage, be bold in the faith, take hold of God’s strength, And in the power of His might, stand.

The Fifth Part

2021-03-09T18:47:00.063-08:00

Seeing You
is feeling with my heart what the naked eye could never see.
Though I could never be inside of your skin, I can see your hurt;
I can listen to your pain;
I can be moved with empathy by your tears;
I can rejoice with you in your joys, and pray with you in your horrors;
I can sit with you In your grief And console you In your sorrows.
I can humble Myself
and acknowledge and hold your anger,
admit that I was wrong; I can swallow My pride,
Learn from my mistakes, and work to make amends.

Or, I can choose to Absolve myself of all culpability for failing to keep you, As it is my privilege And duty to do;
And declare with righteous rectitude, That I don’t see you
as Black
Or White
Or Asian
Or Latinx
Or Indian
Or whoever or whatever your skin
Your ethnicity
Your heritage
Your history
Your experience
Your story
Your culture
Your genealogy
Your gender
Your spirituality
Your orientation
Your gains and tragedy
Your trauma and Your drama
Your tears Your hopes and your fears Have made you.
And what greater tragedy could there be
Than to have eyes that choose to see
only 3/5ths or - on a good day - 4/5ths
of your 5/5ths?

A Kind Word

2021-03-08T18:53:00.000-08:00

It is too easy

In this age of

Ultrafast global exchange

Of data, ideas and opinions

To forget to be

Kind and careful

In all of our communications.

So let’s agree to make

Every effort

To be kind and thoughtful

With what we share and

How we share it.

Let’s de-weaponize our opinions

Disarm our datasets

Demilitarize our negotiations

And

Learn the tactics of truthtelling,

Just dialogue and equitable intercourse.

Let’s learn how to use language

In a way that builds without tearing down,

Critiques without blaming,

Interrogates without shaming and

Confronts while restoring,

That wounds only to heal, and

Elevates, celebrates and ennobles the highest virtues

While mourning lost innocence and missed

Opportunities.

If we make a start today,

With one conversation,

One deleted email, text or tweet,

We may find those missing pieces

Of our minds that we have become

So proficient at giving

Away.

“Almost Entirely Secular:” Dr. Tim Golden Riffs on Judge Alito’s Opinion on the Contemporary Whitewashing of the Cross of Christ

2019-07-05T18:30:00.001-07:00

Note to Reader:

In my attempt to cross post the original Facebook post by Dr. Golden here, a problem was encountered. To read his most excellent synopsis of Justice Samuel Alito’s statement referenced in this blog title, please follow this link: https://www.facebook.com/100010322259954/posts/900602800293787?s=100002365356456&sfns=mo

Remember that critical thought and careful analysis are mainstays for the wise and humble in heart, but the bane of the proud and foolish. Jah bless. - F.M.

Sent from my iPhone

Danny Glover Reads Frederick Douglass Fourth of July Speech

2019-07-04T16:13:00.001-07:00

https://vimeo.com/1275332?sfns=mo

Sent from my iPhone

You Are Enough

2019-06-23T09:46:00.000-07:00

Have you EVER: Doubted yourself?

Struggled with self-confidence/low self-esteem?

Wondered who you are and what your place in life is?

Welcome to the club! You are not alone!

And YOU ARE ENOUGH!

Letter From a Birmingham Jail by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

2018-10-07T10:30:00.002-07:00

"Letter from a Birmingham Jail [King, Jr.]"

16 April 1963
My Dear Fellow Clergymen:
While confined here in the Birmingham city jail, I came across your recent statement calling my present activities "unwise and untimely." Seldom do I pause to answer criticism of my work and ideas. If I sought to answer all the criticisms that cross my desk, my secretaries would have little time for anything other than such correspondence in the course of the day, and I would have no time for constructive work. But since I feel that you are men of genuine good will and that your criticisms are sincerely set forth, I want to try to answer your statement in what I hope will be patient and reasonable terms.

I think I should indicate why I am here in Birmingham, since you have been influenced by the view which argues against "outsiders coming in." I have the honor of serving as president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, an organization operating in every southern state, with headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia. We have some eighty five affiliated organizations across the South, and one of them is the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights. Frequently we share staff, educational and financial resources with our affiliates. Several months ago the affiliate here in Birmingham asked us to be on call to engage in a nonviolent direct action program if such were deemed necessary. We readily consented, and when the hour came we lived up to our promise. So I, along with several members of my staff, am here because I was invited here. I am here because I have organizational ties here.

But more basically, I am in Birmingham because injustice is here. Just as the prophets of the eighth century B.C. left their villages and carried their "thus saith the Lord" far beyond the boundaries of their home towns, and just as the Apostle Paul left his village of Tarsus and carried the gospel of Jesus Christ to the far corners of the Greco Roman world, so am I compelled to carry the gospel of freedom beyond my own home town. Like Paul, I must constantly respond to the Macedonian call for aid.

Moreover, I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities and states. I cannot sit idly by in Atlanta and not be concerned about what happens in Birmingham. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial "outside agitator" idea. Anyone who lives inside the United States can never be considered an outsider anywhere within its bounds.

You deplore the demonstrations taking place in Birmingham. But your statement, I am sorry to say, fails to express a similar concern for the conditions that brought about the demonstrations. I am sure that none of you would want to rest content with the superficial kind of social analysis that deals merely with effects and does not grapple with underlying causes. It is unfortunate that demonstrations are taking place in Birmingham, but it is even more unfortunate that the city's white power structure left the Negro community with no alternative.

In any nonviolent campaign there are four basic steps: collection of the facts to determine whether injustices exist; negotiation; self purification; and direct action. We have gone through all these steps in Birmingham. There can be no gainsaying the fact that racial injustice engulfs this community. Birmingham is probably the most thoroughly segregated city in the United States. Its ugly record of brutality is widely known. Negroes have experienced grossly unjust treatment in the courts. There have been more unsolved bombings of Negro homes and churches in Birmingham than in any other city in the nation. These are the hard, brutal facts of the case. On the basis of these conditions, Negro leaders sought to negotiate with the city fathers. But the latter consistently refused to engage in good faith negotiation.

Then, last September, came the opportunity to talk with leaders of Birmingham's economic community. In the course of the negotiations, certain promises were made by the merchants--for example, to remove the stores' humiliating racial signs. On the basis of these promises, the Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth and the leaders of the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights agreed to a moratorium on all demonstrations. As the weeks and months went by, we realized that we were the victims of a broken promise. A few signs, briefly removed, returned; the others remained. As in so many past experiences, our hopes had been blasted, and the shadow of deep disappointment settled upon us. We had no alternative except to prepare for direct action, whereby we would present our very bodies as a means of laying our case before the conscience of the local and the national community. Mindful of the difficulties involved, we decided to undertake a process of self purification. We began a series of workshops on nonviolence, and we repeatedly asked ourselves: "Are you able to accept blows without retaliating?" "Are you able to endure the ordeal of jail?" We decided to schedule our direct action program for the Easter season, realizing that except for Christmas, this is the main shopping period of the year. Knowing that a strong economic-withdrawal program would be the by product of direct action, we felt that this would be the best time to bring pressure to bear on the merchants for the needed change.

Then it occurred to us that Birmingham's mayoral election was coming up in March, and we speedily decided to postpone action until after election day. When we discovered that the Commissioner of Public Safety, Eugene "Bull" Connor, had piled up enough votes to be in the run off, we decided again to postpone action until the day after the run off so that the demonstrations could not be used to cloud the issues. Like many others, we waited to see Mr. Connor defeated, and to this end we endured postponement after postponement. Having aided in this community need, we felt that our direct action program could be delayed no longer.

You may well ask: "Why direct action? Why sit ins, marches and so forth? Isn't negotiation a better path?" You are quite right in calling for negotiation. Indeed, this is the very purpose of direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored. My citing the creation of tension as part of the work of the nonviolent resister may sound rather shocking. But I must confess that I am not afraid of the word "tension." I have earnestly opposed violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension which is necessary for growth. Just as Socrates felt that it was necessary to create a tension in the mind so that individuals could rise from the bondage of myths and half truths to the unfettered realm of creative analysis and objective appraisal, so must we see the need for nonviolent gadflies to create the kind of tension in society that will help men rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism to the majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood. The purpose of our direct action program is to create a situation so crisis packed that it will inevitably open the door to negotiation. I therefore concur with you in your call for negotiation. Too long has our beloved Southland been bogged down in a tragic effort to live in monologue rather than dialogue.

One of the basic points in your statement is that the action that I and my associates have taken in Birmingham is untimely. Some have asked: "Why didn't you give the new city administration time to act?" The only answer that I can give to this query is that the new Birmingham administration must be prodded about as much as the outgoing one, before it will act. We are sadly mistaken if we feel that the election of Albert Boutwell as mayor will bring the millennium to Birmingham. While Mr. Boutwell is a much more gentle person than Mr. Connor, they are both segregationists, dedicated to maintenance of the status quo. I have hope that Mr. Boutwell will be reasonable enough to see the futility of massive resistance to desegregation. But he will not see this without pressure from devotees of civil rights. My friends, I must say to you that we have not made a single gain in civil rights without determined legal and nonviolent pressure. Lamentably, it is an historical fact that privileged groups seldom give up their privileges voluntarily. Individuals may see the moral light and voluntarily give up their unjust posture; but, as Reinhold Niebuhr has reminded us, groups tend to be more immoral than individuals.

We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed. Frankly, I have yet to engage in a direct action campaign that was "well timed" in the view of those who have not suffered unduly from the disease of segregation. For years now I have heard the word "Wait!" It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This "Wait" has almost always meant "Never." We must come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that "justice too long delayed is justice denied."

We have waited for more than 340 years for our constitutional and God given rights. The nations of Asia and Africa are moving with jetlike speed toward gaining political independence, but we still creep at horse and buggy pace toward gaining a cup of coffee at a lunch counter. Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging darts of segregation to say, "Wait." But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate filled policemen curse, kick and even kill your black brothers and sisters; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six year old daughter why she can't go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky, and see her beginning to distort her personality by developing an unconscious bitterness toward white people; when you have to concoct an answer for a five year old son who is asking: "Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?"; when you take a cross county drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are humiliated day in and day out by nagging signs reading "white" and "colored"; when your first name becomes "nigger," your middle name becomes "boy" (however old you are) and your last name becomes "John," and your wife and mother are never given the respected title "Mrs."; when you are harried by day and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what to expect next, and are plagued with inner fears and outer resentments; when you are forever fighting a degenerating sense of "nobodiness"--then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair. I hope, sirs, you can understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience. You express a great deal of anxiety over our willingness to break laws. This is certainly a legitimate concern. Since we so diligently urge people to obey the Supreme Court's decision of 1954 outlawing segregation in the public schools, at first glance it may seem rather paradoxical for us consciously to break laws. One may well ask: "How can you advocate breaking some laws and obeying others?" The answer lies in the fact that there are two types of laws: just and unjust. I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that "an unjust law is no law at all."

Now, what is the difference between the two? How does one determine whether a law is just or unjust? A just law is a man made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law. To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas: An unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law. Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust. All segregation statutes are unjust because segregation distorts the soul and damages the personality. It gives the segregator a false sense of superiority and the segregated a false sense of inferiority. Segregation, to use the terminology of the Jewish philosopher Martin Buber, substitutes an "I it" relationship for an "I thou" relationship and ends up relegating persons to the status of things. Hence segregation is not only politically, economically and sociologically unsound, it is morally wrong and sinful. Paul Tillich has said that sin is separation. Is not segregation an existential expression of man's tragic separation, his awful estrangement, his terrible sinfulness? Thus it is that I can urge men to obey the 1954 decision of the Supreme Court, for it is morally right; and I can urge them to disobey segregation ordinances, for they are morally wrong.

Let us consider a more concrete example of just and unjust laws. An unjust law is a code that a numerical or power majority group compels a minority group to obey but does not make binding on itself. This is difference made legal. By the same token, a just law is a code that a majority compels a minority to follow and that it is willing to follow itself. This is sameness made legal. Let me give another explanation. A law is unjust if it is inflicted on a minority that, as a result of being denied the right to vote, had no part in enacting or devising the law. Who can say that the legislature of Alabama which set up that state's segregation laws was democratically elected? Throughout Alabama all sorts of devious methods are used to prevent Negroes from becoming registered voters, and there are some counties in which, even though Negroes constitute a majority of the population, not a single Negro is registered. Can any law enacted under such circumstances be considered democratically structured?

Sometimes a law is just on its face and unjust in its application. For instance, I have been arrested on a charge of parading without a permit. Now, there is nothing wrong in having an ordinance which requires a permit for a parade. But such an ordinance becomes unjust when it is used to maintain segregation and to deny citizens the First-Amendment privilege of peaceful assembly and protest.

I hope you are able to see the distinction I am trying to point out. In no sense do I advocate evading or defying the law, as would the rabid segregationist. That would lead to anarchy. One who breaks an unjust law must do so openly, lovingly, and with a willingness to accept the penalty. I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for law.

Of course, there is nothing new about this kind of civil disobedience. It was evidenced sublimely in the refusal of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego to obey the laws of Nebuchadnezzar, on the ground that a higher moral law was at stake. It was practiced superbly by the early Christians, who were willing to face hungry lions and the excruciating pain of chopping blocks rather than submit to certain unjust laws of the Roman Empire. To a degree, academic freedom is a reality today because Socrates practiced civil disobedience. In our own nation, the Boston Tea Party represented a massive act of civil disobedience.

We should never forget that everything Adolf Hitler did in Germany was "legal" and everything the Hungarian freedom fighters did in Hungary was "illegal." It was "illegal" to aid and comfort a Jew in Hitler's Germany. Even so, I am sure that, had I lived in Germany at the time, I would have aided and comforted my Jewish brothers. If today I lived in a Communist country where certain principles dear to the Christian faith are suppressed, I would openly advocate disobeying that country's antireligious laws.

I must make two honest confessions to you, my Christian and Jewish brothers. First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action"; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a "more convenient season." Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.

I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that law and order exist for the purpose of establishing justice and that when they fail in this purpose they become the dangerously structured dams that block the flow of social progress. I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that the present tension in the South is a necessary phase of the transition from an obnoxious negative peace, in which the Negro passively accepted his unjust plight, to a substantive and positive peace, in which all men will respect the dignity and worth of human personality. Actually, we who engage in nonviolent direct action are not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive. We bring it out in the open, where it can be seen and dealt with. Like a boil that can never be cured so long as it is covered up but must be opened with all its ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must be exposed, with all the tension its exposure creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured.

In your statement you assert that our actions, even though peaceful, must be condemned because they precipitate violence. But is this a logical assertion? Isn't this like condemning a robbed man because his possession of money precipitated the evil act of robbery? Isn't this like condemning Socrates because his unswerving commitment to truth and his philosophical inquiries precipitated the act by the misguided populace in which they made him drink hemlock? Isn't this like condemning Jesus because his unique God consciousness and never ceasing devotion to God's will precipitated the evil act of crucifixion? We must come to see that, as the federal courts have consistently affirmed, it is wrong to urge an individual to cease his efforts to gain his basic constitutional rights because the quest may precipitate violence. Society must protect the robbed and punish the robber. I had also hoped that the white moderate would reject the myth concerning time in relation to the struggle for freedom. I have just received a letter from a white brother in Texas. He writes: "All Christians know that the colored people will receive equal rights eventually, but it is possible that you are in too great a religious hurry. It has taken Christianity almost two thousand years to accomplish what it has. The teachings of Christ take time to come to earth." Such an attitude stems from a tragic misconception of time, from the strangely irrational notion that there is something in the very flow of time that will inevitably cure all ills. Actually, time itself is neutral; it can be used either destructively or constructively. More and more I feel that the people of ill will have used time much more effectively than have the people of good will. We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people. Human progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability; it comes through the tireless efforts of men willing to be co workers with God, and without this hard work, time itself becomes an ally of the forces of social stagnation. We must use time creatively, in the knowledge that the time is always ripe to do right. Now is the time to make real the promise of democracy and transform our pending national elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood. Now is the time to lift our national policy from the quicksand of racial injustice to the solid rock of human dignity.

You speak of our activity in Birmingham as extreme. At first I was rather disappointed that fellow clergymen would see my nonviolent efforts as those of an extremist. I began thinking about the fact that I stand in the middle of two opposing forces in the Negro community. One is a force of complacency, made up in part of Negroes who, as a result of long years of oppression, are so drained of self respect and a sense of "somebodiness" that they have adjusted to segregation; and in part of a few middle-class Negroes who, because of a degree of academic and economic security and because in some ways they profit by segregation, have become insensitive to the problems of the masses. The other force is one of bitterness and hatred, and it comes perilously close to advocating violence. It is expressed in the various black nationalist groups that are springing up across the nation, the largest and best known being Elijah Muhammad's Muslim movement. Nourished by the Negro's frustration over the continued existence of racial discrimination, this movement is made up of people who have lost faith in America, who have absolutely repudiated Christianity, and who have concluded that the white man is an incorrigible "devil."

I have tried to stand between these two forces, saying that we need emulate neither the "do nothingism" of the complacent nor the hatred and despair of the black nationalist. For there is the more excellent way of love and nonviolent protest. I am grateful to God that, through the influence of the Negro church, the way of nonviolence became an integral part of our struggle. If this philosophy had not emerged, by now many streets of the South would, I am convinced, be flowing with blood. And I am further convinced that if our white brothers dismiss as "rabble rousers" and "outside agitators" those of us who employ nonviolent direct action, and if they refuse to support our nonviolent efforts, millions of Negroes will, out of frustration and despair, seek solace and security in black nationalist ideologies--a development that would inevitably lead to a frightening racial nightmare.

Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever. The yearning for freedom eventually manifests itself, and that is what has happened to the American Negro. Something within has reminded him of his birthright of freedom, and something without has reminded him that it can be gained. Consciously or unconsciously, he has been caught up by the Zeitgeist, and with his black brothers of Africa and his brown and yellow brothers of Asia, South America and the Caribbean, the United States Negro is moving with a sense of great urgency toward the promised land of racial justice. If one recognizes this vital urge that has engulfed the Negro community, one should readily understand why public demonstrations are taking place. The Negro has many pent up resentments and latent frustrations, and he must release them. So let him march; let him make prayer pilgrimages to the city hall; let him go on freedom rides -and try to understand why he must do so. If his repressed emotions are not released in nonviolent ways, they will seek expression through violence; this is not a threat but a fact of history. So I have not said to my people: "Get rid of your discontent." Rather, I have tried to say that this normal and healthy discontent can be channeled into the creative outlet of nonviolent direct action. And now this approach is being termed extremist. But though I was initially disappointed at being categorized as an extremist, as I continued to think about the matter I gradually gained a measure of satisfaction from the label. Was not Jesus an extremist for love: "Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you." Was not Amos an extremist for justice: "Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever flowing stream." Was not Paul an extremist for the Christian gospel: "I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus." Was not Martin Luther an extremist: "Here I stand; I cannot do otherwise, so help me God." And John Bunyan: "I will stay in jail to the end of my days before I make a butchery of my conscience." And Abraham Lincoln: "This nation cannot survive half slave and half free." And Thomas Jefferson: "We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal . . ." So the question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be. Will we be extremists for hate or for love? Will we be extremists for the preservation of injustice or for the extension of justice? In that dramatic scene on Calvary's hill three men were crucified. We must never forget that all three were crucified for the same crime--the crime of extremism. Two were extremists for immorality, and thus fell below their environment. The other, Jesus Christ, was an extremist for love, truth and goodness, and thereby rose above his environment. Perhaps the South, the nation and the world are in dire need of creative extremists.

I had hoped that the white moderate would see this need. Perhaps I was too optimistic; perhaps I expected too much. I suppose I should have realized that few members of the oppressor race can understand the deep groans and passionate yearnings of the oppressed race, and still fewer have the vision to see that injustice must be rooted out by strong, persistent and determined action. I am thankful, however, that some of our white brothers in the South have grasped the meaning of this social revolution and committed themselves to it. They are still all too few in quantity, but they are big in quality. Some -such as Ralph McGill, Lillian Smith, Harry Golden, James McBride Dabbs, Ann Braden and Sarah Patton Boyle--have written about our struggle in eloquent and prophetic terms. Others have marched with us down nameless streets of the South. They have languished in filthy, roach infested jails, suffering the abuse and brutality of policemen who view them as "dirty nigger-lovers." Unlike so many of their moderate brothers and sisters, they have recognized the urgency of the moment and sensed the need for powerful "action" antidotes to combat the disease of segregation. Let me take note of my other major disappointment. I have been so greatly disappointed with the white church and its leadership. Of course, there are some notable exceptions. I am not unmindful of the fact that each of you has taken some significant stands on this issue. I commend you, Reverend Stallings, for your Christian stand on this past Sunday, in welcoming Negroes to your worship service on a nonsegregated basis. I commend the Catholic leaders of this state for integrating Spring Hill College several years ago.

But despite these notable exceptions, I must honestly reiterate that I have been disappointed with the church. I do not say this as one of those negative critics who can always find something wrong with the church. I say this as a minister of the gospel, who loves the church; who was nurtured in its bosom; who has been sustained by its spiritual blessings and who will remain true to it as long as the cord of life shall lengthen.

When I was suddenly catapulted into the leadership of the bus protest in Montgomery, Alabama, a few years ago, I felt we would be supported by the white church. I felt that the white ministers, priests and rabbis of the South would be among our strongest allies. Instead, some have been outright opponents, refusing to understand the freedom movement and misrepresenting its leaders; all too many others have been more cautious than courageous and have remained silent behind the anesthetizing security of stained glass windows.

In spite of my shattered dreams, I came to Birmingham with the hope that the white religious leadership of this community would see the justice of our cause and, with deep moral concern, would serve as the channel through which our just grievances could reach the power structure. I had hoped that each of you would understand. But again I have been disappointed.

I have heard numerous southern religious leaders admonish their worshipers to comply with a desegregation decision because it is the law, but I have longed to hear white ministers declare: "Follow this decree because integration is morally right and because the Negro is your brother." In the midst of blatant injustices inflicted upon the Negro, I have watched white churchmen stand on the sideline and mouth pious irrelevancies and sanctimonious trivialities. In the midst of a mighty struggle to rid our nation of racial and economic injustice, I have heard many ministers say: "Those are social issues, with which the gospel has no real concern." And I have watched many churches commit themselves to a completely other worldly religion which makes a strange, un-Biblical distinction between body and soul, between the sacred and the secular.

I have traveled the length and breadth of Alabama, Mississippi and all the other southern states. On sweltering summer days and crisp autumn mornings I have looked at the South's beautiful churches with their lofty spires pointing heavenward. I have beheld the impressive outlines of her massive religious education buildings. Over and over I have found myself asking: "What kind of people worship here? Who is their God? Where were their voices when the lips of Governor Barnett dripped with words of interposition and nullification? Where were they when Governor Wallace gave a clarion call for defiance and hatred? Where were their voices of support when bruised and weary Negro men and women decided to rise from the dark dungeons of complacency to the bright hills of creative protest?"

Yes, these questions are still in my mind. In deep disappointment I have wept over the laxity of the church. But be assured that my tears have been tears of love. There can be no deep disappointment where there is not deep love. Yes, I love the church. How could I do otherwise? I am in the rather unique position of being the son, the grandson and the great grandson of preachers. Yes, I see the church as the body of Christ. But, oh! How we have blemished and scarred that body through social neglect and through fear of being nonconformists.

There was a time when the church was very powerful--in the time when the early Christians rejoiced at being deemed worthy to suffer for what they believed. In those days the church was not merely a thermometer that recorded the ideas and principles of popular opinion; it was a thermostat that transformed the mores of society. Whenever the early Christians entered a town, the people in power became disturbed and immediately sought to convict the Christians for being "disturbers of the peace" and "outside agitators."' But the Christians pressed on, in the conviction that they were "a colony of heaven," called to obey God rather than man. Small in number, they were big in commitment. They were too God-intoxicated to be "astronomically intimidated." By their effort and example they brought an end to such ancient evils as infanticide and gladiatorial contests. Things are different now. So often the contemporary church is a weak, ineffectual voice with an uncertain sound. So often it is an archdefender of the status quo. Far from being disturbed by the presence of the church, the power structure of the average community is consoled by the church's silent--and often even vocal--sanction of things as they are.

But the judgment of God is upon the church as never before. If today's church does not recapture the sacrificial spirit of the early church, it will lose its authenticity, forfeit the loyalty of millions, and be dismissed as an irrelevant social club with no meaning for the twentieth century. Every day I meet young people whose disappointment with the church has turned into outright disgust.

Perhaps I have once again been too optimistic. Is organized religion too inextricably bound to the status quo to save our nation and the world? Perhaps I must turn my faith to the inner spiritual church, the church within the church, as the true ekklesia and the hope of the world. But again I am thankful to God that some noble souls from the ranks of organized religion have broken loose from the paralyzing chains of conformity and joined us as active partners in the struggle for freedom. They have left their secure congregations and walked the streets of Albany, Georgia, with us. They have gone down the highways of the South on tortuous rides for freedom. Yes, they have gone to jail with us. Some have been dismissed from their churches, have lost the support of their bishops and fellow ministers. But they have acted in the faith that right defeated is stronger than evil triumphant. Their witness has been the spiritual salt that has preserved the true meaning of the gospel in these troubled times. They have carved a tunnel of hope through the dark mountain of disappointment. I hope the church as a whole will meet the challenge of this decisive hour. But even if the church does not come to the aid of justice, I have no despair about the future. I have no fear about the outcome of our struggle in Birmingham, even if our motives are at present misunderstood. We will reach the goal of freedom in Birmingham and all over the nation, because the goal of America is freedom. Abused and scorned though we may be, our destiny is tied up with America's destiny. Before the pilgrims landed at Plymouth, we were here. Before the pen of Jefferson etched the majestic words of the Declaration of Independence across the pages of history, we were here. For more than two centuries our forebears labored in this country without wages; they made cotton king; they built the homes of their masters while suffering gross injustice and shameful humiliation -and yet out of a bottomless vitality they continued to thrive and develop. If the inexpressible cruelties of slavery could not stop us, the opposition we now face will surely fail. We will win our freedom because the sacred heritage of our nation and the eternal will of God are embodied in our echoing demands. Before closing I feel impelled to mention one other point in your statement that has troubled me profoundly. You warmly commended the Birmingham police force for keeping "order" and "preventing violence." I doubt that you would have so warmly commended the police force if you had seen its dogs sinking their teeth into unarmed, nonviolent Negroes. I doubt that you would so quickly commend the policemen if you were to observe their ugly and inhumane treatment of Negroes here in the city jail; if you were to watch them push and curse old Negro women and young Negro girls; if you were to see them slap and kick old Negro men and young boys; if you were to observe them, as they did on two occasions, refuse to give us food because we wanted to sing our grace together. I cannot join you in your praise of the Birmingham police department.

It is true that the police have exercised a degree of discipline in handling the demonstrators. In this sense they have conducted themselves rather "nonviolently" in public. But for what purpose? To preserve the evil system of segregation. Over the past few years I have consistently preached that nonviolence demands that the means we use must be as pure as the ends we seek. I have tried to make clear that it is wrong to use immoral means to attain moral ends. But now I must affirm that it is just as wrong, or perhaps even more so, to use moral means to preserve immoral ends. Perhaps Mr. Connor and his policemen have been rather nonviolent in public, as was Chief Pritchett in Albany, Georgia, but they have used the moral means of nonviolence to maintain the immoral end of racial injustice. As T. S. Eliot has said: "The last temptation is the greatest treason: To do the right deed for the wrong reason."

I wish you had commended the Negro sit inners and demonstrators of Birmingham for their sublime courage, their willingness to suffer and their amazing discipline in the midst of great provocation. One day the South will recognize its real heroes. They will be the James Merediths, with the noble sense of purpose that enables them to face jeering and hostile mobs, and with the agonizing loneliness that characterizes the life of the pioneer. They will be old, oppressed, battered Negro women, symbolized in a seventy two year old woman in Montgomery, Alabama, who rose up with a sense of dignity and with her people decided not to ride segregated buses, and who responded with ungrammatical profundity to one who inquired about her weariness: "My feets is tired, but my soul is at rest." They will be the young high school and college students, the young ministers of the gospel and a host of their elders, courageously and nonviolently sitting in at lunch counters and willingly going to jail for conscience' sake. One day the South will know that when these disinherited children of God sat down at lunch counters, they were in reality standing up for what is best in the American dream and for the most sacred values in our Judaeo Christian heritage, thereby bringing our nation back to those great wells of democracy which were dug deep by the founding fathers in their formulation of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.

Never before have I written so long a letter. I'm afraid it is much too long to take your precious time. I can assure you that it would have been much shorter if I had been writing from a comfortable desk, but what else can one do when he is alone in a narrow jail cell, other than write long letters, think long thoughts and pray long prayers?

If I have said anything in this letter that overstates the truth and indicates an unreasonable impatience, I beg you to forgive me. If I have said anything that understates the truth and indicates my having a patience that allows me to settle for anything less than brotherhood, I beg God to forgive me.

I hope this letter finds you strong in the faith. I also hope that circumstances will soon make it possible for me to meet each of you, not as an integrationist or a civil-rights leader but as a fellow clergyman and a Christian brother. Let us all hope that the dark clouds of racial prejudice will soon pass away and the deep fog of misunderstanding will be lifted from our fear drenched communities, and in some not too distant tomorrow the radiant stars of love and brotherhood will shine over our great nation with all their scintillating beauty.

Yours for the cause of Peace and Brotherhood, Martin Luther King, Jr.
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King, Martin Luther Jr.

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