Rev. Lowery's Benediction

Rev. Dr. Joseph Lowery Delivering the Benediction
at the Inauguration of President Barack Obama

Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an everflowing stream.
Amos 5:24


When I started writing “Thinking Faith” in January of 2009, the first post I wrote was about the Rev. Dr. Joseph Lowery’s benediction at the inauguration of President Barack Obama.

Rev. Lowery’s death yesterday at the age of 98 called to mind his benediction and the reaction to it.

Halford Luccock, who taught preaching at Yale Divinity School for many years once called the history of Methodist preachers an “Endless Line of Splendor.” That was more enthusiasm than critical analysis, but among that line few were more splendid than Rev. Lowery. He was a close friend and ally of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and served for many years as Director of the Southern Christian Leadership Council which King founded. And he was a great preacher.

I was deeply moved as I listened to Lowery’s benediction at the close of the inauguration and later in the week as I was writing the “Welcome” for our Sunday bulletin I wanted to reference it and I went online to find the text. Along with the text, I was shocked to discover thousands of comments labeling Dr. Lowery’s remarks as racist. I couldn’t imagine what they were talking about.

The prayer began with a quotation from James Weldon Johnson’s great hymn, “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” which has become the Black National Anthem. He called on the nation to reject greed and violence, to embrace inclusion rather than exclusion, and love rather than hate. 

Moving toward his closing, he prayed, “As we leave this mountaintop, help us to hold on to the spirit of fellowship and the oneness of our family. Let us take that power back to our homes, our workplaces, our churches, our temples, our mosques, or wherever we seek your will.”

“Bless President Barack,” he prayed. “First Lady Michelle. Look over our little, angelic Sasha and Malia.”

Then he referenced the Hebrew Prophets:

“Help us then, now, Lord, to work for that day when nation shall not lift up sword against nation, when tanks will be beaten into tractors, when every man and every woman shall sit under his or her own vine and fig tree, and none shall be afraid; when justice will roll down like waters and righteousness as a mighty stream.”

But what set the right wing blogosphere and the pundits into hysteria came in the final paragraph. This is a transcript of the audio recording:

Lord, in the memory of all the saints who from their labors rest, and in the joy of a new beginning, we ask you to help us work for that day when black will not be asked to get back, when brown can stick around -- (laughter) -- when yellow will be mellow -- (laughter) -- when the red man can get ahead, man -- (laughter) -- and when white will embrace what is right.Let all those who do justice and love mercy say amen.AUDIENCE: Amen!REV. LOWERY: Say amen --AUDIENCE: Amen!REV. LOWERY: -- and amen.AUDIENCE: Amen! (Cheers, applause.)END.

“when white will embrace what is right” was the incendiary line.

Of course, those lines were not original. They were meant to recall an earlier time, not that many decades ago when the rhyme told the story of race and color in America: 

"If you're white, you're right, 
if you're yellow, you're mellow,
if you're brown, stick around, 
but if you're black, get back." 

And in the 1970’s those words, just as Dr. Lowery spoke them, were used by Black preachers as a call to action. The laughter in the audience came from those who immediately recognized the reference.

Only those completely ignorant of both Dr. Lowery and the history of Civil Rights would think he was saying that white people had never embraced what was right, and he did not mean to divide. He did mean to raise up a vision of the future by remembering the past. And one could see by the angry responses that the past is not really past, in part at least, because too many people just don’t know their history.

But beyond the issue of historical literacy, the reaction to Dr. Lowery’s benediction was a precursor to the resurgence of racism that has plagued us over the past decade.

Thank you for reading. Your thoughts and comments are always welcome. Please feel free to share on social media as you wish. 

The full transcript of Dr. Lowery’s benediction is printed below:

God of our weary years, God of our silent tears, thou who has brought us thus far along the way, thou who has by thy might led us into the light, keep us forever in the path, we pray, lest our feet stray from the places, our God, where we met thee, lest our hearts, drunk with the wine of the world, we forget thee. Shadowed beneath thy hand may we forever stand -- true to thee, O God, and true to our native land.

We truly give thanks for the glorious experience we've shared this day. We pray now, O Lord, for your blessing upon thy servant, Barack Obama, the 44th president of these United States, his family and his administration. He has come to this high office at a low moment in the national and, indeed, the global fiscal climate. But because we know you got the whole world in your hand, we pray for not only our nation, but for the community of nations. Our faith does not shrink, though pressed by the flood of mortal ills.

For we know that, Lord, you're able and you're willing to work through faithful leadership to restore stability, mend our brokenness, heal our wounds and deliver us from the exploitation of the poor or the least of these and from favoritism toward the rich, the elite of these.

We thank you for the empowering of thy servant, our 44th president, to inspire our nation to believe that, yes, we can work together to achieve a more perfect union. And while we have sown the seeds of greed -- the wind of greed and corruption, and even as we reap the whirlwind of social and economic disruption, we seek forgiveness and we come in a spirit of unity and solidarity to commit our support to our president by our willingness to make sacrifices, to respect your creation, to turn to each other and not on each other.

And now, Lord, in the complex arena of human relations, help us to make choices on the side of love, not hate; on the side of inclusion, not exclusion; tolerance, not intolerance.

And as we leave this mountaintop, help us to hold on to the spirit of fellowship and the oneness of our family. Let us take that power back to our homes, our workplaces, our churches, our temples, our mosques, or wherever we seek your will.

Bless President Barack, First Lady Michelle. Look over our little, angelic Sasha and Malia.

We go now to walk together, children, pledging that we won't get weary in the difficult days ahead. We know you will not leave us alone, with your hands of power and your heart of love.

Help us then, now, Lord, to work for that day when nation shall not lift up sword against nation, when tanks will be beaten into tractors, when every man and every woman shall sit under his or her own vine and fig tree, and none shall be afraid; when justice will roll down like waters and righteousness as a mighty stream.

Lord, in the memory of all the saints who from their labors rest, and in the joy of a new beginning, we ask you to help us work for that day when black will not be asked to get back, when brown can stick around -- (laughter) -- when yellow will be mellow -- (laughter) -- when the red man can get ahead, man -- (laughter) -- and when white will embrace what is right.
Let all those who do justice and love mercy say amen.
AUDIENCE: Amen!

Is the Transgender Person My Neighbor?

But wanting to justify himself, he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?” Jesus replied, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell into the hands of robbers, who stripped him, beat him, and went away, leaving him half dead. Now by chance a priest was going down that road; and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side.
Luke 10:29-32

In what we call “The Parable of the Good Samaritan,” Jesus defines what it means to be a neighbor. And along the way he defines what we mean by “privilege.”

Privilege is the ability to pass by on the other side.

Yesterday the New York Times reported that the Trump administration is planning to adopt a rigid definition of gender as a biologically determined status that is fixed at birth by the genitalia with which a person is born. The effect of this change in terms of government policy would be to define transgender Americans out of existence.

According to a memo obtained by the Times, the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Health and Human Services is arguing that government agencies must adopt an explicit and uniform definition of gender “on a biological basis that is clear, grounded in science, objective and administrable.”

Sex would be defined as either male or female and fixed at birth:

The sex listed on a person’s birth certificate, as originally issued, shall constitute definitive proof of a person’s sex unless rebutted by reliable genetic evidence.”

The new definition of gender would be the most consequential in a series of actions taken by the Trump administration to exclude transgender people from civil rights protections and rescind recent governmental policies designed to extend them. The Times reports that the Trump administration “has sought to bar transgender people from serving in the military and has legally challenged civil rights protections for the group embedded in the nation’s health care law.”

Catherine E. Lhannon, who served as head of the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights under President Obama said, “This takes a position that what the medical community understands about their patients — what people understand about themselves — is irrelevant because the government disagrees.”

Roger Severino, who now heads the Civil Rights Office of HHS has been critical of the efforts made by President Obama to increase protections for transgender Americans. Mr. Severino previously led the Devos Center for Religion and Civil Society at the Heritage Foundation and had opposed the expansion of protections under Title IX to include gender identity, calling it a “radical gender ideology.” 

Severino described the steps taken by the Obama administration as the “culmination of a series of unilateral, and frequently lawless, administration attempts to impose a new definition of what it means to be a man or a woman on the entire nation.”

“Transgender people are frightened,” said Sarah Warbelow, the legal director of the Human Rights Campaign. “At every step where the administration has had the choice, they’ve opted to turn their back on transgender people.” 

After the New York Times article was published online, transgender people posted pictures of themselves on social media with the hashtag #WontBeErased

There are approximately 1.4 million Americans who identify as transgender. In a nation of 330 million that’s barely 4 tenths of a percent. 

The rest of us can just cross the road and pass by on the other side.

Thank you for reading. Your thoughts and comments are always welcome. Please feel free to share on social media as you wish. 

Fifty Years Ago

There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.

Galatians 3:28

The summer before my freshman year in college I received a letter from Wesleyan University asking whether I would mind having a “Negro” roommate. At the time, I was insulted by the question. What would make them think I was a racist? I rewrote the response card to indicate that I would not mind having a black roommate, but I did object to the question.

Looking back, the experience seems surreal. Did I really grow up in a time when we thought that white people needed to be asked whether they could share a room with a person of another race?

To be fair, Wesleyan was embarking on a new and precedent setting path. They were the first of the elite, private, traditional liberal arts colleges to actively recruit and admit a large minority population to the student body, and they were understandably nervous. Looking back, I am proud of Wesleyan’s leadership in that historic endeavor.

And I ended up with a great roommate; Stewart Malloy, a young black man from North Carolina. At a recent reunion we had a group discussion about racism and racial issues while we were at Wesleyan. I recounted the story of the letter I received before freshman year. When I said I was pretty sure that Stewart had not received a similar letter, he just laughed. But I was surprised to learn when I questioned the other folks at the reunion that no one else remembered getting a letter like that. Stewart was amused by what he thought was my naiveté. “Well, Trench,” he laughed, “I guess they wanted to put the poor black kid and the poor white kid together.”

As our freshman year unfolded, Stewart and I found ourselves living through a time of great racial tension and upheaval. The Wesleyan vision of integration was continually under attack from the larger white community, which wanted “more time” to do this more “gradually,” (that was before we had even reached “all deliberate speed”) and from the pressures of the growing Black pride and Black separatism movements on campus. Our room was, at least in our minds, like the eye of the hurricane. Stewart and I talked often about racial issues, but we never had a single argument on the subject. We listened to each other, and we learned. And like many other young people, we were busy thinking about how we could change the world.

Then one night, as I sat at my desk, Stewart came back to the room in tears. “They killed him,” he said. And immediately, I knew who the “him” was. Martin Luther King, Jr., the prophet of non-violent change, had been murdered. On campus and around the country, racial tensions increased dramatically.

A few weeks later, after a meeting with the Black student group, Stewart told me that we could no longer be friends in the same way. Nothing would change in our room, but outside we would not speak to each other. It was not personal. It had nothing to do with us. It was all about larger issues in the Black student community as they related to the racism in the country.

Freshman year ended and we went our separate ways. I don’t believe we spoke again until our twentieth reunion. Stewart was sitting on a stone wall in front of the College of Letters. We hugged and laughed and talked for a long time. It was as if our conversation had only been briefly interrupted.

A lot has happened in the fifty years since Dr. King died. We have made great progress. But racism remains a major issue for us as Christians and as Americans.

Thank you for reading. Your thoughts and comments are always welcome. Please feel free to share on social media as you wish. 

Trump Tweets, Confederate Statues, and Our Three Cats

When Moses saw that the people were running wild (for Aaron had let them run wild, to the derision of their enemies), then Moses stood in the gate of the camp, and said, “Who is on the Lord’s side? Come to me!”
Exodus 32:25-26

Once upon a time in our family we had three cats.

Their given names were Duster, Longfellow, and Wamba.

Their nicknames were General Lee, General Longstreet, and the Gray Ghost, Colonel John Mosby. Since they were gray there was some logic to naming them after Confederate officers. Duster, always looked dignified with his long gray fur and a beautiful white patch from his chin down his chest that reminded us of Lee’s beard. Wamba was fast and elusive and somewhat of a guerrilla fighter, so Gray Ghost seemed to fit. And Longy had to be Longstreet.

The nicknames came into being when we were reading “The Killer Angels,” Michael Shaara’s brilliant historical novel about the Battle of Gettysburg.

We were reading the book because of an interest in Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, who left his position as a professor of Rhetoric and Revealed Religion at Bowdoin College to volunteer for the Union Army. At Gettysburg he led the Twentieth Maine Volunteers to hold the extreme left flank of the Union line against repeated Confederate assaults. Chamberlain’s leadership saved the day, and the battle, and possibly the war itself.

Chamberlain was our hero, but General James Longstreet was the most sympathetic character. Shaara portrays him as a pensive and deeply devout man, shaken by the loss of three children who died in rapid succession in an epidemic of scarlet fever in 1862. He was also a brilliant general who tried in vain to dissuade Lee from ordering Pickett’s disastrous charge.

The nicknames took hold without any conscious decision on our part. They were gray guys and of course they were Confederates.

But when I think about it, it is odd that we did not think it odd at the time.

We were the unlikeliest people to indulge in southern nostalgia.

Elaine and I are Yankees. I am named after my great-great-grandfather, William Crowell Gibbs, who was a Lieutenant Commander in the Union Navy, served under Admiral David Farragut and lost an eye in the Battle of Mobile Bay. And Elaine’s great-grandfather, who was not old enough to fight in the Civil War, was part of reconstruction. He went south after the war to teach former slaves on Wadmalaw Island in South Carolina.

We grew up on Civil Rights. We know about systemic racism. We understand white privilege. And anyone who reads this blog knows that racism has been a frequent topic.

But still.

We named our cats after Confederate war heroes.

Which goes to show how deeply the romanticism of the Civil War is embedded in our national psyche.

I was meditating on all of this as I considered the matter of Confederate Statuary. When the President called the statues part of our culture and history, he was only partly wrong. His advocacy against removal of the monuments was wrong and insensitive. But he was right in his observation. Unfortunately, the statues are part of our history and they remain part of our culture. The myth of the “Lost Cause” which says that the Civil War was not really about slavery, is alive and well. We may be against racism, but we still love “Gone with the Wind.”

But there’s more to our family story

In our little gray trinity, I was surprised to learn that both Longstreet and Mosby became Republicans after the war. They actively supported the reunited Union and each served in the government.

Longstreet’s work after the war was particularly significant. He moved to New Orleans where he played a key role in government and civilian endeavors.

His biography in “The Civil War Trust” views his post war years through a hazy mist of Civil War romanticism:

“In 1867, the New Orleans Times asked several leading citizens to comment on the newly passed Reconstruction Acts. Unwisely, Longstreet suggested that Southerners support the Republicans. . . He supported Grant for president, and when elected, Grant nominated Longstreet to be the Surveyor of Customs for the Port of New Orleans. For this last betrayal of the South he was labeled a ‘scalawag.’”

Longstreet became the target of “Lost Cause” advocates such as Jubal Early, William Pendleton, and Rev. J. William Jones among others. They were so outraged by his support for black suffrage and his willingness to command a biracial force against an uprising of white supremacists that they tried to smear his war record and blamed him for the Southern defeat at Gettysburg.

One of the monuments that the city of New Orleans now proposes to remove is dedicated to the white supremacists that General Longstreet put down in 1874 with an African American militia. It would be fitting to replace that monument with one that honors Longstreet, not for his Civil War exploits, though they were extensive, but for the service he rendered to his country after the war.

Mr. Trump is right that the Confederate statues are part of our history and culture. But we need to reclaim that history from the romantic imagery of the Lost Cause and recognize it for the evil that it was.

William Faulkner wrote, “The past isn’t dead. It isn’t even past.”

In this case, it is long past time to let go of the past. We cannot and should not forget it. But we should stop celebrating it.

Thank you for reading. Your thoughts and comments are always welcome. Please feel free to share on social media as you wish. 

Please: Kim Davis Is Not Rosa Parks

Attempting to block integration at the University of Alabama, Governor of Alabama George Wallace stands at the door of the Foster Auditorium while being confronted by United States Deputy Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach.

He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?
Micah 6:8

Yesterday I was driving south on the Maine Turnpike, listening to Margery Eagen and Jim Braude on Boston Public Radio, WGBH. I came into range of the program when they were inviting listeners to tell them, “What one issue would cause you to support or oppose a presidential candidate, and why?”

And the calls came in. One guy said that he wasn’t a one issue person but he was very concerned that there were people who knew nothing about guns, yet would support a candidate on the basis of his or her support for gun control. He thought that most people in favor of gun control had not owned a gun or fired a gun, and how could they possibly understand the issue.

And then.

A very well-spoken and seemingly intelligent man called in from Cambridge to say that he was supporting Mike Huckabee because of Huckabee’s support for Kim Davis, the Kentucky County Clerk who went to jail (she was released yesterday afternoon) for refusing to issue a marriage license to same sex couples. Davis, he said, was like Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. He said that people did not understand civil disobedience. If they did, then even if they did not agree with her views on gay marriage, they would support her actions.

Oddly, my head did not explode. 

Kim Davis has been called the Rosa Parks of Religious Freedom.

No. And, no. 

Arguments by analogy can be helpful. Often we can understand something new by the comparison with something we already understand well. But analogies are inherently imperfect and inexact. That being said, Kim Davis is not to Religious Freedom as Rosa Parks was to Civil Rights.

A better analogy for Kim Davis’ refusal to issue marriage licenses to same sex couples would be George Wallace’s refusal to permit the integration of public all white schools and colleges in Alabama. Wallace was, as Davis is, a government official who refused to uphold the law.

Beyond that, it is hard to think of anyone who has done more harm to the Christian witness in recent months than Kim Davis. (I said, it’s hard, not impossible. And, yes, it’s a long list. There are other contenders.)

P.S.: On this date in 1963, Governor George Wallace was served with a federal injunction directing him to stop state police from barring black students from enrolling at white schools.

Indiana and the Right to a Dominant Worldview

Indiana Protest Against the Religious Freedom Restoration Act

The time is surely coming, says the Lord God, when I will send a famine on the land; not a famine of bread, or a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord.
Amos 8:11

Amos observes the injustice of his people and proclaims that there will be a famine. But this famine will not be about a shortage of food or water. This will be a famine “of hearing the words of the LORD.” If you do not act justly, says Amos, then you will not be able to hear what God is saying to you.

In Indiana there is a famine among some of their political and religious leaders, “not a famine of bread, or a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord.”

They are so unaware of the injustice of a worldview that takes for granted the lesser status of LGBTQ citizens, that they cannot hear the words of the Lord in this context. When injustice looks like normal, it is very difficult to see anything else.

Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel said that a prophet is someone who knows what time it is.

He did not mean time as measured by the clock. And he didn’t mean the sense of timing that we associate with successfully telling a joke or making a political calculation. The role of the prophet is to reflect on the sacred story of what God has done, and what God has called us to do in the world to work for justice, and then by reading the signs of the times, to proclaim what God requires in the present moment.

The prophet Micah asked rhetorically, “What does the LORD require of you?” And then declared the answer, “To do justice and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.”

In response to Governor Mike Pence’s recent signing of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, United Methodist Bishop Mike Coyner issued a pastoral letter about “Faith and Fear.”

He rightly notes that the measure is not founded on faith or on religion, but on fear. People fear that that their faith is under attack, even though it isn’t. But he wrongly argues that there is an equally misplaced fear on the other side of the issue; that those who fear the law will lead to discrimination are overreacting. In the end, his desire to be fair to both sides gives legitimacy to those who want religious cover for their prejudice.

The law is designed to enable discrimination. It is not unreasonable to fear that the law might do what it is designed to do.

In one sense, the bishop is probably right when he says that it will all turn out to be “much ado about nothing.” It is unlikely that very many vendors will turn away business. It is not the most important thing in the world.

But that is not the point.

The law will do at least two things.

The first and most important result of the law is to reassert the dominance of a worldview that discriminates against LGBT people. Every time they enter into a business transaction, or look for an apartment, or apply for a loan, or apply for a job, they will know that the law says that they can be denied simply because of who they are. That is no small thing.

The second result of this law is that it reinforces the perception that Christians are bigots.

It is time (long past time) for Christians to speak up. This isn’t about sincerely held beliefs on both sides. It is about right and wrong. It is about justice. It is about knowing what time it is.

Lyndon Johnson and the Civil Rights Act

Wash yourselves; make yourselves clean; remove the evil of your doings from before my eyes; cease to do evil, learn to do good; seek justice, rescue the oppressed, defend the orphan, plead for the widow.
Come now, let us reason together, says the Lord: though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be like snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool. If you are willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land; but if you refuse and rebel, you shall be devoured by the sword; for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.
Isaiah 1.16-20

“Come, let us reason together,” was one of President Lyndon Johnson’s favorite Bible verses. He quoted it often and it was indicative of how he thought government was supposed to work.

Fifty years ago today, congress passed the Civil Rights Act. It stands as testimony to the greatness of his political skill and moral leadership.

As a young person living through Johnson’s presidency, I gave him little credit for the Civil Rights Act, or the War on Poverty, or the Voting Rights Act, or Medicare, or Medicaid. And I gave him almost all of the blame for the war in Vietnam. Looking back, I am amazed by his accomplishments.

For many people today, the Civil Rights Act seems like ancient history. And for a significant number of people, it seems like something that has outlived its usefulness. We no longer have segregated businesses, there are no laws about who sits at the back of the bus, we don’t have “colored” bathrooms or water fountains, our schools are integrated, and there are no (legally) segregated neighborhoods. Listening to the Diane Rehm show on NPR yesterday morning, I heard a caller delineate his own impeccable personal history of Civil Rights awareness, explaining that he had been brought up with an integrated circle of family friends and acquaintances, so that he never thought about race. Then he asked earnestly if perhaps the pendulum had swung too far. One of the panelists thanked him for his profession of racial acceptance and then gently recounted the racial disparities in employment, income, wealth, education, and incarceration.

We have come a long way.

But we have a long way to go. One of the benefits of being white is that we don’t have to think about race. That is a significant part of the meaning of “white privilege.” The inability to recognize white privilege is one of the major reasons that further progress in combating racism is so difficult.

Fifty years ago, the issues were more black and white.

But that should not blind us to the enormous courage required for President Johnson and others to support the Civil Rights Act fifty years ago. And without taking away from Johnson’s heroism, we should also remember that he didn’t do it alone. He was supported by an army of civil rights works, congressional staffers, and government bureaucrats who worked tirelessly and selflessly to do the right thing.

And then there was the bipartisan support, which is almost unimaginable today. When the bill was filibustered by Senate Democrats Richard Russell and Robert Byrd, Republican leader Everett Dirksen led 27 northern Republicans to vote with 45 northern Democrats and one southern Democrat (Ralph Yarborough of Texas) to end the filibuster and pass the bill.

Remembering Pete Seeger

For everything there is a season, 

and a time for every purpose under heaven:
a time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
a time to hurt, and a time to heal;
a time to break down, and a time to build up;
a time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
a time to throw away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
a time to seek, and a time to lose;
a time to keep, and a time to throw away;
a time to tear, and a time to sew;
a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
a time to love, and a time to hate;
a time for war, and a time for peace. Ecclesiastes 3:1-10

Sometimes the most Christian people are those who make no confession of faith.

Pete Seeger came across that poem in Ecclesiastes one day when he was leafing through the Bible and he made it into a song called “Turn, Turn, Turn.” The song became even more popular when The Byrds recorded it.

In the 1940’s and early 1950’s Seeger became one of the most popular folk singers in the country, singing with a group called the Weavers, as well as on his own. His career was abruptly derailed when he was blacklisted during the McCarthy era.

At the top of a Slate article by Dahlia Lithwick on Pete Seeger’s testimony before the House Un-American Activities Committee there is a picture of him playing his banjo and singing at the 1944 opening of the Washington labor canteen. You can see First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt sitting in the front row between two sailors, and Seeger appears to be wearing his army uniform.

The House Un-American Activities Committee investigated Seeger for performing at events like the one pictured with Eleanor Roosevelt. They wanted to know for whom he had performed, with whom he sang, and whether any of his performances had been advertised in The Daily Worker. Respectfully and politely, he refused to name names. Over and over, he gave approximately the same response:

“I feel that in my whole life I have never done anything of any conspiratorial nature. I am not going to answer any questions as to my association, my philosophical or religious beliefs or my political beliefs, or how I voted in any election, or any of these private affairs. I think these are very improper questions for any American to be asked, essentially under such compulsion as this.”

Each time he was asked about where and when and to whom he had sung, he would say that he had never refused an invitation, that he had sung for everyone who asked, and then he would offer to talk about his music. And the committee members would tell him that they were not interested in his music, they only wanted to know to whom and for whom he had sung. For a full transcript of the hearing, click here.

Looking back from almost sixty years later, the interchange seems comical, and at one point Seeger called it silly, but it was serious business to the members of the committee. For his refusal to answer, he was convicted of contempt of Congress and sentenced to a year in prison, but he never served the sentence and his conviction was overturned in 1962.

Pete Seeger’s career revived in the 1960’s with the Civil Rights movement and the Peace movement. He popularlized the old spiritual, “We Shall Overcome,” which became an anthem for both movements. He also wrote, “Where Have All the Flowers Gone,” and “If I Had a Hammer.”

At the age of 88, he was interviewd by Wendy Schuman of Beliefnet and asked about his faith. He said,

I feel most spiritual when I’m out in the woods. I feel part of nature. Or looking up at the stars. [I used to say] I was an atheist. Now I say, it’s all according to your definition of God. According to my definition of God, I’m not an atheist. Because I think God is everything. Whenever I open my eyes I’m looking at God. Whenever I’m listening to something I’m listening to God.”

Later in that same interview, he said:

“I tell people I don’t think God is an old white man with a long white beard and no navel; nor do I think God is an old black woman with white hair and no navel. But I think God is literally everything, because I don’t believe that something can come out of nothing. And so there’s always been something. Always is a long time.”

Seeger was married to his wife, Toshi, for 63 years until she passed away last July. When asked what he thought about eternal life, Seeger told about the death of their first child, at the age of six months, while Pete was overseas in the army. His father wrote to him and said, “I don’t think I could cheer you up in the usual way. But remember this, that something good that has happened can never be made to unhappen.” Seeger commented, “That’s a nice way of putting it, don’t you think? Something that has happened can never be made to unhappen.”

Equal Rights, Equal Marriage and the United Methodist Church

“And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them. And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”
Luke 18:7-8

In October of 1960 Melvin Talbert was a seminary student in Atlanta, Georgia, and a member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. came to Atlanta to participate with the students in the first sit-in demonstrations in the city, and he was arrested with them. They spent three days and three nights together in a jail cell. Talbert said that event was one of the formative experiences of his life.

This past October, Bishop Talbert traveled from his home in Nashville to Center Point, Alabama, near Birmingham, to celebrate the wedding of Joe Openshaw and Bobby Prince. The two men were legally married in Washington, D.C., but they wanted a Christian wedding. And they asked Bishop Talbert to officiate because of his support for the rights of LGBT persons, especially within the United Methodist Church.

For Bishop Talbert, the sit-in and the wedding are related. In both cases it is about civil rights.

Before he went to Alabama to preside at the wedding, Bishop Talbert notified Bishop Debra Wallace-Padgett, resident bishop of the North Alabama Conference, of his plans. She responded by requesting that he not perform the ceremony in the area where she serves. She consulted with Bishop Rosemarie Wenner, president of the Council of Bishops, and Bishop Wenner convened the Executive Committee of the Council of Bishops. The Executive Committee issued a statement requesting that Bishop Talbert not officiate at the wedding. They reminded Bishop Talbert that, “The bishops of the church are bound together in a covenant and all ordained elders are committed to uphold the Book of Discipline.” They also pointed out that, "Conducting ceremonies which celebrate homosexual unions; or performing same-sex wedding ceremonies" are chargeable offenses in the United Methodist Church (¶2702.1.b).

There are deep ironies in this.

It is not that long ago that this same Book of Discipline, to which Bishops Wenner and Wallace-Padgett give allegiance, prevented women from being ordained, let alone becoming bishops in the church.

The Discipline is an imperfect evolving document. It did not condemn slavery until 1844, when what was then the “Methodist Episcopal Church” split and the “Methodist Episcopal Church South” became a separate denomination, which tolerated the institution of slavery. When the two denominations reunited in 1939, provision was made for a separate “Central Conference,” where African-American churches were segregated from white churches. And that segregation was approved until 1968.

The Discipline is revised every four years at what we call a “General Conference” that brings together representatives from United Methodist conferences around the world. The language on homosexuality will change soon. Maybe in 2016. Probably no later than 2020.

As the Council of Bishops likes to remind us, we are a world wide church. On this issue the African bishops stand against any change because they fear that if they do not maintain a strong opposition to homosexuality it will put them at a disadvantage in their cultural struggles with Islam and Islamic fundamentalists. If the church is to hold together there will have to be some sort of compromise that allows for the different cultural realities in Africa and North America while still affirming basic human rights.

In the meantime, the Council of Bishops, after meeting this week, called on Bishops Wenner and Wallace-Padgett to file charges against Bishop Talbert.

In explaining their actions, the bishops said that, “The purpose of the Council of Bishops is to lead the church in its mission of making disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.” Did anyone laugh at the irony of that statement? How can we transform the world if we cannot transform the church? It would be more accurate to say that their purpose is to lead the church in maintaining the status quo. And let’s be honest, making disciples of Jesus Christ and maintaining the status quo are mutually exclusive.

The bishops did take a step forward by publicly acknowledging that the church is not of one mind on this issue, and that the Council of Bishops is not of one mind. They go on to note that “pain exists throughout the connection, including persons who support Bishop Talbert’s actions and persons who object to them.” What they fail to say is that the pain is not equal. The pain felt by those who are excluded is not the same as the pain felt by those who want to do the excluding and feel like their ability to exclude is being eroded.

After telling the parable of the widow who pleads for justice from an unjust judge, Jesus asks, “will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night?” Bishop Talbert lived out that parable when he was arrested with Dr. King, and he has lived it out again more than fifty years later in confronting his colleagues on the Council of Bishops. The good news is that ultimately, he knows how the story will end.




The complete statement from the Council of Bishops is printed below:

STATEMENT

OF

THE COUNCIL OF BISHOPS

On October 26, 2013, retired Bishop Melvin Talbert conducted a ceremony celebrating the marriage of a same-gender couple in Center Point, Alabama. Prior to October 26, 2013 Bishop Talbert advised Bishop Debra Wallace-Padgett, resident bishop of the North Alabama Conference, of his intention. Bishop Wallace-Padgett requested that Bishop Talbert not perform the ceremony in the area in which she serves. After conversation with Bishop Wallace-Padgett, Bishop Rosemarie Wenner, president of the Council of Bishops, engaged the Executive Committee of the Council of Bishops in a discussion about the proposed action. On October 21, 2013, the Executive Committee issued a statement requesting Bishop Talbert not to perform the ceremony in Bishop Wallace-Padgett’s area.

They said, in part,

“The bishops of the church are bound together in a covenant and all ordained elders are committed to uphold the Book of Discipline. "Conducting ceremonies which celebrate homosexual unions; or performing same-sex wedding ceremonies" are chargeable offenses in the United Methodist Church (¶2702.1.b).

The actions of Bishop Talbert raise considerable concerns and have stimulated much conversation, reflection, and prayer among the members of the Council of Bishops. The Council recognizes the deep divisions and pain in our church over these issues. United Methodists are not of one mind, and followers of Christ and people of conscience hold conflicting views. These issues require continuing honest and respectful conversation as well as prayer throughout the church.

The purpose of the Council of Bishops is to lead the church in its mission of making disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world. To that end, bishops are also required to “uphold the discipline and order of the Church…..and to share with other bishops in the oversight of the whole church.” (Para 403.1.f) When there are violations of the Book of Discipline, a response is required. However, the General Conference has given the Council of Bishops limited authority for the task of holding one another accountable. Such authority and accountability resides in the College of Bishops and the Jurisdiction or Central Conference Committees on Episcopacy. (Paragraph 413.and Paragraph 403.1.f)

Therefore, the Council of Bishops, after much prayer and conversation, takes the following actions:

We acknowledge that we, the Council of Bishops, and the Church are not of one mind in matters of human sexuality; pain exists throughout the connection, including persons who support Bishop Talbert’s actions and persons who object to them. We express our pastoral concern and care for all people.

We affirm the October 21, 2013 action of the Executive Committee which requested that Bishop Talbert not conduct a ceremony celebrating the marriage of a same gender couple in the North Alabama area.

We respectfully request that Bishop Wenner, President of the Council of Bishops, and Bishop Wallace-Padgett, Resident Bishop of the North Alabama Conference, address the action of Bishop Talbert and file a complaint under the provisions of Paragraph 413 for undermining the ministry of a colleague (Paragraph 2702.1f) and conducting a ceremony to celebrate the marriage of a same gender couple (Paragraph 2702.1b) within the bounds of the North Alabama Conference.

We recommend that the Executive Committee initiate a task force to lead honest and respectful conversations regarding human sexuality, race and gender in a world-wide perspective in our shared commitment to clear theological understanding of the mission and polity of the United Methodist Church.

As a Council of Bishops, we affirm the theological task articulated in the Book of Discipline (Paragraph 105, page 87). “United Methodists as a diverse people continue to strive for consensus in understanding the gospel. In our diversity, we are held together by a shared inheritance and a common desire to participate in the creative and redemptive activity of God. Our task is to articulate a vision in a way that will draw us together as a people in Mission….. We proceed with our theological task, trusting that the Spirit will grant us wisdom to continue our journey with the whole people of God.”

Voting Rights and the Supreme Court

Why do you say, O Jacob, and speak, O Israel,
“My way is hidden from the Lord,
and my right is disregarded by my God”?
Have you not known? Have you not heard?
The Lord is the everlasting God,
the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He does not faint or grow weary;
his understanding is unsearchable.
He gives power to the faint,
and strengthens the powerless.
Even youths will faint and be weary,
and the young will fall exhausted;
but those who wait for the Lord
shall renew their strength,
they shall mount up with wings like eagles,
they shall run and not be weary,
they shall walk and not faint.
Isaiah 40:27-31

Yesterday the Supreme Court eviscerated the most important part of the Civil Rights Act of 1965. They eliminated the provision requiring states and counties with a history of discrimination to get pre-approval from the Justice Department before implementing changes in voting rights laws. Before the day was done, lawmakers in Georgia, Mississippi, Alabama, and Texas rushed to implement laws that will make it harder for African Americans to vote.

In 2006 when Congress extended the Voting Rights Act, the Senate passed it unanimously and the House had only 33 dissenting votes. President Bush signed the measure and gave a speech reminding all Americans that this was one of the most important bulwarks of our democracy.

Without the requirement for pre-approval, states can pass and implement restrictive laws which can only be challenged after the fact. And those challenges would typically work their way through the court system after one or more election cycles had already gone by. If the court did not like the way that states and counties were identified, then it would be better to require pre-approval for every change to voting requirements in every state.

I find myself coming back to Dr. King’s famous declaration of hope, “the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” King adapted the phrase from the great 19th century abolitionist and preacher, Theodore Parker. King made that affirmation of faith in a speech given on March 25, 1965, in Montgomery, Alabama, at the conclusion of a march from Selma. The whole campaign was “centered around the right to vote.”

The Civil Rights movement was not aimed at achieving “equality” as an abstract concept; it was aimed at achieving equality as a practical reality. Achieving equality as a practical reality required laws. Voting was (and is) critical to changing laws.

In an impassioned dissent from the majority, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg declared, "The Voting Rights Act became one of the most consequential, efficacious, and amply justified exercises of federal legislative power in our Nation's history." She added, "Thanks to the Voting Rights Act, progress once the subject of a dream has been achieved and continues to be made."

Later this summer, when we celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the March on Washington and Dr. King’s famous “I Have a Dream” speech, we will hear a great deal about equality as an abstract intellectual concept. But Dr. King was not killed, or jailed, or reviled, because of an abstract concept. He was killed because he led a movement that was changing America.

Affirmative Action and the Moral Arc of the Universe

¹³Happy are those who find wisdom,
and those who get understanding,
¹⁴for her income is better than silver,
and her revenue better than gold.
¹⁵She is more precious than jewels,
and nothing you desire can compare with her.
¹⁶Long life is in her right hand;
in her left hand are riches and honor.
¹⁷Her ways are ways of pleasantness,
and all her paths are peace.
¹⁸She is a tree of life to those who lay hold of her;
those who hold her fast are called happy.

Proverbs 3:13-18

The Supreme Court is presently considering a case about affirmative action, “Fisher v. the University of Texas at Austin.” Abigail Fisher claims that the University of Texas denied her admission because she is white. She claims that minority students were admitted whose applications were otherwise less accomplished than hers. The University is arguing that race is only one factor they consider in admissions and that they have a compelling interest in having a diverse student body. Although I don’t believe it is part of their argument before the court, the school also maintains that Ms. Fisher would not have been admitted even if race were not considered.

Affirmative action is no longer a government mandate. It is a voluntary program initiated by many institutions because they believe their mission can better be fulfilled by enlarging opportunities for historically disfavored groups.

The Court has been clear that is unconstitutional to exclude minorities because of their race. The question before the Court is whether it is constitutional to implement a race-conscious program in order to increase the opportunities of minorities.

I think we can be reasonably certain that the framers of the constitution would have been against any racial preference that increased the opportunities for minorities. They were in favor of slavery. They would have been against the Fourteenth Amendment and they certainly would not have extended the equal protection clause to include affirmative action. Similarly, it is hard to believe that the majority voting for the Civil Rights Act of 1866 would have held together to approve the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

I am not a lawyer and I won’t pretend to understand the legal technicalities. A ruling in favor of Ms. Fisher seems likely, and several of the justices are already on record against any form of “race consciousness.” Unfortunately, this will turn back the clock on diversity and move us away from a more inclusive society.

As Christians, one of our fundamental beliefs is that God works in history. In the long run, we are moving toward the Kingdom of God. In the imagery of the abolitionist preacher Theodore Parker, popularized by the greatest preacher of the Civil Rights movement, “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”

If the program at the University of Texas at Austin is declared unconstitutional, the arc will get a little longer and our task will become a little more difficult.