Refreshing, Surprising Corporate Courage/Leadership in Truth

Food on the Move: CitySquare children thank police officers

Quest to understand. . .

An example of courage and real leadership

Sankofa Coalition

Take a moment to view this public statement from Dallas City Hall from Rev. Dr. Michael W. Waters.

Click "Open Microphone Speakers" and FF to comments beginning at 4:49.

In view of all that has been going on, what do you think about this idea? 

Crazy People!

How long? Not long!

Remembering to never forget

Time

It is the strangely irrational notion that there is something in the very flow of time that will inevitably cure all ills.  Actually time is neutral.  It can be used wither destructively or constructively. I am coming to feel that the people of ill will have used time much more effectively than the people of good will.  We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the vitriolic words and actions of the bad people, but for the appalling silence of the good people.  We must come to see that human progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability.  It comes through the tireless efforts and persistent work of men willing to be co-workers with God, and without this hard work time itself becomes an ally of the fores of social stagnation.  We must use time creatively, and forever realize 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. 

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Letter from Birmingham City Jail

Personal thoughts on an early summer day. . .

Dallas civil rights and city council icon, Al Lipscomb died a week ago today.  I remember following his career in Dallas city politics and governance from my home in Richardson.  Always controversial, thanks to his courage and powerful responses to racism, both personal and systemic; Lipscomb fought some battles for sure.  I remember telling my church of mainly white, middle class folk that people like Lipscomb wouldn't be forced to continually be in the fight if some of us were willing to join him. 

I'll always remember the occasion when I was invited to offer the invocation at the start of a City Council meeting.  I can't remember what I prayed, but I do know that I asked the Lord to bless Dallas with a heart for the poor and a commitment to pursue justice for all its residents.  When I had finished, Lipscomb got out of his seat on the famous "horseshoe" and came to my seat in the audience.  He personally ushered me into the meeting room behind the public area and he invited me to have breakfast that was spread out on tables for the council and their guests.  So very gracious.  Dallas lost a warrior last Saturday. 

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For the record:  homeless persons are no more likely than the general population to be pedophiles or to pose any real threat to children.  As a matter of fact, priests, school teachers, day care workers, youth workers, business people and non-profit workers are likely as great a threat or greater threat to children statistically than are the homeless.  Furthermore, any effort, program or building endeavor that removes people from the street and allows them the option of a safe, decent, air conditioned home makes life on the street and in a city like Dallas safer for everyone, especially the homeless.  Numerous housing developments designed to provide permanent housing for the formerly homeless have co-located child care centers on property.  In the case of our CityWalk project, the housing is located across one street from a charter school and another from a private school.  In the 18 months we've been in the building no problems have been reported involving children and our residents.  And, interestingly, crime statistics indicate that the area around our building is safer than when we opened!

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"Poverty Sucks" t-shirts are going fast!  If you'd like one, send your request for more information to jfogel@CitySquare.org.  Better act fast.  We're selling out!

Four Little Girls

The History of White People

Nell Irvin Painter is out with a must-read new book, The History of White People.  Painter's resume is impressive.  Award-winning author of many books, including Sojourner Truth, Southern History Across the Color Line, Creating Black Americans, and Standing at Armageddon, Painter currently serves as Edwards Professor of American History, Emerita, at Princeton University and lives in Newark, New Jersey.

Here's just a taste of what's in store for anyone who engages this challenging history:

Our story begins in Greek and Roman antiquity where the concept of race did not exist, only geography and the opportunity to conquer and enslave others.  Not until the eighteenth century did an obsession with whiteness flourish, with the German invention of the notion of Caucasian beauty.  This theory made northern Europeans into "Saxons," "Anglo-Saxons," and "Teutons," envisioned as uniquely handsome natural rulers. 

Here was a worldview congenial to northern Europeans bent on empire.  There followed an explosion of theories of race, now focusing on racial temperament as well as skin color.  Spread by such intellectuals as Madame de Stael and Thomas Carlyle, white race theory soon reached North America with a vengeance.  Its chief spokesman, Ralph Waldo Emerson, did the most to label Anglo-Saxons--icons of beauty and virtue--as the only true Americans.  It was an ideal that excluded not only blacks but also all ethnic groups not of Protestant, northern European background.  The Irish and Native Americans were out and, later, so were the Chinese, Jews, Italians, Slavs, and Greeks--all deemed racially alien.  Did immigrants threaten the very existence of America?  Americans were assumed to be white, but who among poor immigrants could truly become American?  A tortured and convoluted series of scientific explorations developed--theories intended to keep Anglo-Saxons at the top:  the ever-popular measurement of skulls, the powerful eugenics movement, and highly biased intelligence tests--all designed to keep working people out and down.


Click on the book's title above to order you a copy or visit your public library to check it out.

Sittin' at the "welcome table"

Here's a new look at the old, oft forgotten faith that works itself out in the real world with high- powered impact.




We're gonna sit at the welcome table.

We're gonna sit at the welcome table one of these days.

Hallelujah!. . .

All God's children around that table. . .

No more fightin' or grabbin' at that table. . .

I'm gonna walk the streets of glory. . .

I'm gonna get my civil rights. . .

We're goanna sit at the table one of these days.

Jack Kemp, class act

Jack Kemp always impressed me. I guess I just loved his style.

His athletic ability kept fans coming back for more week after week. He played through his pain. He never complained.

Kemp led the way in attempting to push the nation to face its racism, to talk about it and to engage in reconciling actions.

After football, Kemp entered politics as one of the chief proponents, better, salesmen for President Reagan's "supply side" economic theories.

Kemp served as the Secretary of the U. S. Department of Housing and Urban Development under President George H. W. Bush.

Kemp had ideas. He was smart. He was fair. He wanted to include everyone.

Kemp died earlier this month after a battle with cancer. He was 73.

Read a great tribute in the May 11, 2009 issue of Sports Illustrated.

Jack Kemp will be remembered and missed.

Civil Rights History--Full Circle

You'll want to listen to this segment of Nina Totenberg's story that aired on NPR today. As Totenberg says, "In one snapshot, there it is: civil rights in America, from 1955 to 2009.

Dallas Dinner Table 2009

Dallas Dinner Table is non-profit group devoted to developing specific settings during which people from all across our community can come together, share a meal and engage in honest conversations about race.

Lots of people talk about talking about race and racial issues. Dallas Dinner Table actually talks about race!

And, guess what?

You are invited to participate in the 2009 Dallas Dinner Table Event

When: Thursday March 19th at 6:00 p.m.

Where: Venues throughout the Dallas - Ft. Worth Metroplex.

We hope you will join us.

Registration is open until March 12th at http://www.dallasdinnertable.com/.

For those interested in volunteering as facilitators, please check the facilitator box on the registration form.

Sign up now!

More on Joseph Lowery

For more insight on Rev. Joseph Lowery's benediction at the close of the Inauguration last Tuesday, check out Gerald Britt's post here.

Gerald's so right.

So much to remember of which most of us have never been aware.

Those who do remember, those who were there, those who felt the pain, and were touched by the hate and the death, those are the people to whom I will give my undivided attention for as long as they will allow me to be taught.

Certainly, these teachers must not be dismissed in haste as if all is forgotten and well.

Thanks, Gerald.



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Completing the story. . .a struggle

Lots of white Americans remain bewildered by the feelings and comments of some black Americans, especially those of a generation ago (just see the comments on one of my posts from yesterday!). The legacy of segregation, Jim Crow, lynchings, and a system born of prevailing racism shaped all of us as a people, and it infected our systems and institutions where it still lingers today.

Frankly, our national story to date has not been completed, not fully reported, not sufficiently understood and certainly not appropriately honored.

On Monday, I listened to a fascinating report on NPR's new program, "Tell Me More," moderated by Michel Martin. "Built by Slaves: A Capitol History Lesson" is worth your time.

Most of us don't realize that the rotunda of the capitol was built from ground to dome by slave labor.

Did you realize that the statue Freedom atop the capitol dome was the work of Philip Reed, a slave who saw the work of his hand and heart lifted to the top of the dome on December 2, 1863, by which time he had been freed?

Slaves cut the stones of the capitol walls and their masters were paid $5 per month for the labor of each worker.

Eight paintings grace the walls of the Capitol Rotunda.

None include African Americans.

A history frieze is painted around the inner perimeter of the rotunda. The frieze ends with the Civil War. An original painting depicted Abraham Lincoln delivering the Emancipation Proclamation. This painting was later removed and replaced by a portrait of a Union soldier shaking hands with a Confederate soldier.

Not until the Congress acted in the mid-1980s did the Capitol enjoy the presence of a sculpture of any African American national leader. It was at that time that our representatives commissioned the depiction of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. shortly before the establishment of his birthday as a national holiday.

Listen to the report. View the photos. Open your heart of a huge group of people who have reason to be rejoicing today, but who also need us to agree that we will not forget.

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Robert Kennedy on the Death of Dr. King

As we prepare to honor Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on Monday, my mind turns back to the awful April evening almost 41 years ago now when he was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee. Like most people alive and beyond childhood at the time, I can remember exactly where I was when the news arrived.

Just as word of the nation's terrible loss began to spread across the country, Senator Robert F. Kennedy rose to inform a crowd in Indianapolis of the tragedy. His words are worth watching here.

May the work of Dr. King continue. May his memory, his message and his values shape our lives and inform our actions.

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Racism very much alive and active. . .

Jesse Washington filed a sickening story ("Obama election spurs race crimes around the country") last Sunday, November 16, 2008 with the Associated Press.

So much for those who report that they are tired of "hearing about race" or that it's time for the nation "to move on beyond racial conversations and categories."

Wishful thinking, folks.

Consider, better, can you believe these tag lines?

Cross burnings.

Schoolchildren chanting "Assassinate Obama."

Black figures hung from nooses.



Racial epithets scrawled on homes and cars.

And, that is just for starters. sort of tones down the optimism most of us have been feeling, wouldn't you say?

Across the United States from one corner to the other, authorities document a wide range of racially motivated crimes, threats and attacks. a range of alleged crimes, from vandalism and vague threats to insults and racial taunts, as well as at least one physical attack. Hundreds of incidents have been reported involving people of all ages, including, unbelievably, a group of second-graders.

On second thought, maybe not so unbelievable at all.

From Washington's report:

One [incident] was in Snellville, Ga., where Denene Millner said a boy on the school bus told her 9-year-old daughter the day after the election: "I hope Obama gets assassinated." That night, someone trashed her sister-in-law's front lawn, mangled the Obama lawn signs, and left two pizza boxes filled with human feces outside the front door, Millner said.

She described her emotions as a combination of anger and fear.

"I can't say that every white person in Snellville is evil and anti-Obama and willing to desecrate my property because one or two idiots did it," said Millner, who is black. "But it definitely makes you look a little different at the people who you live with, and makes you wonder what they're capable of and what they're really thinking."

I'd say Ms. Millner has it about right.

Other incidents (can you spell "u-n-b-e-l-i-e-v-a-b-l-e"?, not so fast. . .) Washington includes in his report:

-Four North Carolina State University students admitted writing anti-Obama comments in a tunnel designated for free speech expression, including one that said: "Let's shoot that (N-word) in the head." Obama has received more threats than any other president-elect, authorities say.

-At Standish, Maine, a sign inside the Oak Hill General Store read: "Osama Obama Shotgun Pool." Customers could sign up to bet $1 on a date when Obama would be killed. "Stabbing, shooting, roadside bombs, they all count," the sign said. At the bottom of the marker board was written "Let's hope someone wins."

-Racist graffiti was found in places including New York's Long Island, where two dozen cars were spray-painted; Kilgore, Texas, where the local high school and skate park were defaced; and the Los Angeles area, where swastikas, racial slurs and "Go Back To Africa" were spray painted on sidewalks, houses and cars.

-Second- and third-grade students on a school bus in Rexburg, Idaho, chanted "assassinate Obama," a district official said.

-University of Alabama professor Marsha L. Houston said a poster of the Obama family was ripped off her office door. A replacement poster was defaced with a death threat and a racial slur.

-Black figures were hanged by nooses from trees on Mount Desert Island, Maine, the Bangor Daily News reported. The president of Baylor University in Waco, Texas said a rope found hanging from a campus tree was apparently an abandoned swing and not a noose. [I must say, I need to hear more about this investigation at Baylor, how about you? LJ]

-Crosses were burned in yards of Obama supporters in Hardwick, N.J., and Apolacan Township, Pa.

-A black teenager in New York City said he was attacked with a bat on election night by four white men who shouted 'Obama.'

-In the Pittsburgh suburb of Forest Hills, a black man said he found a note with a racial slur on his car windshield, saying "now that you voted for Obama, just watch out for your house."

Please take the time to read Washington's entire report here.

Minority reports, these acts of hateful stupidity? Let's hope so. Clearly, the work is far from over in this country. Those who want to rush us along without allowing us to invest in the necessary work of reforming and cleansing the nation's soul should be ignored and their commentaries discounted.

And, now that you mention it, a strong, continuing word from the white church in America would be useful. Are you hearing anything out there from that camp?

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