Parson to Person: “Good Trouble from the Boy from Troy,” August 7, 2020
Like many of you, I have been moved by the tributes to the life of Congressman John Lewis, who represented Georgia’s 5th district (including most of Atlanta) from 1987 until his death on July 17th.
John grew up near Troy, Alabama (which is why Dr. King called him the Boy from Troy), the third of ten children of sharecroppers Eddie and Willie Mae Lewis. As a child he wanted to become a minister (and was preaching to the chickens on the farm at the age of 5). He even graduated from the American Baptist Theological Seminary in Nashville and was ordained a Baptist minister, but decided to take on a ministry of civil rights and social action instead.
In college he organized sit-ins at segregated Nashville lunch counters and was arrested and jailed often. He was also one of the 13 original “Freedom Riders” (7 whites and 6 blacks) who tried to integrate buses from Washington D.C. to New Orleans, and was beaten by angry mobs with chains, stones, lead pipes, and baseball bats. As he later told CNN on the 40th anniversary of the Freedom Rides, “It was very violent. I was left lying at the Greyhound bus station in Montgomery, unconscious.”
In 1963 John Lewis became the chair of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) that helped plan the 1963 March on Washington–and the youngest speaker there (age 23), delivering his address just before Dr. King’s “I Have a Dream” speech. In 1965 he led the first of the Selma-to-Montgomery marches across the Edmund Pettus bridge, and was beaten up by state troopers when he and other marchers refused to disperse (as they were ordered) but knelt down to pray instead. He often referred to his civil-rights work as “good trouble.” (Which, when I think about it, is pretty much what I mean when I end my services with the words “peace and unrest.”)
John Lewis was involved in many progressive struggles (including immigration reform, gay rights, women’s rights, workers’ rights, ending poverty, etc.), but one that jumps out at me, especially at this particular time in our country’s history, is voting rights. There are many people who are trying to make voting onerous (in the name of preventing voter “fraud”) or are trying to make it seem unnecessary (because “it won’t change anything anyway”). I believe the election in November will be one of the most important ones in my lifetime, and I know that many of you feel the same. So, I have a couple suggestions for our beloved congregation. First, let’s make sure that everyone at UCN is able to vote, even if they are in a shut-in situation. (This might mean a few of us volunteering to help non-tech-savvy people request ballots by mail.) Second, let’s make sure that our friends and acquaintances vote (especially those we think might not be regular voters)–and provide rides if necessary. Our UUA’s “UU the Vote” project is encouraging us to get involved; so is our interfaith-justice organization MICAH through its “Relational Voting Program” (RVP). (The idea behind “relational” voting is that people are much more likely to vote if they are asked by someone they are in relationship with, than if they simply get a “cold call” from a get-out-the-vote organization.)
For those wondering what kind of voters we should target, the answer is that we want everyone who can, to vote–regardless of their likely political affiliation. You are, of course, free to choose who you want to prioritize when you reach out to contact possible voters. But ultimately, our country will be better off when the majority of its citizens are invested in the electoral process, so we are not advising anyone to target only some acquaintances.
One thing we can all do right now is make a list of 10 people we know (especially anyone we think may not be a regular voter) and decide to “shepherd” them through the voting process. (If 10 people seems too many, a list of just 3 people would be good. If you get 3 people to vote who wouldn’t have otherwise, you have increased your part of the voting electorate by 300%!) Or you might contact people who would be willing to contact their own list of 3 or 10 people.
You can do this on your own, of course, but it would help us if we heard from everyone who intends to contact people on their list. Feel free to call or email me (262-632-9886 or revtonylarsen@gmail.com) or Leigh Hoftiezer (920-698-0680 or leigh.hoftiezer@gmail.com), to let us know in what way you want to help.
One of the things that struck me, when reading about Congressman John Lewis, was his words about the two figures who inspired him so much: Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy. “The assassinations of Dr. King and Robert Kennedy was the saddest time in my life. I admired both…Martin had taught me how to stand up, to speak up and speak out, and how to get involved. And I met Robert Kennedy when I was 23 years old, before the March on Washington. And he was so inspiring, so uplifting. …These two young leaders, I thought, represented the very best of America. …And I really felt when the two of them died that something died in America. Something died in all of us….I became convinced in myself that I had to do something, I had to pick up where Dr. King left off and Bobby Kennedy left off.”
I too feel that I need to “pick up” where not only where Dr. King and Bobby Kennedy left off, but where John Lewis left off too. I hope many of you will join me, with, of course, a little…
peace and unrest
tony
