I don't know; it just strikes me as odd. As reported by the Des Moines Register, a group of religious folk gathered on Sunday at a historic African-American church here in Des Moines to pray and rally against "a Polk County judge's decision that Iowa law improperly prohibits same-sex couples from marrying," and to encourage the Iowa Supreme Court to overturn the decision. In fact, it wasn't simply "a group." It was a BIG group -- 1200 according to the story. "This is more than a political battle," said the host pastor. "This is a spiritual battle."
That's fine. And while I can agree that the question does, indeed, have precious and powerful spiritual implications, my understanding of those implications leads me to an opposite conviction. Again, that's fine. In this country we are entitled to differing views.
What strikes me as odd, however, is the thought of this large and animated gathering, assembled in an African-American church of all places, singing and swaying and holding hands, according to the story, while singing the classic civil rights anthem, We Shall Overcome. I'm not making this up: employing a core piece of civil rights iconography to denounce the civil rights of a minority. Bizarre. Next, Hamas militants will be singing We're Marching to Zion while planning insurgent attacks on Jerusalem, or an Iraqi terrorist stealing Patrick Henry's famous "Give me liberty or give me death" just before detonating an explosive beside an American Humvee. It is an Orwellian -- or is it an Alice in Wonderland -- twist that feels wrenchingly, offensively absurd.
Please. Speak your mind. Sing if you want. Hold hands and sway if you must, but don't bastardize We Shall Overcome -- an anthem of visionary, inclusive and liberating hope -- by wielding it as an instrument of walling constraint. Go find your own anthem for that.
5 comments:
AMEN!!!
Whoa, Tim,
I can almost hear your voice on this one!
Don't you know that everyone sees inclusiveness through their own perspective lens?
Hope someone like you finds the key to acceptance...a way for folks who find themselves in very different places on this or any other divisive issue to have a faithful relationship. DOC has got to be the place where we don’t all have to agree, and we still find something larger to be grounded to.
I always appreciate what you write.
Mike Hunter
Please Tim, don’t you start that old song (no pun intended) and dance. I have heard the supporters of same-sex marriage a thousand times equate it with the civil rights movement. Nonsense! A classic case of mixing apples and oranges if there ever was one. As far a the song goes, a good case could be made for it being very appropriate for the setting you pass judgment on . You (and those who share your view) don’t own it any more than I or anyone else.
Thanks, MGB
Thank you for your insightfulness!
And I applaud your call for us all to stand with the marginalized.
I am continually amazed by those in the church who can listen
so INTENTLY
so CLOSELY
so CAREFULLY
so ATTENTIVELY
so KEENLY
so ABSORBEDLY
to that about which
only a few select scriptures speak so minimally,
and then even questionably, to the discerning student . . . .
but fail to take seriously
the “weightier matters of the law”
or the substantial scriptural focus
on “tearing down the dividing walls of hostility”
or even advocating for St Paul’s image
of love that “does not insist on its own way.”
Given the choice between Christian hospitality
and Pharisaical self-righteousness . . . .
it is a no-brainer.
The welcoming heart, and the welcoming Table
are at the heart of the message of Grace Christ came to embody and teach!
As Christians we ought to MINIMALLY stand for the civil rights of all!
Richard Guentert
It makes me sad to read about people who have keenly felt the injustice of uninformed prejudice and who turn around and inflict some degree of injustice on other undeserving individuals. We would do well to remember that God created all of us.
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