Historic St. John's Church near White House set on fire in DC riots

From Washington D.C.-

The parish office at the historic St. John's Episcopal Church in Lafayette Square near the White House in Washington, D.C., was torched as riots escalated Sunday night.

Fox News White House correspondent Kevin Corke was at the scene to report that the church had been vandalized with graffiti and set on fire.

"It does appear that St. John's Church is on fire, the parish office," Corke said. "We went downstairs, and it is on fire."

"This is awful. We saw graffiti, once the door was broken, we saw something similar happen earlier, and as you can see there's definitely a fire here," he said a half-hour before the city's 11 p.m. curfew.

More here-

https://www.christianpost.com/news/historic-st-johns-episcopal-church-set-on-fire.html

and here-

https://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/ny-white-house-george-floyd-protests-trump-bunker-church-fire-20200601-p7rk4yn3prcnbgv35fyv3iwosu-story.html 

and here-

https://theweek.com/speedreads/917414/firefighters-extinguish-blaze-historic-st-johns-church-dc

Religious, education leaders stand against racism at Buffalo Athletic Club, 1968

From Buffalo-

For the last 39 years, heading to the Buffalo Athletic Club meant you were heading to the gym. After the original BAC fell on hard times, the club’s majestic E.B. Green-designed home was renovated into a modern health club with exercise facilities for both men and women.

For decades before it was just a gym, it was a private men’s social club. Very private.

When Episcopal Bishop Harold Robinson was given an award by the Erie County Bar Association at a banquet held at the club, a group of Episcopal priests signed a letter protesting the prelate’s attendance, saying in part, “We are … concerned that any of our church's leaders can allow themselves to be honored at a reception in a club that segregates by membership and from an association that meets in facilities segregated by membership. This situation is deeply confusing when religious leaders are expected to provide the leadership and personal example in the most pressing of the country's domestic crises — the breakdown of communication and relations between black and white citizens.”

More here-

https://buffalonews.com/2019/09/11/religious-education-leaders-stand-against-racism-at-buffalo-athletic-club-1968/

Bell-ringing ceremony to mark anniversary of first slaves landing in U.S.

From South Carolina-

The Most Rev. Michael Curry, presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church, invited all Episcopal churches to participate in what is being called a day of healing.

Each Church will ring their bells one minute for each of the four centuries that have passed since slavery began on wh
at is now American soil.

Many Episcopal churches were active in the civil rights movement, which is commemorated in a stained glass at St. Athanasius Episcopal Church on Albany Street in Brunswick. The stained glass memorializes martyrs of the movement.

St. Athanasius will hold its own bell-ringing observance.

Terry E. Brown, superintendent of Fort Monroe, stressed that Sunday’s event will be somber.

More here-

https://thebrunswicknews.com/news/local_news/bell-ringing-ceremony-to-mark-anniversary-of-first-slaves-landing/article_631d50c3-3d76-5c2d-9c07-ed259708a97d.html

How the math works

From Denim Spirit-

I helped bury a friend and colleague last week in Detroit, an amazingly joyous sendoff for a man who lived a big and long life.

He was a retired Episcopal priest. As a young man he rushed to join the brave throng crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge a second time in Selma, Alabama in 1965. It was just three weeks after Bloody Sunday, that cruel riot of police brutality that mercilessly attacked unarmed demonstrators.

Later, he was fired from a wealthy suburban congregation for his civil rights witness, which included him and his wife bundling up their small children to be part of the massive Poor People’s March in 1968. I should mention, because it is relevant, he was neither poor nor African-American.

More here-

https://www.fltimes.com/opinion/denim-spirit-how-the-math-works/article_6447c166-3fc1-5863-aea3-9febc17cb56d.html

In Praise Of Jonathan Daniels and Ruby Sales: Greater Love Hath No Man Than This

From Common Dreams-

Jonathan Daniels, born on 20 March 1939, would have turned 80 this week. A doctor's son and small-town kid from Keene, New Hampshire, he attended Virginia Military Institute and Harvard briefly, then entered an Episcopal seminary. In 1965, he followed the call from Dr. Martin Luther King for people of faith to join him in a march to Montgomery after civil rights activists were attacked on Selma's Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma. Daniels went to Alabama for what he thought was a few days; instead, he briefly left and returned for the rest of his short life - "The imperative was too clear" - remaining as activist, witness and finally martyr until his cruel death at 26. In these bitter times, writes John Samuel Tieman, let us celebrate Daniels' story, "a history of becoming, of process. He was open to change and growth...an ordinary man who saw great evil and responded with love."

More here-

https://www.commondreams.org/further/2019/03/20/praise-jonathan-daniels-and-ruby-sales-greater-love-hath-no-man?fbclid=IwAR1LjhoJAj2kMnlATSy1KFbO0WMlJ7gxEjYebR3xncoDoyGla4EgEBoS15Y

A Santa Barbara Episcopal Priest’s Stand Against Racial Injustice

From California-

My father was an Episcopalian missionary in Davis, California, before the church appointed him associate rector at Santa Barbara’s Trinity Episcopal Church in 1961. It was quite a change to move from a small, rural college town to one of the prettiest cities in the world. Palm trees grew in front of the church. Olive trees grew on Olive Street, figs on Fig Avenue. In Davis, Dad started out holding services in the local movie theater before the Episcopal Church purchased a house we were able to convert into a parish church. Parishioners from the campus theater department turned its windows into colorful stained-glass replicas with only glue and tissue paper. 

What a contrast to the imposing Trinity Church, one of the oldest Episcopal churches in the state. In the English Gothic style, it is built of local sandstone and designed by Philip Hubert Frohman, the same architect for the Washington National Cathedral. It all seemed near perfect to me and my brother and sister, especially when my parents were able to buy a house in the Samarkand, a neighborhood of charming houses and underground utilities.


More here-

https://www.independent.com/news/2019/feb/21/santa-barbara-episcopal-priests-stand-against-raci/

Justice & Dignity: Pauli Murray

From North Carolina-

As a Chapel Hill resident, it always astounds me when I come across someone who is unfamiliar with Anna Pauline Murray (also known as Pauli Murray). We are, after all, a professed and often recognized community of educated, social justice activists with a proclivity for open discourse and legacy pride.

Murray, great-granddaughter of an enslaved woman and the family that owned her, was raised by her grandparents in neighboring Durham. She celebrated her first Eucharist at the local Chapel of the Cross church and was famously denied admission to the UNC School of Law because she was African American. In a letter to then UNC president, Frank Graham, Murray argued that any hesitation about admitting African Americans should be answered by “frank, open discussion” and a “give-and-take process where prejudices are openly aired and accounted for, where correct interpretations are made and where enlightenment is gained in an atmosphere of mutual co-operation and respect.” Early on in her life Murray demonstrated an interest in social justice and open dialogue that became a life-long commitment to advocacy.

More here-

https://chapelboro.com/town-square/justice-dignity-pauli-murray

The Christian church in America: A history of racial intolerance and racism

From Cincinnati-

The division persisted at the start of the civil rights movement when King and former Episcopal Bishop James A. Pike of New York were among the major religious leaders to say, "The 11 o’clock hour on Sunday is the most segregated hour in American life."

It's still that way in Cincinnati. And, says one of the city's most recognizable and senior church pastors, the Rev. Damon Lynch Jr., the racial climate today is more toxic than 50 years ago and racial attitudes both in and outside of the church have hardened. He says too many white ministers and churchgoers still believe whites are superior to African-Americans.

"We've been at this for what seems like forever," says Lynch, who in September will begin his 48th year as pastor of New Jerusalem Baptist Church in Carthage. "The will is just not there for white Christians and white clergy to address racism."

More here-

https://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/2018/05/31/american-christianity-history-intolerance-racism/657403002/

Billy Graham was on the wrong side of history

From The Guardian-

When Billy Graham stands before the judgment seat of God, he may finally realize how badly he failed his country, and perhaps his God. On civil rights and the environmental crisis, the most important issues of his lifetime, he championed the wrong policies.

Graham was on the wrong side of history.

The world’s most famous evangelist let his apocalyptic anticipation of the coming kingdom of God blind him to the realities of living in this world.

For Graham, the Bible had a clear message for Christians living in what he believed were humans’ last days on earth. Individuals alone can achieve salvation; governments cannot. Conversions change behaviors; federal policies do not.

These convictions shaped the evangelist’s views on civil rights.

In the late 1950s, Graham integrated his revivals and seemed to support the burgeoning civil rights movement. This is the Graham most Americans remember.

More here-

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/feb/21/billy-graham-wrong-side-history?CMP=share_btn_fb

Six Unsung Heroines of the Civil Rights Movement

From History-

The writings of The Rev. Dr. Anna Pauline “Pauli” Murray were a cornerstone of Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, the 1954 Supreme Court case that ended school segregation, but the lawyer, Episcopal priest, pioneering civil rights activist and co-founder of the National Organization for Women wouldn’t be made aware of that extraordinary accomplishment until a decade after the fact.

In 1944, Murray was the only woman enrolled at Howard Law School—and at the top of her class. While discussing Jim Crow laws, Murray had an idea. Why not challenge the “separate” in “separate but equal” legal doctrine, (Plessy v. Ferguson) and argue that segregation was unconstitutional? This theory became the basis of her 1950 book, States’ Laws on Race and Color, which NAACP attorney Thurgood Marshall called the “bible” of Brown v. Board of Education.

More here-

http://www.history.com/news/six-unsung-heroines-of-the-civil-rights-movement

L.A. Parker: Solving U.S. race issues requires white leadership

From New Jersey-

Fifty-two years have passed since destiny caught up with Jonathan Daniels, a 26-year-old white Episcopal seminary student from Massachusetts.

Destiny and fate frequently travel parallel with death and such an unexpected demise awaited Daniels as he, Richard Morrisroe, a Catholic priest, and two young black women were ambushed while attempting to buy soda pop in a Ft. Deposit, Alabama store on August 20, 1965.

Daniels jumped in front of a shotgun shell fired by white supremacist and special county deputy, Tom Coleman.

Coleman had targeted 17-year-old Ruby Sales who escaped injury but Daniels suffered a fatal wound.

More here-

http://www.trentonian.com/opinion/20170819/la-parker-solving-us-race-issues-requires-white-leadership

Jonathan Daniels Forgotten Hero of the Civil Rights Movement

From Plough-

On August 14, 1965, Jonathan was part of a protest in Fort Deposit, Alabama. He, Stokely Carmichael, and some twenty others were arrested and held in the Hayneville county jail, where they sat for a week in the sweltering heat. On August 20 they were released and quickly set about trying to get to somewhere safe. While some of the activists organized rides, Jonathan and a Catholic priest named Richard Morrisroe along with two local women, Ruby Sales and Joyce Bailey, walked to a local store known to serve blacks and whites.

As Ruby opened the door, a figure from the shadows warned them off the property. Then the man raised a shot gun and pulled the trigger. Jonathan pulled Ruby from the line of fire and was hit instead. He was dead before he hit the ground. The gunman shot Father Morrisroe in the back, and then walked over to the county courthouse to call the state police chief and inform him he had just shot two preachers.

At Jonathan’s funeral, many of the mourners stood around the grave and sang the anthem of the movement, “We Shall Overcome”– a final tribute from those who had come to love this son of New England and his integrity, love, and commitment to freedom.

More here-

http://www.plough.com/en/topics/faith/discipleship/jonathan-daniels-forgotten-hero-of-the-civil-rights-movement

THE MANY LIVES OF PAULI MURRAY

From The New Yorker-

In classic Murray fashion, the position she sought was officially unavailable to her: the Episcopal Church did not ordain women. For once, though, Murray’s timing was perfect. While she was in divinity school, the Church’s General Convention voted to change that policy, effective January 1, 1977—three weeks after she would complete her course work. On January 8th, in a ceremony in the National Cathedral, Murray became the first African-American woman to be vested as an Episcopal priest. A month later, she administered her first Eucharist at the Chapel of the Cross—the little church in North Carolina where, more than a century earlier, a priest had baptized her grandmother Cornelia, then still a baby, and still a slave.

It was the last of Murray’s many firsts. She was by then nearing seventy, just a few years from the mandatory retirement age for Episcopal priests. Never having received a permanent call, she took a few part-time positions and did a smattering of supply preaching, for twenty-five dollars a sermon. She held four advanced degrees, had friends on the Supreme Court and in the White House, had spent six decades sharing her life and mind with some of the nation’s most powerful individuals and institutions. Yet she died as she lived, a stone’s throw from penury.

More here-

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/04/17/the-many-lives-of-pauli-murray

ACT NOW: MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., AND ‘THE ACCEPTABLE TIME’

From The Living Church-

It was Good Friday, April 12, 1963, that an open letter, “A Call for Unity,” written by seven white Christian and Jewish leaders in Alabama, appeared in The Birmingham News. It was during the days of the Civil Rights Movement, and these seven men shared the view that the demonstrations occurring in Birmingham were creating unnecessary havoc and discord. They hoped that their letter would dissuade Birmingham’s African-American community from going forward with an illegal march on Birmingham’s City Hall, planned for the same day as the letter’s publishing, in protest of the city’s segregation laws.  The clergymen also hoped that the letter would move city officials to work toward racial progress through peaceful negotiations and nonviolent resolutions. But despite their hopes, the march went on, with arrests and media attention coming along with it.

On Easter Sunday, April 14, Southern Christian Leadership Conference Executive Director Wyatt Walker went to the Birmingham Jail to give a copy of the white ministers’ letter to an “outsider” arrested two days earlier. His name — Martin Luther King, Jr.

More here-

http://livingchurch.org/covenant/2017/01/16/act-now-martin-luther-king-jr-and-the-acceptable-time/

Retired Miss. Episcopal Bishop Duncan Gray Jr. dies

From Mississippi-

The Rt. Rev. Duncan Montgomery Gray Jr., a civil-rights advocate and retired bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Mississippi, died Friday. He was 89.

Gray died at his home in Jackson after having been in hospice care, said one of his sons, Lloyd Gray of Meridian. He said a funeral will be at St. Andrew’s Episcopal Cathedral in Jackson, but plans were still pending.

As rector of St. Peter’s Church in Oxford in the autumn of 1962, Gray called for calm as violence broke out in response to the court-ordered integration of the University of Mississippi in that city. Gray had been a chaplain on campus until 1961 and was known to students. According to Episcopal archives, Gray held onto the statue of a Confederate soldier near the main administrative building on campus and implored people not to riot.

In the pulpit of St. Peter’s, Gray denounced racism.

More here-

http://www.clarionledger.com/story/news/local/2016/07/15/retired-miss-episcopal-bishop-duncan-gray-jr-dies/87164428/

also here-

https://djournal.com/news/duncan-gray-jr-retired-bishop-activist-dies-jackson/

and here-

http://episcopaldigitalnetwork.com/ens/2016/07/16/former-mississippi-bishop-duncan-m-gray-jr-dies-after-brief-illness/

Brunswick seek assistance to enhance African American tourism

From Georgia-

Officials and administrators in Brunswick and Glynn County have joined forces to obtain assistance from the Georgia Department of Economic Development to better promote area-wide African American heritage tourist attractions.

“We have a rich African American heritage that has not been drawn out and planned,” said Brunswick City Commissioner Julie Martin. “This is an opportunity for the city, county and the (Golden Isles Convention and) Visitors Bureau to feed into and market that segment of the population.”

Brunswick and Glynn County commissioners recently approved the city’s “Letter of Interest” requesting assistance from the state development department’s Tourism Product Development Team who will come in and help conduct an assessment of African American heritage tourism opportunities. The team will then make its recommendations on how to grow tourism county-wide.

More here-

http://www.thebrunswicknews.com/news/brunswick-seek-assistance-to-enhance-african-american-tourism/article_c9e120ba-9f66-5119-b004-254413d4aa0e.html

Op-ed: Faith calls us to push for civil rights

From Indiana-

We represent a group of 150 clergy and religious leaders from across Indiana who have come together to express our support for upholding religious freedom while protecting the civil rights for all citizens of our state.

The religious liberty upon which our nation was founded has allowed our country’s diverse faith traditions to flourish. We cherish this religious freedom, which is guaranteed by the Bill of Rights, and believe it should be affirmed.

More here-

http://www.jconline.com/story/opinion/readers/2015/12/17/op-ed-faith-calls-us-push-civil-rights/77475408/

“Did I do what I should have done?”: white clergy in 1960s Mississippi

From Oxford University Press-

In his 1963 “Letter from Birmingham Jail,”  Martin Luther King Jr. expressed keen disappointment in white church leaders, whom he had hoped “would be among our strongest allies” and “would serve as the channel through which our just grievances could reach the power structure.” Southern white clergy members in the civil rights era are stereotypically portrayed as outspoken opponents of change, or as chaplains of the segregated system who claimed a purely “spiritual” (i.e., not “political”) role for the church, or as somewhat sympathetic supporters of the black freedom struggle who remained in tormented silence, afraid to stir things up and hurt the church and their own careers.

 Looking back on that time, many white pastors who led churches in the 1960s have asked themselves, “Did I do what I should have done?”
In Mississippi, the state known as “the toughest nut to crack” by movement leaders, a few white church pastors tried to do the right thing. In response to the 30 September 1962 riot at Ole Miss on the eve of James Meredith’s registration as the school’s first African American student, a small ecumenical group of white clergy in Oxford, including Episcopal priest Duncan M. Gray Jr., issued a call for repentance “for our collective and individual guilt in the formation of the atmosphere which produced the strife at the University of Mississippi.” Most white Mississippians aware of this appeal either ignored or rejected it.

- See more at:


http://blog.oup.com/2015/11/white-clergy-1960s-mississippi/#sthash.RxfbvYtf.dpuf

WHAT WE DON’T KNOW ABOUT BLACK SOCIAL GOSPEL: A LONG-NEGLECTED TRADITION IS RECLAIMED

From Religion Dispatches-

The black social gospel had numerous proponents in its early years, notably Episcopal cleric Alexander Crummell, Methodist clerics Reverdy Ransom, Alexander Walters, and Richard R. Wright, Jr., Methodist anti-lynching crusader Ida B. Wells-Barnett, and Baptist clerics William J. Simmons, George W. Woodbey, and Adam Clayton Powell, Sr.

They belonged to embattled minorities in their denominations, because the social gospel was divisive and it threatened to get people in trouble. The founders and their successors fought hard for the right to advocate progressive theology and social justice politics. Washington versus Du Bois was at the center of the argument, until the Du Bois faction prevailed.
More here-

http://religiondispatches.org/what-we-dont-know-about-black-social-gospel-a-long-neglected-tradition-is-reclaimed/

Civil Rights Activist Honors Man Who Died Taking Bullet Meant For Her

From Huffington-

In 1965, Ruby Sales was just 17 years old when Jonathan Daniels, a 26-year-old Episcopal seminary student, stepped in front of the bullet that would have likely killed her. Both of them -- Sales, a young black activist from Alabama, and Daniels, a white man from New Hampshire -- were devoted Civil Rights activists fighting against segregation in Alabama, but only one of them would live to see the end of that year.

Fifty years after that act of selflessness, Sales will speak about Daniels' legacy on on Sunday, October 11 at the Washington National Cathedral, which just completed a limestone bust of Daniels in August.

“You have to understand the significance of Jonathan’s witness,” Sales told The Washington Post in July. “He walked away from the king’s table. He could have had any benefit he wanted, because he was young, white, brilliant and male. ”

More here-

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/ruby-sales-jonathan-daniels_5616c004e4b0082030a1a106