A weekend of remembrance, honor, awareness, and truth.

“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”

Dr.Martin Luther King Jr.

 

As I sit here to reflect over this weekend, so many emotions, thoughts and questions flood my mind.

This weekend a group of friends; my brothers and sisters in Christ; from backgrounds across the spectrum, collectively decided to take a trip together to experience, learn and gain more awareness surrounding Biblical Racial Reconciliation through visiting The Legacy Museum: From Enslavement to Mᴀss Incarceration and The National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, Alabama as well as the historic sites of the Montgomery Bus Boycott.

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Our journey began well before this weekend and before we all set foot in our travel starting point of Atlanta. It began months earlier at our local church where we all attend and are invested…

This past Fall (Fall 2018), we had the opportunity to join in on the 3^rd round of a 9-week biblical study on racial reconciliation using the Be The Bridge curriculum. We had two cohorts, one on Saturday mornings and the other on Thursday evenings. The intention of these groups was an effort to provide an environment for open, honest, and vulnerable conversations surrounding biblical racial reconciliation.

More than anything we had an urging and call to continue the conversations, learning and take the first steps of our own acknowledgment to help shift the needle in the possibility of healing. This comes from our own life experience of racial divide, along with experiences we all shared in the Racial Reconciliation class we took this past Fall.

Our travel family (Fried Chicken And Friends) consisted of 9 girls, 3 boys, 7 People of Color and 5 Caucasian brothers and sisters in Christ from different backgrounds with one central commonality: A devotion to follow Christ, learn his word, live it out, and share his love and the good news of the gospel as we step up to his command on our lives as believers; a family united in Christ. We also got the blessing to have two additional sisters in Christ join us the first day of our adventures (real life sister to one of our travel members) which made the Day 1 insights even more fruitful. The overall group count for the first day’s experiences were 11 girls, 3 boys; 7 People of Color and 7 Caucasian.

The only reason I note the breakdown of people of color vs. non people of color is for perspective on the nature of this particular trip and experience. These are all family members in Christ that raised their hands voluntarily to say I want to join in on this experience, want to be apart of this conversation, want more knowledge and I want to help shift the perspective in my sphere of influence.

From these two cohort groups, the idea was formed to continue the conversations and discovery by taking a trip together to Montgomery to explore two historical places that are forever marked in our history by the events that occurred there and the memorialized remembrance erected at these locations. Scheduling was a little hectic, so about 12 of us were able to join in with 2 more meeting us there for the first day explorations over MLK weekend.

Somewhere along the way as we traveled up and down the Georgia and Alabama highways, our 14 pᴀssenger shuttle was affectionately named Fried Chicken and we are the Friends. So if you follow me or my travel family on social media a lot of our interactions, additional pH๏τos, discussion highlights and everything in between is captured on the tag of #FriedChickenAndFriends

Disclaimer: We are not attorneys, employed by social injustice organizations or theologians, but we ARE fully devoted followers of Christ. We ARE banded together as a family of believers doing life together, learning together, sharing our experiences, hurts and the prayer for healing as we raise our hands to have a place in this conversation moving forward in our own spheres and hopefully beyond.

The Plan

Our original plan was to land in Atlanta, drive to Montgomery, explore these two places, stay in Alabama to rest, reflect, and share, then proceed back to Atlanta on the back-end for a local church service, and farewell as the departure groups were in 2 waves.

Traveling in a group of 12, as you can imagine, time was a fun and interesting struggle on the day one excursions. We definitely wanted the chance to explore the historical sites in Montgomery and hands down, knew it was non-negotiable to have time to experience both the Museum and Monument in a thoughtful manner without rushing. Ultimately, our group ended up visiting the Museum on Day 1 and exploring the Memorial on Day 2.

This provides yet another example of how the Lord’s ultimate plan was and is so much sweeter. His plan with the rain and lightening served as a huge catalyst to allow us to press pause in between the Museum and Memorial visit. This gave us an uninterrupted and truly introspective, educational, powerful, tenacity, sobering, raw, changed, emotional, enlightening, real, impactful, surprising, heavy, informative, overwhelming and hopeful time of outpouring and reflection.

The words expressed above are the one and two-word descriptions each of us gave from our first day experience at the Legacy Museum and walking around the historic sites from the Montgomery Bus Boycott.

“So God created mankind in his own image,
in the image of God he created them;
male and female he created them.”

Genesis 1:27 NIV

Coming into this experience

Coming into the weekend, I honestly had no idea what I may feel or encounter, as unaware as that sounds. I knew where we were going, and figured I would react from an intellectual perspective. Mainly gaining more information and knowledge to continue more informed conversations along with having the real history absorbed. Either way, I was eager to experience, eager to learn more truth and eager to have a stronger connection to my history as an American and as a person of color in America. My hope was to leave this experience more informed, with a better frame of reference for what happened then, what’s happening now and a stronger call to be apart of the solution for change.

Obviously, all of this happened and more. For reasons beyond me, I did not expect the strong emotional reaction that it triggered in me, as I can admit, to a degree, I came in a bit jaded and desensitized to the commonality of racial/social injustice that occurs daily and ignorantly believing that I knew more than I really did from my education in school. This was a huge fallacy. The little, and I do mean microscopically little I did know, was hugely inaccurate or misleading as many facts and details of importance were either omitted or embellished in the public school system that shaped my foundational framework growing up. Growing up in the South as a person of color, I have my own experiences with racism that made this experience a more sensitive H๏τ spot as well.

We all have a story to tell directly or indirectly and that is a powerful piece of the puzzle to move forward from with a foundation first and foremost being in the Truth and Love of Christ.

Reflections on the experience

Going into The Legacy Museum: From Enslavement to Mᴀss Incarceration immediately you feel the heaviness and gravity of what you are about to learn and experience. From the beginning plaques as you enter the ramp going into the museum telling the story of African Americans first being brought to this country and enslaved, to the first area of the Museum where holographic re-enactments of enslaved individuals’ testimonies behind a barred cell begin to bring to life the real stories of people forced into slavery. The famiies torn apart, the horrific torture and lasting impact of abuse, degradation and devaluing of human lives.

Museum Reflections

Within the first 5 minutes of hearing the voices of young children calling out for the mother who had been taken, separated from her children and sold to another slave owner was the beginning of the emotional flood gates being opened. The next cell featured a woman singing an old negro spiritual as a plea for peace and relief. In that moment, it hit home harder than I expected. Real people, real families torn apart, treated like animals and property, devalued, abused, and left for ᴅᴇᴀᴅ in the event they stood up for themselves, stood up for their family, tried to learn to read or crossed their master or another Caucasian person.

Even though I knew this history, I knew the oppression, seeing this made it more real. My first thoughts were God, Why? And just a plea for change in my silent prayer for these individuals lives to not be lost in vain. I know God is good and hears the cries of his people. That gives me a sense of peace knowing he will right all wrongs according to his timing.

” For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and his ears are attentive to their prayer, but the face of the Lord is against those who do evil.”

1 Peter 3:12 NIV

From there as your transition into the main area of the museum the path walks you through the progression of slavery into systematic slavery through mᴀss incarceration. Throughout this path and in between were different rooms with video accounts telling the story of everything from slave accounts, to racial injustices after slavery to the inhumane and social injustices happening in the prison system that many legislators and states turn a blind eye to.

Each exhibit in this museum was moving beyond words, informative, and really makes the narrative most of us heard growing up real. One exhibit in particular that stopped me in my tracks was a room that displayed large jars of soil as remembrance, with the names of indivuals lynched during this era for a variety of nonsensical reasons. The most striking part were the jars with “Unknown” written as the name. Where records document a black person lynched but details of their name was unable to be obtained. The fact that some of these jars had dates up until the 1930’s and 40’s and beyond was shocking. It was all so raw and real. Things that once seen and acknowledged, how could you possibly ignore?

As I went through the various exhibits and timelines, interactive narrations, lots of emotions and thoughts swirled around my head as I processed, how could this happen, not in a foreign country but in the land I call home, the land I was born and raised in? The flame was more than fanned as the Lord’s mission and command to stand in the face of injustice, to mourn with those who mourn and weep with those who weep was crystal clear.

The hopeful part for me as you come to the end of the exhibits is what we called the Hope or Orange room. It was an orange room with placard pH๏τos of pioneering men and women at the forefront of the movement for change, equality, justice, freedom and peace for all. Many past, some present but their legacy continuing to be rebirthed by each person that experiences this museum and allows God to spur their heart on to no longer be jaded, ignorant or blind to what has happened and what needs to happen moving forward. We could’ve easily spent two or three days or more going through the museum piece by piece. It is truly an extraordinary museum and experience. Unfortunately (but understandably), the museum does not allow pictures or videos of the exhibits. However if a picture was worth a thousand words, know there would be many words here for you to view. It was an experience I highly recommend and would do 1,000 times over. It serves as an education, a reminder, a call to action and overall posture of intolerance for this behavior and compᴀssion for those that have suffered and their lives been taken by those in power.

What left the most glaring lasting impression was a plaque as you exit that noted the below:

“Today, the Alabama state consтιтution still mandates that there be racial segregation in education with “separate schools for white and colored children.” While barring black children from attending schools with white students is prohibited by federal law, the Alabama consтιтutional ban still exists. In 2004 and 2012 an effort to remove this language from the state consтιтution through a statewide referendum was attempted. On both occasions predominantly white votes elected to ratify this language and keep this restriction in the state consтιтution.”

 

What does it mean that the Alabama consтιтution still prohibits racial intergration in education and what should be done about it?

Memorial Reflections

Moving into Day 2, after our reflections, hopes, and prayers over our experiences at the Museum, I knew the Memorial would be just as impactful and emotional, however I entered in with more hope of the family of beleivers I was experiencing this journey with.

The temperature on Day 2 was ridiculous! It was still a bit wet, muggy and the colder temperature drop was frigid beyond belief. Still we were all eager to experience the memorial without interruption. Before entering the staff alerted us that the chains on the first statues were real chains used from the time of slavery.

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Going through the Memorial, also triggered more emotions of sadness, empathy for those whose lives were taken away, as well as anger of how could another human being, do this to another human being. I also found myself asking the question, how could people celebrate these horrendous acts or stay silent about them? When we do not learn, acknowledge and try to heal our past, we are destined to repeat it.  ~J P J

 It is beyond time to step up and step out of the silence to propel forward significant change. What was most heartbreaking for me, was seeing the counties I live, work and grew up in with names on them. Names of normal everyday black americans that were lynched. Throughout all of the columns there were dates as recent as the 1940’s. Almost every state and county was represented with names on their column. My home, my city, my parents and grandparents city and county they grew up in were all listed….

Dallas County, Collin County, Rockwall County, Tarrant County, Kaufman County, Baylor County, I could go on and on. At this point, it reiterated for me that we all have lost sight of where it all begins and ends at that is at the foot of the cross. Jesus weeps over this injustice and those injustices still happening daily in 2019. This is not what God wanted for his children. We cannot drive out hate with hate, but hate with love. Just as we cannot drive our darkness with darkness, we need light to do that job.

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” Darkness cannot drive out darkness;
only light can do that.
Hate cannot drive out hate;
only love can do that. “

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Excerpt from Strength To Love, 1963

The memorial reaffirmed that my voice matters, my life matters and the lives of those who were lynched and still facing injustice today matter. United in Christ with fellow believers we can impact change. For me its a balance of harnᴀssing these emotions of anger with a call to action in a productive and positive way that will help propel forward significant change. We are the generation that has been purposely placed here to impact change, to bring these conversations into our homes, our workplaces, our churches, and our government on the state and federal level. Silence is no longer an option.

The hopeful part towards the end of the memorial was the invitation for other counties to come, acknowldge and erect the columns of memorial in their own county to start the remembrance, acknowledgement and healing path forward.

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The invocation pictured below also had a lasting impact leaving the memorial.

Overall this trip was a blessing beyond words. Yes, it was heavy, emotional, raw, informative and in some aspects as we relate it to our society and culture today, extremely frustrating. However, getting the opportunity to experince this trip with my brothers and sisters in Christ, to be able to openly share, connect and hear hurts, anger, questions and hope has made this trip an experience of a lifetime. All of our hearts have been further stirred to God’s command of action. It doesn’t stop here and we are all raising are hand to engage more in this conversation, in this process and in the path forward to healing and biblical reconciliation.

Further reflections and debrief excerpts from myself and my travel family that we shared together from our final day can be viewed below. (Excuse any background noise and interruptions as we were filming,this is real life folks!)

Please be respectful of the views expressed. This is the raw and unedited debrief from our time as a collective group. Our experience and opinions are reserved and valid for us to have and express in the moment of our experience.

https://youtu.be/dy–EscgR0w

In the end we’re all here for God to be Glorified, to Share Awareness and a Call to Action from a Biblical Foundation.  This is a great opportunity to level up, with the Church having a credible front seat at the table of these discussions, and most of all as Christians to have the biblical tools, vocabulary and foundation of love to be the vessel that helps move the needle forward for acknowledgement, truth and ultimately healing and restoration.

My words and this post will not adequately capture all that we experienced… the laughs, tears, insights and unity we have together. However, my hope is that this will help to give insight, an overview and hopefully put a spark in your heart to visit these places, learn more, acknowledge what happened, and put Christ at the center of it as you make yourself a vehicle to continue theses conversations, continue the action, Love like Jesus loved and aide in being the bridge in healing for all.

The picture above reads:

“Thousands of African Americans are Unknown Victims of Racial Terror Lynchings Whose Deaths Cannot Be Documented, Many Whose Names Will Never Be Known. They Are All Honored Here.”

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Thankful for this experience, for organizations like the Equal Justice Initiative, for my brothers and sisters in Christ (Fried Chicken And Friends) that I got to experience this with and a platform to be a voice and share my journey along this road of life.

Thanks for reading! Feel free to leave me any comments if you want to learn or know more or if you have any questions.

Love you,

~J P J