Tag Archives: Upstanders

This Must End

I’ve seen one of these cards personally. It was 1995 in Ohio.


It was a Sunday morning and I’d just completed the second service at one of the churches I served as a pastor.


The day prior, I’d performed a wedding ceremony between two friends, one happened to be a Black man and his fiancee, a white woman.


As parishioners were leaving church that Sunday, a man came up to me after all had left and handed me the card explaining this was a warning for what I’d done the day before. He said I should know better than to perform a marriage between people of different races, especially Black and White.

I recall the shock of it, then the fear, and then the rage that I felt. I tore the card up in front of him and told him to leave. He warned me to watch my back and that lots of accidents can occur in a rural area, especially at night. He reminded me that I sometimes worked nights at either that particular church or the even more remote one just up the road.


Seeing this card again brings up those memories. The attempt at intimidation.


I’ve seen and stared into the face of hate. Unadulterated, contemptible, and all too American grown hate.


I’ve passed places in the South where they don’t even hide it. Places like Laurens, SC where a shop across from the courthouse brazenly displays the name “White Man’s Shop” and has a mannequin wearing the robe of the Klan.


Living in the South, I’ve had my children hear racist epithets hurled at them by the parents of classmates and those who had children in the same daycare they attended. I’ve heard them thrown at me as well. Things like “Chink lover” and asking why I didn’t adopt “one of my own kind.”
If anyone questions why I never wanted to return to the States after having lived in Canada, this is a major reason. I saw the writing on the wall during the 2016 election. I saw more and more individuals then as I see now around the country who have become more brazen and public with their hate.


I’ve watched the last 4 years of an administration led by an individual who espouses and encourages hatred, prejudice, division, and racism. I heard it when he claimed there were “good people on both sides” after the white supremacists marched on Charlottesville. I heard him when he told them to “Stand by and stand down,” rather than condemn them. Sure, he offered a half-hearted comment of being against them when asked by a reporter, but his actions speak louder than his words.

It causes me fear.
It causes me sadness.
It causes me anxiety.
It causes me anger.

Fear for my children and for people who are not white or who stand up against these horrible individuals and groups.
Sadness in that there are people who feel that way now.
Anxiety as I know there is somewhat of a target on my back and the backs of those who stand against the hate.
Anger in a way that motivates me to stand against them even more.

We cannot and must not allow this to continue. It matters not whether it is the Klan or any other white supremacist group or individual, they must be stopped. Silenced. Rendered flaccid in their rhetoric and actions.

We do this by standing up against them.
We do this by not being silent.
We do this by removing elected officials who espouse racist and divisive beliefs.
We do this by never giving up nor giving in.
We do this by protesting, peacefully when at all possible, but at the same time not becoming doormats for them to trample upon nor silence.

Never Forget–Never Let It Happen Again

Today, January 27, 2017, is International Holocaust Remembrance Day. This day was established on November 1, 2005, to commemorate the victims of the Holocaust. It is also the day in 1945 when the Auschwitz-Birkenau death/concentration camp was liberated. Over 6 million Jewish, 2 million Romani, 250,000 mentally and physically disabled, and 9,000 homosexual men (Wikipedia) died as the result of the Holocaust.

Some of you may be saying, “Gee, thanks for the history lesson. What does this have to do with me here in the 21st Century?”

It has everything to do with you.

The common phrase associated with the Holocaust is Never Forget. That phrase is more than just some catchy advertising campaign. Never Forget is what those who survived the Holocaust tell us because they not only want us to never forget what happened to the millions of people under the savage reign of the Nazis, but they want us to make certain it never happens again. Unfortunately, it has in places like Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia, and Darfur.

It happens when groups of people are set apart as being the cause of problems from loss of jobs to terrorism. We hear it today from the current incumbent of the White House who calls Mexican people “criminals” and “rapists” and “killers”. He blames violent crimes on Blacks and Hispanics. He’s called for a ban on Muslims. He’s signed executive orders to ban Muslims from immigrating and to build a wall to keep Mexicans out. He has also taken action that would be detrimental to the LGBTQIA community. His words are reflected in the actions of his supporters who go on the attack against these groups of people and some of whom, frighteningly enough, also fly the flag of the Nazis or engage in the salute of that same group.

Never Forget also means to never let it happen again. If we never let it happen again to the Jewish people or to any other group that is discriminated against, that honors the victims of the Holocaust. No group of people should face those horrors again.

The numbers of Holocaust survivors are dwindling as that population ages. Their call to us should never cease, even when the last survivor dies.

We must act against prejudice and violence against marginalized people!

We must STAND UP to those who bully, threaten, or attack marginalized people!

We must act against laws that discriminate against other people!

Now is not the time to simply Never Forget, but it is a time to ACT against future atrocities!

Even if it doesn’t personally affect you now, there’s nothing to say it will not affect you or someone you love in the future. Therefore, STAND UP and ACT UP against prejudice and violence wherever you encounter it. Whether it is contacting your elected officials or marching in the streets, it is up to US to Never Forget and NEVER let it happen again.