The Courage to Change - MLK 2018

There is no great reconciliation, unity and peace to come without truth, without amends, without real apologies and ownership of wrongs. One cannot slap forgiveness unto pain like a Band-Aid on puss. It just won’t work. We are not wired like that. The wound must be cleaned first. When I was a little girl my great-aunt Katherine Phinazee would put mercurochrome on my scrapes and cuts. It burned like hell. They don’t even make the stuff anymore. However, I never got an infection and my wounds always healed. See, she knew the wound had to be cleaned first, then, it would heal. She also knew it would hurt but I would flourish.

The most healing moment for me this MLK day was the presentation by Rob Lee IV, who apologized for the deeds of his ancestor Robert, E. Lee, the Civil War general. When he apologized I felt a piece of my heart open up in healing. I suspect Rob Lee IV has the values of righteousness, the values of justice, the values of human dignity. Just as, if not more resonating, is that Rob Lee IV has courage. The courage to feel whatever it feels like to renounce inequality, stand for his values, part ways with evil wherever he found it.

As a nation, to be who we can be we must refuse to normalize hate. The only normalcy we will accept is the normalcy of love, the normalcy of decency, the normalcy of human dignity, the normalcy of justice, the normalcy of equality.

God Bless America with unity. God Bless America with a revolution of values. God Bless America with compassion. God Bless America with love. God Bless America with a shift from materialism to people. God Bless America with the courage to obliterate racism, poverty, and inequality.