WEBVTT - A Blueprint for Change | A Conversation with Bishop William Barber & Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove 0:00:00.040 --> 0:00:03.800 I am thrilled tonight to join you here on the 0:00:03.880 --> 0:00:08.240 warning with two men I admire a great deal. We 0:00:08.400 --> 0:00:13.760 have Jonathan Wilson Pargrove, Minister Jonathan with us, and of 0:00:13.800 --> 0:00:20.240 course we have Bishop William Barber. And both of these 0:00:20.400 --> 0:00:24.880 men are new to Substack, where they are spreading a 0:00:25.160 --> 0:00:33.160 gospel of not just the Good Lord's teachings, but of Americanism. 0:00:33.920 --> 0:00:36.320 And we're going to talk about that. One of the 0:00:36.360 --> 0:00:40.360 things that I've been dealing with is I took my 0:00:40.600 --> 0:00:46.040 eighty year old mother to the Normandy Landing Beaches, which 0:00:46.080 --> 0:00:50.000 is something that she wanted to see a few weeks before. 0:00:50.080 --> 0:00:54.760 I had the great privilege in Jackson, Mississippi to stand 0:00:54.800 --> 0:00:59.760 in the driveway on the spot where Medgar Evers was 0:00:59.800 --> 0:01:04.240 gone down. He was a Normandy veteran. I was at 0:01:04.280 --> 0:01:09.880 the spot where Medgar Evers would have come ashore, where 0:01:09.920 --> 0:01:16.160 he would have begun his duty and his journey. And 0:01:17.120 --> 0:01:23.800 I have been dealing with an incandescent anger as I 0:01:23.959 --> 0:01:34.040 walked amongst the gravestones the betrayal of American values and ideals. 0:01:34.200 --> 0:01:39.680 And I know that anger is not healthy, and I 0:01:39.760 --> 0:01:46.240 know that anger is not productive. But I know my 0:01:46.400 --> 0:01:51.720 anger about what is happening is very real, and so 0:01:51.760 --> 0:01:55.440 I couldn't think about two better people to talk about 0:01:55.840 --> 0:02:02.000 three things before we talk about registering million voters. I'd 0:02:02.040 --> 0:02:05.120 like to talk about anger, because there's a lot of 0:02:05.160 --> 0:02:09.959 angry people in America angry about what's happening, and I'm 0:02:09.960 --> 0:02:18.200 one of them. I'd like to talk about doubt. It 0:02:18.240 --> 0:02:24.400 doesn't seem like men like Abraham Lincoln and Winston Churchill 0:02:26.080 --> 0:02:33.000 and Martin Luther King ever dealt with doubt, But the 0:02:33.120 --> 0:02:37.280 record shows they all had crises of faith and they 0:02:37.320 --> 0:02:43.480 all doubted, and we look at them as lions who 0:02:44.480 --> 0:02:50.840 were strong when everybody else wavered. But it's more complex 0:02:50.919 --> 0:02:57.760 about that. And then lastly, to talk about faith and 0:02:58.240 --> 0:03:05.200 how to let go and trust that there is a 0:03:05.240 --> 0:03:09.760 plan and that things will turn out. And so, with 0:03:09.880 --> 0:03:13.600 no further ado for me, turn over to you, Reverend Barber, 0:03:14.000 --> 0:03:18.600 for those of us that are wrestling with anger, with depression, 0:03:18.960 --> 0:03:22.799 with doubt, with a crisis of faith in the country, 0:03:24.280 --> 0:03:26.200 how should we process all of this? 0:03:27.760 --> 0:03:29.960 Well, first of all, Steve, thank you so much for 0:03:30.000 --> 0:03:33.480 having Jonathan and I and the name of your show 0:03:33.800 --> 0:03:37.920 is really how we should deal with the warning. My 0:03:38.080 --> 0:03:40.600 father was also a world War two better. And he 0:03:40.680 --> 0:03:45.440 went in when the army, and that offerses, was segregated. 0:03:46.480 --> 0:03:49.680 But despite the segregation, and despite the fact that he 0:03:49.840 --> 0:03:53.000 was drafted, and some say to give first class blood 0:03:53.000 --> 0:03:57.080 for second class citizenship, he knew the deeper meaning and 0:03:57.120 --> 0:04:01.000 the possibility and the hope of this country if she 0:04:01.400 --> 0:04:06.120 leaned into what she had said on paper about establishing justice, 0:04:06.240 --> 0:04:09.720 providing for the common defense, promoting the general welfare, and 0:04:09.880 --> 0:04:14.240 ensuring domestic tranquility and equal protection under the law. And 0:04:14.400 --> 0:04:21.520 nobody had the authority to deny or abridge the right 0:04:21.600 --> 0:04:24.880 to vote. And so he went in the navy drafted. 0:04:25.920 --> 0:04:29.960 By the time for the war was over, you know, 0:04:30.000 --> 0:04:33.520 there was some desegregation of his armed forces. And he 0:04:33.640 --> 0:04:36.680 went in angry, Steve, he went in angry. But let 0:04:36.720 --> 0:04:41.240 me say a word theologically about anger. The scriptures, the 0:04:41.360 --> 0:04:45.720 prophets of the Bible were all angry and injustice. They 0:04:45.720 --> 0:04:49.760 were angry when they saw people being beaten and betrayed. 0:04:50.040 --> 0:04:53.440 Take for listening to these words, for instance, Isaiah, woe 0:04:53.560 --> 0:04:57.080 unto you who legislate evil and robbed the pull of 0:04:57.120 --> 0:05:00.240 their rights. That doesn't sound like somebody is happy or 0:05:00.839 --> 0:05:04.680 cry loud and spare not blow your chauffeur, tell the 0:05:04.760 --> 0:05:09.160 nation of your sins. Or Jeremiah saying it owed that 0:05:09.279 --> 0:05:11.760 my head was a fountain of tears, that I might 0:05:11.839 --> 0:05:16.160 weep and cry on behalf of the nation. Or Jeremiah 0:05:16.160 --> 0:05:19.400 saying I said I wasn't gonna talk anymore about the 0:05:19.440 --> 0:05:22.680 things of God, but the word is like fire, shut 0:05:22.760 --> 0:05:25.760 up in my bone. Or Jesus the first day of 0:05:26.040 --> 0:05:30.400 Holy With on Monday, turns over the tables in the temple, 0:05:30.920 --> 0:05:34.520 says there's something's wrong here when the place where people 0:05:34.520 --> 0:05:36.480 are supposed to come for hope and piece has been 0:05:36.520 --> 0:05:39.960 turning into a dead of beef. And Paul says to us, 0:05:40.600 --> 0:05:44.920 be angry and sin not. Now what that means is 0:05:45.120 --> 0:05:50.320 anger comes from and grief. If you're not greathing right 0:05:50.360 --> 0:05:55.040 now at what you see happening, if you don't grieve 0:05:55.279 --> 0:05:58.479 and have a sense of grief and anger. When every 0:05:58.600 --> 0:06:02.920 day President, for instance, and a hit and the majority 0:06:02.920 --> 0:06:05.600 in the Congress get up and say, let's figure out 0:06:05.640 --> 0:06:07.839 how we can knock thirty six million people off of 0:06:07.880 --> 0:06:12.480 health care, off of Medicaid, which we know will cost 0:06:12.520 --> 0:06:15.760 people their lives. If something doesn't bother you deep down, 0:06:15.960 --> 0:06:18.359 as doctor, the King said one time, you are to 0:06:18.440 --> 0:06:24.440 have a a what did he call it? Anger against 0:06:24.480 --> 0:06:28.760 the injustice? An inherent and an inexhaustible anger. You should 0:06:28.880 --> 0:06:34.680 never be satisfied, never be satisfied. Now, what we don't 0:06:34.680 --> 0:06:37.200 want to be is mad in the sense where we're 0:06:37.240 --> 0:06:40.040 going mad, or we're gonna lose our minds, or we're 0:06:40.080 --> 0:06:44.240 gonna start using violence and tang up things. But anger 0:06:44.600 --> 0:06:50.440 at injustice, anger at wrong, anger at hate itself, hating 0:06:50.560 --> 0:06:54.120 the sin, finding a way to love the sinner is very, 0:06:54.240 --> 0:06:57.520 very very much a part of what morral descent is. 0:06:57.560 --> 0:07:01.080 How can you be smiling and eight hundred people are 0:07:01.120 --> 0:07:03.240 dying a day from posdy and we could stop it. 0:07:03.360 --> 0:07:06.400 How can you be silent when when folk are saying 0:07:06.440 --> 0:07:11.200 no to just raising the minimum wage and raising minimum 0:07:11.240 --> 0:07:14.480 wage to a living wage, when and it hadn't been 0:07:14.480 --> 0:07:17.840 done since twenty or nine, when CEOs are making three 0:07:17.880 --> 0:07:20.200 hundred and four hundred times, well, how can you not 0:07:20.440 --> 0:07:25.160 be angry and bothered and mal adjusted? That's King's word, 0:07:25.240 --> 0:07:30.960 mal adjusted When you actually see the Constitution being violated, 0:07:31.040 --> 0:07:34.600 not something but every day by the administrator, When you 0:07:34.640 --> 0:07:39.160 see people being picked up and taken abroad and put 0:07:39.160 --> 0:07:54.760 in other jail frustration. I'm angry, but the question is 0:07:54.800 --> 0:07:57.800 what do you do with that anger? What do you 0:07:57.880 --> 0:07:59.440 do with it that becomes degranded? 0:07:59.520 --> 0:08:03.880 Question, Bishop Barber, we've lost your image. 0:08:04.120 --> 0:08:06.400 Yeah, I'm gonna put it back. I just think I 0:08:06.720 --> 0:08:11.120 think somehow it got twisted around, but you lost Stay 0:08:11.200 --> 0:08:13.440 with it, and I'm gonna get right back. 0:08:13.520 --> 0:08:16.680 I'll tell a quick story while he flips that around. 0:08:18.320 --> 0:08:21.080 This is absolutely true that you know, in some ways 0:08:21.200 --> 0:08:24.680 we would be losing our humanity if we weren't angry. 0:08:24.800 --> 0:08:27.720 But people who aren't used to being angry have to 0:08:27.840 --> 0:08:31.960 learn where to find the spiritual resources to deal with it. 0:08:32.080 --> 0:08:34.319 So there was a young there was a young white 0:08:34.320 --> 0:08:37.480 man who went down to ebenez Or Baptist Church to 0:08:37.520 --> 0:08:41.520 do his ministry internship with doctor King when he was 0:08:41.520 --> 0:08:44.840 in seminary, and he came into the church one day 0:08:45.160 --> 0:08:48.400 after having been harassed on the street by white folks 0:08:48.400 --> 0:08:49.839 who were who were mad at him for working with 0:08:49.880 --> 0:08:52.800 these black folks for civil rights. And he didn't he 0:08:53.160 --> 0:08:56.439 didn't have any experience of being attacked and harassed and 0:08:56.520 --> 0:08:58.400 yelled at in that way. So he went into doctor 0:08:58.480 --> 0:09:00.240 King's office and he said, how in the world do 0:09:00.280 --> 0:09:04.400 you deal with this. And Doctor King's secretary, as the 0:09:04.400 --> 0:09:07.319 story told, was asking at the moment for him to 0:09:07.360 --> 0:09:09.960 take the phone for a call from the Justice Department, 0:09:10.200 --> 0:09:11.800 but he said, no, wait a minute, I need to 0:09:11.840 --> 0:09:15.000 talk to this young man. And he said He looked 0:09:15.000 --> 0:09:18.920 at him, and he said, you have to reach down 0:09:19.040 --> 0:09:23.520 on the inside and find the internal resources, the internal 0:09:23.559 --> 0:09:26.120 resources that make it possible for you to tap in 0:09:26.160 --> 0:09:29.840 to the deepest of who you are, because that's both 0:09:29.880 --> 0:09:32.120 the source of the grief that Bishop Barbara is talking about, 0:09:32.120 --> 0:09:34.440 but that's also where we're going to find the strength 0:09:34.720 --> 0:09:38.080 to come together and to build the kind of community 0:09:38.120 --> 0:09:40.760 that gives hope. So I think we need to remember 0:09:40.800 --> 0:09:42.719 the lessons of folks like that too. 0:09:43.280 --> 0:09:46.199 And Steve can I make one point. When Rosam Hawks 0:09:46.520 --> 0:09:51.479 sat down, remember what caused to sit down on that bus? 0:09:52.320 --> 0:09:56.679 People had sat down before her in Mountgomery. She had 0:09:56.720 --> 0:09:59.959 gotten great hope. In nineteen fifty four, the Brown decision 0:10:00.080 --> 0:10:04.480 had happened. Clesey versus Ferguson was overturned after nearly sixty 0:10:04.559 --> 0:10:07.640 years of fighting. But then in the midst of that, 0:10:07.760 --> 0:10:11.480 Emmett Till gets killed in kind of a reaction to 0:10:11.800 --> 0:10:16.360 the Brown decision and then his killers get acquitted. And 0:10:16.520 --> 0:10:20.800 contrary to to oftenime, we present Roses, this nice little, 0:10:20.800 --> 0:10:26.520 sweet little lady, Rosa Parks investigated rapes black women before 0:10:26.559 --> 0:10:31.320 she ever sat down that bus. She did not. She 0:10:31.520 --> 0:10:35.480 was very bothered by grieving, if you will, by whatever. 0:10:35.559 --> 0:10:37.640 And when she saw what happened to Emmett Till and 0:10:37.679 --> 0:10:41.199 they got acquitted, she then got with some women. They 0:10:41.280 --> 0:10:45.160 sent her to Highlander, and she knew that she had 0:10:45.160 --> 0:10:50.360 to reach way down, as Jonathan said, to resources that 0:10:50.800 --> 0:10:54.560 would allow her to stand up to the system that 0:10:54.720 --> 0:10:59.520 was destroying people. And that's the difference between righteous indignation, 0:11:00.120 --> 0:11:04.839 righteous anger, and unrighteous madness when you just lose it. 0:11:05.320 --> 0:11:07.679 Because when you have righteous anger, the one thing you 0:11:07.760 --> 0:11:12.679 don't want to become is if you will your adversary 0:11:12.800 --> 0:11:14.880 or your envy. You don't want to become like them. 0:11:15.480 --> 0:11:17.800 You want to be different. But what you don't want 0:11:17.840 --> 0:11:22.280 to do is dismiss the anger. Lastly, when you see, 0:11:24.000 --> 0:11:27.360 you know, people talking about in the midst of the 0:11:27.400 --> 0:11:30.560 hard time, we're gonna take two trillion dollars and just 0:11:30.720 --> 0:11:35.760 give it away back to at the pope called market forces, 0:11:35.800 --> 0:11:40.520 which will never have delivered hope for everybody or we're 0:11:40.559 --> 0:11:47.040 going to attack voting rights and lie and suggest that 0:11:47.120 --> 0:11:51.560 that's flawging to not be angry. And I'm gonna tell 0:11:51.600 --> 0:11:55.720 you where. For me it is when I see my mother. 0:11:56.000 --> 0:11:59.800 One day I went home. She's ninety seven years old. 0:12:00.240 --> 0:12:03.720 My mother helped desegregate schools down in eastern North Carolina. 0:12:05.240 --> 0:12:09.120 And she said to me, son, I know you're sixty 0:12:09.120 --> 0:12:12.760 some years old now, she said, but I never thought 0:12:14.320 --> 0:12:18.640 I would have a son or a child that would 0:12:18.679 --> 0:12:21.560 have to fight the battles. I thought we already won. 0:12:22.960 --> 0:12:25.400 And she cried. And what I call it is the 0:12:25.440 --> 0:12:30.960 one tear cried. In black communities, sometimes women talk about 0:12:31.200 --> 0:12:33.480 they cried one tier out of one side. That think 0:12:33.520 --> 0:12:36.320 that means they are greatly disturbed. If that means they 0:12:36.400 --> 0:12:40.160 a bothered and upset and angry. And she cried that 0:12:40.280 --> 0:12:42.720 one tier. And then she looked at me and said, 0:12:44.200 --> 0:12:47.080 I never wanted or thought you would have to fight, 0:12:48.000 --> 0:12:51.400 but you better fight. What you better not do in 0:12:51.520 --> 0:12:55.480 this moment is sit down and dismiss it and act 0:12:55.559 --> 0:12:58.560 like it's okay and say, well, I've made it, and 0:12:58.600 --> 0:13:00.560 the other folks just gonna have to get along the 0:13:00.559 --> 0:13:04.040 best way they can. This is the actual wrong season 0:13:04.679 --> 0:13:07.120 not to have the kind of righteous in the nation 0:13:07.200 --> 0:13:10.960 and anger that the Bible talks about, which is which, 0:13:11.040 --> 0:13:14.520 which is necessary, and will force you to reach down 0:13:14.559 --> 0:13:18.240 and say, what do I do with this? What do 0:13:18.320 --> 0:13:20.760 I do with this to change the situation? Because if 0:13:20.760 --> 0:13:24.400 we're anglish deed, imagine what the people are who are 0:13:24.400 --> 0:13:27.559 losing their health care. Imagine what the people are to 0:13:27.640 --> 0:13:30.320 the that that got to figure out the night. Do 0:13:30.400 --> 0:13:32.520 I sleep in the car to night or do I 0:13:32.559 --> 0:13:36.440 buy some medicine or some milk? If we're angry, imagine 0:13:36.440 --> 0:13:38.960 where they are. And what we don't want to see 0:13:39.600 --> 0:13:43.080 is a country that turns to madness because the energy 0:13:43.120 --> 0:13:47.040 is going to go somewhere. It's going somewhere. And so 0:13:47.160 --> 0:13:49.600 this is the very moment that we need a moral 0:13:49.679 --> 0:13:54.840 movement that says the folk, we do have guidelines and 0:13:54.920 --> 0:13:59.360 compasses for what we do in moments of history where 0:13:59.400 --> 0:14:03.680 anger is a necessary part, just like truth and justice 0:14:03.840 --> 0:14:07.400 and crying and tears. And this is one of those 0:14:07.480 --> 0:14:11.040 moments that we have to transfer my anger into deep 0:14:11.200 --> 0:14:14.600 righteous action that seeks to change what is going on. 0:14:17.760 --> 0:14:23.760 When I'm walking these beaches in Normandy and or standing 0:14:23.800 --> 0:14:31.760 in the Canadian cemetery, and you see the graves. I 0:14:31.920 --> 0:14:38.280 went and stood on the spot in Dashoba County, Mississippi 0:14:38.400 --> 0:14:45.000 where the three civil rights workers were murdered in nineteen 0:14:45.120 --> 0:14:54.080 sixty three. And these people, American martyrs, all gave their lives, 0:14:55.360 --> 0:15:00.840 people who didn't have much, not like El Musk in 0:15:00.840 --> 0:15:06.600 the way of material things, but gave everything they had 0:15:07.640 --> 0:15:17.200 and more for the most ephemeral concept freedom, dignity to 0:15:17.360 --> 0:15:22.960 live life in God's image. And when you ponder that 0:15:23.320 --> 0:15:31.160 sacrifice and you think about this moment, your sub stack 0:15:31.360 --> 0:15:38.080 is called this moral moment, and it is a moral moment. 0:15:38.880 --> 0:15:43.960 And I think that when we talk about politics, there's 0:15:44.000 --> 0:15:48.120 an allergy on the part of a lot of politicians, 0:15:49.360 --> 0:16:01.960 particularly democratic politicians, to combine politics and morality overtly. And 0:16:02.200 --> 0:16:06.320 I don't see how we get out of this unless 0:16:06.360 --> 0:16:12.040 it is framed as fundamentally what it is, which is 0:16:12.960 --> 0:16:19.240 a moral crisis and a moral fight between right and wrong, 0:16:20.600 --> 0:16:28.960 and that seeing that clearly is of the highest highest importance. 0:16:29.440 --> 0:16:37.200 And so for example, when a democratic governor says, well, 0:16:38.520 --> 0:16:42.920 mister Garcia, who has been sold to an al Salvador 0:16:43.000 --> 0:16:49.240 and gulag to a dictator, is the wrong fight at 0:16:49.280 --> 0:16:55.120 the wrong time. My response to that, not as a 0:16:55.320 --> 0:17:02.400 spiritual leader, not as a moral leader, but as a 0:17:02.400 --> 0:17:07.879 political strategist, is that could not be more wrong. Is 0:17:07.920 --> 0:17:14.760 that sometimes the fights we must fight and the time 0:17:14.840 --> 0:17:20.040 we must fight them are not chosen by us but 0:17:20.119 --> 0:17:25.439 by others. But it does not alleviate the necessity of 0:17:25.480 --> 0:17:29.600 the fight. And so I'd just like to hear you 0:17:29.680 --> 0:17:34.439 both talk about this exact moment in time through that 0:17:34.640 --> 0:17:40.040 prism of the moral moment. And let me just say 0:17:41.119 --> 0:17:44.280 that one of the most important things we have almost 0:17:44.320 --> 0:17:46.840 two thousand people on and many more we'll see it 0:17:46.880 --> 0:17:51.679 in the aftermath. If you are not subscribing yet to 0:17:51.880 --> 0:17:58.120 Reverend Barbara, Bishop Barbara and to Minister Jonathan's Moral Moment, 0:17:58.280 --> 0:18:04.400 sub stack, please do so. These are two of the 0:18:04.400 --> 0:18:08.880 most important voices. We'll get more into this in this country, 0:18:09.880 --> 0:18:14.560 in this moment right now. And so one of the 0:18:14.600 --> 0:18:18.240 things about Bishop Barber, one of the things about Jonathan, 0:18:18.280 --> 0:18:21.040 when you think about all of the great things that 0:18:21.119 --> 0:18:22.919 they have done, I don't have a doubt in my 0:18:23.040 --> 0:18:31.400 mind in that book of records that chronicles what we 0:18:31.480 --> 0:18:35.480 did in our time here, what these men will be 0:18:35.600 --> 0:18:41.240 most remembered for is a lifetime of service to others, 0:18:42.240 --> 0:18:48.480 but acutely in this moment of crisis. And so these 0:18:48.520 --> 0:18:54.480 are exceptional men coming into this exceptional moment I feel, 0:18:54.520 --> 0:18:57.639 I know in a profound way, and that's why I 0:18:57.680 --> 0:19:00.399 want all of you to follow them. But I just 0:19:00.560 --> 0:19:05.159 ask you, Bishop Barbara, can you talk about the moral moment? 0:19:05.960 --> 0:19:10.120 As you said, you know Steven and said, I think 0:19:10.160 --> 0:19:12.680 that for you to raise what a governor said, now 0:19:12.720 --> 0:19:17.640 the democratic government said about the wrong fight actually portrays 0:19:17.800 --> 0:19:24.240 the moral shallowness and weakness that we must overcome. Benjamin 0:19:24.280 --> 0:19:28.080 Franklin actually said that it would be better for one 0:19:28.200 --> 0:19:33.240 hundred guilty men to go free than for one innocent 0:19:33.320 --> 0:19:38.879 person to be found guilty. In our system where the 0:19:39.040 --> 0:19:45.399 constitution is designed to protect the minority in the real sense, like, 0:19:45.600 --> 0:19:52.119 for instance, it doesn't require fifty people's constitutional right to 0:19:52.200 --> 0:19:55.680 be violated for it to be wrong. If one person's 0:19:56.240 --> 0:20:00.960 right is violated, they can go to court challenge the 0:20:01.040 --> 0:20:05.679 violation on costitus the ground. Why is that because something 0:20:05.760 --> 0:20:11.199 called president If you start allowing a president and his 0:20:12.440 --> 0:20:17.280 gang to just lift people off the street, to admit 0:20:18.240 --> 0:20:22.119 that they picked up somebody innocent and to send them away, 0:20:22.680 --> 0:20:26.199 and there's no moral outcry. Then you open up the 0:20:26.320 --> 0:20:30.400 door for that to become president, and the question becomes 0:20:30.480 --> 0:20:34.399 who's next. What we're wrestling with, Steve, And it's not 0:20:34.480 --> 0:20:40.320 even an issue of being political versus moral or religious. 0:20:42.040 --> 0:20:44.879 Nobody is argued. Jonathan and I have not argued that 0:20:45.000 --> 0:20:48.800 everybody has to be Christian or a particular faith. However, 0:20:49.280 --> 0:20:52.600 we say in this country that money of our laws 0:20:52.600 --> 0:20:56.240 are rooted into their Christian traditions. But when we mean 0:20:56.280 --> 0:20:58.800 Maral movement, we mean a place even where people who 0:20:58.880 --> 0:21:02.680 may not have a particular the religious faith, but they 0:21:02.800 --> 0:21:10.560 believe deeply in the Morrow foundations that were written on 0:21:10.720 --> 0:21:13.919 paper in this country, even when the men that wrote 0:21:13.960 --> 0:21:17.240 them were not living up to them. I often say 0:21:17.359 --> 0:21:20.919 one of the great things about those back then is 0:21:20.960 --> 0:21:24.840 they wrote into the process amendments that you could change. 0:21:25.400 --> 0:21:28.360 And maybe it's because they recognized that they were flawed 0:21:28.480 --> 0:21:30.520 in the way in which they were following the very 0:21:30.560 --> 0:21:34.240 things they wrote, but they wanted to give succeeding generations 0:21:34.240 --> 0:21:37.199 the ability not to stay that. So, for instance, in 0:21:37.240 --> 0:21:41.600 the Decoration of Independence, it actually said Steve that when 0:21:41.640 --> 0:21:46.960 there's been a long train of abuses, it is the 0:21:47.200 --> 0:21:53.240 duty ut y of of people to change that system 0:21:53.240 --> 0:21:56.520 of government, to throw it off when there's been abuse 0:21:56.840 --> 0:22:02.320 out and so in a real sense, when we're saying 0:22:02.359 --> 0:22:05.119 default is when you swam, When politician, you put your 0:22:05.160 --> 0:22:10.600 hand on that Bible and you swam the uphold the Constitution, 0:22:10.800 --> 0:22:15.680 what you're really saying is every piece of policy that 0:22:15.760 --> 0:22:22.080 I support will meet these basic standards. Number one would 0:22:22.800 --> 0:22:28.080 does it establish justice or is it just for a few? Two? 0:22:28.119 --> 0:22:32.600 Does it provide for the common defense of all? Three? 0:22:32.720 --> 0:22:37.720 Does it promote the general welfare? Four? Does it bring 0:22:37.800 --> 0:22:42.760 the community peace or disunity? Five? Does it represent equal 0:22:42.800 --> 0:22:46.800 protection under the law? And if that policy doesn't meet 0:22:46.840 --> 0:22:52.680 those basic mal principles, then it is wanting. It is 0:22:52.880 --> 0:22:57.560 of being constitutional, it's flawed. It's a matter of right 0:22:57.640 --> 0:22:59.960 versus wrong. When courtbook are sitting there. The other day 0:23:00.040 --> 0:23:03.240 in his Senate speech, he actually was lifting something that 0:23:03.280 --> 0:23:06.680 we've been saying in our movement since we since repairs 0:23:06.680 --> 0:23:08.400 to the breach was found the all the way back 0:23:08.440 --> 0:23:11.640 to Themorrow movement in North Carolina. When we said the folk, 0:23:12.119 --> 0:23:14.040 they said, but you don't have the votes. It's another 0:23:14.080 --> 0:23:16.320 group in majority said that it has nothing to do 0:23:16.400 --> 0:23:20.040 with moral descent. Who's in the majority because if the 0:23:20.160 --> 0:23:27.000 majority is not following its own oath, then that majority 0:23:27.160 --> 0:23:30.119 must be challenged. I'll give you one quick example in 0:23:30.240 --> 0:23:33.760 North Carolina, when black and white people came together in 0:23:33.840 --> 0:23:37.359 eighteen sixty eight to rewrite the constitution in a way 0:23:37.400 --> 0:23:40.159 that moved us away from the vestitors of slavery and 0:23:40.200 --> 0:23:45.760 discrimination to a more just society. They guaranteed the public 0:23:45.920 --> 0:23:50.119 education as a fundamental right in the state of North Carolina, 0:23:50.160 --> 0:23:55.080 that every legislature had to ensure that every child, at 0:23:55.080 --> 0:23:58.520 that time's male child, but later on every child had 0:23:58.840 --> 0:24:06.120 had had a quality education, a sound basic So when 0:24:06.160 --> 0:24:09.440 we assue that, we found not all one hundred counties, 0:24:09.440 --> 0:24:12.320 but a number of counties where that was not happening. 0:24:12.800 --> 0:24:16.720 And the courts agreed, because what they said was you 0:24:16.920 --> 0:24:20.520 cannot swear uphold that. And then when you get in 0:24:20.560 --> 0:24:23.720 the office, cut all the money in public education, cut 0:24:23.720 --> 0:24:26.080 all the money. You can't do. It's contract is wrong. 0:24:26.760 --> 0:24:30.200 And so today we have to have a moral movement. 0:24:30.640 --> 0:24:34.600 When you have people saying in the mag of movement, 0:24:35.240 --> 0:24:38.600 and and you've got these uh uh uh, this this 0:24:38.800 --> 0:24:42.679 gang of billionaires they call themselves the dark Mafia, or 0:24:42.720 --> 0:24:49.080 you've got people now talking about uh apocalyptic fascism, you know, 0:24:49.240 --> 0:24:53.120 fascism that wants to live a form of running government 0:24:53.160 --> 0:24:57.240 that literally wants to say things are ending and then ended. 0:24:57.480 --> 0:25:01.000 In other words, you're self fulfilling prophecy, you say, and 0:25:01.320 --> 0:25:03.800 you want to do this regardless of who it hurts. 0:25:04.440 --> 0:25:07.840 As long as a few peoples of our people are 0:25:07.880 --> 0:25:11.640 talking about they want free cities where a certain it's 0:25:12.200 --> 0:25:16.000 not we the people is us few, us few, not 0:25:16.119 --> 0:25:21.320 we just us few. Those are dangerous im moral categories. 0:25:21.440 --> 0:25:24.800 It's dangerous in all ways of talking about leading a country, 0:25:25.400 --> 0:25:30.760 and they must be challenged. This is a moment. Lastly, 0:25:30.920 --> 0:25:34.960 whether whether you believe in the molarc of the universe 0:25:35.240 --> 0:25:38.120 bes toward justice that you need to be a part 0:25:38.160 --> 0:25:41.679 of bending it. If you're a person of faith and 0:25:41.720 --> 0:25:47.000 your faith tells you that those empowered politicians. As my 0:25:47.080 --> 0:25:50.280 book tells me and Matthew twenty five, it says that 0:25:50.520 --> 0:25:55.200 every nation steed not individual, It's not by individual piety. 0:25:55.760 --> 0:26:01.960 Every nation will be judged by these four critiques. When 0:26:02.000 --> 0:26:06.000 I was hungry, did you feed when I was naked? 0:26:06.080 --> 0:26:09.520 Did you clothe me? When I was an immigrant? Did 0:26:09.560 --> 0:26:12.840 you welcome me when I was in prison? Did you 0:26:12.960 --> 0:26:16.000 come to see and when I was sick, did you 0:26:16.160 --> 0:26:19.359 visit me? And that up he'll me. How you treat 0:26:19.480 --> 0:26:22.840 the least of these is a judgment on the nation. 0:26:24.240 --> 0:26:28.000 And and and and we've had these battles in America before, 0:26:28.119 --> 0:26:32.080 time and time again. And there are moments like ending slavery. 0:26:32.119 --> 0:26:35.679 There are moments like women's suffrage. There are moments like 0:26:37.119 --> 0:26:39.920 when you need a new deal. There are moments throughout 0:26:39.960 --> 0:26:43.400 the American process when the only thing that got us 0:26:43.480 --> 0:26:50.040 out was when say, for instance, Kennedy or Johnson would 0:26:50.119 --> 0:26:52.920 give a speech and say, fundamentally, this is a moral issue. 0:26:53.160 --> 0:26:56.679 Or Roosevelt would say something like, uh, we only have 0:26:56.760 --> 0:26:58.280 to see the only thing we have to fee and 0:26:58.400 --> 0:27:01.600 fear itself. Or any court operation that doesn't pay people 0:27:01.600 --> 0:27:04.719 of basic living wad has no right to really exist 0:27:04.760 --> 0:27:08.480 and work in America. Or Teddy Roosevelt when he broke 0:27:08.520 --> 0:27:11.200 with both parties in nineteen twelve and gave his bull 0:27:11.280 --> 0:27:14.280 speech and said that they are just some fundamental things, 0:27:14.880 --> 0:27:19.880 protecting the environment, long term care for our senior citizen, 0:27:21.920 --> 0:27:26.280 paying a basic minimum wave He said those issues were 0:27:26.359 --> 0:27:30.440 not Democrat or Republican. It really was about right versus wrong. 0:27:31.560 --> 0:27:36.840 We must have a massive movement of people, clergy, rabbis, 0:27:36.960 --> 0:27:40.200 im mobs, people of faith, people not of faith, who 0:27:40.280 --> 0:27:43.159 believe in tomorrow universe. To say what we are seeing 0:27:43.240 --> 0:27:48.560 right now is just wrong. It's just wrong. And it's 0:27:48.600 --> 0:27:52.240 not just wrong in terms of feeling wrong. It's wrong 0:27:52.680 --> 0:27:57.920 because it's deadly, it's hurting people. It's political violence, it's 0:27:57.920 --> 0:28:01.520 social balance, it is policy. And I feel like Frederick 0:28:01.520 --> 0:28:07.439 Douglas when he said something because this critique has to 0:28:07.520 --> 0:28:09.800 be rooted in love. And this is what Frederick Douglas 0:28:09.840 --> 0:28:12.800 said when he was asked one time, what did he 0:28:12.880 --> 0:28:16.760 think about slaveholding religion that justified slavery, tried to make 0:28:17.040 --> 0:28:19.639 that which is wrong right, which we see happening today 0:28:19.680 --> 0:28:26.760 with the so called religious nationalism. Frederick Douglas said, because 0:28:26.920 --> 0:28:34.720 I love the peaceable, pure, just and truth telling religion 0:28:34.800 --> 0:28:40.880 of Jesus, I must hate the lying man, stealing, destructive 0:28:41.960 --> 0:28:47.400 religion of the slave master. You cannot love one without 0:28:47.400 --> 0:28:54.240 hating the other. There are ideals. It's not about being 0:28:54.280 --> 0:28:59.240 against one person, it's about what's being promoted. And you 0:28:59.520 --> 0:29:03.560 cannot be for freedom at liberty on the one hand, 0:29:04.440 --> 0:29:08.440 and then be for tyrancy and abuse of the law 0:29:08.640 --> 0:29:13.240 on the other, the two can't exist equal. They're not 0:29:13.400 --> 0:29:19.920 too equal existing moral positions one is wrong and one 0:29:19.960 --> 0:29:20.360 is right. 0:29:23.720 --> 0:29:25.880 One of the gifts of one of the gifts of 0:29:26.960 --> 0:29:30.200 our life is that we get to teach public theology 0:29:30.280 --> 0:29:32.920 to our students at Yell Divinity School. And when we do, 0:29:34.360 --> 0:29:36.400 we look at these moral movements in the history of 0:29:36.400 --> 0:29:39.880