Speaker 1: I am thrilled tonight to join you here on the
Speaker 1: warning with two men I admire a great deal. We
Speaker 1: have Jonathan Wilson Pargrove, Minister Jonathan with us, and of
Speaker 1: course we have Bishop William Barber. And both of these
Speaker 1: men are new to Substack, where they are spreading a
Speaker 1: gospel of not just the Good Lord's teachings, but of Americanism.
Speaker 1: And we're going to talk about that. One of the
Speaker 1: things that I've been dealing with is I took my
Speaker 1: eighty year old mother to the Normandy Landing Beaches, which
Speaker 1: is something that she wanted to see a few weeks before.
Speaker 1: I had the great privilege in Jackson, Mississippi to stand
Speaker 1: in the driveway on the spot where Medgar Evers was
Speaker 1: gone down. He was a Normandy veteran. I was at
Speaker 1: the spot where Medgar Evers would have come ashore, where
Speaker 1: he would have begun his duty and his journey. And
Speaker 1: I have been dealing with an incandescent anger as I
Speaker 1: walked amongst the gravestones the betrayal of American values and ideals.
Speaker 1: And I know that anger is not healthy, and I
Speaker 1: know that anger is not productive. But I know my
Speaker 1: anger about what is happening is very real, and so
Speaker 1: I couldn't think about two better people to talk about
Speaker 1: three things before we talk about registering million voters. I'd
Speaker 1: like to talk about anger, because there's a lot of
Speaker 1: angry people in America angry about what's happening, and I'm
Speaker 1: one of them. I'd like to talk about doubt. It
Speaker 1: doesn't seem like men like Abraham Lincoln and Winston Churchill
Speaker 1: and Martin Luther King ever dealt with doubt, But the
Speaker 1: record shows they all had crises of faith and they
Speaker 1: all doubted, and we look at them as lions who
Speaker 1: were strong when everybody else wavered. But it's more complex
Speaker 1: about that. And then lastly, to talk about faith and
Speaker 1: how to let go and trust that there is a
Speaker 1: plan and that things will turn out. And so, with
Speaker 1: no further ado for me, turn over to you, Reverend Barber,
Speaker 1: for those of us that are wrestling with anger, with depression,
Speaker 1: with doubt, with a crisis of faith in the country,
Speaker 1: how should we process all of this?
Speaker 2: Well, first of all, Steve, thank you so much for
Speaker 2: having Jonathan and I and the name of your show
Speaker 2: is really how we should deal with the warning. My
Speaker 2: father was also a world War two better. And he
Speaker 2: went in when the army, and that offerses, was segregated.
Speaker 2: But despite the segregation, and despite the fact that he
Speaker 2: was drafted, and some say to give first class blood
Speaker 2: for second class citizenship, he knew the deeper meaning and
Speaker 2: the possibility and the hope of this country if she
Speaker 2: leaned into what she had said on paper about establishing justice,
Speaker 2: providing for the common defense, promoting the general welfare, and
Speaker 2: ensuring domestic tranquility and equal protection under the law. And
Speaker 2: nobody had the authority to deny or abridge the right
Speaker 2: to vote. And so he went in the navy drafted.
Speaker 2: By the time for the war was over, you know,
Speaker 2: there was some desegregation of his armed forces. And he
Speaker 2: went in angry, Steve, he went in angry. But let
Speaker 2: me say a word theologically about anger. The scriptures, the
Speaker 2: prophets of the Bible were all angry and injustice. They
Speaker 2: were angry when they saw people being beaten and betrayed.
Speaker 2: Take for listening to these words, for instance, Isaiah, woe
Speaker 2: unto you who legislate evil and robbed the pull of
Speaker 2: their rights. That doesn't sound like somebody is happy or
Speaker 2: cry loud and spare not blow your chauffeur, tell the
Speaker 2: nation of your sins. Or Jeremiah saying it owed that
Speaker 2: my head was a fountain of tears, that I might
Speaker 2: weep and cry on behalf of the nation. Or Jeremiah
Speaker 2: saying I said I wasn't gonna talk anymore about the
Speaker 2: things of God, but the word is like fire, shut
Speaker 2: up in my bone. Or Jesus the first day of
Speaker 2: Holy With on Monday, turns over the tables in the temple,
Speaker 2: says there's something's wrong here when the place where people
Speaker 2: are supposed to come for hope and piece has been
Speaker 2: turning into a dead of beef. And Paul says to us,
Speaker 2: be angry and sin not. Now what that means is
Speaker 2: anger comes from and grief. If you're not greathing right
Speaker 2: now at what you see happening, if you don't grieve
Speaker 2: and have a sense of grief and anger. When every
Speaker 2: day President, for instance, and a hit and the majority
Speaker 2: in the Congress get up and say, let's figure out
Speaker 2: how we can knock thirty six million people off of
Speaker 2: health care, off of Medicaid, which we know will cost
Speaker 2: people their lives. If something doesn't bother you deep down,
Speaker 2: as doctor, the King said one time, you are to
Speaker 2: have a a what did he call it? Anger against
Speaker 2: the injustice? An inherent and an inexhaustible anger. You should
Speaker 2: never be satisfied, never be satisfied. Now, what we don't
Speaker 2: want to be is mad in the sense where we're
Speaker 2: going mad, or we're gonna lose our minds, or we're
Speaker 2: gonna start using violence and tang up things. But anger
Speaker 2: at injustice, anger at wrong, anger at hate itself, hating
Speaker 2: the sin, finding a way to love the sinner is very,
Speaker 2: very very much a part of what morral descent is.
Speaker 2: How can you be smiling and eight hundred people are
Speaker 2: dying a day from posdy and we could stop it.
Speaker 2: How can you be silent when when folk are saying
Speaker 2: no to just raising the minimum wage and raising minimum
Speaker 2: wage to a living wage, when and it hadn't been
Speaker 2: done since twenty or nine, when CEOs are making three
Speaker 2: hundred and four hundred times, well, how can you not
Speaker 2: be angry and bothered and mal adjusted? That's King's word,
Speaker 2: mal adjusted When you actually see the Constitution being violated,
Speaker 2: not something but every day by the administrator, When you
Speaker 2: see people being picked up and taken abroad and put
Speaker 2: in other jail frustration. I'm angry, but the question is
Speaker 2: what do you do with that anger? What do you
Speaker 2: do with it that becomes degranded?
Speaker 1: Question, Bishop Barber, we've lost your image.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm gonna put it back. I just think I
Speaker 2: think somehow it got twisted around, but you lost Stay
Speaker 2: with it, and I'm gonna get right back.
Speaker 3: I'll tell a quick story while he flips that around.
Speaker 3: This is absolutely true that you know, in some ways
Speaker 3: we would be losing our humanity if we weren't angry.
Speaker 3: But people who aren't used to being angry have to
Speaker 3: learn where to find the spiritual resources to deal with it.
Speaker 3: So there was a young there was a young white
Speaker 3: man who went down to ebenez Or Baptist Church to
Speaker 3: do his ministry internship with doctor King when he was
Speaker 3: in seminary, and he came into the church one day
Speaker 3: after having been harassed on the street by white folks
Speaker 3: who were who were mad at him for working with
Speaker 3: these black folks for civil rights. And he didn't he
Speaker 3: didn't have any experience of being attacked and harassed and
Speaker 3: yelled at in that way. So he went into doctor
Speaker 3: King's office and he said, how in the world do
Speaker 3: you deal with this. And Doctor King's secretary, as the
Speaker 3: story told, was asking at the moment for him to
Speaker 3: take the phone for a call from the Justice Department,
Speaker 3: but he said, no, wait a minute, I need to
Speaker 3: talk to this young man. And he said He looked
Speaker 3: at him, and he said, you have to reach down
Speaker 3: on the inside and find the internal resources, the internal
Speaker 3: resources that make it possible for you to tap in
Speaker 3: to the deepest of who you are, because that's both
Speaker 3: the source of the grief that Bishop Barbara is talking about,
Speaker 3: but that's also where we're going to find the strength
Speaker 3: to come together and to build the kind of community
Speaker 3: that gives hope. So I think we need to remember
Speaker 3: the lessons of folks like that too.
Speaker 2: And Steve can I make one point. When Rosam Hawks
Speaker 2: sat down, remember what caused to sit down on that bus?
Speaker 2: People had sat down before her in Mountgomery. She had
Speaker 2: gotten great hope. In nineteen fifty four, the Brown decision
Speaker 2: had happened. Clesey versus Ferguson was overturned after nearly sixty
Speaker 2: years of fighting. But then in the midst of that,
Speaker 2: Emmett Till gets killed in kind of a reaction to
Speaker 2: the Brown decision and then his killers get acquitted. And
Speaker 2: contrary to to oftenime, we present Roses, this nice little,
Speaker 2: sweet little lady, Rosa Parks investigated rapes black women before
Speaker 2: she ever sat down that bus. She did not. She
Speaker 2: was very bothered by grieving, if you will, by whatever.
Speaker 2: And when she saw what happened to Emmett Till and
Speaker 2: they got acquitted, she then got with some women. They
Speaker 2: sent her to Highlander, and she knew that she had
Speaker 2: to reach way down, as Jonathan said, to resources that
Speaker 2: would allow her to stand up to the system that
Speaker 2: was destroying people. And that's the difference between righteous indignation,
Speaker 2: righteous anger, and unrighteous madness when you just lose it.
Speaker 2: Because when you have righteous anger, the one thing you
Speaker 2: don't want to become is if you will your adversary
Speaker 2: or your envy. You don't want to become like them.
Speaker 2: You want to be different. But what you don't want
Speaker 2: to do is dismiss the anger. Lastly, when you see,
Speaker 2: you know, people talking about in the midst of the
Speaker 2: hard time, we're gonna take two trillion dollars and just
Speaker 2: give it away back to at the pope called market forces,
Speaker 2: which will never have delivered hope for everybody or we're
Speaker 2: going to attack voting rights and lie and suggest that
Speaker 2: that's flawging to not be angry. And I'm gonna tell
Speaker 2: you where. For me it is when I see my mother.
Speaker 2: One day I went home. She's ninety seven years old.
Speaker 2: My mother helped desegregate schools down in eastern North Carolina.
Speaker 2: And she said to me, son, I know you're sixty
Speaker 2: some years old now, she said, but I never thought
Speaker 2: I would have a son or a child that would
Speaker 2: have to fight the battles. I thought we already won.
Speaker 2: And she cried. And what I call it is the
Speaker 2: one tear cried. In black communities, sometimes women talk about
Speaker 2: they cried one tier out of one side. That think
Speaker 2: that means they are greatly disturbed. If that means they
Speaker 2: a bothered and upset and angry. And she cried that
Speaker 2: one tier. And then she looked at me and said,
Speaker 2: I never wanted or thought you would have to fight,
Speaker 2: but you better fight. What you better not do in
Speaker 2: this moment is sit down and dismiss it and act
Speaker 2: like it's okay and say, well, I've made it, and
Speaker 2: the other folks just gonna have to get along the
Speaker 2: best way they can. This is the actual wrong season
Speaker 2: not to have the kind of righteous in the nation
Speaker 2: and anger that the Bible talks about, which is which,
Speaker 2: which is necessary, and will force you to reach down
Speaker 2: and say, what do I do with this? What do
Speaker 2: I do with this to change the situation? Because if
Speaker 2: we're anglish deed, imagine what the people are who are
Speaker 2: losing their health care. Imagine what the people are to
Speaker 2: the that that got to figure out the night. Do
Speaker 2: I sleep in the car to night or do I
Speaker 2: buy some medicine or some milk? If we're angry, imagine
Speaker 2: where they are. And what we don't want to see
Speaker 2: is a country that turns to madness because the energy
Speaker 2: is going to go somewhere. It's going somewhere. And so
Speaker 2: this is the very moment that we need a moral
Speaker 2: movement that says the folk, we do have guidelines and
Speaker 2: compasses for what we do in moments of history where
Speaker 2: anger is a necessary part, just like truth and justice
Speaker 2: and crying and tears. And this is one of those
Speaker 2: moments that we have to transfer my anger into deep
Speaker 2: righteous action that seeks to change what is going on.
Speaker 1: When I'm walking these beaches in Normandy and or standing
Speaker 1: in the Canadian cemetery, and you see the graves. I
Speaker 1: went and stood on the spot in Dashoba County, Mississippi
Speaker 1: where the three civil rights workers were murdered in nineteen
Speaker 1: sixty three. And these people, American martyrs, all gave their lives,
Speaker 1: people who didn't have much, not like El Musk in
Speaker 1: the way of material things, but gave everything they had
Speaker 1: and more for the most ephemeral concept freedom, dignity to
Speaker 1: live life in God's image. And when you ponder that
Speaker 1: sacrifice and you think about this moment, your sub stack
Speaker 1: is called this moral moment, and it is a moral moment.
Speaker 1: And I think that when we talk about politics, there's
Speaker 1: an allergy on the part of a lot of politicians,
Speaker 1: particularly democratic politicians, to combine politics and morality overtly. And
Speaker 1: I don't see how we get out of this unless
Speaker 1: it is framed as fundamentally what it is, which is
Speaker 1: a moral crisis and a moral fight between right and wrong,
Speaker 1: and that seeing that clearly is of the highest highest importance.
Speaker 1: And so for example, when a democratic governor says, well,
Speaker 1: mister Garcia, who has been sold to an al Salvador
Speaker 1: and gulag to a dictator, is the wrong fight at
Speaker 1: the wrong time. My response to that, not as a
Speaker 1: spiritual leader, not as a moral leader, but as a
Speaker 1: political strategist, is that could not be more wrong. Is
Speaker 1: that sometimes the fights we must fight and the time
Speaker 1: we must fight them are not chosen by us but
Speaker 1: by others. But it does not alleviate the necessity of
Speaker 1: the fight. And so I'd just like to hear you
Speaker 1: both talk about this exact moment in time through that
Speaker 1: prism of the moral moment. And let me just say
Speaker 1: that one of the most important things we have almost
Speaker 1: two thousand people on and many more we'll see it
Speaker 1: in the aftermath. If you are not subscribing yet to
Speaker 1: Reverend Barbara, Bishop Barbara and to Minister Jonathan's Moral Moment,
Speaker 1: sub stack, please do so. These are two of the
Speaker 1: most important voices. We'll get more into this in this country,
Speaker 1: in this moment right now. And so one of the
Speaker 1: things about Bishop Barber, one of the things about Jonathan,
Speaker 1: when you think about all of the great things that
Speaker 1: they have done, I don't have a doubt in my
Speaker 1: mind in that book of records that chronicles what we
Speaker 1: did in our time here, what these men will be
Speaker 1: most remembered for is a lifetime of service to others,
Speaker 1: but acutely in this moment of crisis. And so these
Speaker 1: are exceptional men coming into this exceptional moment I feel,
Speaker 1: I know in a profound way, and that's why I
Speaker 1: want all of you to follow them. But I just
Speaker 1: ask you, Bishop Barbara, can you talk about the moral moment?
Speaker 2: As you said, you know Steven and said, I think
Speaker 2: that for you to raise what a governor said, now
Speaker 2: the democratic government said about the wrong fight actually portrays
Speaker 2: the moral shallowness and weakness that we must overcome. Benjamin
Speaker 2: Franklin actually said that it would be better for one
Speaker 2: hundred guilty men to go free than for one innocent
Speaker 2: person to be found guilty. In our system where the
Speaker 2: constitution is designed to protect the minority in the real sense, like,
Speaker 2: for instance, it doesn't require fifty people's constitutional right to
Speaker 2: be violated for it to be wrong. If one person's
Speaker 2: right is violated, they can go to court challenge the
Speaker 2: violation on costitus the ground. Why is that because something
Speaker 2: called president If you start allowing a president and his
Speaker 2: gang to just lift people off the street, to admit
Speaker 2: that they picked up somebody innocent and to send them away,
Speaker 2: and there's no moral outcry. Then you open up the
Speaker 2: door for that to become president, and the question becomes
Speaker 2: who's next. What we're wrestling with, Steve, And it's not
Speaker 2: even an issue of being political versus moral or religious.
Speaker 2: Nobody is argued. Jonathan and I have not argued that
Speaker 2: everybody has to be Christian or a particular faith. However,
Speaker 2: we say in this country that money of our laws
Speaker 2: are rooted into their Christian traditions. But when we mean
Speaker 2: Maral movement, we mean a place even where people who
Speaker 2: may not have a particular the religious faith, but they
Speaker 2: believe deeply in the Morrow foundations that were written on
Speaker 2: paper in this country, even when the men that wrote
Speaker 2: them were not living up to them. I often say
Speaker 2: one of the great things about those back then is
Speaker 2: they wrote into the process amendments that you could change.
Speaker 2: And maybe it's because they recognized that they were flawed
Speaker 2: in the way in which they were following the very
Speaker 2: things they wrote, but they wanted to give succeeding generations
Speaker 2: the ability not to stay that. So, for instance, in
Speaker 2: the Decoration of Independence, it actually said Steve that when
Speaker 2: there's been a long train of abuses, it is the
Speaker 2: duty ut y of of people to change that system
Speaker 2: of government, to throw it off when there's been abuse
Speaker 2: out and so in a real sense, when we're saying
Speaker 2: default is when you swam, When politician, you put your
Speaker 2: hand on that Bible and you swam the uphold the Constitution,
Speaker 2: what you're really saying is every piece of policy that
Speaker 2: I support will meet these basic standards. Number one would
Speaker 2: does it establish justice or is it just for a few? Two?
Speaker 2: Does it provide for the common defense of all? Three?
Speaker 2: Does it promote the general welfare? Four? Does it bring
Speaker 2: the community peace or disunity? Five? Does it represent equal
Speaker 2: protection under the law? And if that policy doesn't meet
Speaker 2: those basic mal principles, then it is wanting. It is
Speaker 2: of being constitutional, it's flawed. It's a matter of right
Speaker 2: versus wrong. When courtbook are sitting there. The other day
Speaker 2: in his Senate speech, he actually was lifting something that
Speaker 2: we've been saying in our movement since we since repairs
Speaker 2: to the breach was found the all the way back
Speaker 2: to Themorrow movement in North Carolina. When we said the folk,
Speaker 2: they said, but you don't have the votes. It's another
Speaker 2: group in majority said that it has nothing to do
Speaker 2: with moral descent. Who's in the majority because if the
Speaker 2: majority is not following its own oath, then that majority
Speaker 2: must be challenged. I'll give you one quick example in
Speaker 2: North Carolina, when black and white people came together in
Speaker 2: eighteen sixty eight to rewrite the constitution in a way
Speaker 2: that moved us away from the vestitors of slavery and
Speaker 2: discrimination to a more just society. They guaranteed the public
Speaker 2: education as a fundamental right in the state of North Carolina,
Speaker 2: that every legislature had to ensure that every child, at
Speaker 2: that time's male child, but later on every child had
Speaker 2: had had a quality education, a sound basic So when
Speaker 2: we assue that, we found not all one hundred counties,
Speaker 2: but a number of counties where that was not happening.
Speaker 2: And the courts agreed, because what they said was you
Speaker 2: cannot swear uphold that. And then when you get in
Speaker 2: the office, cut all the money in public education, cut
Speaker 2: all the money. You can't do. It's contract is wrong.
Speaker 2: And so today we have to have a moral movement.
Speaker 2: When you have people saying in the mag of movement,
Speaker 2: and and you've got these uh uh uh, this this
Speaker 2: gang of billionaires they call themselves the dark Mafia, or
Speaker 2: you've got people now talking about uh apocalyptic fascism, you know,
Speaker 2: fascism that wants to live a form of running government
Speaker 2: that literally wants to say things are ending and then ended.
Speaker 2: In other words, you're self fulfilling prophecy, you say, and
Speaker 2: you want to do this regardless of who it hurts.
Speaker 2: As long as a few peoples of our people are
Speaker 2: talking about they want free cities where a certain it's
Speaker 2: not we the people is us few, us few, not
Speaker 2: we just us few. Those are dangerous im moral categories.
Speaker 2: It's dangerous in all ways of talking about leading a country,
Speaker 2: and they must be challenged. This is a moment. Lastly,
Speaker 2: whether whether you believe in the molarc of the universe
Speaker 2: bes toward justice that you need to be a part
Speaker 2: of bending it. If you're a person of faith and
Speaker 2: your faith tells you that those empowered politicians. As my
Speaker 2: book tells me and Matthew twenty five, it says that
Speaker 2: every nation steed not individual, It's not by individual piety.
Speaker 2: Every nation will be judged by these four critiques. When
Speaker 2: I was hungry, did you feed when I was naked?
Speaker 2: Did you clothe me? When I was an immigrant? Did
Speaker 2: you welcome me when I was in prison? Did you
Speaker 2: come to see and when I was sick, did you
Speaker 2: visit me? And that up he'll me. How you treat
Speaker 2: the least of these is a judgment on the nation.
Speaker 2: And and and and we've had these battles in America before,
Speaker 2: time and time again. And there are moments like ending slavery.
Speaker 2: There are moments like women's suffrage. There are moments like
Speaker 2: when you need a new deal. There are moments throughout
Speaker 2: the American process when the only thing that got us
Speaker 2: out was when say, for instance, Kennedy or Johnson would
Speaker 2: give a speech and say, fundamentally, this is a moral issue.
Speaker 2: Or Roosevelt would say something like, uh, we only have
Speaker 2: to see the only thing we have to fee and
Speaker 2: fear itself. Or any court operation that doesn't pay people
Speaker 2: of basic living wad has no right to really exist
Speaker 2: and work in America. Or Teddy Roosevelt when he broke
Speaker 2: with both parties in nineteen twelve and gave his bull
Speaker 2: speech and said that they are just some fundamental things,
Speaker 2: protecting the environment, long term care for our senior citizen,
Speaker 2: paying a basic minimum wave He said those issues were
Speaker 2: not Democrat or Republican. It really was about right versus wrong.
Speaker 2: We must have a massive movement of people, clergy, rabbis,
Speaker 2: im mobs, people of faith, people not of faith, who
Speaker 2: believe in tomorrow universe. To say what we are seeing
Speaker 2: right now is just wrong. It's just wrong. And it's
Speaker 2: not just wrong in terms of feeling wrong. It's wrong
Speaker 2: because it's deadly, it's hurting people. It's political violence, it's
Speaker 2: social balance, it is policy. And I feel like Frederick
Speaker 2: Douglas when he said something because this critique has to
Speaker 2: be rooted in love. And this is what Frederick Douglas
Speaker 2: said when he was asked one time, what did he
Speaker 2: think about slaveholding religion that justified slavery, tried to make
Speaker 2: that which is wrong right, which we see happening today
Speaker 2: with the so called religious nationalism. Frederick Douglas said, because
Speaker 2: I love the peaceable, pure, just and truth telling religion
Speaker 2: of Jesus, I must hate the lying man, stealing, destructive
Speaker 2: religion of the slave master. You cannot love one without
Speaker 2: hating the other. There are ideals. It's not about being
Speaker 2: against one person, it's about what's being promoted. And you
Speaker 2: cannot be for freedom at liberty on the one hand,
Speaker 2: and then be for tyrancy and abuse of the law
Speaker 2: on the other, the two can't exist equal. They're not
Speaker 2: too equal existing moral positions one is wrong and one
Speaker 2: is right.
Speaker 3: One of the gifts of one of the gifts of
Speaker 3: our life is that we get to teach public theology
Speaker 3: to our students at Yell Divinity School. And when we do,
Speaker 3: we look at these moral movements in the history of
Speaker 3: the United States, and Reverend Barber mentioned a few of them.
Speaker 3: I mean, there was the fight against the claim that
Speaker 3: you could own other human beings. There was the fight
Speaker 3: for labor rights, fight for women's suffrage, the civil and
Speaker 3: human rights of the mid twentieth century. And in all
Speaker 3: of these movements, when we look closely at where the
Speaker 3: moral authority came from, at the heart of it, it's
Speaker 3: that people who were directly impacted by these injustices stood
Speaker 3: up right. I mean, we always need all kinds of leaders,
Speaker 3: but the moral authority at the root of these movements
Speaker 3: are you know, women like Fanny lou Hamer who says,
Speaker 3: I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired. You know,
Speaker 3: I know this from my own experience, and so in
Speaker 3: this moment, I think it's critical in the movement building
Speaker 3: that we're trying to do that. We listen closely to
Speaker 3: you know, who are the people who are the people
Speaker 3: who are being directly impacted. I mean the moral voice
Speaker 3: that's ringing out about this neighbor of ours who has
Speaker 3: been disappeared to the prison you mentioned in Ol Salvador
Speaker 3: is his wife and kids and their neighbors who are
Speaker 3: crying out and say, we know that God hears our cry.
Speaker 3: We know that this is wrong, and we're inviting our
Speaker 3: neighbors to join us in this. I think that's the
Speaker 3: kind of voices we need at the heart of a
Speaker 3: moral movement.
Speaker 2: Steep I mentioned one peace just cross. There is this
Speaker 2: scripture in the ancient Hebrew text, and I want your
Speaker 2: listeners today to hear the sound of it because it
Speaker 2: is applicable. The prophet is looks at the nation and
Speaker 2: he sees how people are using He says, he says,
Speaker 2: we must loose the bands of wickedness. That's the language,
Speaker 2: but in Hebrew, when you translate that, it means pay
Speaker 2: people what they deserve. In other words, to refuse to
Speaker 2: pay people what they deserved in the ancient prophet's mind
Speaker 2: was a form of wickedness. To be the greed was
Speaker 2: a form of wickedness, and and and then but then
Speaker 2: earlier he's looking at the unholy uh alliance of some people,
Speaker 2: from corruptive people in the in the religious order, and
Speaker 2: the politicians or the princes, if you will, that they say,
Speaker 2: and he says this word whoa? Now, whoa we? Anytime
Speaker 2: you see that I come from the country steed. Well,
Speaker 2: well that's what you said to a stubborn me.
Speaker 1: Whoa stop.
Speaker 2: So the fact that the prophet says whoa to the
Speaker 2: whole nation who't? And then he says, to those who
Speaker 2: legislate evil, Now that's not my word, these are words
Speaker 2: straight out of scripture. Who legislate evil and rob the
Speaker 2: poor poo r of their rights and make women and
Speaker 2: children p r a e y pray. If you listen
Speaker 2: at that imagery, it is saying whenever politicians use their
Speaker 2: power not to uplift people, but they get caught up
Speaker 2: in some kind of mythology that convinces now the right
Speaker 2: use of power is to get up every morning they
Speaker 2: figure out who you can hurt, particular only those on
Speaker 2: the margins. That that is a form of wickedness, It
Speaker 2: is a form of evil, and it must be challenged
Speaker 2: both in hopes that the people doing it will be
Speaker 2: redeemed and changed and see the error of their way,
Speaker 2: but to stop what is going on. And so in
Speaker 2: our movement we think there are four movements. First, in
Speaker 2: a moment like this, you must have what we call
Speaker 2: moral analysis, what's really going on, So we get the
Speaker 2: best think tanks and people to exam. Right now, we
Speaker 2: have a piece called the High moraw calling of this budget,
Speaker 2: the high moral cost of this budget, And we went
Speaker 2: inside of it and looked at these numbers and how
Speaker 2: devastating it will be. One number one of the footnotes
Speaker 2: is twenty four million children, not black children, but white,
Speaker 2: twenty four million children losing access to free and reduced lunch.
Speaker 2: We looked at if you cut medical k the way
Speaker 2: it's going to have to be cut, what it would
Speaker 2: do the rural hospital, what it will do in Appalachia
Speaker 2: and in the delta of Mississippi. Then you but you
Speaker 2: have to have Marlin. Now, then if you have Marral analysis,
Speaker 2: you have to have what we call marl articulation. How
Speaker 2: do you get how do you make that persons understand
Speaker 2: what's going on Because a lot of times so much
Speaker 2: is done with so much cover up. You know, the
Speaker 2: Pope before he died said, isn't it strange that if
Speaker 2: Wall Street goes down, it's a headline story. But if
Speaker 2: somebody is sleeping in their car having to decide how
Speaker 2: they're going to feed their family, but they also work
Speaker 2: every day, but they work at such a low wage
Speaker 2: they can't afford a basic two bedroom apartment, how is
Speaker 2: that not a headline story? These are the contradictions. So
Speaker 2: how do we articulate, how do we get the voice
Speaker 2: not of people speaking for people? But people are young
Speaker 2: and said themselves, which is the greatest marbles. Then the
Speaker 2: third thing is maral agenda. No anger at injustice is
Speaker 2: sufficient if you don't offer a replacement. If you don't offer,
Speaker 2: you can't just curse the darkness. You have to say
Speaker 2: there is something better, there's a way better, and this
Speaker 2: is what the better way would look like. But then
Speaker 2: finally you have to take mall action. Now your listeners
Speaker 2: may not know this, but on ass Wednesday, we took
Speaker 2: about four hundred clergy and impact the people into the rotunda,
Speaker 2: I mean into the capitol. Now there's an insurrection, was
Speaker 2: a resurrection, and delivered to them this study called the
Speaker 2: High bar car. Do you all really realize what you're doing?
Speaker 2: Remember all five hundred some of them, and we delivered
Speaker 2: it to both the Speaker of the House and opposition
Speaker 2: parties leaders so far, and then we get they gathered
Speaker 2: in the retunda. I didn't go in deliberately on last Wednesday?
Speaker 2: Do you know Steve that when they got in the
Speaker 2: rotunda and they were asked by one of the officers
Speaker 2: what do y' all planned to do? And they said,
Speaker 2: we plan to buy our heads in pray. The officer
Speaker 2: told them the new rules are. If you buy your
Speaker 2: head in prayer, it will be seen as an act
Speaker 2: of violation and aggression in a country that says we
Speaker 2: have the freedom of religion and the freedom of speak.
Speaker 2: You tell clergy who were in full vestments by the way,
Speaker 2: Steve roads crossing, you know, to let people know press
Speaker 2: all for our Jewish brothers and sisters, if you just
Speaker 2: buy it. When we have gone to that left and
Speaker 2: that depth, we cannot refuse to take action, non violent action,
Speaker 2: whatever it takes to put our bodies on the line
Speaker 2: in such a way that our bodies speak and say
Speaker 2: the folk this is wrong and it doesn't have to
Speaker 2: be and it will only be if we be quiet
Speaker 2: and we don't say anything, because the only way a
Speaker 2: king gets to be a king is if the people
Speaker 2: about it.
Speaker 1: Right, Ron, Barbara, do you plan to go back to Washington,
Speaker 1: to the Capitol rotunda and bow your head and face
Speaker 1: possible arrest.
Speaker 2: Well, I tell you what I'm living to do. On
Speaker 2: this coming Monday. We have called for clergy all over
Speaker 2: the country and impacted people to join us for the
Speaker 2: beginning of Marrow Monday in DC. We're going on this
Speaker 2: fourth Monday and then every first Monday of the month,
Speaker 2: and it may escalate bigger, but we're gonna start with
Speaker 2: the first Monday. It will happen. We were on the
Speaker 2: call last night with hundreds of clergy and impact the people,
Speaker 2: and we're going, and we're going this particular Monday to
Speaker 2: deliver to every member of the Congress what the budget
Speaker 2: will do to workers and children. Because the process of
Speaker 2: nourvice is you have to make sure that the persons
Speaker 2: you're standing against know exactly why you're doing it. We
Speaker 2: do intend to go in full investment. We do intend
Speaker 2: to go in the rech under like any other visitor,
Speaker 2: and I will have to for as reasons leave that
Speaker 2: we never go to get arrested. We never do anything
Speaker 2: and get arrested. But what we will do at times
Speaker 2: is we cannot say yes to something that is contrary
Speaker 2: to both our promises of our faith and promises of
Speaker 2: our democracy. So I'm going with others who are coming
Speaker 2: and we and but we're not. It's not a spectacle
Speaker 2: one time, Steed. We're launching smorrow Monday in DC. Folk
Speaker 2: can go to Breach Repairs dot org and learn all
Speaker 2: about it. And we've got a lot of other partners
Speaker 2: and denominational leaders that are joining us in impact the
Speaker 2: people that are joining.
Speaker 1: Does the clergy that you're going with generally agree that
Speaker 1: it is important to be able to if they choose
Speaker 1: bow their head and pray under the rotunda in the
Speaker 1: United States Capital as is their first amendment?
Speaker 2: Right? Oh yeah, they all agree with that. And people
Speaker 2: have to make decisions because you know, we've been told
Speaker 2: some things about even what the new penalty is, but
Speaker 2: it points out how far we've gone. Some say that
Speaker 2: that penalty can be up there now five hundred dollars
Speaker 2: six months in jail. But of course all this stuff
Speaker 2: has to be challenged in court. But the reason they're
Speaker 2: bow it is because of John. I hope you'll tell
Speaker 2: us or about another person who used to beg people
Speaker 2: to come to pray here. But why are we that?
Speaker 2: Why are we going investments because the situation is so bad,
Speaker 2: you know, we want to see Republicans and Democrats turned.
Speaker 2: I'm like used to Steve. I got very bothered three
Speaker 2: years ago when all Republicans and a group of eight
Speaker 2: Democrats voted against thirty five million Americans and saying no,
Speaker 2: they're raising the minimum wage at fifteen dollars an hour.
Speaker 2: It was just ridiculous considering the hurt and the pain
Speaker 2: that people are in. So why would clergy put on
Speaker 2: their investments to make sure people know we're not there
Speaker 2: just as individuals, but we're doing ministry. We're giving the
Speaker 2: nation the pastoral care that it needs at this moment
Speaker 2: and the prophetic challenge that it needs at this moment.
Speaker 2: Why would they do that? Why would they Because to
Speaker 2: do less than that, to say nothing, would be a
Speaker 2: form of religious malpractice. Democracy democratic malpractice. I don't mean
Speaker 2: Democrats of the party because right now, I think Steve,
Speaker 2: you and I have talked about this. We're not just
Speaker 2: in a this is not just a crisis of political parties.
Speaker 2: This is a crisis of civilization, This is a crisis
Speaker 2: of humanity. If we claim that America has the greatest
Speaker 2: economic power in this world, the greatest military power, and
Speaker 2: the greatest imprint on the CLNT, this country goes that
Speaker 2: direction where the main decision about policies we make is
Speaker 2: how a few will get more and how those who
Speaker 2: are trying to make it will get less. If that's
Speaker 2: the way that we go, without any regret, without any resistance,
Speaker 2: what happens to the rest of civilization and society itself.
Speaker 2: This is a borrow moment. This is a gut check
Speaker 2: moment for this country.
Speaker 3: I'm just going to say quickly, in any movement, the
Speaker 3: point of direct action is to expose right, to shine
Speaker 3: a light and help people see what's really happening. And
Speaker 3: for far too long a political movement in this country
Speaker 3: has actually used Christianity. Sociologists call this Christian nationalism these days,
Speaker 3: but has tried to use Christianity to really prop up
Speaker 3: extremism in politics. And what Bishop Barber was referencing is
Speaker 3: that you know, the folks who were leading the Congress
Speaker 3: right now, many of them are tied to these Christian
Speaker 3: nationalist organizations that for years have invited their supporters to
Speaker 3: come to the rotunda, and a guy named David Barton
Speaker 3: has stood in there and told them stories he's largely
Speaker 3: made up about how this has been a kind of
Speaker 3: sacred space and that you know, they need to be
Speaker 3: able to worship there and pray. But when people who
Speaker 3: disagree with them, people who challenge their abuse of power,
Speaker 3: want to come and pray, then all of a sudden,
Speaker 3: religious freedom is out the window and there's a threat
Speaker 3: of the rest. So that's why we have to pray.
Speaker 3: Because of course the prayers of the cries of people
Speaker 3: are being heard by pastors, they have to lift those
Speaker 3: to God. But we have to pray in public because
Speaker 3: it's an important part of our vocation to make those
Speaker 3: prayers known not only to God but to the people
Speaker 3: in power.
Speaker 1: I had a conversation with you, Jonathan that left an impression,
Speaker 1: and you talked about your devotion to the doctrine of
Speaker 1: nonviolence and talked about your commitment to it, talked about
Speaker 1: if necessary, and it was not a frivolous comment about
Speaker 1: laying down your life. And I see some of the
Speaker 1: comments rolling below, and there will be a moment that
Speaker 1: comes later this summer, I feel for sure, but it's coming.
Speaker 1: I can't tell you what day of the week, but
Speaker 1: there's going to be a moment when a massive Americans
Speaker 1: are facing a massive uniforms and those uniforms will lower
Speaker 1: weapons at peaceful protesters on the orders of the state.
Speaker 1: I don't have a doubt in my mind about that.
Speaker 1: And the question is for those who will be in
Speaker 1: the front row, close to the barrels of the rifle,
Speaker 1: and I know that you will, proverbially, in any instance
Speaker 1: be one of those people. I think about Lewis, and
Speaker 1: we think about the Edmund Pettis Bridge, and go to
Speaker 1: the Edmund Pettis Bridge and walk across it in a
Speaker 1: group or walk across it alone. When John Lewis did
Speaker 1: it with peaceful people, they were walking into the devil's teeth.
Speaker 1: They were walking into death, and they faced it. And
Speaker 1: John Lewis almost lost his life there that day.
Speaker 2: He did not.
Speaker 1: But when we think about what's coming, how do you
Speaker 1: model courage for people? Arc of the that is that minor.
Speaker 1: Yours is saying it's mine that the moral arc of
Speaker 1: the universe is long. We would have agreed with that right,
Speaker 1: and it bends towards it, It bends towards justice. You know,
Speaker 1: to what Bishop Barber's mom said, to what Bishop Barber's
Speaker 1: mom said about h I understand that I was frozen.
Speaker 1: So I'll try to I'll try to get this, to
Speaker 1: get this out clearly what Bishop Barber's mom said at
Speaker 1: ninety one, which is that I just never thought that
Speaker 1: you'd have to refight this fight right, this idea that
Speaker 1: the moral arc of the universe is long, but it
Speaker 1: bends towards justice, and now all of that is in doubt.
Speaker 1: What do you say to peopleeople who are afraid, who
Speaker 1: sense the the stakes are high, who are looking to
Speaker 1: find their courage in this moment. And what I tell
Speaker 1: people is that, you know, there's an old definition of courage.
Speaker 1: It's not about not being afraid. It's about recognizing there's
Speaker 1: something more important than your fear right that helps you
Speaker 1: take that step off the first line.
Speaker 3: You know, John John Lewis, who you mentioned, was a
Speaker 3: student of Jim Lawson. Bishop Berber and I are also
Speaker 3: students of Jim Lawson. Many people who who've learned the
Speaker 3: tradition of non violence in this country know that the
Speaker 3: commitment to meet violence with non violence is ultimately.
Speaker 1: We have frozen ass here that I am not frozen
Speaker 1: right now.
Speaker 2: You're coming through a mind and hear me.
Speaker 1: Okay, I got you back, Jonathan, can you dear me?
Speaker 1: I got you Bishop. There we go.
Speaker 2: I was.
Speaker 3: I was saying that the conviction that that nonviolence is
Speaker 3: the right response to violence is is is a conviction
Speaker 3: that it's actually more powerful, that it taps into, uh
Speaker 3: the fundamental reality of who we are and what truth
Speaker 3: is in the world, and what people who practice that
Speaker 3: know is that there is inside you know, all of us,
Speaker 3: you know, things that will won't make us want to
Speaker 3: turn away, And so we have to train ourselves. Then
Speaker 3: we have to be part of a community that's committed
Speaker 3: to this kind of It's not that you know, individuals
Speaker 3: are going to rise up in some sort of you know,
Speaker 3: heroic effort. The sit in movement was led by people
Speaker 3: who had practiced, who had you know, with people who
Speaker 3: they knew and trusted, had practiced playing the roles of
Speaker 3: you know, the people who would knock you off the stool,
Speaker 3: and rather than get up and fight back, who would
Speaker 3: sit back and continue to focus on the goal, not
Speaker 3: just of staying there, but of ultimately transforming the people
Speaker 3: who were committing the violence against them. And I think
Speaker 3: that hope that even people who have been deeply twisted
Speaker 3: and really removed from their humanity by evil and by
Speaker 3: evil systems can in fact be redeemed because at the
Speaker 3: route and part of every one of us is the
Speaker 3: humanity that was stamped on to us by our creator,
Speaker 3: and no matter how depraved we might be, we don't
Speaker 3: lose that. I think that's the core conviction of non violence,
Speaker 3: and so we need to be in communities where we're
Speaker 3: spending time getting to know that humanity of one another
Speaker 3: and practicing how we might use the power of nonviolence
Speaker 3: to resist the evil that's going to happen. Because I'll
Speaker 3: say this, the administration and autocratic regimes like the one
Speaker 3: we're dealing with right now, they want violence. They want
Speaker 3: there to be a violent response in public so that
Speaker 3: they can use that to justify the militarization of police
Speaker 3: and even you know, putting troops on the ground. In
Speaker 3: the United States, they would very much like that. And
Speaker 3: it's it's our job as a movement to prepare the
Speaker 3: kind of discipline that will be needed in order to
Speaker 3: use nonviolence to expose their violence so that everyone can
Speaker 3: see it for what it is.
Speaker 1: Well, that's a that's a powerful word. You just said
Speaker 1: there that I'm going to steal from you and repeat back.
Speaker 1: But a disciplined movement, a disciplined opposition, a fierce opposition,
Speaker 1: a moral opposition that is fierce and disciplined. An American
Speaker 1: is something to be reckoned with and.
Speaker 2: Steve A discipline movement that's rooted in the greatest power
Speaker 2: in the universe. Scripture says, perfect love cast out fear.
Speaker 2: So the opposite of courage is not fear is the
Speaker 2: absence of what do you really love? What's worse? What?
Speaker 2: In other words, when you consider your life and while
Speaker 2: you're here with others, what is it that you love
Speaker 2: so much that's so important not just to you but
Speaker 2: to those around you, that you're willing to stand up for.
Speaker 2: So the discipline of the movement, you know, people didn't
Speaker 2: just go out and just thought doing nonviolence. That there's
Speaker 2: processes to it. And not only that they knew what
Speaker 2: they were fighting for, right they also looked backwards to
Speaker 2: go forward. The Sanko fo bird flies forward looking backwards. So,
Speaker 2: for instance, right now, and this may sound to some
Speaker 2: people strained, but we have to stop saying this is
Speaker 2: the worst moment we've ever seen, because it's insulting to people.
Speaker 2: That comes from people who stayed hopeful through two hundred
Speaker 2: and fifty years of slavery and the indigenous people in
Speaker 2: this country who who saw their lands and things robbed
Speaker 2: and taken away. It is banned, but in a real
Speaker 2: sense we need right now to people need to be
Speaker 2: looking at those who had to make decisions, whether it's
Speaker 2: we have Lord Garrison, who was an abolitionist, white abolition
Speaker 2: who said when he was in jail on one occasion,
Speaker 2: William Lord Garrison was placed in this jail for preaching
Speaker 2: the damnable gospel that all men are creating equal I
Speaker 2: mean he wrote on So there's a sense in which
Speaker 2: we have to know who we are. We talked about Lewis,
Speaker 2: but we have to remember that forty years before John
Speaker 2: Lewis ever came to Selma, black and white and Jewish
Speaker 2: people in Selma had been standing and fighting for voting rights.
Speaker 2: And one of the reasons John Lewis got hit so
Speaker 2: hard to dance because he was helping Ms. Boyington, who
Speaker 2: lived to be some ninety here, ninety nine years old,
Speaker 2: who was a teacher and all, but she was hit
Speaker 2: on that day what we call bloody Sunday. And what
Speaker 2: also made Bloody Sunday so powerful is that the movement
Speaker 2: operated in such a way that Bloody Sunday didn't happen
Speaker 2: outside of the eyes of the camera. One of my
Speaker 2: professors said to me in history, he said, asked us
Speaker 2: why did the segregation sides come down, and we were young.
Speaker 2: We all say because people martials to them. He said no,
Speaker 2: we said, yesterd is No, That's not the only reason.
Speaker 2: He said. Part of the strategy was to embarrass the
Speaker 2: leadership of the greedy means spirit of leadership of America
Speaker 2: on the world stage, because America would often go to
Speaker 2: other countries and chastise them. But when those when the
Speaker 2: world saw in America people having dogs turned on there
Speaker 2: and their rights being violated, it caused a form of
Speaker 2: global embarrassment and forced a new conversation and consideration about
Speaker 2: who we are and what we're doing, and why things
Speaker 2: have to shift. So I believe, like you, I think
Speaker 2: there are two possibilities. The one possibility is that folk
Speaker 2: can just get angry and go off and just just
Speaker 2: do any and everything, which could be very, very detrimental,
Speaker 2: and as Jonathan said, is what they want Trump wants.
Speaker 2: The other is discipline, strong, courageous, fears studied movement with
Speaker 2: the clear demands, clear articulation, letting people know we're not
Speaker 2: just fighting an individual, because in a sense, if one individual,
Speaker 2: let's just say, was in peace and put out of office,
Speaker 2: I know that that would not stop what's happening now,
Speaker 2: it would not stop the level in witch Maga and
Speaker 2: the extremist forces. So we have to be very clear
Speaker 2: about what is going on and what we're fighting. But
Speaker 2: I do agree with you and that that the constant
Speaker 2: what they called one hundred days of under and attacking
Speaker 2: of people is not going to serve to discourage people.
Speaker 2: It's actually going to serve to embolden people. And one
Speaker 2: of the things Howard Thurmann said that we need to
Speaker 2: hear right now, he said, study very clearly the tools
Speaker 2: and the energy and the effort and the strategies that
Speaker 2: your adversary has to use or they think they have
Speaker 2: to use to defeat you, and therein you'll find your strength.
Speaker 2: In other words, if you have to do all of this,
Speaker 2: you got to chieat in elections, you have to shut
Speaker 2: down justice departments, you have to try to take over
Speaker 2: the now. If you think about all the things they're
Speaker 2: attempting to do, that also says how strong the forces
Speaker 2: of justice if we come together, if we mold together.
Speaker 2: You know right now in this country. The interesting than
Speaker 2: Steve is that the very people that will be hurt
Speaker 2: the most by say, the economic policies of extremism, which
Speaker 2: are poor and lowell, is actually the same group where
Speaker 2: you have the greatest possibility to expand the electric that
Speaker 2: could fundamentally shift outcomes of election.
Speaker 1: Bishop, we got we're coming up on the hour, and
Speaker 1: I do want to before I let you go. I
Speaker 1: cannot let you go before you tell three thousand, three
Speaker 1: hundred people with us, and many more who will watch
Speaker 1: later the story that I have shared a couple times now,
Speaker 1: but I heard it from you, and it's the story
Speaker 1: of Frederick Douglas and Harriet Tubman in the aftermath of
Speaker 1: Frederick Douglas's depression, in the math the dread Scott decision,
Speaker 1: and when Harriet Tubman sees the depression in her friend
Speaker 1: and she says, Frederick is God dead. I would love
Speaker 1: for you to share that. Before I do turn it
Speaker 1: over to Bishop Barbara, I want to thank Jonathan, Minister Jonathan,
Speaker 1: I want to thank Bishop Barber, and I want to
Speaker 1: thank all of you for joining us. One of the
Speaker 1: things I want to say about Bishop Barber and Jonathan,
Speaker 1: they're also brilliant political strategists who are deeply in touch
Speaker 1: with the people in the country. And when we next
Speaker 1: get together, we're going to talk about the strategy of
Speaker 1: building a black white coalition in all fifty these states
Speaker 1: of Americans of good faith, people of deep faith, people
Speaker 1: of no faith at all, in a great moral moment,
Speaker 1: into a force that is going to make this country better.
Speaker 1: And so when you think about why things happen and
Speaker 1: the links of events that none of us can see
Speaker 1: clearly because they haven't happened yet, and where we have
Speaker 1: to wrestle with our doubt and our faith and confront
Speaker 1: our fear, we have to appreciate that we're not alone,
Speaker 1: and that the greatest people that we revere through history
Speaker 1: walked in that doubt and walked in that fear, and
Speaker 1: walked in in those moments, just like we are in
Speaker 1: their own time and in their own way. And so
Speaker 1: if I could get you to tell that story, Bishop Barber,
Speaker 1: I know it will inspire many thousands of people tonight
Speaker 1: like it did me. And then we'll have you all
Speaker 1: back soon, and we're working on some things together that
Speaker 1: we'll share with all of you soon. But understand, the
Speaker 1: aggressor always has the advantage of the first mover in
Speaker 1: any type of fight. The moral side of the fight
Speaker 1: is always the peaceful side of the fight, and so
Speaker 1: that side always has to react off of its backfoot
Speaker 1: to aggression. But now that the fight is joined, and
Speaker 1: you take full stock everybody the destruction of Elon Musk's
Speaker 1: companies that have resulted from his aggressions, the cowtow that
Speaker 1: Donald Trump has made this night in defeat to the
Speaker 1: Chinese with his trade war. It is not the case
Speaker 1: that Donald Trump is winning. No clear Eide analysis would
Speaker 1: support that conclusion. The clear Eyd analysis supports the conclusion
Speaker 1: that suffering in damage and a morality that was all
Speaker 1: necessary is coming, and we're gonna have to lift up
Speaker 1: a lot of people. But I feel that the overall
Speaker 1: outcome of this fight has never been in doubt. The
Speaker 1: consequences of it are in doubt. But if I could
Speaker 1: turn it over to you, Bishop, and what an honor
Speaker 1: it is to be with both of you tonight, two
Speaker 1: of the finest men this country has in it. Thank
Speaker 1: you both.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Steve, and thank you for your tremendous voice
Speaker 2: and clarity. I'm going to do like you and steal
Speaker 2: that last part from you about it. The outcome is
Speaker 2: never in doubt, but the consequences, and we must work
Speaker 2: to make sure that the consequences are less than they
Speaker 2: would be if we don't stand up and challenge yeah,
Speaker 2: or less because we stood up, because the consequences will
Speaker 2: be deep. We're not just trying to get back to normally,
Speaker 2: to just get back to what we were before this election,
Speaker 2: because even going into this, eighty seven million people are
Speaker 2: uninsured or uninsured. One hundred and forty million people were
Speaker 2: poor and or lower age in this country. I won't
Speaker 2: go through all the numbers, but they are numbers that
Speaker 2: say to us we have work to do, not just
Speaker 2: to stop what is happening, but to also to climb
Speaker 2: hot to a higher and a deeper, higher place, and
Speaker 2: to lift all humanity not just something. This is not
Speaker 2: just about stopping a moment in history and then leaving
Speaker 2: things that Traderick Douglas knew that born a slave escaped
Speaker 2: from slavery, and in and around the eighteen fifties, a
Speaker 2: decision was made to challenge the rights, the fundamental rights
Speaker 2: of black people, just the right itself there was a
Speaker 2: black person to even having the right under the law
Speaker 2: for him to be respected, and there was a situation
Speaker 2: as it related to where people sat in the cars
Speaker 2: of trains. Dred Scott, a very bright skinned man, chose
Speaker 2: to challenge what was happening and the separation that was
Speaker 2: happening to a black people. And they went to court,
Speaker 2: and the Supreme Court justice was an advocate of slavery,
Speaker 2: and so were most of the Supreme Court justice at
Speaker 2: that moment, and they decided basically that a black man
Speaker 2: had no rights that the country or a white man
Speaker 2: ever had to respect. When Frederick Douglas got wind of this,
Speaker 2: along with the abolition movement, they were floored. This is
Speaker 2: this is eleven years, twelve years before the Civil War,
Speaker 2: I mean, excuse me, nine years. They were floored. They
Speaker 2: basically said this, that's this Supreme Court has said, we
Speaker 2: have no legs, no legsis stand on. And he went
Speaker 2: into a funk, a crisis of existence, what would have
Speaker 2: happened to all of his work? What would have happened,
Speaker 2: What would happen to the abolitionist's work? And the story
Speaker 2: is told that he's in Pennsylvania, I think Philadelphia, and
Speaker 2: so journal Truth actually sees him sitting somewhere with his
Speaker 2: head in his hand, this great orator, this lion, this man.
Speaker 1: Who learned.
Speaker 2: How to read, and was talked by some of the
Speaker 2: best people up in New Bedford, up in the near
Speaker 2: up in Massachusetts and New Boston, and she screamed the
Speaker 2: story that says across that room, Frederick is God dead?
Speaker 2: Just a question? But she knew that for Frederick, God
Speaker 2: was the God of justice, of freedom, of transformation, of redemtion,
Speaker 2: of resurrection. And the traderic was having a crisis of faith, morality,
Speaker 2: and consciousness. He had to answer that question, and they
Speaker 2: asked up to that question would determine what he would do.
Speaker 2: And Frederick knew at that moment that what he believed
Speaker 2: the divine source of the universe was eternal, could not die,
Speaker 2: and that source was on the side of justice and
Speaker 2: love and truth and freedom. And it is said that
Speaker 2: he got up and contact the Diabolition Society, one of
Speaker 2: them and said, I need to speak in two or
Speaker 2: three weeks. Give me time, and he went and began
Speaker 2: to write and prepare a disciplined, fierce response to the
Speaker 2: Dredge God decision. The story concludes by saying that when
Speaker 2: Frederick got up to do that teacher, it was about
Speaker 2: an hour long, and interestingly, Steve he takes the first
Speaker 2: thirty to forty minutes and talked about how bad things are.
Speaker 2: He owns people's fear and people struggles, and then tore
Speaker 2: the end. Predi Decta says, but as monstrous as this
Speaker 2: decision is, and with all of the government seemingly against us,
Speaker 2: the judicial, the legislative executive against us, I we can
Speaker 2: receive this decision with a cheerful spirit because history is
Speaker 2: studied with studied with proof that all the efforts to
Speaker 2: alli the abolition and freedom movement in this country has
Speaker 2: only served to embolden and intensify its agitation. Could it
Speaker 2: be that the actions of this court is a necessary
Speaker 2: link in the chain of events to lead to the
Speaker 2: downfall of slavery itself? He reshaped, reshaped his narrative, and
Speaker 2: and re committed himself to the work of abolitionists along
Speaker 2: with other black and white abolitionists throughout the country. Could
Speaker 2: it be, Steve, could it be that this moment that
Speaker 2: we're seeing all this gut check moment is a necessary
Speaker 2: link because it's been there under the surface. But could
Speaker 2: it be that it's now all brought to the surface.
Speaker 2: So and it may be a necessary link in a
Speaker 2: chain of events to wake everybody up. To wake everybody up,
Speaker 2: because this could be the moment that is the chain
Speaker 2: of events to bring down this kind of extremism, set
Speaker 2: people free from it, redeem people from it, and give
Speaker 2: America a fresh opportunity to seek to be a more
Speaker 2: perfect union and to have the third reconstruction that we
Speaker 2: so badly needed for so long.
Speaker 1: Bishop Barber, Minister Jonathan, and all of you. Thank you.
Speaker 1: I'm Steve Schmidt. This is the warning. I invite you
Speaker 1: to join this community where I promise to be honest,
Speaker 1: blunt and direct about what is happening in this country.
Speaker 1: America is in crisis. Follow and subscribe to this channel
Speaker 1: and on substack. Thank you.