We've Come So Far...but Have So Far To Go

This picture was taken at around 1913.
Whites hung two Black men accused of raping a White female.
To them, justice was served.
This was 96 Years ago.

This picture was taken in 1981.
Only 28 years ago.
This boy, 19-year-old Michael Donald, was randomly picked out by Klansmen in Alabama.
The men were tried, convicted, and imprisoned. in 2005...24 YEARS later.

24 years. For lynching an innocent man.
And Post Civil-Rights, even.

I dare anyone to rest in the fact that we have, as a nation, "arrived".
I am not, by far, one of those people who exercise paranoia and weave conspiracy into my everyday routines. However, I feel that the majority of the problem is that people feel that we shouldn't take responsibility for what's going on, on our own soil. Our own land. People grow wary of mentioning race relations; claiming it to be an irrelevant issue. We've detached ourselves from the sins of our fathers. We apologize and feel that this is sufficient.

I am with you. Walking with you to move forward to a new sense of Unity. But, you nor I can ignore the deep-seeded pain that I still sometimes feel. Sometimes, it confuses and frustrates you...I know. I didn't experience any of it....but when I look at the pictures of Michael Donald...I feel hurt like you wouldn't imagine. Because I am like him. I am him. Had it been my town, and my street, and my face...I would have been hanging from that tree.And it could have been you behind that white sheet.

I think if we are to grow as a country, we should stand under the Glory of Almighty God and painfully stare at our own tendencies. Just fathom what has happened on our land since the first people set foot here...

It includes more than Columbus Day, Independence Day, and 9/11...

2 Chronicles 7:14
If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.

God Bless America.