March toward Social Justice

Seguin is not a place that I would expect to have a long commitment to the celebration of the Martin Luther King, Jr., holiday, but hundreds of people turn out every year to march a couple of miles from the downtown square to the TLU campus. The march is the culmination of four days of events, including an inspiring MLK concert that TLU has hosted for the past nine years. (The organizing committee promises a big blow out for next year’s 10th musical celebration of the birth of Martin Luther King, Jr., who was born a mere 77 years ago on Jan. 15, 1929.)


This year’s pre-march speaker,Tina Lee, principal of Lifegate Christian School in Seguin, reminded those in the audience not to give up when life seems hard. She used a parable about a deaf frog to illustrate the importance of ignoring the negative messages we hear as we work toward our goals.

She told her own amazing story of overcoming financial obstacles, health problems and racism to earn several degrees, honors and good jobs. I was most struck by the story of her entrance into college. She had been accepted and offered a scholarship to a nearby university, but when she appeared to meet with university officials, the officials revoked the offer. She knew why and faced the issue head on.

Her birth certificate said she was white, but the official saw a black woman sitting in his office.

She did not go away meekly. Instead, she pointed out that her race was the only thing that had “changed” since she walked on the campus. Her credentials had indicated her potential for success, she said, and asked the official to give her a change to prove that she would thrive in the university.


Today, she is nearing completion of a doctorate.


I am inspired by her achievement, by the songs of four talented young sopranos at the concert Sunday night, by the Seguin Community Choir’s rousing gospel songs (especially “Oh Freedom”), by the smart and funny comments of Nikki Bittings between songs and readings, by the words of Rev. Frankie Rivers and Rev. W.C. McIntyre, by Dr. King’s example. This could be a long list.


I love to celebrate Dr. King’s legacy, but at the same time, I can’t help but remember how far we are from seeing his philosophy bear full fruit. At the concert and during the speech this afternoon, I nodded my head in agreement, clapped and let out a loud “uh huh” one or two times. I did the same while reading a column by Leonard Pitts reminding us that King’s goals did not only apply to racial equality but also sought to remove the barriers of class and unfair economic advantage.

Pitts,who is teaching in Appalachia for a few months, reported that he was struck by the similarities in the lives of poor white people to the dysfunctions he is more accustomed to seeing in poor black communities.

I was also nodding and saying “amen” (that's the influence of living for four years in Durham, N.C., where the population is more than half African American and teaching at North Carolina Central University, the successor to the first liberal arts university in America for African American students, not any particular personal religiosity)in agreement with authors and callers on several NPR talk programs devoted to MLK and LBJ (for the non-Texan young folks, that’s Lyndon Baines Johnson) as they discussed the legacy of the civil rights movement. Among the topics that came up were King's biography, including FBI surveillance of King, Johnson’s roots in the hardscrabble Hill Country (before it was the in place to cultivate grapes or take refuge from California real estate prices), the divergent views the two men held on war in Vietnam and Johnson’s foreknowledge that his push to pass civil rights legislation would destroy the Democratic Party in the South.

Both of these men knew that social justice was necessary but lacking in the United States. They had ideas about how to create a more just society and they weren’t afraid to try them.

If only we could all be brave enough to march toward justice undaunted by fear of what we might encounter on the way there.