The Fierce Urgency of Prophetic Hope

  ©Wendell Griffen, 2022     In recent days we have witnessed unprecedented evidence of bigotry and violence. Bear with me while I mention some of the more obvious examples. Start with the abuse and disrespect Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson experienced this week from Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee. She was called vile names. Her professional and personal integrity was demeaned. Her character and intelligence were questioned. What Judge Jackson experienced was intentional bigotry. She was the target of premeditated violence from Senators Tom Cotton, Ted Cruz, Lindsey Graham, Marsha Blackburn, and Charles Grassley. Remember their names. Remember how they treated Judge Jackson. Do not believe them if they eventually make predictably fake excuses, assertions of good faith, and other efforts to downplay their bigotry and violence. Those vicious politicians could not crack Judge Jackson. They could not break her spirit. Through it all, Judge Jackson did what Bl

  ©Wendell Griffen, 2022   I am one of the more than thirty million (30,000,000) descendants of American slavery in this country. Our enslaved ancestors were shipped, sold, robbed, maimed, raped, murdered, and otherwise wronged from 1619, when a Dutch ship named the White Lion arrived at Jamestown, Virginia, until slavery was supposedly ended at the end of the civil war in 1865. That entire pattern of behavior happened openly. It happened officially. It was sacralized by preachers and congregations, carried on as part of daily business, and continued across successive generations. This society has done nothing to compensate the descendants of enslaved persons for 250 years of unpaid labor. This society has done nothing to compensate the descendants of enslaved persons for 250 years of life theft. This society has done nothing to compensate the descendants of enslaved persons for 250 years of rapes, castrations, mutilations, beatings, and murders. This society has done n

  © Wendell Griffen, 2022   What should your neighbors do if a bully broke into your home in broad daylight, began killing members of your family, and publicly announced that the killing would continue until you surrendered or abandoned your home? Should the neighbors send thoughts and prayers? Should they wear the favorite colors of your family? Should they stop doing business with the bully? Should they seize property and bank accounts owned by the bully? If neighbors welcomed you and your family into their homes, would that alter the reality that they refused to help you and your family fight the bully?   How would those responses make your neighborhood safer?  How are they consistent with the moral duty to value the lives and peace of neighbors as highly as we value our own lives and peace?   These questions have troubled me since Russian military forces invaded Ukraine on orders from Russian President Vladimir Putin. Thoughts, prayers, economic sanctions, and other