The Fierce Urgency of Prophetic Hope

Like each of you, I am hearing from many people who ask my opinion about what is going on in Gaza, Israel, and Palestine. Here are my thoughts. I am concerned about the current war in Gaza, Israel, and Palestine because I care about life, justice, truth, and peace as a follower, ordained minister, and pastor of a congregation of people whose faith and living are inspired by the teachings of an itinerant Palestinian Jewish rabbi named Jesus, who lived, suffered, and died under Roman military occupation.   (1) I have deep anger and sorrow for the victims of the Hamas attack on last Saturday, the Israeli counterattack, and for the men, women, and children who are being killed, injured, traumatized, and otherwise scarred every day by the horrendous violence associated with this war.  (2) I lament the casualties and destruction from the Hamas attack, the Israeli counterattack, the Israeli blockade, siege, and impending invasion of Gaza, and Israel's threat to depopul...

  ©Wendell Griffen, 2023   Mark Wingfield of Baptist News Global has written an analysis of the current war between Israel and Hamas. I am quoted in it along with others who hold shared and different perspectives.  https://baptistnews.com/article/in-this-war-there-are-no-good-guys/ The analogy Ashlee Wiest-Laird shared in Wingfield’s piece is appropriate. Nobody should expect people whose land has been stolen, who've been locked in a room of their house, denied basic protections and civil rights, attacked at will by a stronger, US financed, stocked, and cheered military that is the fourth largest in the world, and whose 75-year plea for justice has been belittled, to decide that fighting their way out of the hellish place they have been forced into is unreasonable.  I wrote a long piece for Baptist News Global in May of this year to mark the 75th anniversary of the Palestinian Nakba (meaning "catastrophe") that provides the historical context for the war no...

  ©Wendell Griffen, 2023   A Little Rock, Arkansas police officer shot Brendon Johnson a few days ago ( https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2023/oct/05/lr-officer-facing-shooting-charge/ ). That Little Rock police officer shot Brendon Johnson in the back of his head as Brendon was fleeing – moving away from him – in a vehicle. The Little Rock police officer shot a fleeing person who was not threatening physical harm to anybody. That police officer was recruited, hired, trained, and deployed by the same police agency that hired, trained, and deployed a former Little Rock officer who shot 15 times and killed Bradley Blackshire on February 22, 2019, less than five years ago. The police officer who shot Brendon Johnson in the back of the head was recruited, hired, trained, and deployed by the same police agency that recruited, hired, trained, and deployed another former Little Rock officer who shot and killed unarmed Bobby Moore III on August 12, 2012, eleven years ago. ...

  ©Wendell Griffen, 2023   I am a product of public education. I was born September 23, 1952 – making me now 71 years old – when Jim Crow public segregation was required by law in Arkansas. Although my family lived less than three miles from Delight High School (in Pike County), I didn’t know where it was until September 1965, when Black children from my rural neighborhood began attending Delight High School for the first time. ·       That was eleven (11) years after the Supreme Court of the United States issued the landmark decision in Brown v. Board of Education . ·       That was eight (8) years after nine Black children were admitted to Little Rock Central High School thanks to the presence of troops from the 101 st Airborne Division.            P ublic education was segregated by race in Arkansas. And the inequities associated with Jim Crow public education were known by religious ...

  © Wendell Griffen, 2023   In Chapter 22 of To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee’s classic novel about racial injustice, there is an unforgettable line spoken by Miss Maudie, a white woman, to Jem Finch, a white boy whose father, a lawyer named Atticus Finch, had defended a Black man named Tom Robinson who was wrongly charged with raping a white woman. Jem was appalled at the bigotry white people expressed towards Robinson and was crushed about the guilty verdict. In an attempt to provide encouragement to Jem and his sister, Scout, Miss Maudie invited them to her home for cake. She noticed that Jem was upset about the outcome of the trial and the racial prejudice he had witnessed. In an attempt to console the boy, Miss Maude said: “Don’t fret, Jem. Things are never as bad as they seem.” I wish that Harper Lee had given Jem permission to make this response to that comment. “Miss Maudie, you’re right. Things are never as bad as they seem. Sometimes they are worse.”  H...

  ©Wendell Griffen, 2023   Maina Mwaura wrote a recent article in Baptist News about Cornel West's campaign to become President of the United States. If you haven't already read it, I invite you to do so. https://baptistnews.com/article/cornel-west-also-is-running-for-president/ After you’ve read the article, will you share it? Will you invite others to think aloud with you about Dr. West, his career, and the values he articulates? Why not? Why shouldn’t you treat Cornel West as a legitimate and sensible alternative to any of the other people who are announced candidates for the highest elective office in the United States, including Joe Biden and Donald Trump? Whether you agree with West or not, why should you refuse to consider his candidacy as a prophetic and politically sensible alternative to any of the other candidates? Why not weigh his values, vision, and commitment to democracy, inclusion, justice, peace, and global well-being alongside what the other ca...

  ©Wendell Griffen, 2023 In 1999, I made the following comments in a paper titled Race, Law, and Culture:   A Call to New Thinking, Leadership, and Action . [1] The great need for our society regarding racial equity in the 21 st Century is new thinking, new leadership, and new action about racism and racial justice.   Without new thinking, new leadership, and new action about racism and its results, we will merely perpetuate past mistakes and re-institutionalize centuries of ingrained racism.   The question is whether we, as a society, have the character to embrace new thinking, accept new leadership, and rise to new action concerning racism, an issue that has been always with us but about which we are virtually phobic. …By racism, I mean the belief system by which persons are subordinated, subjugated, and otherwise accorded inferior status and treatment due to race.   Racism has infected American thinking concerning history, economics, law, culture, an...