Juneteenth

Today is Juneteenth. It marks the day, after the end of the Civil war, when slaves in Texas finally found out they were free. Union soldiers arrived and told them.

The Emancipation Proclamation was two years before, but word of it hadn't reached Texas--no cable news or cell phones or emails, remember.

June 19th has been celebrated by visiting graves, picnics and lots of singing ever since.

It is a day 'holy' to African Americans.

Which is why the President's plan to hold a rally on Juneteenth in Tulsa caused such an uproar.

As did Tulsa, the scene of some of the most vicious racial violence a century ago when whites burned black homes and businesses and churches to the ground and murdered several hundred people.

The President went on Fox News to tell people he had brought knowledge of Juneteenth to the country. The truth was, he didn't know what June 19th was about.

He asked an aid in the White House if they knew what Juneteenth was and she told him the White House staff sent out a press release on June 19 every year celebrating the day.

He didn't know that.

I have held people of color in my heart today (my way of 'praying') and held the protestors there as well.

This could--I said 'could'--be a time of a great reckoning and renewal for our country. Things could change drastically and for the much better.

I pray so. I will do what I can to make it happen, as little as that might be.

I urge you to as well.

We could find the end of the rainbow this time--peace, equality, freedom, hope and wonder.

(The opinions in this blog are mine and mine only and do not reflect on the opinions of the churches and people I serve.)