Another Day to Never Forget

Dear Friends

Coming just five days after the anniversary of 9/11, a day we are encouraged to “never forget”, it would be easy to miss the anniversary of the murder of four little girls at a church in Birmingham, Alabama in 1963. The 60^th anniversary of that horrible day was yesterday, September 16^th.

The speech given by Supreme Court Justice Ketangi Brown Jackson was simply one of the best I have ever heard. Among other things, she reminded us that there are other days in our history to “never forget.”

An excerpt:

Knowledge of the past is what enables us to mark our forward progress.

If we’re going to continue to move forward as a nation, we cannot allow concerns about discomfort to displace knowledge, truth or history. We have to own even the darkest parts of our past, understand them and vow to never repeat them…”

Kathleen and I have visited several civil right memorials including ones dedicated to Emmet Till and Jonathan Daniels. But the day we parked in front of the 16^th Avenue Baptist Church in Birmingham (across the street from the park with statues depicting the firehoses and dogs used to attack demonstrators) we were moved immediately to tears, knowing the story and seeing the names of the four girls pictured above.  

We may all have some things in our lives we would like to forget and should forget. But as citizens of this country, there are some things we should never forget, and, indeed, should be taught to each new generation.

John

If you get a chance to google the speech, (recorded yesterday on C-SPAN) it would be worth your 27 minutes and 44 seconds! If you find the whole ceremony, this comes at the end.