NEW LIFE
A new life arrived on April 26, 2021. Granddaughter Evangeline Marie Maliekel was born. More than enough reason to continue to work toward a better world and toward being the change we seek. The song The Missing Peace was written 35 years ago for Evangeline Marie’s mother. It is dedicated today to Eva Marie and her future.
DEAR PARTNER LETTERS
The weekly Podcasts continue to be Dear Partner Letters. Last fall Mike McCoy and I celebrated 55 years of friendship and musical partnership. We were also commemorating 25 years McCoy has lived a life of faith. Before the Pandemic we planned to do some recording and performing to celebrate. As it turned out we are honoring those milestones with this series of letters. Here is a link to the latest.
Creating these letters has helped me see our lifetime relationship from different angles. Recently I realized McCoy and I have journeyed, individually and together, in search of lives of love and truth. Not always successfully but worth the effort.
Writing the Dear Partner Letter #21, My Witness, I saw the connection between McCoy’s dark night in 1995 and the revelation of my family’s secret in 1997. In both cases we were able to finally face the truth and in doing so learn the transformative power of love. That we were witnesses for each other during those times was an important tie that binds. Here’s a link to that Podcast.
LEARNING FROM HISTORY
For a long time I’ve been aware of the idea that those who cannot remember the past are doomed to repeat it. Recently I’ve wondered about the inverse of that idea: Those who remember the best of our past may be more likely to repeat it.
A moment in American history we should always remember is Bloody Sunday in Selma, Alabama and how that act of courage inspired the US Congress to pass the Voting Rights Act of 1965. That moment and the events that followed illuminate the best this country strives to be and illustrates how we are all served when more, not less, are given the right to vote.
Every time I hear of one more state legislature limiting the access to voting I think of President Lyndon Johnson’s words to a joint Session of Congress a few days after Bloody Sunday.
At times history and fate meet at a single moment at a single place to shape a turning point in our unending search for freedom. So it was at Lexington and Concord and a century ago at Appomattox and so it is now in Selma, Alabama…It is all of us who must overcome the crippling legacy of bigotry…and injustice. And We Shall Overcome.
I’m reminded of the words Dr. King spoke to the marchers days later near the steps of the Capitol in Montgomery.
In the end what we seek is a society at peace with itself, a society that can live with its conscience.
And I think again of being in Selma for the 50th anniversary of Bloody Sunday and hearing President Obama speak at the base of the Edmund Pettis Bridge.
We honor those who walked so we can run. We must run so our children soar and we will not grow weary because we believe in the power of an awesome God. And we believe in this country’s sacred promise. May He bless those warriors no longer with us.
Included in our country’s sacred promise is the right for everyone to vote and for all votes to count.
The passing of The Voting Rights Act of 1965 remains one of the most important examples of what makes this country both great and good. Legislatures who create barriers to voting would do well to remember the best of our country’s history and its sacred promise.
Here is a link to a bit more of the story from Remembering the Dream.
