Juneteenth. Are we making any progress?

Many years ago I was honored to serve on a board that administered a scholarship fund in memory of Black gospel singer Alma Perry. Alma was a dear friend, and cancer cut her life short far too early. 

We met on a beautiful Saturday morning in downtown Grand Rapids. The date: June 19. In a nearby park along the Grand River, tents and booths were being erected for what would obviously be some kind of celebration. Venders were barbecuing ribs and hawking sweet potato pies. 

I innocently inquired as to what the heck was going on. I’m ashamed to confess that this was the very first time I had ever heard the word Juneteenth! 

Many decades later, I’m no longer a broadcast journalist. Now I’m a prisoner advocate, and I’m proud to say that I am now familiar with this new national holiday! 

Juneteenth celebrates the end of slavery, a pivotal time in race relations in our country. 

Sad statistics about prisoners help to emphasize why this holiday must remain so very important to all of us. 

-Black Americans are incarcerated in state prisons at nearly 5 times the rate of white Americans.

-One in 81 Black adults in the U.S. is serving time in state prison.

-Here in Michigan, more than half the prison population is Black. 

There more sad stats, not necessarily connected or related to incarceration. 

-In the recent Covid pandemic, Michigan and other states saw a huge disparity in who was dying of this disease.

-There is still a massive wealth and income gap against Black people.

-Black women are still dying in childbirth at a rate three times that of white women.

-The rate of infant mortality is almost three times for Black babies than for white babies.  

Says Michael Rafferty today’s Detroit Free Press: 

We need to get to a point where the color of someone’s skin doesn’t equate to a different reaction, reality, and experience whether it’s in the workplace, out to dinner, getting a bank loan or appraisal, or getting pulled over by a police officer. 

In Dr. King’s I HAVE A DREAM speech, he concludes with a message from scripture, “…the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.” 

Then he says: 

With this faith, we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day. 

On Juneteenth, 2023, I respond: “Amen and Amen!”

 

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