If you don't know about the Jena 6 case by now, you should go here. Or here. It's another horrifying proof that we still have a long way to go.
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People who know me know that I'm not religious at all, but I'm open to everything, even though I don't like the idea of having to be inside of a church, or a temple, or a synagogue, so I can get my ticket to heaven. I think spirituality is much more personal than that, and it requires no rules, or poses any punishments, or suffering for "disappoint" your God. Anyway, I went to church today with a friend. It was a mostly black church, not my first time, but the biggest and loudest one I've ever been. On the way in, I was handed a flyer that said "A Litany and Prayer for the Families of the Jena 6". Here's a excerpt:
"We will not be silenced. We remember the Scottsboro boys and the lynching of old. We honor the memory of Emmett Till and the Birmingham Four Little Girls. We stand with the righteous steadfastness of Angela Davis, The Wilmington 10 and Nelson Mandela and the Rivonia Six. We will not be silenced for we know through all generations, from Ramah to Jena, Your name Spirit, that convicted our ancestors, Rosa Parks, Fannie Lou Hamer, Medgar Evers, Malcom X, Martin Luther King, and so many others, runs through our veins. (...)
Bryant Purvis, Jesse Beard, Carwin Jones, Theodore Shaw, Robert Bailey, Jr and Mychal Bell, now know as the Jena 6, stand before the unrighteous courts of this land - a symbol of a new generation's reminder never to forget the things of old - the tree, the noose, the unreachable bail, the three hour trial of a kangaroo court - guilty as charged and sentenced - maximum term - as American as apple pie."
