Dear Sisters and Brothers,

In response to my comments about attending the events on Martin Luther King
Day, someone wrote me: "I wasn't planning to respond on this, but . . .
racism is not the unforgivable sin . . King didn't even sound like he could
affirm the Apostles Creed . . . Adultery/fornication automatically
disqualifies you for the ministry, whether you are Jimmy Swaggart, MLK,
Jesse J, Jimmy Bakker or whoever. MLK might have been a Christian, but he
had no right to be called a minister, period. He disqualified hisself.
Nobody else did, much less any racist white folks . . . Nor is this to deny
that God can judge this nation . . . by visiting a
fraud/hypocrite/opportunist of sorts like MLK upon it . . . and MLK was not
a communist/socialist, right? Still everybody today knows that the only
racist act in town is the white folks. That's the real lesson of all the MLK
Day festivities out there on the street if you can read between the lines of
the media propaganda, much less ignore it and look for yourself."

Dear ___,

Your thinking probably represents that of a lot of White Americans. Racism
is still quite pervasive. And yes, I agree that it is very much present in
the Black community, just as it is in the White. And you are also correct:
when the press touches on racism today, it generally focuses on that of
Whites. Of course, that's quite a change from the time when Walter Cronkite
mocked Dr. King on national television.

I am a Protestant minister who holds to the inerrancy and infallibility of
the Bible, confessing that it is the only rule for faith and life. I try to
preach expository sermons that are true to the text and hit people where
they live, even though I often fall very short of that ideal. Twenty years
ago our congregation established a Christian school that now has close to
five hundred students. We strive for academic excellence, scholarships for
children from poorer homes, and we do our best to teach our students a
biblical world and life view, particularly in our high school, so I tend to
attract a pretty conservative audience to the congregation I serve.

Younger people who haven't done a lot of research aren't bothered by my
joining with leaders in the African-American community trying to work for
the welfare of our community, even though I am often the only White
involved, as, for example, about six months ago, when about thirty of us met
with our mayor, and he promised to appoint a particular African-American man
as the next chief of police -- he's to make the announcement the end of this
week; I pray that he doesn't break his promise. Older folks, particularly
those who have read very extensively, aren't particularly bothered by my
trying to be a bridge between our two, divided communities, but many of them
have been disturbed by my very visible presence at Martin Luther King Day
events, especially back when I was the key-note speaker, and my remarks
ended up on television and in the newspaper.

I've had people try to get rid of me. Once I was very involved on the
opposite side of the fence from the Director of the Louisiana Baptist
Convention. The gentleman quietly went to work on one of my elders, the
president of a bank, trying to undermine his relationship with me. I guess
this was his method in dealing with Baptist preachers that didn't
wholeheartedly support the Cooperative Program, and he thought it would work
with the Presbyterians. But that elder knew that I was committed to the
Bible and telling the truth, and he knew I loved him, so he quietly
dismissed that inveigling denominational bureaucrat and reported the
incident to me. The state head of the Baptists is now dead, and I'm still
very much alive. When I was called to preach, the Lord impressed me with
Jeremiah 1:19, '"They will fight against you but will not overcome you, for
I am with you and will rescue you," declares the LORD.'

I'm sure quite a few of my folks have been embarrassed by me here and there
over the years -- one of my elders was once humiliated and quite angry when
he brought a wealthy couple to church -- they owned a good-sized
manufacturing company. But instead of impressing them, I broke down and
wept in the pulpit. (It was the only time that I remember doing that from
the pulpit, but I was preaching on hell and simply lost control.)

I try to do my pastoral work diligently, so these same folk know that I love
them. I get up and go in the middle of the night when they call. I visit
them when they're sick, in trouble or have a tragedy. I don't say "no" to
their requests unless the request would require me to sin. I've cut short a
vacation to come back to do a funeral. I took seriously what I was told
years ago: a congregation will put up with a whole lot if they know their
pastor loves them.

Bottom line . . . probably not a few of them view me like a kind, old,
generous uncle that's a little bit crazy once in a while, but most of the
time he's the person they call when they're in a fix. I buy the right to be
brazenly bold by letting folks walk all over me on all the things that don't
really matter.

Probably my closest male friend was the Central Louisiana leader of the John
Birch Society a few years back, and he has passed on a lot of things about
Martin Luther King to me. Every year he gives me a subscription to _The New
American_, and I enjoy reading some of its insightful articles. So what is
my response to him?

For most African-Americans, the national Martin Luther King Day holiday is
symbolic of the real beginning of overcoming several hundred years of
oppression within America. It isn't so much about a man, but about an ideal
of freedom. In Central Louisiana, it takes on a thoroughly Evangelical
tone. Legal oppression in America denied Blacks the right not only to read
and write, but sometimes even forbad them legally to marry each other.

Now, I will say this to anybody: that's as wicked as hell. It's damnable,
and it has left America with the legacy of pandemic bastardy. As I see the
influence of the worst elements of this youth-driven sub-culture conquering
the dying remnants of the Christian elements of an older American culture,
especially with regard to the sanctity of marriage, I am reminded that the
Lord our God is a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the
children to the third and fourth generation. (Exodus 20:5.) Does 2 Samuel
21:1-14 have anything to say to us in America today, other than, "Thank God,
I'm under the New Covenant!"? As I come to the chilling implications of 2
Samuel 21:14 ("After that, God answered prayer in behalf of the land."), I
understand that I am affected by what my ancestors and my federal
representatives did long before my time. It makes me wonder if systemic
racism isn't a curse on American society just like abortion and public
sodomy.

For me, marching in our city's annual Martin Luther King Day parade is like
saluting the American flag, the flag of a nation that has repeatedly refused
to acknowledge the Lord Jesus Christ in its Constitution, a nation whose
national leaders have included a lot of notorious, godless men -- adulterers
and murderers, like the victorious Union cavalry that committed genocide
against the Native Americans of the Western Plains. But I still love
America and haven't quit praying the words of the early twentieth century
hymn:

"O beautiful for pilgrim feet
Whose stern, impassioned stress
A thoroughfare for freedom beat
Across the wilderness!
America! America!
God mend thine every flaw,
Confirm thy soul in self-control,
Thy liberty in law!"

Was Dr. King guilty of so much of what his critics say and even some of his
friends acknowledge? Probably so. For me to attend his funeral back in
1968 was a statement to those around me, just as my marching is today. As a
White, Southern male, I acknowledge that I have been greatly influenced by
what my ancestors bequeathed to me. I stand in solidarity with them, owning
up to their failures and mine. In no small way, I see my actions not unlike
the prayer of Daniel:

"O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps his covenant of love with all
who love him and obey his commands, we have sinned and done wrong. We have
been wicked and have rebelled; we have turned away from your commands and
laws. We have not listened to your servants the prophets, who spoke in your
name to our kings, our princes and our fathers, and to all the people of the
land . . . O LORD, we and our kings, our princes and our fathers are covered
with shame because we have sinned against you." (Daniel 9:4-8.)

I stand in solidarity with a nation -- perhaps the best nation that has ever
been, but one nonetheless deeply flawed from its inception -- I acknowledge
my corporate, federal connection with this nation, not only now, but with
its history, a wonderful and inspiring history of freedom under law, but
also a history written with the blood of those whom it has oppressed and
enslaved and from whom it has stolen.

Dr. King's written statements represent a variety of theological positions.
Sadly, it's easy to find things that he wrote that are contrary to biblical
Christianity. Like most students, he tried to impress his teachers and win
good grades. He wrote to win over some of the theologically liberal
professors he had at Crozer Theological Seminary and Boston University. I
remember back in the sixties getting a perfect score on my zoology final
because I so perfectly traced my professor's particular theory of evolution
with so many intricate details put down to prove it. Did I believe what I
wrote over those three hours? No, but I lacked the intellectual firepower
to take on my professor and still get a good grade, so I hid a little
statement within, just as a conscience salve. Most folk don't do that; they
just vomit back what the professor has laid out. In saying that, I'm not
saying that Dr. King was a thorough-going, consistent, conservative
Protestant Evangelical, but he did confess Jesus Christ, notwithstanding
everything else.

Was he guilty of adultery? I wasn't there; I don't know. But his close
friend, Ralph David Abernathy, said that he was. I've known more than one
White conservative minister who committed adultery, and they're still in the
pulpit. (I don't know why, but folks seem to seek me out and tell me what's
going on in their lives, even at a General Assembly or presbytery meeting.
I guess they know that I'll really listen to them, keep it to myself, tell
them the unvarnished truth and pray for them.)

Were some of the Whites who reached out to Dr. King communists? Did they
reach out to him not because they cared about the plight of Blacks, but
because they sought to destabilize America during the Cold War? Probably
so. Where were all those Whites who "believed the Bible" back then? They
mocked Blacks and refused to allow them to attend White houses of worship --
at least that was my experience in South Carolina, when my Daddy voted with
the rest of the elders to refuse admittance to Blacks.

There have been three mainstream, Black approaches to overcoming the
egregious, violent oppression of the American system: that of Booker T.
Washington, that of Martin Luther King and that of Malcolm X. (Malcolm
Little.)

Dr. Washington and Dr. George Washington Carver sought to help Black folks
without confronting the sins of the American system.

Malcolm X sought to help Black folks by confronting the sins of the American
system _By Any Means Necessary_, including a willingness to use physical
violence.

Dr. King sought to help Black folks by confronting the sins of the American
system honestly but without violence. He sought self-consciously to instill
the teachings of the Lord Jesus Christ when he would speak to prepare people
for the outpouring of rage they were soon to experience as they publicly
confronted evil.

As I think about those three methods, I land squarely with Dr. King. He
cited Gandhi, to be sure, but he walked in the methods of the New Testament
in confronting evil -- not unlike the way the Apostle Paul did. Saint Paul
forced the Philippian government officials to come to the jail and public
acknowledge what they had done; he didn't take up arms against them, but he
did confront them: 'But Paul said to the officers: "They beat us publicly
without a trial, even though we are Roman citizens, and threw us into
prison. And now do they want to get rid of us quietly? No! Let them come
themselves and escort us out."' (Acts 16:37.)

Dr. King's good impact on the American system reminds me of the elegant,
open letter of the late A. Leon Higginbotham Jr., Chief Judge of the United
States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. (It is well worth reading.
)
Judge Higginbotham wrote to the young African-American judge, Clarence
Thomas, who was about to take Thurgood Marshall's seat on the United States
Supreme Court, reminding him that he stood today on the shoulders of those
who had sacrificed so much. His words remind me of Dr. King's dream at the
Lincoln Memorial back on August 28, 1963:

'I say to you today, my friends, that in spite of the difficulties and
frustrations of the moment, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply
rooted in the American dream.

'I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true
meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men
are created equal."

'I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former
slaves and the sons of former slave-owners will be able to sit down together
at a table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a desert state,
sweltering with the heat of injustice and oppression, will be transformed
into an oasis of freedom and justice.

'I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where
they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of
their character.

'I have a dream today.'

So, I'll continue to salute the flag and to march in memory of Dr. King. I
hope you'll consider doing so yourself next year.

Cordially in Christ,
Bob

Robert Benn Vincent, Sr.
Grace Presbyterian Church
4900 Jackson Street
Alexandria, Louisiana 71303-2509