Thanksgiving 2006

For the Sunday before Thanksgiving I was asked by my pastor to speak briefly to our congregation on what I was thankful for. This is what I said:

Thank you Miss Rosa, you are the spark,
You started our freedom movement
Thank you Sister Rosa Parks.

These lyrics by the Neville brothers honor the famous seamstress from Montgomery Alabama who defied the violence of Jim Crow and inspired a struggle for civil rights that continues to this day.

I hear the soaring vocals of Mahalia Jackson wash over me whenever I consider the courage of heroes like Parks, Dr. King, James Lawson, John Lewis, Fannie Lou Hamer...

And I am equally moved when I think of the thousands who often go unnoticed in their work for social justice.

One of these is Hee Pok "Grandma" Kim who learned her activism as a child aiding the Korean resistance to Japanese occupation and now in her 80s organizes fellow immigrants to demand the transit bureaucracy improve the deplorable conditions faced by the mostly working class people of color who ride the bus in L.A.

When I hear Christians say a million dollar home in the Encino hills with a collection of Porsches in the garage is a sign of God's blessing I am somewhat confused. It is true that everything we have is a gift from God, but shouldn't we see the truly blessed as those who have the strength to abandon material possessions--like the followers of Jesus--and give their lives over to serving the poor, the weak, the oppressed?

I don't have the gifts of a Parks or a Kim, but their resolve, and those who share their thread of the divine keep the dream flashing, pushing the divine within me to change the world.
And this is what I am thankful for.