I wish Kid Oakland had written this dairy. Or perhaps Pastor Dan. And I’ll allow anyone with a truly powerful voice in this community the opportunity to steal from it freely. I even see one diary by Kalman immediately below mine that starts to go in this direction, but I think we need something even stronger.
I’ve spent the past week thinking about what this community can do in light of the media’s near comical portrayal of Jeremiah Wright and Trinity United Church of Christ. The most dangerous toxin injected into the political discourse for Senator Obama is not the strident foreign and domestic policy criticisms from Pastor Wright, (these are very real comments that must be dealt with separately), but the notion that Trinity United Church of Christ is somehow a "racist" church that is "anti-white" at its core. Clearly, the latter contention is entirely untrue, and there is absolutely nothing that confirms that assertion in either the words of the church or Jeremiah Wright. It is equally clear though that if this notion ever sinks into the public conscience via the commercial media, Obama’s candidacy will be forever poisoned. S what can we as a community do to help?
In 1964 "Freedom Summer" began with hundreds of white activists, Christian and Jewish alike, risking their lives (and the lives of those they worked with) to register black voters in Mississippi. Throughout the Deep South, African American churches were burned and churches were bombed, while deeply religious African Americans were killed and intimidated. It took the deaths of two young white men, Michael Schwerner and Andrew Goodman, however, to bring the attention of the national media and alert the public to what was really happening in the country. Alas, I think we are at another such moment wherein the progressive white community’s voice on Trinity UCC is now exceedingly critical to the national discourse. Because of the way in which race continues to be portrayed in America, I do not believe the Trinity United Church of Christ will ever get the positive media exposure it needs to clarify its positions or its Christian ideology. If African Americans speak for the church, they will simply be sidelined or marginalized by the media. Ten second sound bites will and already have replaced investigative journalism, and crude caricatures will continue be drawn that have no semblance whatsoever with reality. Unless of course, we do something to change that image.
Yesterday I came to the idea of having Senator Obama’s white supporters pack his church. The idea of an overwhelmingly Caucasian crowd flowing into UCC Trinity to hear the Gospel would, I believe, make for an extremely positive and possibly influential national media sensation. If this community, along with others such as Oprah Winfrey and her millions of viewers, could help mobilize and organize tens of thousands of white supporters to attend Trinity on Sundays (the larger the overflow crowds the better!) it would show the nation the very best side of the civil rights movements – black and whites meeting, praying together, worshiping together, and Sunday mornings would no longer be the most segregated hour in America.
An overflowing movement of white supporters to Trinity would also allow Senator Obama to be seen as a positive agent of transformation in the country. By shining the light on Trinity UCC in such a positive manner, we would help dispel any of the "dark, secret, anti-white" images and rumors that are bound to come out of the Swiftboating extremists during this election campaign. If we mobilize and stand-up now, we can help set the media agenda.
Are there Kossacks or Obama supporters in Chicago, Illinois, or elsewhere in the country that would be willing to help lead this charge? Isn’t this idea worth pursuing? Aren’t we after all, the ones we have been waiting for?