Meadville Alum March for
Justice in Jena, Louisiana

September 21, 2007

In a letter to other Unitarian Universalist ministers earlier this month, Lyn Oglesby, MDiv '05, told her colleagues about a recent conversation with an African-American minister of a large Baptist church in Shreveport, Louisiana, whom she met through Interfaith work.

Oglesby told her colleagues that the minister said, "Lyn, I remember James Reeb. I'm from Alabama.  I remember that the Unitarians came to Selma.  My daddy was an organizer.  I remember that the Unitarians came when we needed help .  and they were just about the only white folks there."

"My heart leaps every time I think about that conversation with a prominent minister who was only a boy then," Oglesby continued on in her letter to UU ministers. "But he remembers that we answered the call and made a point of telling me so."

It was with these words that Oglesby issued her own call to action to her colleagues, asking them to help her raise awareness about the unequal dispensation of the law to six African-American youths in a small town in Louisiana, now known as The Jena Six.

For her part, Oglesby and the congregation she serves, All Souls Unitarian Universalist Church of Shreveport (ASUUCS), joined with the Northern Central Louisiana Interfaith to host a Prayer Meeting and Service earlier this week to raise awareness to the issues of justice. The congregation at All Souls also, on September 9, approved a resolution condemning the withholding of justice in the case of the Jena Six.

And on September 20, 2007, Oglesby, with 19 members of ASUUCS attended the rally held in Jena, Louisiana.  Joining the Shreveport contingent were two other recent graduates of Meadville Lombard, Eliza Galaher, MDiv '07 and Fred Hammond, MDiv '07. Galaher trekked to Louisiana from Austin, Texas, where she serves Wildflower Church and Hammond from Jackson Mississippi, where he serves the UU Church of Jackson.

Hammond says he responded to Oglesby's call to come to Jena for several reasons. "The major reason is because we have a criminal justice system in the United States that is infused with institutionalized racism.  Not all of the facts about Jena have been reported to the press.  There was white on black violence before the incident involving the Jena 6.  The white students were given the equivalent of a wrist slap for their instigation," said Hammond. "No one is saying that the Jena 6 were right in their beating up the white student. But there is a disparity in the application of the laws of the land. White students get their wrists slapped; Black students get their lives destroyed just as the District Attorney had threatened would happen with a stroke of his pen."

Oglesby said at the march there were "few white faces other than those of the Unitarian Universalists from Shreveport, Baton Rouge and New Orleans . in a sea of African American faces from as far away as New York state and Alaska, Baltimore, Washington, DC, and North Carolina."

Hammond said he felt it was also important to "show a white face in support." He said many of the people marching with them were thrilled they were there, but were also puzzled by their presence. "They asked us why we were there, implying that it was not our issue. Well, it is our issue. We can not have justice for all, if all do not work for justice. The injustice done in Jena is not just a black injustice. It is an injustice that is pervasive in our American legal system and it affects all people, of all races. I was in Jena to give witness that all of America needs to speak up about this injustice against Americans."

Galaher, in a sermon to the Wildflower UU Church on Sunday, September 17, explains her reasons for going to Jena, Louisiana:

On a religious level, Ibrahim Abusharif states that religion has "always sought to help us remember, not something new, but what we all know intuitively. In each of us there is this soul." But, Abusharif says, "in the tumble of a crowded life, we are prone to silence or ignore" it. As I've learned about the Jena Six, I've felt my soul wanting to uphold the Unitarian Universalist principle of "justice, equity, and compassion in human relations." To show up in Jena with people of all faiths is to refuse to be lost in the "tumble of a crowded life." It is to show our support for justice, and to say, we are all here to inscribe each other on the pages of life.

Lee Barker, President of Meadville Lombard said "we're not surprised to hear that Meadville Lombard graduates were in the streets of Jena yesterday protesting yet another instance of racial injustice in this country. By their presence, Lyn, Eliza, and Fred hold up ministries that call for true equality and protection under the law.  They also hold up the hope that that the world can be more fair and the faith that all people may one day live in harmony. We're not surprised, but we are enormously proud."