Reactions and Reflections Re: Juneteenth

On our last meeting, Friday, June 7, we had a presentation about a project, “Telling the Whole Story”. This was a discussion between representatives of St. Barnabus Episcopal church, a Black congregation and All Saints Episcopal church, from which St. Barnabus was created in the early 1900’s in order to make All Saints a white congregation.

On Sunday, June 16^th a service was held at St. Barnabus with perhaps 150 attendees, which was the first time that the two congregations had come together to worship since the founding of St. Barnabas in 1923. June 16^th happened to be the day of the first service of St. Barnabas in 1923.

The sermon was given by Pastor Mark Chase, of All Saints. He referred to the current day work of the two churches as “planting seeds,” he referred to the fact that we often do not see the change we want resulting from the efforts we make. He made a connection to the fact that when planting seeds we do no see the result immediately. He also made the point that seeds often develop better in darkness. He described this situation as “ seeds not seen but sewn.”

The work these churches are doing, and what we are doing with our discussions are much the same. As a discussion group meeting regularly, over an extended period of time, we are sewing seeds, which we hope will grow to create a better world.

In other discussions recently, there have been a wide variety of opinions expressed about the Juneteenth holiday, these opinions have ranged from approval of the holiday to the idea that there should be such holiday at all. The negative feelings expressed did not come from white speakers, which might have been an expected outcome.

The idea of the holiday Juneteenth might be an interesting discussion for our upcoming meeting this Friday, on June 21 at 12PM Noon PST. Think about what the holiday means to you personally and what you think it does or should mean to the nation.

On a related topic, our commemoration of the Civil Rights struggle of the 1960’s, led by Jim Hendrick will continue on July 23 at 1PM PST. The presentation will be Civil Rights Movement Discussion: 1964 Freedom Summer. This is a member only, in person event and registration is required at the link shown above.

We look forward to an interesting discussion on Friday, June 21^st at 12PM PST.

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