Pilgrimage to Little Rock! Part 1
As we find ourselves in the middle of our pilgrimage to Little Rock and drive through Tennessee, we begin to reflect on how this trip started. Yesterday on a Sunday morning, we gathered at the Charles St. AME Church in Dorchester with members of the African American Community who gave us an incredible send off. The service started and we could feel the love and energy in the atmosphere.
We all sat together through the service, people were singing, praying and celebrating god’s presence. In the middle of the service, Pastor Groover asked all the guests in the church to stand up. A group of people stood up, us included and one by one everybody introduced themselves. When it got to our group, we introduced ourselves and briefly spoke about the pilgrimage. Pastor Groover pointed out that we were his guests and continued to introduce the reason of our pilgrimage and the basic principle of equality in education. The congregation cheered and looked at us with excitement. After everybody introduced themselves, the pastor called us up to the altar. We kneeled down at the altar as our brothers and sisters form the congregation put their hands on our shoulders and held our hand while the pastor gave us his blessing. They wished us a safe trip, they embraced our courage to fight for education but most importantly, they valued and celebrated unity in our communities. As he was done with the blessing, everybody came to us to wish us well and give us hugs and handshakes. Color or race did not matter, what matter was that we are human beings each going on the pursuit of happiness and in our case, the pursuit of education.
"Listening to the sermon, I felt empowered. Every word he spoke led to a great belief in our success. "Access" was the key. We should have access to higher education, access to greater good, access to life liberty and the pursuit of happiness. We have access to God, and through him we will have access to all those things that are unjustly denied to us. In the powerful ceremony, the welcoming congregation inspired hope in our ability to change our communities." Dave - SIM Leader.
The service ended at about 1:40 PM. We all walked outside and agreed to go home and get all our things ready to meet at the SIM office at 6:00 PM to have a final check in before we left. A few hours later, we all began to arrive at the office; we sat around a table and started the check in. First, we divided into pairs and discussed how we were feeling about the trip and came up with a shared purpose. After that, we talked about certain norms for the trip, meaning the guidelines of how we would operate as a team throughout the whole journey, and then did a quick overview of all of our stops. Miles and hours later, we are close to Clinton, Tennessee; the home of the Clinton 12, the very first group of African American students who desegregated a school in the south, a year before the Little Rock 9.
When we arrived at Green McAdoo Cultural Center, we were greeted by two of the original white supporters who came on their day off to treat us with a tour of the Museum. As we walked through the exhibit and heard their stories, we asked if we could meet any of the Clinton 12. The tour guide said no, that they would be hard to reach and unavailable. We were compelled to tell them our story and Renata stepped up to share her struggles. The tension in the room increased, yet the white supporters were still interested, taken in by the story and ready to help. Immediately, he offered to call people who could help and before the night ended called us back with a meeting with 3 of the Clinton 12.
We are all tired, our 4 drivers are on the second round of 3 hour driving shifts but at the same time we are excited, not only for getting to meet such important people in American history, but to actually be creating history at the same time. We are writing a new narrative along with our brothers and sisters in this movement and we are well into the first paragraph!