But attempts to form a more perfect union were being made.
- “creation of a bipartisan commission to investigate asserted violations of civil rights and to make recommendations;
- creation of a civil rights division in the Department of Justice in charge of an Assistant Attorney General;
- enactment by the Congress of new laws to aid in the enforcement of voting rights; and
- amendment of the laws so as to permit the Federal Government to seek from the civil courts preventive relief in civil rights cases.
2
Dad wanted absolutely to not have the newfangled TV contraption sitting in our house. He was perfectly content with our state of the art 1938 Zenith radio, and I have to admit the cabinet was a majestic piece of craftsmanship to behold and the electronics produced superb audio quality. By 1952 programming had become so well refined that, to advertisers delight, listeners found it was hard to resist. The more popular broadcasts included "The Lone Ranger", "Perry Mason", "Dragnet",“Gunsmoke”, “The Jack Benny Program”, The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show”, "I Love Lucy", "The Adventures of Superman", "The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet", "Guiding Light”, “Amos and Andy”, “The Shadow”, “Fibber McGee and Molly”, and “The National Barn Dance”. Toss in a constant mix of sports programming and there was something for everyone to love.
Dad wasn’t the only one who found TV resistible. The list price for a 1952 Dumont model 30T380 was $1,795 which was almost precisely 1/2 the average American family’s annual household income at the time. A TV set was more than 5 times the price of a top grade radio. Then, of course, you also needed an antenna. While rabbit ears worked fine near the urban broadcast towers, In rural areas antenna meant an expensive monstrous gizmo mounted on top of the roof or an even more expensive stand-alone tower. Also a clunky remote controlled rotor was needed to precisely aim the antenna for best reception.
That first TV broadcast I ever saw was the October 26, 1951 Joe Louis vs Rocky Marciano match. It lasted into the 8th round whereby Joe caught a left hook followed by an overhand right that sent him into La-la land. The picture was snowy and the horizontal and vertical controls required constant readjustment, but the FM sound was good making it possible to keep up with the action. Our host had invited several other neighborhood friends and had folding chairs set up directly in front of the set for the male members to sit and watch the fight while the unliberated June Cleavers fixed refreshments in the kitchen. Meanwhile us tag-along kids were left alone to entertain ourselves - mostly running wild throughout the house in a make-shift game of cops and robbers or cowboys and Indians - I’m not sure which - or that it mattered. What I am sure of is, that at the end of the proceedings Dad was even more unimpressed with the TV thing. But that all changed abruptly only a few weeks later when it was announced that the Illinois Fighting Illini would be participating in the first ever televised Rose Bowl game. Then it became incumbent that we own a TV.
Most of the programs we enjoyed listening to on the radio had already begun also broadcasting on TV. Even though we had a set in the living room awaiting the Rose Bowl, Dad was reluctant to make the transition from radio to TV and insisted we listen to “The Lone Ranger” on the Zenith rather than watch the televised version. But Dad was seldom home during the day, and Mom, more receptive to change, thought It would not damage our impressionable young minds if we were allowed to watch Miss Frances ring her bell to commence a session of “Ding Dong School” or Buffalo Bob banter with “Howdy Doody”.
Mom was a big fan of Arthur Godfrey whom she alternately watched on TV, or if too busy, listened to the simulcast on the radio. There were times when Arthur was radioing in the kitchen and televising in the living room simultaneously. It was a bit confusing in the dining room where you could hear both because the audios were not perfectly in sync with one another.
Arthur was an early and strong supporter of the civil rights movement and was not shy about letting it be known on his broadcasts. He was an advocate of desegregation and sharply criticized Senator Talmadge when Talmadge declared, ”He would sooner end public education in Georgia than allow Black children to attend school with white children.”
What had gotten the Georgia Senator’s shorts in a bind was that a sacred pillar of Southern culture, segregated public education, was being attacked in the courts. Brown vs Board of Education of Topeka was working its way up to the Supremes, and Plessy v. Ferguson, a legal case decided in 1896 in which the US Supreme Court put forward the controversial “separate but equal” doctrine, was in danger of being overturned.
Jim Crow’s days were numbered. Senator Talmadge knew it and was having nightmares of Black boys sitting next to White girls in the cafeteria and maybe even holding hands. HORRORS! The Reverend Martin Luther King knew it and was dreaming dreams that “one day right there in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.” Bobby Zimmerman knew it. “The times they Are a-Changin.” Arthur Godfrey knew it and was doing his part through his broadcasts to enlighten his audience to accept the change. .
June 5 The House agreed to adopt a rule for debate on HR 6127.
June 18 HR 6127 passed the House by a roll-call vote of 286-126.
June 20 HR 6127 was placed on the Senate calendar.
July 16 the Senate agreed to consider HR 6127.
St. Louis still led the pack on Aug 4 when they beat the Phillies 4 to 1 with Lindy on the mound.
But after that win they lost 9 games in a row - 6 of those against the Cubs,.
Aug 7 the Senate passed an amended HR 6127 by a roll-call vote of 72-18.
4
Fayetteville County Tennessee A.D.1959
So, Lucas, you called for this here'ns White Citizen’s Council meeting, what’s it all about.
Some of our colored have gotten the high minded notion that they could register to vote, so we alls had better reckon about just’n hows we’s gonna deal with that.
Whatever in blazes gave them a crazy idea like that. It ain’t even legal is it - I mean them being nigahs and supposing they got rights?
You know, we’ve always been good to our black neighbors; treating them just like they were practically kin. Course they hain’t and never could be. Having received the curse of Ham, God intended them to be our hand maids and servants. Ain’t necessarily anyone’s in particulars fault, them being inferior to us, but it is what it is, and tarnation if we just twiddle our thumbs while they try and imaginate themselves our equals.
So can they vote?
Oh, you better believe it’s legal according to the civil rights bill congress passed in ’57, but that only makes it legal, it sure as rain don’t make it right. In the natural order of things, Black folk, being of lesser industry and intelligence, need us’n White folk to rule over them. Else wise they’d get in a heap lot of trouble trying to make complicated decisions for themselves. Most of ‘em, I thought, understood and appreciated the necessity of White rule. God knows they couldn’t do it for themselves.
Well, they do, and did, pretty much respect the natural order of things ’til this black agitator, John McFerren, began stirring the pot. T’ain’t so much that John gives a lick about his kind voting, but unregistered black folk are excluded from being called for jury duty. You heared how Burton Dodson was finally convicted of murdering a white deputy sheriff. So, McFerren thinks, had African-Americans who make up 70% of our population served as jurors, Dodson wouldn’t had been convicted. That’s the real bug in McFerren’s crawl. He wants Blackies serving on jury duty.
Holy Moses! We can't let that happen? Think about it. Blacks won’t just be serving on trials of other Blacks, they will also be sitting in judgment over us. And that is just fundamentally as wrong as wrong can be. Can you Imagine it? Yourself being tried by nigahs? What possible justice could you expect?
As bad as that sounds, I don’t want them voting neither. They outnumber us in this here county nearly 2 to 1. Enough of ‘em voting and you’ll never see another white face elected to office. It just ain’t right. It ain’t natural. It ain’t what God intended.
One thing for sure I’m gonna do. Any black tenant renting from me that haps to register to vote is gonna be evicted lickety split.
Well now there’s a doable plan. I don’t rent no property but I certainly have enough of ‘em buying groceries from me. I don’t see the need to sell vittles to any of ‘em I hears is registering to vote. Nope, it just wouldn’t be right feeding the uppity ones.
How about you, doc? They is always mucking up your place. Times I’ve seen the colored section totally filled, and white folk hav’n to wait just for a simple shot or some pills.
Count me in. Just keep me up to date with the latest registration list. If they want to vote they can see a midwife or one of their own herbalists. I hear fat back and collard greens will cure most anything.
Okay, I’m sure we’re on to something here. It’ll be simple enough to keep track of who’s showing up to register. It’s public record, you know. If we pull together, we will put a kibosh on all this nonsense from the git-go. Congress wants darkie to vote, then congress can provide him with food, housing, and medical care. Because we ain’t having none of it.
The white citizen's council dutifully kept a blacklist of African Americans who registered to vote. Most white business owners in the county refused to sell goods or provide services to anyone whose name appeared on the list, and most white farm owners evicted Black sharecroppers who had lived on their land for decades. The few white citizens who dared to stand against the blacklisting were themselves boycotted and shunned by other white citizens in the county.
Many evicted families moved into encampments, living in surplus Army tents, on land owned by black activists Shepard Towles and Gertrude Beasley.
Asked for help, the local Red Cross claimed aid was not required and refused to provide assistance to the displaced black citizens.
Television and other media drew public attention to “Tent City,” and newly elected President John F. Kennedy took notice and had his brother, the Attorney General Robert Kennedy, investigate civil rights violations in Fayetteville County. He also ordered the federal government to send food to feed the homeless families.
The spotlight of national media, also evoked national sympathy that resulted in direct assistance from organizations nationwide: including the AFL-CIO, the UAW, the Teamsters, Cornell University, the University of Wisconsin, and the Quakers. Voter registration drives intensified and Black registered voters did become the majority in the county, although that did not translate quickly into a controlling majority.
Tent city dispersed as its residents mostly moved in with friends and relatives or left the county altogether. Only a very few returned to the tenant farms they were evicted from.
My Town
No Negroes were being evicted from my hometown, not that my hometown was any less racist, it wasn’t, it was because no Negroes lived there. I can’t think of any reason they would want to live there, but that point is mute because, like most other towns in downstate Illinois, my hometown had an ordinance that banned Negroes from sundown to sunup.
My small town was in rapid decline during my youth. It was a County Seat that otherwise depended wholly on merchandising to local farmers for its welfare. But local farmers were rapidly becoming scarce as mechanization exponentially expanded the acreage one person could cultivate, so the community was dramatically losing its market base.
During my early primary school days the town had 3 barbershops, 3 farm equipment emporiums, 4 gas stations, an appliance store, a five and dime, a furniture store, a dress shop, a shoe store, 3 eating establishments and 4 grocers. When I left to go to college there was 1 barber working out of his home, 1 farm equipment dealer, 1 gas station, no appliance store, no five and dime, no furniture store, nor dress shop, or shoe store, and only 1 greasy spoon diner. The theater had also closed down, and the local blacksmith had shod his last horse. The welding shop, after exploding when torch was applied to a not quite empty oil barrel, was not rebuilt. The train depot and bus station had long gone the way of the horse and buggy.
Who was to blame for this devastation? I’m not sure a finger could rightly be pointed in any one direction. I’m darn sure it wasn’t a result of integration. I’m equally sure it wasn’t because of uncontrolled emigration across the Rio Grande. Maybe it was fluoridation, or possibly the Trilateralist Commission; or could it be the U.N., the Elders of Zion, or, more than likely, the books school kids were being allowed to read.
I know books have a great influence. Reading The Robe and then rereading it, I became convinced I was every bit the lost soul Marcellus Gallio was, and I desperately needed to accept the faith of Demetrius.
There’s a Fountain Flowing Deep and Wide
In the Campbelite tradition atonement was a 5 step process, a fact I was fully taught in Vacation Bible School, where during craft time I used a wood burning iron to emboss Hear, Believe, Repent, Confess, Baptism into five plywood plaques jigsawed to represent five footsteps.
After my baptism I made it a point to not miss a church service. I even went to the Wednesday night men’s prayer meeting. While all male members of the church are invited, it actually turned out to be a meeting of only the church leadership, and they were required to attend. The pastor, two elders, four deacons were there, as were the song leader and Sunday school superintendent. Two Sunday school teachers also attended. The female Sunday school teachers were not expected to attend this male exclusive club, and, of course, there were no women in leadership roles.
I obviously was the youngest one there, by at least twenty years, and I thought this might cause some consternation, but if it did, I didn’t pick up on it. They reacted to my presence as if it were an expected normal thing. No one made a fuss over me. No one talked down to me. I was just there like everyone else was just there.
The meeting began with the Pastor presenting a list of prayer concerns to consider. So and so was in the hospital. So and so was home from her bladder operation. So and so’s army son was stationed overseas in a hot zone. So and so’s husband had a wandering eye. So and so hasn’t attended a church service in over 5 weeks. etcetera and etcetera
Attendees dutifully jotted down the concerns on pads and then offered the Pastor a few prayer needs they were aware of that he had not mentioned, which he then added to his list. This all took approximately 15 or so minutes, after which the pastor adjourned us.
Instantaneously, like a designed football play, upon pastor’s departure, the men moved to new positions in the church. Ready for action. Of course I was unprepared and like a dummy remained seated not knowing where to go. But only a few seconds passed before one of the elders suggested I join him.
I was obviously observing a routine maneuver. The elder I was not with laid hands on the open lectern Bible and prayed fervently. The song leader paced around his position on the dais, and with hands lifted and eyes closed made appeals to God. Two of the deacons prayed kneeling with hands stretched out over various individual pew positions in the nave addressing the needs of the member who sat there, or maybe who was absent on Sunday morning last. A third deacon did the same in an anteroom reserved for mothers with squawking babies. The fourth deacon, standing erect as if greeting people, prayed in the vestibule.
The Superintendent and two Sunday school leaders went off to the annex where the classrooms were located, while the elder who rescued me led me to the communion table and directed me to pray over the host while he prayed over the wine - which was actually grape juice according to our tradition. No prior life experience had prepared me for this role. Now I lay me down to sleep… wasn’t going to cut it any more than God is great God is good… so I recited as best I could remember the Lord’s Pray and 23rd Psalm while the elder, in unintelligible deep guttural groaning utterances, poured out his heart and soul. I felt assured that his fervent pleadings more than compensated for my feeble effort.
The prayer part of the meeting broke up when the deacons had finished praying over the last pew. I then came to understand that some of these prayers were specific requests by certain family members for certain other lost family members to accept Jesus as their Lord and Savior. I wondered if my name hadn’t recently been one of those poor lost wretched souls.
After exhausting intercessory prayer, the men now spent a few minutes of unwinding with small talk about crops, sports, the weather, and what not. You could tell they genuinely liked and respected one another. A true family of God.
As I walked home I felt refreshed and elated about my choice to join the family. I realized it would take a lot of growing-up to achieve the faith these men exhibited, but I did not feel inadequate. I felt sure I had what it takes.
It never for a second occurred to me these men could be racist pigs. Everything about their exhibition of faith contradicted any possible animosity towards another creature of God.
The maxims of Christ were love one another, treat others as you wished to be treated, and love thy neighbor as thyself. The lessons of the Old Testament, as practiced and illuminated by Christ, were to treat the sojourner as family, forgive those who trespass against you, and turn the other cheek. What separated Christianity from many other world religions was, in the mind of God there was no distinction between rich and poor, slave and freeman, neighbor, kin, and foreigner.
The book of Ruth, the parable of the Good Samaritan, the Woman at the Well, the Sermon on the Mount, ad-infinitum the overall text of the Bible screamed out the equality of all humankind.
Matt. 5.34-36 Then the King will say to those on His right hand, ‘Come, you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: for I was hungry and you gave Me food; I was thirsty and you gave Me drink; I was a stranger and you took Me in; I was naked and you clothed Me; I was sick and you visited Me; I was in prison and you came to Me.’
I am sure the Wednesday night prayer meeting men would be horrified if they thought for a split second that they were on the King’s left hand. And our merciful Lord, through His infinite grace, may anyway deem them as righteous. But to my knowledge never once did one these men acknowledge fault or object to our fair village’s sundown ordinance.
And in my boldness, when I asked a minister of our faith how he would respond to a person of color attending our service, he, without hesitation, replied that that person would be most unwelcome. They had their own Christian Churches to attend. That’s the way it's always been. That’s the way it’s meant to be. So that’s the way it’s going to be.
World without end, Amen, Amen
5
I began driving at age 14 for all things farm related. This meant the mile from town to our farm parcel, anywhere on our farm, and in town to get gas, supplies needed on the farm, the grain elevator etc.
Now, age 16, I could drive legally anywhere. And I did, and I loved it. I loved the old Dodge, no frills, 4 on the floor, flathead six, half ton pickup as much as the Beach Boys loved their little deuce coup. Probably even more. The engine was so simply engineered that just about any problem could be fixed with a wrench or screwdriver. But it was not temperamental at all, and could withstand great abuse - which it got crossing farm fields and traveling muddy roads. I could say the 49 Dodge pickup was my first love, and at age 14 that could have been true, but by age 16 I had another teenage sweetheart, later to become my wife and lifelong companion, and priorities got totally rearranged.
I still cherished my Schwinn, and my paper route business had expanded to include morning deliveries. In addition to my Journal Gazette afternoon route, I was delivering early morning editions of the Decatur Herald, the Chicago Tribune, the Sun Times, and the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. I really liked the morning route. It meant getting up at 5AM and going over to Woolen’s Drugs to pick up the newspapers from the dispatcher who came from Decatur. I paid the dispatcher directly for the papers I needed to deliver, which was different from my afternoon route where I wrote biweekly checks to the Journal Gazette. The doughnuts usually arrived while I was folding the papers, or at least they would be there when I finished my route. I snagged one or two, and paid Mr. Woolen by leaving coins in the doughnut box.
Dawn broke while I was making deliveries. The pastel sky painting of the early morning sunrise, as it overwhelmed the last twinkling star, was always amazing. And as the sun was making its dramatic appearance over the horizon, indoor house lights were being turned on, and outdoor porch lights turned off - the light show composing a Shakespearean narrative of diurnal life as I cycled my way down the streets of hamlet.
Teenage romance is costly. My paper routes did not cover the expenses of weekend dates. Barn painting, concrete mixing for Meeker’s storage bins, and farm labor baling hay, detasseling corn, and cultivating bean crops made weekend wooing possible. Not to complain; seriously I loved the sweaty manual labor, the camaraderie that went with it, and the cooling off dip in the spring-fed pond that ensued. These experiences were formative. I still enjoy physical activity. I still get up before 5 AM every morning. Most important, my experience taught me at an early age the value of managing money and to appreciate physical labor.
As basic as the 49 pickup was, it did have a radio, and a very good one that easily picked up WLS which had converted to all rock in 1960. The Dodge radio produced full tones not heard on small transistor radios. It was almost irresistible to not stomp the accelerator as Del Shannon’s Runaway blared through the speakers. Dion’s Runaround Sue, and Chubby Checker’s Let’s Twist Again kept the tires rapidly spinning. But the Shirelles’ Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow and Dedicated to the One I Love mellowed the tempo. Meanwhile, Patsy Cline was Falling to Pieces, Roy Orbison was Crying, Bobby Lewis was Tossin’ and Turnin’, and Barry Mann was wondering Who Put the Bomp in the Bomp Bomp Bomp? Soon to be on the charts, 19 year old Bob Dylan traveled east from Minnesota to meet 48 year old Woody Guthrie who was dying with Huntington’s disease at Greystone Park Psychiatric Hospital in New Jersey.
Henry Mancini also made a top twenty song with Moon River which was the theme song for the box office hit Breakfast at Tiffany’s starring Audrey Hepburn, George Peppard, Buddy Ebsen, and Mickey Rooney. With Blake Edwards as director and based on Truman Capote’s book, Breakfast at Tiffany’s was by far my favorite movie of 1961 and among my favorites ever. Only a few other films worth noting came out of Hollywood that year. The Misfits with Marilyn Monroe, Clark Gable, and Montgomery Clift in the cast didn’t live up to promise. But West Side Story was definitely a financial success with an innovative script and memorable music composed by Leonard Bernstein. Roger’s and Hammerstein’s Flower Drum Song also earned rave reviews. Lover Come Back, The Guns of Naverrone, The Parent Trap, La Dolce Vita, were other1961 releases I saw, or least paid to see, on weekend dates.
The Saint Louis Cardinals finished in the middle of the National League Pack ahead of the Pirates, Cubs, and Phillies. With a roster including Bob Gibson, Tim McCarver, Ken Boyer, Red Shoendienst, Curt Flood, and Stan Musial you would expect a better ending. But it didn’t really matter, the Yankee’s won twice as many games as they lost during the regular season and were fated to give a drubbing to whomever they met in the World Series. Mickey Mantle, Whitey Ford, Roger Maris, Yogi Berra, Clete Boyer, Elston Howard, and company definitely ruled.
6
1 week after confederates opened fire on Fort Sumter and precisely 100 years before my 16th birthday the 6th Massachusetts recruits arrived by train in Baltimore. They needed to cross Baltimore by horse drawn carriages and board another train that would take them to DC to join with troops summoned by the 16th president to put down the southern insurrection. Maryland, a slave state, had many southern sympathizers, and they formed a mob to prevent the Massachusetts’s regiment from crossing their city. During this initial confrontation prior to Manassas Junction, four Massachusetts' soldiers and 12 rebels lost their lives.
100 years later segregationist were again opposing interstate travel. Jim Crow laws made it illegal for Blacks to use most public transportation. CORE organized freedom riders boarded buses in DC bound for New Orleans to challenge these racist regulations. Their ride ended, as Martin Luther King predicted, in Alabama 100’s of miles short of its Louisiana goal. After suffering beatings and arrests in Virginia and South Carolina, the Freedom Riders were met by over 100 Klansmen in Anniston, Alabama. As the first bus pulled up, the driver yelled outside, “Well, boys, here they are. I brought you some niggers and nigger-lovers”
After the bus had been firebombed and its passengers beaten in multiple mob attacks, CORE leader James Farmer called a halt to this initial Freedom Ride.
SNCC next took up the cause beginning their freedom ride in Nashville, only to be pulled over and arrested in Birmingham for defying segregation laws. The riders were forcibly transported back to Nashville.
A third attempt was made. Again sponsored by SNCC and departing from Nashville, and this time, with the support of AG RFK, the riders made it all the way to Montgomery Alabama. There they were confronted by a white mob who beat them severally inflicting numerous permanent injuries. Local police took the side of the mob and served the riders with an injunction prohibiting them from reentering the bus.
This injustice, and the media furor it created, prompted the Feds to get even more involved, and National Guard support was given to 27 Freedom Riders who continued on to Jackson, Mississippi. There they were arrested and jailed. Robert Kennedy doubled down ordering the ICC to enforce desegregation in interstate travel. With this added support multiple freedom rides broke out across the south, and by September civil rights leaders felt they had succeeded in accomplishing their mission. At least, enough so, the Freedom Rides were suspended and the energy it created was transferred to other operations.
7
..they clothed him with purple, and platted a crown of thorns, and put it upon his head ...
The senseless Roman Soldiers. Taking orders with no thought of the consequences. No sorrow nor remorse for whom might suffer, all because of their mindless obedience to higher authority. And, of course, the Jewish leaders. No wonder John called them "a generation of vipers." God had entrusted to them the law and the prophets, yet when the messiah comes before them in the form of a simple man, out of their fear, greed and lust, they condemn him to the cross.
I closed my Bible, set it on the end table, eased into a more comfortable position in my recliner, stretched, yawned . . . , and
... clicked the remote to the evening news. "Angry Mob Gathering Outside Pilot's Courtyard is our lead story tonight," announced an on-the-spot reporter. That seemed a bit bizarre. My TV screen was filled with a scene right out of a Cecil de Mille's Hollywood set, and a cast of thousands was all dressed for the take.
"Late last night," the reporter continued, "a man, claiming to be the Messiah prophesied by Isaiah, was arrested for treason and tried by the Jewish Leaders." This was too incredible. I decided I would drive down to the newsstand and pick up a paper to see what was really happening.
I opened the front door to total shock. Whatever was happening was not confining itself to my TV. The panorama outside my house was that of Biblical Jerusalem. The car in my driveway was drawing inquisitive stares from the dusty passersby on the narrow dirt pathway that had just moments before been an asphalt avenue. Or maybe it was my Levis, hooded sweatshirt, and tennis shoes that captured their curiosity.
"Good day," I shouted.
Well, at least they understood me because they responded with a 'Good day' in return.
"Where is everyone rushing?” I inquired as the street was increasingly becoming jammed with an unruly mob.
"To Pilot's Courtyard," was the unison reply. "we're going to free Barabbas! Join us!"
There was no use trying to figure out how I had entered this fantasyland, so I decided to join the crowd and see where fate would take me.
"Free Barabbas?" I enquired of a twentyish looking young man who was sprinting beside me.
"Yes, Yes!" He sounded almost out of breath. "The leaders have promised that if enough of us show up Pilot will release Barabbas."
"But isn't there also a man named Jesus being held by Pilot?" I queried in hope of hearing something good about him from this determined youth.
"Oh, yes. But it is he that will be punished instead of Barabbas if we can get there in time. We must be in large numbers and threatening enough to intimidate Pilot and the Roman authorities."
"But this Jesus; he's an innocent man," I pleaded feebly.
"He's also of no consequence to us. At first we thought he and his cousin, John, were with us, desiring to see the overthrow of the Romans. But his cousin was beheaded, and it's become obvious that this man Jesus is some kind of romantic dreamer. He espouses peace. We want war. Barabbas is our leader. Leave Jesus to the women, children, and weary old men."
I was about to protest his remarks, but I noticed several of his zealous friends had joined us in our hurried march and a few of them brandishing knives. Anyway, any one of them was in better physical condition than me, so I decided to continue on keeping my opinions to myself.
I decided we must be approaching the courtyard. The noise was getting deafening now like that of a modern sporting event; but with a bitter, angry edge. I was being pushed and shoved forward by the mob. Everyone was trying to work their way to the front. Standing still was impossible, so I determined to get a good view and did some elbowing and impolite nudging of my own.
"We already missed the excitement," I overheard a man in front of me telling the woman he was with.
"But what happened?” she asked.
"Barabbas is free liked we hoped. Jesus will be crucified." The woman buried her face in her hands. Her sobs bore genuine grief. The man didn't seem to notice.
The crowd, thus, was now beginning to disperse; no longer a mob, but smaller enclaves forming here and there. Many preparing to journey together to their next destination. Some to line the Via Dolorosa, some already on their way to Golgotha, others just milling around in quiet conversation waiting to see what would transpire.
Silence. Silence like I had never experienced immediately swept through the remaining crowd. Something was happening. Those left of me were quickly stepping back, clearing a path. Then the cadence of heavy footsteps broke through the silence concomitant with the jeering and booing of contemptuous hecklers. The procession was quickly approaching.
And then I saw him! At first the view was intermittently blocked by the legions in the lead. I could see that he was being shoved and jabbed by the legions immediately behind him. Angry bystanders were taunting and kicking at him. While others, grief stricken, were merely trying to touch him. The Roman soldiers were impatiently, but ineffectually, trying to push everyone back.
As the first guards reached my position, I could see the rivulets of blood streaming down Jesus' forehead and dripping from his brow. Blood also pulsed from his bruised back, sides, and legs where the cat-of-nine-tails had torn and gouged his flesh. He was stumbling under the heavy burden of the crucifix he was partly carrying, partly dragging. His progress made more difficult by the pressure of the crowd on either side and the impatient soldiers behind. Yet he made no sign of complaint.
The woman who had buried her face in her hands looked up, then gasped. "Shut up," her husband scorned, "he's getting just what he deserves. Claiming he's God's own Son. Well, let God save him now." She said nothing, but reached out her hand into the pathway in an attempt to get a touch of his garment as he passed directly in front of her.
"Jesus, I whispered mostly to myself, "it is really you!" I couldn't believe the sound of my own words. Jesus; not more than a few feet from me. I could hear his labored breathing. The sweat, blood, stale dirt and dust encrusted on his body and garment permeated the already rank air with its stench. Overcome, I too reached out. "Lord," I cried not caring who heard.
His eyes had been downcast, but now he looked up briefly. And for an instant, yet an eternity, our eyes met. In that moment, I was transfixed. He saw everything: every motive, every guilt, every doubt, every weakness that was my being. Yet there was no reproof in his countenance. Only love, compassion, acceptance.
That one glance into his essence exploded all previous notions. Beaten, bloodied, rejected, and on the way to being nailed to the cross, The Lamb of God conveys his redemptive message in a glance. "I know you unlike anyone else knows you. Still I love you unlike anyone else loves you. These wounds hurt, and this cross is heavy, but my love for you goes beyond my pain or the burden of this cross; Beyond your sins; all the way to my Father who loves you as I do. He has chosen this hour and place so that you might truly understand his love.”
The man with the woman spat towards Jesus. It misses its mark and dribbles down the crosspiece of the crucifix onto the blood stained dirt pathway. Angered even more by his poor aim, he clenched his fist and jeered, "some prophet! Look at you now. Better you'd never been born. At least we're finished with you." A Roman soldier slaps the man aside as the procession proceeds on down the pathway.
My throat thickens and my eyes begin to flood with tears as I watch the man's wife chase after the procession. She's yelling, "Forgive him, Jesus. He didn't mean to curse you. He doesn't know you like I do. Jesus! Jesus! You don't have to go with those soldiers. I've seen you perform miracles. Ask God. He will frighten the soldiers away." She continues her pursuit, crying hysterically now while other of his followers join her. The rear guard beats them back. The woman stumbles, falls to her knees, and begins to pound the ground in her sorrow. "You don't have to go! You don't have to go!" she cries to the unsympathetic ground.
I try to console the woman. The man she had been with, less angry now, takes her hand and leads her away from the crowd.
Watching them slowly walk away, I realize that I know Jesus must go with the soldiers. He must go to the cross.
There to suffer. There to die - and on rising again giving me a new song.
... I rub my eyes. The TV remote is in my lap. My Bible is on the end table beside me. The newscaster is saying something about a mob action in Jerusalem last night. I look out the front door.
The flashing traffic light hanging over the asphalt intersection gently sways with the breeze and silently reflects its gleam in the winter snow.
