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In the
twinkling of an eye, it seems, a new congress and
administration have bulldozed decades long progress on race
relations, the acceptance of others’ differences and the
building of an efficacious safety net for the most
vulnerable.
In less
than a month, conservative and extreme right ideologues have
launched an aggressive legislative assault, leaving racial
and ethnic minorities, low and moderate - income citizens,
the LGBTQ community and women, on shaky political ground and
facing an uncertain future.
I spoke
with 2017 MLK Unity Speaker, Donzaleigh Abernathy, about
fighting back and how to keep our heads above water in these
perilous times. Abernathy, an acclaimed actress, author and
activist, is the daughter of Reverend Dr. Ralph and Juanita
Abernathy, King’s “closest friends” and co-founders of the
Civil Rights movement.
This is
the finale of our three-part interview.
Perryman:
Well, America seems to be at quite a crossroads today much
like when your dad and King valiantly fought for justice.
Where do we, as a nation, go from here and how do you unite
black and brown and poor whites together with others to
ensure justice and equality?
Abernathy:
Well, we begin one by one, but right now we’ve got to unite
black and brown people regarding the issue of immigration
because we cannot allow the government to deport those who
have been here and are part of the backbone of the nation.
America is a land of immigrants, whether documented or not,
so we need to figure out how to embrace those that are here,
love them and find a language that we can all speak
together. We have to also understand that they’re not taking
our jobs, because they’re not.
And I
also know that Cesar Chavez and my dad could, and did, work
together. So then, we must also work together today.
Perryman:
In what ways should we work together?
Abernathy:
Certainly we need to get our young people to put down their
weapons and extend that olive branch to each other and
figure out how to stop fighting over nickels and dimes and
quarters and determine how we can arm ourselves to fight the
big fight, which is for millions of dollars that’s being
passed on to Wall Street or Silicon Valley, things like
that.
We can
and should, organize constructive boycotts and take to the
streets again and march so that voting rights are protected,
so that organizations like Black Lives Matter - it’s more
than just black lives - so that we understand it’s black
lives, it’s brown lives, it’s all lives. And without the
Affordable Care Act or with the privatization of Social
Security and Medicare, our senior citizens won’t have income
and won’t have healthcare. So, we’re going to have to figure
out how to take care of them. Those things should unite us.
When the government cuts food stamps - the majority of
people on food stamps are white women, we’re going to have
to figure out how to feed them.
One the
best things we can do, in my opinion, is to reject drugs and
alcohol. The people that are infiltrating our communities
with drugs and alcohol are billionaires, and when we stop
drinking and stop doing drugs, we cut into their profits.
We need to stop spending our money in these stores where
people don’t care about us. So we need to boycott the stores
again like we did in the 50’s and the 60’s. Keep our money
in our pockets and not eat food that’s unhealthy for us out
of these fast food establishments. Instead, have our own
little gardens and grow our own greens and go to the
farmer’s market, directly to the farmer and pay the farmer
for whatever it is that we get.
We’re
going to need to be healthier to endure because we won’t
have healthcare. They’re not interested in what’s happening
to the masses of the people in America. So we need to
figure out how to protect ourselves, and that’s something
that will unite us. And we need to take our neighbor in,
whether that neighbor looks like us or not, just take them
in and let them know that we are a friend to all mankind.
Perryman:
Well, you mentioned a collective need for spirituality. You
were a child of the black church and you talked earlier
about your experiences in that venerable institution. Where
are you currently on your spiritual journey and what is your
view of the contemporary black church that played such a
prominent role in the Civil Rights Movement back in the day?
Abernathy:
I wish that we had the powerful black church today that we
used to have back then, that espoused the Social Gospel. We
don’t have that today. Instead, we don’t hear our church
voicing political statements like we used to. We don’t see
churches as the foundation of the black community. We don’t
see churches going out into the community stopping the gang
violence, and that’s what we need now more than ever. We
have mega churches, and these mega churches need to become
meccas within our community so that we can house our
homeless and address alcohol and drug addiction. We can
create afterschool centers within these churches so that
when the children come from school they go to the
afterschool program that the church provides, and then feed
those children so that when their mother’s come home from
their jobs or if the mother doesn’t have a job, the mother
is free to go get a job because she knows that there’s going
to be an afterschool program at the church that she doesn’t
have to pay for, and then pick her child up and take her
child home to rebuild our community. I can only hope and
pray that our churches will get to that place.
And,
spiritually? I’m so glad that I was raised by my dad. He
used to say to me, “Do you think that God loves us more
because we are Christian than our brothers and sisters who
are Jewish or Muslim or those who worship the sun.” He
said, “We all serve the same God. We may call God by
different names, but we all serve the same God, and we
should not allow religion or religious organizations to
create a difference between us.”
My dad
also used to tell me, “We hate each other because we fear
each other; we fear each other because we don’t know each
other; we don’t know each other because we won’t sit down at
the table together. Let’s sit down at the table together.”
So I
sit down at the table and I live in a Jewish community where
they worship differently from me, but have embraced me and
my little Christmas tree and my little Christmas lights.
And I also have Catholic friends, Muslim friends, Buddhist
friends and Hindu friends. I have atheist friends, so I feel
that I have grown and evolved and I’m glad that my parents
sent me to Quaker School and to Quaker Camp. In the Quaker
faith, there’s no one preaching down on or at you. It’s a
spiritual place where, when the spirit hits you, you can
stand and rise and say something.
So I’m
accepting of all faiths and that’s what I think being a
minister’s child has taught me. I don’t think that one is
any better than the other. Why? Because religion is a
creation of man but we are all a creation of God. So I look
for God in everyone that I meet and everything that I
encounter, whether it is a dog or a bird, those are all
creatures of God, so I respect them all.
Contact Rev. Donald Perryman, D.Min, at
drdlperryman@centerofhopebaptist.org |
