Tad Talk
Sarah Jane Weaver and I compared notes Monday morning as we sat with others waiting for our flight home from Detroit, Michigan. We both felt we had witnessed a unique moment in history as we'd covered President Russell M. Nelson's speech the night before at the annual convention of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.
As the editor of the Church News, Sarah has traveled to cover the president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints dozens of times. I have done so a half-dozen times. In each case, the church’s leader has done something historic and important. We both covered President Nelson’s visit to the Vatican in March, for example.
This time felt a little different. For one, the church’s relationship with the Roman Catholic Church has been building for decades. The visit with Pope Francis was a culmination of vast groundwork done for years on both sides. In Detroit, while I felt at home because I covered the NAACP convention last year in San Antonio and had met and interviewed all of the association’s leaders, I was struck by the stunning velocity of the new relationship between the two groups.
The NAACP’s top leaders met, interacted and worked directly with — and hugged — President Nelson. How was this possible? As I interviewed people on both sides, two things became clear. First, as I reported in my two stories (found below in My Recent Stories) the groups share a fundamental common belief that all people “are alike unto God,” as President Nelson put it at the convention, quoting the Book of Mormon (2 Nephi 26:33). Second, this is a practical choice for both the church and the NAACP, which is a distinctly Christian outfit. |
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Like the growing NAACP relationship, many of the church’s humanitarian aid partnerships around the world are based both on similar religious beliefs in helping others and the practical consideration that many of those partnerships can take the church’s money and aid into places where the church does not yet have the ability to go.
Clearly, as my reporting showed, partnering with the NAACP has helped the church reach inner-city African Americans in a new and meaningful way. Additionally, the church’s leadership for years has sought to create new partnerships with other faith-based or faith-rich organizations to help with public policy struggles and the defense of religious liberty.
Meanwhile, NAACP leaders and the association’s membership are deeply concerned that racism and xenophobia are on the rise in America. They hope that, in addition to the practical help the church’s self-reliance program can provide to inner-city refugees and blacks, the church’s membership in the United States also may respond to President Nelson’s example of reaching out to and working with African Americans. They clearly were thrilled to have him say that the church wants to be “dear friends.”
Some people have taken note of the divergent reputations of the two groups. The church often is stamped with a conservative label. The NAACP is seen as liberal. The issue of differences was plainly addressed.
“We don’t have to be alike or look alike to have love for each other,” President Nelson told the convention. “We don’t even have to agree with each other to love each other. If we have any hope of reclaiming the goodwill and sense of humanity for which we yearn, it must begin with each of us, one person at a time.”
NAACP Chairman Leon Russell publicly thanked President Nelson for his friendship, expressing hope that the joint self-reliance project soon operates in communities across the country. “We may not agree on all things,” he said, “but we agree we should be a friend before we need a friend.”
One person stood out in Detroit: the Rev. Dr. Amos C. Brown, an American civil rights legend directly tied to the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
The Rev. Brown was one of eight students who took the only college seminar taught by King. Now 78 years old and using a cane after suffering a stroke in 2010, the Rev. Brown is sharp, bright and witty. I’ve never seen an introduction of President Nelson like the one this pastor of a black Baptist church in San Francisco offered on Sunday night in Detroit.
I decided to share it so you can see the entire text. He took the stage with an obvious goal to rally the 3,000 people in the vast convention hall to listen to President Nelson and recognize the opportunities the partnership provides. He took seven full minutes. |
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Here is what the Rev. Brown said:
“This is a fateful evening, and I have been assigned the task to introduce and present a brother of another mother, a brother of another faith tradition. And though he comes from a different period, a different faith tradition and of a different race, for there’s a commonality that we both embrace, for our next speaker has had, unfortunately, in this nation that common, evil, mean reality of oppression coming from people who claim to be religious, who claim to be Americans in one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. His heritage mirrors a people who were persecuted because of their faith tradition. In the NAACP and as a son and daughter of Africa, we can all say, we are oppressed because of this ethnic visibility, the blackness of our skin.
“However, we should applaud President (Derrick) Johnson, Chairman (Leon) Russell, who responded to this brother and his faith community when they had the courage to say, we have unfortunately been complicit in that evil of racism in this nation, but unlike certain persons in America, we are honorable enough to say that we are sorry, we’re going to change our ways and we’re going to do a new thing, we’re going to sing a new song, talk a new talk, walk a new walk, and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, under the leadership of President Russell Nelson are here tonight to say to the NAACP, we’re gonna join and lock arms with you as we fight racism, anti-semitism, homophobia, xenophobia and all of those phobias and -isms that separate and divide the human family that we might be one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
“And when I think of President Russell (Nelson), who by profession is a heart surgeon and that this September the 6th in Salt Lake City I will have the privilege of being there when he will celebrate his (95th) birthday. But this heart who has moved from doing heart surgery, moved from making hearts brand new, and he’s joined us to do a heart transplant for America that we will truly get back to being a nation that will be a light to the nation and the world. And I feel that he is the epitome of the words of Edwin Markham: ‘He drew a circle that shut me out — / Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout. / But love and I had the wit to win: / We drew a circle and took him in.’
Let us welcome now, President Russell Nelson of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, president of the First Presidency, who will widen the circle and take us all in, with a united front, marching on to a better day in religious activity in the United States of America.”
President Nelson spoke for 11 minutes. He received a standing ovation from many. |
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What I’m Reading ... Let’s start with more viewing rather than reading. The Church News video team put together a fantastic video about President Nelson’s appearance at the NAACP convention in Detroit as part of its ongoing series covering his ministry.
Reading time has been scarce this week, but I’m a sucker for certain types of stories. I love stories about people who want to have or are having large families. I love stories about Latter-day Saint athletes. I love stories about dads doing whatever they can to be there when their wives give birth. Since this link has all of that, I have to recommend it, even though the Express’ website is impossibly frustrating.
This one’s just a hoot.
I served a church mission in Germany, so it’s with nostalgia that I include this link. |
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