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Covenant Connections

Higher Ground Pilgrimage

Apr 20, 2023

By Jackie Putnam

“I’m pressing on the upward way. New heights I’m gaining ev’ry day;

Still praying as I’m onward bound, ‘Lord, plant my feet on higher ground.’”[i]

In 2022, Fourth Presbyterian Church members attended a luncheon with Bryan Stevenson, a lawyer, social justice activist, and founder of the Equal Justice Initiative in Montgomery, AL, and he challenged us to seek “higher ground” for racial justice in our community. While Fourth is not new to the work of racial justice, in recent years we have grown more intentional in our education, advocacy, and commitment to dismantling white supremacy. In particular, we have felt God’s call to reassess and deepen our relationship with the Sterling Community, a historic Black neighborhood located a few miles from the church, with whom we have partnered for over thirty years. Our relationship has evolved into an authentic partnership, where honesty is embraced, mutuality is nurtured, and unhealthy power structures are reversed. This intentional work led us to travel together on what we named “The Higher Ground Pilgrimage,” a spiritual journey through historic civil rights sites in Alabama. In February of 2023, 45 members of Fourth and the Sterling Community (with nearly equal numbers from each community), visited Birmingham, Selma, and Montgomery.

Day One: We departed the church bright and early and made our way to Birmingham where we stopped at the Kelly Ingram Park, which is filled with sculptures depicting civil rights struggles. Then we visited the 16th Street Baptist Church where four precious girls were killed in a bombing during the Sunday School hour on September 15, 1963. We also toured the Civil Rights Institute. After dinner, we gathered for Scripture reading, prayer, and conversations. Common themes shared around the circle were gratitude for the gift of traveling together, grief for those who have endured/continue to endure injustices, shock and anger at the decades of delay in holding the 16th Street bombers accountable, and a desire for a better world for all people.

Day Two: We had always planned to stop in Selma to walk the Edmund Pettus bridge, in honor of the brave people who in 1965, after receiving communion in worship at Brown Chapel AME Church, rose from their pews and began the march to Montgomery. On their first attempt they were met with extreme police brutality and 50 people were injured. Weeks later, Dr. King led a march across the bridge and that march was instrumental in securing the Voting Rights Act. What we hadn’t planned for was the terrible tornado that devastated Selma in January.Upon hearing of the devastation, we called Rev. Leodis Strong from Brown Chapel AME Church and asked how we could help. After hearing about our mission for racial justice, Rev. Strong asked if his church could serve us lunch. What a gift! The meal they served was fantastic and the hospitality was a true embodiment of God’s love! For the tornado survivors, we collected 102 Walmart gift cards totaling over $2500 and also collected a love offering for the church of $1500. Blessings received and blessings given!

We then drove to Montgomery to the Rosa Parks Museum and the Dexter King Memorial Baptist Church, where Dr. King pastored from 1954-1960. Many of the pilgrims reported feeling a Spirit of grace and love in the historic sanctuary, which was constructed mere steps away from the Capitol building, which has been called “the birthplace of the Confederacy.”

Day Three: Our day began with a time of prayer and devotion around the theme of “feet.” We reflected on our tired feet and the places they had carried us on this trip: marching alongside of the saints who crossed the bridge at Selma on Bloody Sunday, planting them firmly alongside of Rosa Parks who refused to move from her rightful seat on the Montgomery bus, and standing in the pews of Dr. King’s church. We discussed the places in our community where injustices continue today and considered how God might call our feet into those places. Are we called to stand firmly in the truth? March in protest? Dance in joy in the face of a world that tries to steal it? Kick our feet up and rest in a world that tries to overwork us? We then read about how Jesus washed the feet of his disciples (including Judas) and then we blessed each other’s feet by touching their shoe and speaking this blessing: “Bless the feet of your disciple and guide their steps.” Our closing song, “Guide My Feet” strengthened us for the journey.

It’s hard to put into words what we experienced at the Equal Justice Initiative’s Legacy Museum and Memorial in Montgomery. At the museum we witnessed painful truths about our history of racism and its connection to the modern day incarceration system in America. We beheld soul-stirring art that beckoned us to draw closer to the pain so that it could then be transformed within us.

The memorial honored the lives of more than 4,400 African American men, women, and children who were hanged, burned alive, shot, drowned, and beaten to death by white mobs between 1877 and 1950. Millions more fled the South as refugees from racial terrorism, profoundly impacting the entire nation. Until now, there had been no national memorial acknowledging the victims of lynchings. On a six-acre site atop a hill overlooking Montgomery, the national lynching memorial is a sacred space for truth-telling and reflection about racial terror in America and its legacy. It’s important to note that the memorial sits on the highest ground in all of Montgomery. How fitting that we came on this trip to find higher ground for racial justice and we found it, rooted in the memory of those who suffered and died.

Final Day: Our final stop was Immanuel PCUSA Church in Montgomery for closing worship and communion. We decided to anchor our worship service around the theme of Jesus’ transfiguration on the mountaintop, since that was the lectionary text the day before. It was fitting for a few reasons: First, this trip felt like a mountaintop experience. With each day, we sought a higher vantage point, so that we could see a God’s-eye-view of humanity. Naming our trip after the old hymn, “Higher Ground,” was intentional. We felt that if there was ever going to be hope for us, we had to stop walking in the same worn-out paths of ordinary existence and climb out of these ruts to higher ground. We also resonated with Jesus, who after being transfigured on the mountain, descended back down into the valley where much pain and suffering prevailed.

It’s hard to return home after such an experience and we understand why the disciples wanted to stay up on that mountaintop forever. It’s hard to return to our community where Sterling residents are daily being harassed by developers who will go to great, unethical lengths to try to secure their properties. It’s hard to return to the systems that have continued to undermine, undervalue, underrepresent, and underpay people of color. After witnessing the way God is glorified when diverse people come together, it’s hard to return to our largely homogenous worshiping communities. And yet, this is where we’re called to join Christ in the hard work of discipleship and mission.

In the two months since returning home, our group has continued to meet, pray, process, and plan. We believe that our pilgrimage was a catalyst for racial justice in our local community and we are seeking God’s guidance as we deepen our commitment to finding higher ground.

For more images from the Higher Ground Pilgrimage, visit https://photos.app.goo.gl/NyJRFXYQWhCsxMACA.

 

 


Rev. Jackie Putnam is the Associate Pastor for Mission and Discipleship at Fourth Presbyterian Church. She previously served as a Christian Educator and Youth Director at Northminster Presbyterian Church in Hickory, NC. Her undergraduate studies were in Religious Studies and Psychology. She received her MDiv, and is currently pursuing her DMin degree, at Union Presbyterian Seminary’s Charlotte campus. Her passions for ministry include mission, preaching, interfaith relations, and social justice.

 


[i] Lyrics from the hymn “Higher Ground” by Johnson Oatman, Jr.