Posted on 06/05/2005 3:33:42 AM PDT by WKB
JACKSON, Miss. -- The Rev. Keith Tonkel knew signing a simple statement against racism could put his life and those of his colleagues in peril. It was four decades ago and Mississippi remained a stronghold of segregation.
The white minister signed the document anyway.
The "Born of Conviction" statement, benign by today's standards, denounced racism, communism and the threatened closure of public schools that were facing integration. Some of those 28 white United Methodist ministers who publicly opposed segregation will reunite Monday in Mississippi.
In 1963, they signed their names, mailed the statement to newspapers and waited.
The backlash was swift.
Some of the ministers were ousted by their congregations and fled Mississippi under death threats. Others left freely.
Still others, including Tonkel, stayed to wage an evangelical battle against the evil of racism.
"I said to them, 'I'm only signing this thing with the understanding we're committed to staying in Mississippi,'" Tonkel said. "How can you flesh out a conviction if you're absent? I thought our responsibility was to see what we can create that would be inclusive."
Today, the 69-year-old is pastor of Wells United Methodist Church, an interracial congregation in Jackson. He's led the church since 1969.
Tonkel doesn't like to dwell on the 1963 document or its fallout, but he plans to attend Monday's "Born of Conviction" reunion _ the ministers' first gathering in 42 years.
The reunion coincides with the Mississippi Methodist Conference's annual meeting in Jackson. It also occurs a week before the opening of the Philadelphia, Miss., murder trial of a reputed Ku Klux Klansman accused of the 1964 murders of Ben Chaney, Michael Schwerner and Andrew Goodman, civil rights volunteers who helped blacks register to vote.
Eight of the 28 ministers are deceased. At least 13 will be in Jackson on Monday.
Jim Nicholson, who organized the ministers' reunion, remembers a struggle of conscience.
The United Methodist Church, like most white denominations in the South, had not spoken out against the beatings, lynchings and mistreatment of blacks. Yet, the official United Methodist Church position in 1960 opposed discrimination based on race, color or creed.
As minister of a small church in Byram, just outside Jackson, Nicholson tried to change the attitude of his white congregation through his sermons.
"I delivered a sermon there called a trail through the wilderness. I laid it on them pretty heavy," he said. "They boycotted me from then on and refused to pay me any more, but they let me stay in the parsonage."
After the "Born of Conviction" statement, the congregation voted him out.
Nicholson, now 82, grew up in Mississippi and eventually left the state for Iowa.
Gerald Trigg, Maxie Dunnam, Jim Waits and Jerry Furr were the original authors of the document. They secretly met at Hidden Haven, Dunnam's river camp near Richton, a small south Mississippi town.
They worked overnight on the document, carefully choosing words that conveyed their conviction without being incendiary.
The plan was to give the statement to the newspapers and the United Methodist Church simultaneously. The ministers feared the church would pressure them to abandon their mission, Waits said.
The statement was published in the Mississippi Methodist Advocate on Jan. 2, 1963, and columnists in state newspapers wrote scathing editorials condemning the ministers' actions.
"This was perceived as liberal troublemakers rocking the boat. It's not the letter from the Birmingham jail or anything like that. The main thing it did was remind the Methodist Church of their social creed," said Joseph Reiff, a religion professor at Emory and Henry College in Virginia, who is writing a book about the 28 ministers.
The statement was released months after rioting erupted on the Oxford campus of the University of Mississippi when James Meredith became the first black student there. Just a few months after the statement was published, Mississippi NAACP field secretary Medgar Evers was assassinated in Jackson by white supremacist Byron De La Beckwith in June 1963.
Violence directed toward the ministers was less severe. Some had their tires slashed or received telephoned threats.
"What was more difficult for many of these folks was the lack of support that they got from conference leaders and the shunning they got from their church members," Reiff said.
Dunnam said the ministers hoped to do more than integrate churches. In Gulfport, where he preached, blacks lived along unpaved, dirt roadways with no street lights. They were intimidated by law officers who forbade them to openly meet with whites.
Dunnam recalled a midnight phone call he received from the Rev. Henry Clay, a black Gulf Coast minister. Dunnam had visited Clay's Sunday service. That night, the police invaded Clay's home and demanded to know the name of every white person who was at the church service.
"Henry wouldn't give him my name without my permission," Dunnam said.
Dunnam, 70, who recently became chancellor of Asbury Theological Seminary in Wilmore, Ky., said he left Mississippi after the statement was published because "there was absolutely no support from the leaders of the church."
He said that while race remains a national issue, "at least the governmental and civil laws have been changed. That's the difference."
Mississippi ping
Does this dead horse's beating ever end? Those idiots fail to realize, "That was then-This is now." NSNR
How ugly I yet find it that schools are using "racial" numbers to create, establish a "racial" mix -- which requires some children to travel long distances to a school -- just so a "racial" mix is established.
Martin Luther King, Jr. fought that type of thinking.
Martin Luther King, Jr. fought that type of thinking.
He also would have fought against Affirmative Action!!
Does this dead horse's beating ever end?
Not as long as there is a liberal alive.
Yes, he would have. Unfortunately, the revisionists, the modern day Elmer Gantry's would have us all believe otherwise.
Wow that's amazing a church that would turn away black people?? I don't see how people could say this country hasn't made any progress.
Well it's the only way they know how to make some money. Otherwise, they'd be on welfare.
I agree with gulfcoast6, about the MS threads. I was telling my nephew just a couple of months ago, there is so little I really know about my own home state, about the goings on of my adolescent years, and it's been mainly through posts like this that I feel a tad more comfortable nowadays. Pshaw.
But a question comes to mind: Is there a possibility the Born of Conviction statement is available for posting? That, to me anyway, would be a truly interesting document, I would think, as I was raised in the Methodist doctrine.
When dead horses lie, a liberal starves for lack of money.
Well it's the only way they know how to make some money. Otherwise, they'd be on welfare.
So very true!!
Yellow dog democrats eh? Up here in NY, the most racist people you'll meet are democrats.
The biggest problem is there are too
many people who think Ms is still like
it was 50 years ago.
I remember when I was about 8 or 10
Daddy had a black man helping him around
the house. When lunch time came the black
guy ate on the back porch. I remember asking
momma why he couldn't sit at the table with us.
I don't even remember what she said but that was my first experience with race in Ms.
Yellow dog democrats eh?
If there was a Republican and an old yeller dog
on the ticket they would vote for the OYD.
The sad thing is, there ARE parts of MS where life is the same as it was 50 years ago. The same can be said of any of the Southern States, as well; however, seeing how MS suffered more atrocities which made the NYT and WaPo in print, first impressions are hard if not impossible to change. I would hope for the future of MS and the rest of the Southern States that when the last of that generation die off, and maybe the next generation as well, that the attitudes will improve, but I doubt it.
As my Mom told me one time, a loooong time ago, everybody is 'from' somewhere. Be proud of who you are, and never forget your roots. I'm from the Delta in MS, and I'm damned proud of MY roots.
I believe there were two white men at Evers's funeral; one was Bishop Joseph Brunini of the Diocese of Mississippi, the other was Rev. Bernard Law, a priest in the Diocese, who was also the Editor of the diocesan newspaper, which had been, at great risk to those involved, and with the full knowledge and permission of the Bishop very vocal in support of civil rights.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.