Ex-KKK leader now a minister fighting racism (Uncle of J.C. Watts turned him around)

Record Searchlight (Redding, OK) ^ | 15 June 2002

[Stultis]

Ex-KKK leader now a minister fighting racism

			"When I heard the Klan and the skinheads say they wanted to kill all the blacks, I used to think of Rev. Watts, and think, 'Do you really want to see this man hurt?' He was such a good man that I started doubting all these things I was supposed to teach." Johnny Lee Clary, former KKK leader COMPLETE TRANSFORMATION: Johnny Lee Clary holds a Bible while standing in front of a poster of Martin Luther King Jr. in his home in Tulsa, Okla. Clary quit the Ku Klux Klan in 1989 and now operates an international ministry against racism.

June 15, 2002 — 2:17 a.m.
TULSA, Okla. (AP) — Ku Klux Klan leader Johnny Lee Clary patted his white sheet as he waited in the radio station for his debate opponent, a civil rights activist.

Clary expected the Rev. Wade Watts to hate whites as much as Clary hated blacks. But then Watts stunned Clary. He walked into the broadcast booth, smiled and told the then-Grand Dragon of the Ku Klux Klan that he loved him.

Clary was stunned. He had set a fire that damaged Watts' McAlester church — a crime for which he was never prosecuted. Still, he couldn't help but shake the reverend's extended hand, despite the KKK rule against touching blacks.

That night in 1979, Clary first began to doubt his racist convictions. In another decade, he left the Klan as Imperial Wizard and a couple of years after that he began his itinerant ministry against racism.

He now draws crowds around the world who come to hear his story of failure and redemption, of overcoming racism in one of its ugliest forms.

Clary credits much of his transformation to Watts, who marched with Martin Luther King Jr. and led the Oklahoma NAACP for 16 years. The men became close friends before Watts' death in 1998.

"He taught me what it was like to be black, what black people feel about the things they've been through," Clary said recently at his small Tulsa apartment, a poster of King behind him. "I became a man who looked at himself in the mirror and decided it was time to change that man."

Clary, who turns 43 this month, spent his early childhood in Oklahoma. But when he was 11, his father committed suicide — shooting himself in the head with a handgun in front of his son — and the boy was sent to Los Angeles to live with his sister.

Living in a gang-ridden neighborhood, mostly among kids from other races, Clary didn't fit in. Racism he had learned in Oklahoma — he remembers his father directing a racial slur at a black man when he was 5 — became ingrained as Clary was shunted aside.

"Nobody seemed to care about this 14-year-old kid," Clary said. "I was about ready to give up when I turned on the TV and saw David Duke talking about the KKK."

The white supremacist's speech reminded Clary of talks his father had had with his uncle, a Klansman from Georgia. Clary wrote Duke, who sent a man to his Los Angeles door.

That Klansman wore a big belt buckle, glasses and a western shirt, and reminded Clary of his father.

"You've been through a horrible life," Clary remembered the man telling him. "What you need is a family, and the words 'Ku Klux Klan' comes form the Greek word 'kuklux' which means circle and 'Klan' from Scotland, which means family."

Clary joined the Klan youth corps, becoming an adult member at 17 and quickly rising through the ranks. Returning to Oklahoma, he became the Grand Dragon there and later the Imperial Wizard, a rank similar to national spokesman.

But after meeting with Watts, Clary began to question his devotion to the Klan.

"When I heard the Klan and the skinheads say they wanted to kill all the blacks, I used to think of Rev. Watts, and think, 'Do you really want to see this man hurt?' " Clary said. "He was such a good man that I started doubting all these things I was supposed to teach."

In 1989, Clary called the Klan's Grand Council and told them he was quitting.

A couple of years later, Clary said he felt God was calling on him to preach. He soon called Watts and asked forgiveness. The reverend, in turn, asked him to deliver a sermon to his all-black church, the one that Clary had set ablaze.

When Clary came to the white, pillbox church in McAlester, he was too nervous to think about the last time he'd been there, he said. Reporters had gathered for his first public appearance since leaving the Klan.

Watts, the uncle of Rep. J.C. Watts, R-Okla., had warned his faithful the week before that the former KKK leader was coming. Many stayed home.

The worshippers in the worn wooden pews crossed their arms and stared at Clary with lowered brows, he said. He got no "Hallelujahs" or "Amens" when he told the congregation about his reformation.

Finally, he asked if anyone would like to know Jesus as their savior, and a teen-age girl cried and ran to the pulpit to hug Clary. The ice was broken.

Soon afterward, Clary and Watts traveled across the South together preaching against racism and protesting at Klan rallies.

"He became like family to us," Betty Watts, the reverend's widow, said. "He always came down (to McAlester) to tell us how much he loved us."

Clary estimates his ministry, which he calls Operation Colorblind Inc., has helped thousands avoid or escape a life of racism. In May, the former Klansmen spent about a week in Canada, and has a series of appearances in Australia this month and next.

He charges no fees, but asks for donations, he said. He also sells videos of his sermons and recordings of his gospel singing.

"I hate looking back at the person that I used to be," said Clary, who's ordained by the International Charismatic Bible Ministries. "I would hate to live it all over again. But if it's the only way all these lives would be helped, then I'd do it."

Saturday, June 15, 2002

[Stultis]

Ping!

[mhking]

Black conservative ping

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Extra warning: this is a high-volume ping list.

[rdb3]

That's wonderful!

See? The arm of the Lord is not short that it can not save. I commend him.

[hchutch]

Agreed.

The soft answer turneth away wrath.

[Gumlegs]

Thanks for this most remarkable ping. And thanks to Stultis for posting the Record Searchlight story! Too bad we don't hear about this sort of thing in the larger circulation papers or in the broadcast media.

[MoJo2001]

God Bless the Watts family and the man they have come to love and appreciate. God Bless this man for seeking the righteous path!

[farmfriend]

Hope shines eternal!!!

[drstevej]

A powerful testimony!

PING

[Stultis]

Too bad we don't hear about this sort of thing in the larger circulation papers or in the broadcast media.

Pardon? Conservative, religious Republicans healing racial strife? Right-wing Christians are all racists and nazis. Don't you read the papers? (Big media mode OFF)

[Gumlegs]

Oh, dopey me!

[FightForTheTruth]

It is very sad that people do not look beyond their nose to see the truth. This man, Johnny Lee Clary, is no more a Christian today than he was when he was in the Klan. He still hates. Only difference is that now he calls for the death of homosexuals and several other groups instead of minority races. Hate is hate no matter what form and no one who hates should be supported. We are all one people. No one out there wants to be judged or hated. So no one out there should be judging or hating. Does not matter if the target is Black, Hispanic, Muslim, Homosexual, Jewish, A rock star with unorthodox entertainment techniques, a political figure representing a party you do not like or anyone else. If people would take a close look at Mr. Johnny Lee Clary, they would see who he really is. He will hate whoever he needs to further his financial agenda. When the KKK was supporting him, he hated black, Catholic, Jewish and Hispanic. Now that he is being supported by the conservative Christian he hates homosexual, liberals, etc. Mr. Watts appeared to be an exceptional man. Spend a couple of days one-on-one with Johnny Lee Clary and you will know Mr. Watts is rolling over in his grave watching how his good name is being used and abused by an man for financial gain.