A New Found Hero

Thanks to the recommendation of Marty Purks, I have discovered a new hero, Clarence Jordan. “Clarence Jordan was a strange phenomenon in the history of North American Christianity.” (http://www.koinoniapartners.org/clarence/index.html) Jordan was a white southerner born in 1912 in Georgia. In 1942 he established an agricultural community called Koinonia, “participating love” which was an interracial, intentional, religious community. He stood firm against the flow of the rivers of racial hatred so prevalent in the South and fought for Civil Rights in a theoretical, but also practical lifestyle way, making a statement with his life, along with the lives of other families in the community, as they chose to eat together, farm together, pursue God together, and stand up for Right together. And as the Civil Rights movement progressed, this stand came under furious attack, by members of the KKK, by the town, and often by local white churches, who viewed their integrated community as a threat. There are FBI files on him for bringing to African Americans with him to a white church, where they were refused entrance one Sunday morning, as well as investigation into Communist ties with the farm. Eventually members at this farm would go on to create Habitat for Humanity.
Reading about this history, and this vision makes me want to cry, it speaks to so many of my desires and dreams. “He believed that the best way to effect change in society was by living, in community, a radically different life.” Yes, Yes, YES! In some ways my heart feels broken that here existed such a man, and yet he has died, and it is impossible for me to meet him. How I long to meet him!! And I’m always so excited to find intersections between any of my four passions: environment, faith, arts, and social justice issues. But it goes beyond that. I’ve often found it difficult sorting out my identity of a white American, especially one who does not really know her ancestral roots, of feel a tie to any one cultural community. Embracing and learning from diverse cultures has valuable, but has often left me feeling a little unconnected, and a little lost in terms of who I am, and where I come from. And this often intensifies when looking at the issue of slavery or the history of segregation in America, and the role whites have played in this story. It’s been helpful, really helpful, to find these figures in history who are examples of White Americans who stood against the tide, and fought against slavery, fought against segregation, fought against hatred and injustice. I can hold them up as something to aspire to, and hold them up as heroes.
On a further note….what the civil rights movement of today?…what I can incorporate into my artistic, multicultural/international, social justice oriented, environmental farming community….So that we also can stand strong against the tide and create change by living our lives in a meaningful, intentional, and radical way against the norms of society.

“A community of nearly sixty men, women, and children is facing annihilation unless quick, decisive action is taken by someone in authority. I am therefore appealing to you as a last resort, with the hope and prayer that you might find some course of action before it is too late….We shall not run, for this is America. It is a land where free men have the right—and the duty—to walk erect and without fear in their pursuit of peace and happiness. Should this freedom perish from our land we would prefer to be dead. We gladly offer our lives for its preservation.”
From his telegram to President Eisenhower in January, 1957, when the community was under severe attacks of bombings, vandalism, and violence. He most certainly is a true hero of liberty in America. A new hero for me…