Black lives matter. I can’t breathe. These two statements have been connected in my mind since 2014. I was a new seminary student then. A month before I arrived in New York a man named Eric Garner was stopped by police officers on a street corner in Staten Island. He was suspected of selling individual cigarettes. They asked him if he was selling cigarettes. He said no. Then Garner told the police he was tired of their harassment. An officer went to arrest Eric by putting his hands behind his back. Eric pulled his arms away and then an officer put his arm around his neck in a choke-hold taking him to the ground. On the ground Eric called out “I can’t breathe” 11 times. He died a short time later. All of this was caught on video tape and it looked nearly certain there would be disciplinary measures taken since the chokehold was against NYPD protocol. The medical examiner who did the autopsy ruled that the chokehold was one of the reasons for Eric’s death, ruling it a homicide.
At the time the focus was still on Ferguson, Missouri where the nation was watching the aftermath of the shooting of Michael Brown.
Protests erupted in Ferguson immediately after the shooting, some peaceful, some violent. Police called for a militarized response and set a nightly curfew for the entire city. Brown’s death struck a chord, bringing out rage, fear, and deep distrust. It looked like chaos.
Even before that, 3 years earlier the nation was following the shooting of Trayvon Martin and the acquittal of George Zimmerman, the police officer involved in the shooting. After this a hashtag started on social media which simply said #Black Lives Matter, and it spread quickly. The originators of the hashtag saw the quick and powerful response on social media and put out a call to action for local communities across the nation to campaign against violence and systemic racism including racial profiling, police brutality, and racial inequality in the United States Criminal Justice System. It also gave a public platform to family members and spouses of those who have died.
It was years later until I came into close contact with the Black Lives Matter movement. I knew it was something that was happening, but it hadn’t touched me yet.
The only thing I knew was that the movement started with women. Three African American women originated the movement through the hashtag and call to action – Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometti. I was impressed with the way these women used social media to spark a national movement. But as I said, it hadn’t really touched me yet.
Five months after Eric Garner’s death on Staten Island, I was asked to deliver my first sermon in historic James Chapel for the whole student body and faculty. It was early December, in the season of Advent. As I’ve shared with you, Advent is literally translated as waiting in anticipation for Christ, but I like to think of it in more general terms of waiting for something momentous and life changing. I wrote a complete sermon 4 days before I was supposed to preach. And then the verdict was announced. Five months after Eric Garner was put in a choke hold, five months after the world saw him on video say 11 times “I can’t breathe,” “I can’t breathe,” the grand jury announced its final verdict for the police officer who is seen on video performing an illegal chokehold. The grand jury ruled not to indict him or press any charges.
It felt like the verdict opened a festering wound that was trying to heal for months. It ripped the bandage right off. People were crying in the streets. I lived near Harlem, and the air was hot – you could feel the pain and emotion in the air. And I knew I had to preach on it. I scrapped most of the sermon I wrote except the original idea – that we were all waiting for a momentous and life changing event.
I did something I almost never do – I left my written sermon on the lectern. The speaker before me offered a reading and sat in the back of the sanctuary. It was packed with both students, faculty, and people from the community. The energy in the sanctuary was intense – anger, disappointment, exhaustion. As I stepped up to the lectern, I looked down expecting to see my notes, and they were gone. My palms were sweating, and I thought about asking the person in the back if he had accidently taken my notes, but it didn’t feel right in the moment. I knew if I paused too long, I would freak myself out. So I just spoke. I tried my best to speak to the pain in the room, and I spoke about the meaning of Eric’s words – I can’t breathe.
There was a reason this phrase caught on – I can’t breathe. It was about more than the horrific death of Eric Garner – it was a recognition that we are all suffocating without even realizing it. The cause of this suffocating is not just racism. It’s more insidious than that. The real cause of this chokehold is blindness – personal and institutional blindness. And this is why the videos that were shared through social media were excruciating but necessary. They showed many people a different reality, a different narrative of what life is like in this country. A different narrative of justice, and its limits in our current scheme.
I attended a rally for Eric’s death in midtown Manhattan later that week. There were a few hundred gathered, and about an equal number of police surrounding us on all sides. We all walked peacefully together. A white woman noticed an African American police officer, and playfully asked him – Why don’t you join us? He smiled and replied – I’m walking with you, aren’t I? As we crossed over to the East Side, it felt like time had stopped. Tourists, people working 9-5’s, shoppers, all took notice of us marching. I could see on various floors of office buildings people peering out the windows. From where I stood, they looked suffocated, all packed together behind glass. I remember the feeling I had – the time is now. I felt the meaning of King’s words written in 1967 – “We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. Over the bleached bones and jumbled residues of numerous civilizations are written the pathetic words – “Too late.”
King’s last book before he died was Where do we go from here – chaos or community? King saw clearly that something was brewing in this country, and he saw first hand individuals and whole communities suffocated. After King died in 1968, there were riots in many cities including Youngstown. My research shows that the National Guard was called to bring order in Youngstown. Tanks rolled down streets on the South side, and they instituted a dusk to dawn curfew, very much like Ferguson. It was considered one of the most violent days in Youngstown’s history.
I think it is too simplistic to say the people chose chaos instead of community. King had a wise statement about rioting. He said “rioting is the language of the unheard.”
And this is the main reason our faith has decided to support the Black Lives Matter movement.
The question now is more dire. The question is no longer where do we go from here – chaos or community? It is now where do we go from here – community or death?
The beginning of community is truth telling. This is the promise and challenge of the Black Lives Matter movement. As long as we fail to hear people trying to be be heard, as long as we stay blind to the stories of those around us (including the tragic ones), as long as we stay silent about institutional bias and perversion, our days are numbered. If our faith is going to continue to be a vital force in our life and the life of our community, we need to stand up and listen. The right time is always now, lest we miss the moment, and are forced to receive the pathetic words – too late.
I think there is much more that can be done in Youngstown, don’t you? Our board lately voted to support BLUU – Black Lives of Unitarian Universalism. They are a collective that offer resources and support for local activists and congregations. This is just the beginning. We will be discussing at our next board meeting what tangible commitment we can make as a community locally and nationally to this movement.
It’s a big step. It may be seen by you or others as a controversial choice. There may be critics that say by taking this step as a congregation we are becoming anti-police. There will be those who will say this movement is too limited, even that it’s racist. They will ask us why don’t we say “All lives matter?”
Our answer will be simple – All lives matter when Black lives matter. We need each other completely. This our faith and our commitment. We can’t afford to have anyone left out of the picture, gasping for air. All lives matter when black lives matter. Our life, the life of this church, the life of our schools, our work, our justice system, the people inside this sanctuary and the people outside this sanctuary, our entire community depends completely on everyone noticing the most basic truth – black lives matter.
