Prayer, Persistence, and Change

Sometimes things intersect. In reality, or just in my mind. Today that happened. The text of Luke 18 and the parable of the persistent widow is one.  A friend from Trinity High School is another. The Jim Crow south and separate but equal another.

No one was taking care of the widow. She appeared frequently before a judge who was powerful and fearless before God, one who disregarded people. Her persistence amounted to wearing him down or beating him up. She had no bribe money, or that would have made things easier. The setting for the story is most likely a typical small village through which Jesus would walk. Four times in this text a unique word is used. Transliterated in various forms it is ekdikesin, or vengeance, or justice. “Grant me justice against my adversary,” verse 3; “I will see that she gets justice,” verse 5; “will not God bring about justice,” verse 7; and “he will see that they get justice,” verse 8.

For some time now, I have been pondering a task.  Call me foolish or call me a dreamer, or call me a whatever. My wish would be to find an African American male student at Westside High School from Trinity, Texas who graduated in 1968. Perhaps he and I could discuss our paths to and from school and life in Trinity, Texas. I graduated from Trinity High School that same year. THS was a mere five or so blocks from WHS, but they were worlds apart. The white school was on the main highway that ran north and south through town. The black school was off to the west by several blocks.  I seldom saw black students, as I recall, anywhere around Trinity, except for that one time on a Saturday night I heard, along with a lot of other whites of the community, the football game on the THS field played by the Westside team. We got up on top of the animal barns and watched part of the game. Cheering was different. The teams were different. The band played different music. I was enthralled, but not enough to ask questions. This team, so history bears out, was one of the best in the state of Texas. Those students were invisible to me in my narrowmindedness. Was I invisible to them? The racial divide was there even in a town with a population of 1,776. For that, I repent.

I suppose that Black citizens prayed persistently like the woman did in Luke 18. Surely they persisted in prayer against the injustices of Jim Crow south and the egregious separate but equal system that only served to make the distinctions even more distinct. During my senior year in high school, Phenita Dennis, 10^th grade; Priscilla Dennis, 9^th grade; Tom Whorton, 8^th grade; Dwight Dennis, Artie Mae Mayse, and Cynthia Wheeler, 7^th grades; and Carolyn Thomas, 6^th grade, had integrated the white senior high and junior high. How much courage did they and their families possess? How persistent were their prayers? How persistent were their actions?

I have met via social media, a gentleman who was in the last graduating class of the 8^th grade from Westside Junior High. He grieves that there is nothing there at WHS to signify that a school was ever actually there.  No monument, no marker, no buildings. I grieve with him. He mattered. His school mattered. It apparently does not matter enough for someone to erect a historical marker there. I am encouraged by Otis Walker, THS class of ‘72 and his pursuit of righteousness.

My world then was small, very, very small.  So small it was and for probably good reasons.  I was more focused on survival, or so it seems.  I did not have much of a social consciousness other than that part of me revealed when the black church minister and some of his members attended the white church of Christ gospel meeting, or when my dad’s three friends included one white guy, one black guy, and one Hispanic guy.

So, did anyone pray the prayer of the persistent widow for justice against their adversaries, and did the unjust judge ever grant their wishes or they’d wear him out with their persistence.  I hope so. Separate but equal is dismantled. Jim Crow is dismantled, at least in the laws. It remains on in the hearts of people and is intensified during this time of political strife.

Did they pray for justice? Were their prayers answered? Did Jesus’ words ‘always pray and never give up’ mean something to them?

These things just make me wonder. What makes you wonder?