成人快手

A spiritual comment and prayer to begin the day with the Revd Azariah France-Williams

Good morning.

Lt Nathan Bedford Forrest had a chequered history. His death came on this day in 1877. He lived in the American deep south and had been a plantation owner and slave master. During the civil war he became a highly regarded confederate general. Post war, his notoriety and anti-black, white supremacist views made him a natural leader of the emerging Klu Klux Klan. He was appointed in 1867 as the first Grand Wizard of the secret hate organisation, although he contested his level of involvement when asked.

Over time, however, the level of raw violence against black people meted out by his new troops disturbed him. His grappling with tenets of the Christian faith enlightened him and in 1869 he tried to disband the Klu Klux Klan. He was unsuccessful. It continued but not with him. There is controversy surrounding how genuine or not his conversion was to a deeper view of humanity. Nevertheless, in 1875 a black organisation dedicated to black voting rights and fairness in employment, (a precursor to the NAACP), invited him as a guest speaker. This was an honour no white person had had before. At that meeting a black woman offered him flowers as an expression of gratitude for what he had done with and for the black community since his change of heart and attitude.

Loving God, in this black history month, in a time of renewed focus on the sin of racism, lead each one of us from hate to love, from death to life, from violence to peace, from fists to flowers, from grand wizards to the great wisdom shown through your son our Saviour Jesus Christ, Amen