Pride

"Early morning, April 4/ Shots ring out in the Memphis sky/ Free at last, they took your life/ They could not take your pride." - "Pride (in the Name of Love)" by U2

Last week six-year-old Riley was learning about the Civil Rights Movement in school. She was writing a report on Martin Luther King, Jr. and Rosa Parks and was telling Alana and me about it while they were having snack Friday afternoon. When she mentioned that Rosa Parks was not allowed to keep her seat in the front of the bus just because she was African American, Alana got upset and wanted to know why. How do you explain such a cruel injustice to a four-year-old? I tried my best, saying how a long time ago there used to be a lot of really unfair rules that very brave people like Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King, Jr. fought to end.

Just as I was finishing my explanation, this little preschooler looked up at me with so much innocence in her eyes and asked, "Why would people be so mean just because someone looks different? We all look different from each other." That's a question I still don't have an answer to, and I've been wondering about it my whole life.

While I was trying to come up with something to tell her, Riley chimed in and said, "Dr. King wanted to change those unfair laws. That's why he talked to people and tried to teach them that we should all be treated equally. He gave this speech called the "I Have a Dream" speech, and he said, "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character." Alana stared at Riley and said, "That's what Jesus wants too. We are all supposed to treat each other with love, right?" That totally blew me away. Here are these two little girls, so young and innocent, yet they have an understanding of how the world should be that so many adults never will. I am always proud of Riley and Alana, but I don't think I have ever been as proud of them as I was at that moment. From now on, I will not just think of the "I Have a Dream" speech on Martin Luther King Day, but also of those two little girls that understood the simplicity of his words and personally felt the unjustice that caused him to speak out. Out of the mouths of babes...