Today is the day we should celebrate. On this day Union General Gordon Granger arrived in Galveston, Texas, and informed the still enslaved population that not had the Union been preserved but that the slaves were free. Their old masters had not told them that. Granger delivered the order and the following year former slaves began celebrating June 19 as a day of their freedom.
Like most Federal holidays, this one makes for a three-day weekend. Thank goodness cooler heads prevailed when the Uniform Monday Holiday Act was passed by Congress in 1968, it did not include Christmas, Easter, or Veterans Day although some pushed for it for shopping purposes.
Juneteenth as it is called should be a day of solemn remembrance that at one time in our history people were enslaved for no other reason than the color of their skin. It should be a day that we pledge ourselves anew to the eradication of prejudice and racism in all its forms for God has no one color but is the Source of our being, no matter who or what we are.
Prayer for the Day
On this day, O God, we remember that we are created in your image,
With the colors, sizes, and shapes of all races and peoples;
You have created us to be voices for justice and righteousness
Therefore, we pray for the determination to reflect your call.
Grant us, O God, that we are not silent in the face of wrong,
But disturbers of the status quo and workers for justice.
In the name of him who was not silent when he saw injustice,
Even Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.
Thoughts for the Day
Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly.
Martin Luther King (1929-1968)
There is no reason to repeat bad history.
Eleanor Holmes Norton, (nonvoting) Representative for Washington, D.C.
I am the Lord, I have called you in righteousness,
I have taken you by the hand and kept you;
I have given you as a covenant to the people, a light to the nations,
To open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon
Isaiah 42: 6-7