Description:
A call for unity in the face of growing dehumanization of marginalized people-from a powerful voice in the dialogue on racism today.
The walk back on a commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion. The silence across communities as the undocumented, primarily Latino population faces attack. The grandstanding of nationalism and the intersection with white supremacy and ideas of genetic superiority. These issues are not temporary but rather exist on a continuum in the history of racism and divisiveness. Meeks, who has spent a lifetime fighting for racial justice and healing, offers collaborative strategies to fight systemic racism--together. She also addresses current cases with civil rights impact in areas such as zoning, voting, and immigration, and delivers a powerful message about the need for unity in combating these destructive decisions.
This moment, Meeks argues, shows that othering is alive and well in America and a continuation of white supremacy. She also believes the United States has been complicit in continuing the destabilization of other countries and the cycles of ethnic cleansing. Within Black communities, she explains, there is a hesitance to join the conversations, but the fight is one that demands solidarity. Resistance is necessary to dispel hierarchies of human value and combat the failure of institutions.
Praise for The Night is Long but Light Comes in the Morning
"Readers will be challenged and changed by this moving work." --Publishers Weekly
Brief description:
Catherine Meeks, PhD, is the winner of the President Joseph R. Biden Lifetime Achievement Award for her decades of work for racial justice. A nationally recognized speaker, radio commentator, and writer for publications including Baptist News, she is the former executive director of the Absalom Jones Center for Racial Healing and author of six books, including The Night is Long, but Light Comes in the Morning: Meditations on Racial Healing. Dr. Meeks is the founder of Turquoise and Lavender, an institute for transformation and healing. She holds a master's degree in social work from Clark Atlanta University, a PhD from Emory University, and honorary doctorates from Virginia Theological Seminary, the Seminary of the Southwest, and the Berkeley Divinity School at Yale University. Dr. Meeks lives in Atlanta, Georgia.
Review Quotes:
"This book is about the painful gap between the de jure and de facto realities associated with the preamble of our constitution "that all men are created equal." Meeks calls on four major underrepresented groups--Indigenous Peoples, African-Americans, Asian Americans, and Latin Americans--to band together and invites whites who are willing to be more than allies and become pilgrims to join in the effort to overturn the systemic racism that is embedded within our culture. The frustration and yet the hope in this sensitive and important voice needs to be heard by Americans who want us to become the America we long to be, not the America we have been and are."
-- "Gregory E. Sterling, The Reverend Henry L. Slack Dean, The Lillian Claus Professor of New Testament, Yale Divinity School"