A public television documentary from 1965 has been released on DVD this year called "A Time for Burning". It chronicles the struggles of Augustana Lutheran Church in Omaha, Nebraska as it comes to grips with racial integration. The Omaha World Herald (wankers though they may be) is doing a three-part series on the film and I have been following it because 1) I am Lutheran and 2) I live in Omaha. Here's a link to the current story:
http://www.omaha.com/...
The series today focuses on Ray Christensen, a member of Augustana at the time "Burning" was filmed. Ray's role in the file becomes a central focus because of his change of heart toward supporting racial integration in the congregation. Christenen is eventually villified by the recalcitrent members and is left with no choice but to move his family and his career to Minnesota (bastion of liberal Lutheranism).
Read the whole article if you want. It's noting Pulitzer Prize worthy, but not a complete waste of time either. The reason I felt compelled to circulate this to the wider community (who probably don't read the OWH) was because of one quote from Christensen. After all he was put through, here is how he summed up his life:
"The things we [he and his wife] were proudest of, were when we had stood up. The hard times."
Those two sentences really resonated with me. It seems to me that what was true for Christensen in 1965 should be true for us today. Perhaps some of our Democratic Congresspersons need to be reminded of that.