What I Learned From A Baptist Bishop

I didn't know who Bishop Calvin Woods was when my client called and asked me to write a video script celebrating his accomplishments. The video was for a series called History in Motion and is part of an award presented each year by Regions Bank during Black History Month. 

I set up an interview time, and on Tuesday afternoon, we met. Bishop Woods grinned when he saw me, and his smile was infectious. Although I extended my hand to him as I introduced myself, that sort of greeting seemed far too formal. At once, we hugged and laughed. I felt an immediate affinity for this 80-year old man who was clearly so full of love and joy.

Proof of Bishop Woods work in the 60s:
Jack and his friend TJ in 2006. They
met in preschool at age 2.5 and are still
best friends today. 

Sitting across a conference table, Woods' story quickly unfolded. He was a leader in the Alabama Christian Movement for Equal Rights, which was started by Rev. Shuttlesworth. Many people know of Calvin's older brother Rev. Abraham Woods, who served as the president of the Birmingham chapter of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. (A street in downtown Birmingham bears his name.) But Calvin, who began to preach at age 19, was right in there too. In 1958, he was arrested for encouraging his congregation to boycott riding buses in Birmingham. In 1963, he was beaten, arrested and hauled off to jail for sitting at a whites-only lunch counter. Later that year, he delivered a list of conditions from ACMER to city hall, and helped negotiate the integration of Birmingham's white business sector.

By 1966, Birmingham was still one of the 10 most segregated cities in the country. Dr. Martin Luther King tapped Calvin Woods as one of ten SCLC City Conveners in the nation. As such, he helped educate Birmingham ministers in the practices of non-violent protest. (But make no mistake, Woods was not—and is not—a passive man.)

Throughout his interview, Bishop Woods attributed his life and accomplishments to God. This wasn't an act of feigned religiousity or humility. I can't even begin to explain what it was like to sit across from a human being who is so genuine and loving and unselfconscious. This man has seen and experienced things in his lifetime that should have left him bitter and shaken — or at least resentful and jaded. Instead he exuded a confidence and presence that contained both the wisdom of ages and childlike wonder. (When he told me he had visions of Jesus and speaks with angels on a regular basis, I believed him.)

In 1963, when Woods was doing hard labor for his "crime," I was an infant, not even a year old in Little Rock, Ark. (the scene of hotly contested desegregation at Central High School.) I was blissfully ignorant of the lives being risked — and lost — in the name of equanimity, not just for people of a certain color, but for everyone. I am still wrapping my head around the incredible feats of bravery and perseverance performed by the men and women who led and supported the Civil Rights Movement.  The fact that I grew up in a different world, a world were I am hardly aware of the sacrifices that were made back then, is a testament to what was accomplished.

Sure, our world is far from perfect. Since its beginnings, mankind has —for the most part — resolved its problems through force and violence. But something in our collective karma changed when those young men and women sat down at a lunch counter and asked to be served. Our primal responses shifted when children locked arms, ignoring the jeers and hateful words and worse being thrown at them as they marched through the streets of downtown Birmingham. Dr. King knew that non-reaction was a shield and a sword. And in a very definitive way, these non-violent protesters changed the world with ... peace. And the world watched (through the miracle of broadcast TV) and saw a truth that was so undeniable that centuries of fear and hatred were finally brought to light.

"We had no idea we would make an impact in the world," Woods said at the end of the interview. "But our work is never over. You can’t stop talking about love and faith and prayer." 

Despite the terrible violence in Paris this past month, the world my son Jack is growing up in is a still more peaceful, loving world because of the wisdom of Dr. King, Bishop Woods and all those who met hatred with love and compassion. But in the words of the good Bishop, "Our work is never over."

Walkers Gotta Walk

By now you'd have to be brain dead, or at least way, way off the grid, to not have heard about the phenomenon that is AMC's The Walking Dead. The series about the post-apocolpytic world run amuck with zombies — eh, Walkers, as they are called in the show— has lifted the interest of some 17 million viewers during it's Season 5 premiere. That's a lot of (live) viewers, 2.5 million more, in fact than watched Sunday's NFL  match up on network television, according to the Nielsen ratings. Why in the world would 17 million people want to watch a TV series about the gruesome end of the world as we know it? Well, I have my theories.

The Walking Dead is the latest in a popular TV series genre that throws a variety of sympathetic and unsympathetic characters into a fictional extreme circumstance to see just how far they will go to stay alive. A few years ago, ABC's Lost was a very successful example of this brand of survivalist drama. (By comparison, for its fifth season premiere, Lost, drew a paltry 11.35 million viewers, according to lostpedia.wilia.com.) Although the survivors turned against each other from time to time, at least Lost had its share of philosophic overtures about the meaning of life and death. (The island outpost was called the Dharma Project, hello!) The very dark world of The Walking Dead may pose a problem for spiritual practitioners of any denomination. I mean, it is hard to find any sense of redemption in a world that's overrun by non-sentient beings. 

A zombie horde in AMC's The Walking Dead.

In the initial episodes we learned that a virus is the cause of the mayhem. At first, it's thought that it is transmitted via the bite or scratch of an infected person, but as the show progresses, turning zombie is an inevitability brought on by a little factor called death. Everyone is infected and it's only a matter of time before you die and transform into a flesh-eating wraith with one and only one response motivation: consume other beings. There is no thought to this action, no malice, nor prejudice, nor merit. It's not personal. Walkers gotta walk. Killing is a pure craving that cannot be sated. And yet, as we enter the series' fifth season, it's clear that the dead are not nearly as disturbing as the living.

The racist mob in the Universal Pictures' film
To Kill A Mockingbird.

In the world of TWD, society as we know it has shut down — literally unplugged overnight. It's hard for me to wrap my head around what our world would look (and act) like if that were to happen. Our reliance on electronic communications systems, fossil fuel, infrastructures, technology and manufacturing renders us rather helpless when those things are systematically taken away. We are all so interdependent that collapse becomes inevitable. With no one to run Google, man the latte machines, and repair the DSL, our society crumbles and what is left — humans without a system of checks and balances — is really scary. And yet, that world existed here in the South more than 50 years ago.

Over the summer (while TWD was on hiatus) Jack and I did something radical. In the evenings we put down our electronic devices ... and read a book. And not an e-book, mind you, but a real, live paperback version of a classic, To Kill A Mockingbird. I had not read the novel since I was in high school. At first Jack resisted since the book seemed like ancient history and didn't feature boy wizards or zombies, but to humor me (and extend his bedtime by 30 minutes,) he acquiesced. Now it is all I can do to keep him from reading ahead. Yes, the content contains some mature situations and language, but sharing this book with Jack has become one of the most important deliberate acts of parenting I've accomplished.

As it turns out, Jack is the exact age of Jem Finch, one of the central characters. The story is told by Jem's younger sister, Scout, which makes the tale highly relatable to my inquisitive 12-year-old. Harper Lee's portrayal of the children's loss of innocence is one of the most beautiful accounts I've read in literature. As their father, Atticus, defends a black man (Tom Robinson) accused of raping a white woman, the children see a side of their tranquil southern town they didn't know existed.  In the late 1930s (when the story is set) the penalty for such a crime was sure and certain death—and often not via the US judicial system.

In one poignant scene, Jem and Scout seek out their father, who is sitting vigil in front of the jail where Tom Robinson is being held the night before the trial. They witness a lynch mob threaten Atticus if he doesn't step away from the door to allow them to take the alleged assailant. Driven by fear and hatred, the mob is bent on taking justice into their own hands. As a group, they set aside their individual humanity and assume a sense of collective righteousness. Things seem dire until Scout innocently speaks to one of the mobsters (the father of a classmate), and reawakens his humanness by reminding him that he, too, is a father. The mob disbands without completing their intended mayhem. The following day, Atticus explains what happened:

"Every mob in every little Southern town is always made of of people you know—doesn't say much for them, does it? ... It took an eight year old child to bring 'em to their senses didn't it? That proves something—that a gang of wild animals can be stopped, simply because they're still human."

Harper Lee published To Kill A Mockingbird four years before the passing of the Civil Rights Act, which prohibited discrimination in public facilities and education. This amendment to our nation's constitution encouraged humans to "do the right thing," and was necessary to forward the civil liberties of Americans regardless of their ethnic background or skin color. Without the this Federal law, would people have integrated schools and businesses? Maybe. It certainly would have taken more time though. And, arguably, the sense of society we enjoy today would not have unfolded as it did without a higher power (our judicial system) setting the rules. Many people in this country wanted to uphold "liberty and justice for all," but may have needed a law to back them up.  Fear of consequences from those who wanted to maintain segregationist status quo might have silenced a lot of well-intentioned folks had it not been for the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

It seems humans create the power (in this case, our democracy) to help us do the very difficult things we cannot accomplish as individuals. We may not always agree on the rules established by our federal, state or local governments, but as we celebrate the 50th anniversary of the passing of this essential piece of legislature, it seems these entities are necessary to maintain a healthy and altruistic human nature.

Left to our own devices (and not mobile ones), humans will do some horrible stuff to each other in the name of survival. And that's what was demonstrated during the record-breaking season five premiere of The Walking Dead. Mankind, sans any sense of kindness, has turned upon itself, like the Ourovoros Ophis, the tail-eating snake, which appears throughout ancient cultures as symbol of the endless cycle of life and death — what the Buddhist call, samsara. Eternally, the snake consumes itself and must begin again. At this rate, it's hard to imagine what in the world will be left to consume by the series' sixth season.

I believe humans are, by nature, compassionate, but we need support to demonstrate compassion when things get tough. Sure, our world is far from perfect, but to think we would be better off without structure and a check-and-balance system is as crazy as the Governor believing his dear little, flesh-eating, zombie daughter will be restored to her Shirley Temple-like self. Perhaps that's the reason why millions of people tune in to The Walking Dead on Sunday nights. We need to be reminded of what can happen if we lose our humanity, and to be grateful for what we've got.

Perspective from the Dark Side

I love summer movies. There's nothing better than entering a cold, dark theatre on a hot summer day, settling in with a big tub of popcorn and a cold drink and being transported to another place or time. But last week, Jason and I went to see Maleficent, a movie that was less of an escape and more of a reality check. 

As a kid, I was given the Big Golden Book Sleeping Beauty, which featured illustrations from Disney's 1959 film by the same name. Malecifent is painted as nothing less than pure evil, so I was curious to see the sorceress' side.

Disney portrayed folklore's "bad fairy" as
a horned menace with too much
purple eye shadow.
Image from Walt Disney's Sleeping Beauty

Of course, the tale of Sleeping Beauty is an ancient one. It existed in oral tradition long before the father of the fairy tale genre, Charles Perrault, published it in his Tales of Mother Goose in 1697. Perrault's telling was informed by Gambattista Basile's collection of fairy tales the Pentamerone published in 1634. There are distinctions to these old tales—which in Basile's telling includes the rape of Sleeping Beauty—but the premise of a princess being cursed to sleep remains a consistent thread.

According to the Charles Perrault tale, the upon the birth of their longed for child, the King and Queen invite seven fairies to their daughter's christening party. They hope the magical creatures will bestow wondrous gifts upon their baby. The King and Queen spare no expense to please these special guests and commission custom-made golden place settings for the seven fairies. But when the big day arrives, they find they've made a royal faux pas. An old fairy shows up at the castle without an invite. According to Perrault, the oversight wasn't intentional, but due to the minor discrepancy that—because she hadn't been seen in a long time—everyone assumed she was "dead or enchanted." Seems like an understandable mistake. But the Royals are at a total loss of what to do. To their credit, they try to accommodate the senior citizen as best they can but she's pissed about the "sorry we thought you were dead" excuse. Maybe she's suffering from dementia or maybe she's just hurt over being left out. Regardless, she chooses to bestow her own gift on the baby—and it ain't a sterling silver binky. We don't know much more about the old fairy or why no one bothered to find out if she really was deceased. And, after her curse is bestowed, we don't hear from the old fairy again.

The Disney 1959 film version of Sleeping Beauty gives the old fairy a bad name—literally. Maleficent is the embodiment of malice, which according to Merriam Webster is the "desire to inflict injury, harm, or suffering on another, either because of a hostile impulse or out of deep-seated meanness."  Disney also gives the storybook villainess a facelift and the ability to transform into hideous creatures, like a dragon. Resplendent in horns and purple-black attire, Disney's arch-villaness, like her haggish precursor (pun intended,) Maleficent crashes the christening of the little Princess. Her appearance is much more overtly foreboding than that of an elderly woman (although let's face it, most of us are terrified of aging,) but her malicious baby gift is borrowed from Perrault, who apparently had a textile aversion. 

Enter the 2014 Hollywood version. The villainess (portrayed by Angelina Jolie) is front and center and provides us a new perspective on the making of the evil curse. And as it turns out, her story is far more lively than that of the dosing princess.

We meet Maleficent as an orphaned fairy child. She is the protector of her magical land. Grant you with long, pointy horns and dark wings, she isn't your classic good fairy type. Indeed she is a creature who is much more of the earth than are the trio of candy-colored sprites who end up as bumbling babysitters. As the tale unfolds from her perspective, we discover that Maleficent was betrayed. Suddenly we're rooting for her to take out King Stefan, the asshole who violated her trust and stole her wings. As the saying goes, hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.

The film also reveals the perspective of the innocent princess, Aurora, whom Maleficent has cursed to a fate worse than death (ie: waiting for eternity for unconditional love.) Aurora, being pure of heart, doesn't judge Maleficent as evil just because she has huge scary horns, impossibly sharp cheekbones and ultra-thin arched eyebrows. Because she's met with acceptance, the child's goodness and compassion warm the cold-hearted fairy. Transformation happens. True magic manifests. Hatred and resentment melt into—yes!—true love.

What happens to our long-loathed stereotypical villains when we begin to understand what turned them to the dark side? We start to understand that perhaps there is no abject evil in this world. We see that villains—like heroes—are made not born. 

Accepting that we are collectively the authors  of our world's unhealthiness and suffering is not always easy. I want someone to blame, someone to pin my hurt upon, because I think that it will make me feel better or relieve me of the responsibility for my own actions. When I can open my eyes and see that everyone responds to life based on their experiences and their perception of those experiences, I come closer to realizing the truth. So if someone is treating me badly, I can bet my silver binky that she has experienced the same treatment (or worse) from someone else. And I can generate compassion for that person rather than hatred and fear. This is so much easier said than done! But seeing a movie like Maleficent reminds me of to consider more than my own limited point of view. I'm still wrestling with this final piece, but I know in my heart that everyone—even villains—deserves to live happily ever after.

Of course, Maleficent is just the latest Hollywood offering that shifts the plot line to the villain's perspective. The Star Wars series was perhaps one the first and most lucrative of these explorations of the nature of "good and evil." The Harry Potter series is another great example. In recent years, Hansel and Gretel, Alice in Wonderland, Jack and the Beanstalk have all received a revisionist approach on the big screen. On TV, ABC's current series Once Upon A Time has created an ongoing drama that explores the stories behind beloved fairy tales. Revisionist fairytales obviously has financial appeal or Hollywood wouldn't keep turning them into movies, but I wonder if the outcome extends beyond entertainment value. 

Will these perspective-shifting tales blow the lid off the stereotype that bad guys are 100% pure evil? Will Jack and his generation begin to realize that evil is indeed made, not born? If so, our media-saavy kids just might be inspired to stem the tide of suffering. I doubt that's Hollywood's aim, but it might just be a very happy ending.