Juneteenth: Still We Rise


Rev. Reuben Eckels | June 17, 2021

The Tulsa race massacre was not a single event of white rage in America but one of many genocidal confrontations that happened in places such as Rosewood, Florida, Springfield, Michigan and Wilmington, North Carolina.  

These massacres were meant not just to obliterate Black progress but to humiliate and crush the spirit of Black people. Like the slave-breaking overseers hired by plantation owners who raped, lynched, and tortured enslaved Africans and their family members, these massacres sent the message that, in the words of Chief Justice Roger B. Taney in the Dred Scott decision, “black people had no rights that a white man was bound to respect.”

Over the next 100 years, the same racism that produced the Tulsa race massacre metastasized into voter suppression and intimidation, redlining, housing discrimination, limited education access, Jim Crow, Tuskegee experiments, eugenics, the murder and incarceration of Black leaders, the War on Drugs and mass incarceration, and the police-related deaths of unarmed black people such as Tamir Rice, Michael Brown, George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and Ahmaud Arbery. 

But like Maya Angelou stated, “Still I Rise!”  

Juneteenth, the oldest celebrated commemoration of the ending of slavery in the United States, is not only a reminder of the many atrocities committed in America but a call to  remembrance  of  the indomitable spirit of Black and Indigenous People of Color on this continent.  

Often, conversations about race focus solely on the suffering of Black people and not on the brilliance, strength, dignity, and character of their fight for freedom, equality, and equity. For far too long Black and Indigenous People of Color have had to depend on the guilt of whites for a measure of justice. This dependency eschews the recognition that not only are we human and deserving of every right afforded all citizens, but that there would not be an America without Black Indigenous People of Color.  

Juneteenth, is the recognition that America was lifted, and continues to be lifted, by Black people.

It is the recognition that America was lifted when Blacks who fought heroically in the Revolutionary and Civil War were free. 

It is the recognition that America was lifted when Blacks started to attend Wilberforce, the first University to open its doors to Black college students. 

It is the recognition that America was lifted when the first Blacks were elected to office in the House and Senate during Reconstruction. 

It is the recognition that America was lifted when Black inventors created such the gas mask, the X-ray, brain tumor surgery, the ironing board, the home security system and so many other items that Americans use daily. 

It is the recognition that America was lifted in sports with Jessie Owens, Jackie Robinson, Jack Johnson, Wilma Rudolph, Hank Aaron, Muhammad Ali, Venus and Serena Williams and other amazing champions defied overwhelming odds and opened the doors of society. 

It is the recognition that America was lifted by Katherine Johnson and the other Black women mathematicians whose brain power made the space age possible. 

It is the recognition that America was lifted by the courageous and intellectual strategies of civil and human rights champions such as Fannie Lou Hamer, Ella Baker, Bayard Rustin, A. Philip Randolph, Malcom X, and Dr. Martin Luther King. 

But beyond the individual achievements and inspirations, Juneteenth reminds us that the Civil Rights movement, which was predominantly led by Black people, was instrumental in lifting up women, the disabled, Asians, Latinos, LGBTQ people, and Indigenous people.  

Church World Service leadership recognizes the intersections of race, oppression and discrimination happening with Black, Indigenous and People of Color communities. We stand with these communities to support the eradication of racism and discrimination and will work across the BIPOC communities to fight these injustices. To our Black colleagues, partners, and clients, we share your outrage.   

Last year, CWS launched a Platform on Racial Justice in the wake of an alarming rise in deaths of BIPOC Americans at the hands of police, highlighting the importance of equity and repair that needs to happen so that BIPOC Americans can continue to help make this nation a more perfect union.  

By Building on that platform, CWS marks this Juneteenth by additionally encouraging its staff, network, partners, and donors to come together to dismantle anti-Blackness and racism. It further pledges to continue to work with Black community leaders and organizations to call on government officials to change laws and policies that perpetuate inequality.  CWS honors this day by calling for our elected officials to help reconcile our nation’s past with the promise of our future by embracing Black history and Critical Race Theory.

From our past and into our present, Juneteenth calls on America to live up to its ideals by remembering all who came before. We must nationally honor the sacrifices of those who laid down their lives in the name of freedom and equality and those who were brutally robbed of the chance to simply live in peace.

—Rev. Reuben Eckels is Domestic Policy Advocate at Church World Service

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Still I Rise 

Maya Angelou - 1928-2014 

You may write me down in history 

With your bitter, twisted lies, 

You may trod me in the very dirt 

But still, like dust, I’ll rise. 

Does my sassiness upset you? 

Why are you beset with gloom? 

’Cause I walk like I’ve got oil wells 

Pumping in my living room. 

Just like moons and like suns, 

With the certainty of tides, 

Just like hopes springing high, 

Still I’ll rise. 

Did you want to see me broken? 

Bowed head and lowered eyes? 

Shoulders falling down like teardrops, 

Weakened by my soulful cries? 

Does my haughtiness offend you? 

Don’t you take it awful hard 

’Cause I laugh like I’ve got gold mines 

Diggin’ in my own backyard. 

You may shoot me with your words, 

You may cut me with your eyes, 

You may kill me with your hatefulness, 

But still, like air, I’ll rise. 

Does my sexiness upset you? 

Does it come as a surprise 

That I dance like I’ve got diamonds 

At the meeting of my thighs? 

Out of the huts of history’s shame 

I rise 

Up from a past that’s rooted in pain 

I rise 

I’m a black ocean, leaping and wide, 

Welling and swelling I bear in the tide. 

Leaving behind nights of terror and fear 

I rise 

Into a daybreak that’s wondrously clear 

I rise 

Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave, 

I am the dream and the hope of the slave. 

I rise 

I rise 

I rise.