On Thursday evening I boarded a tour bus in Chicago with about 40 other folks from our denomination for the Sankofa Journey, a three day trip through a number of southern Civil Rights destinations.

The trip is very intentionally designed to address issues of race, privilege and injustice throughout America’s history including the present day.  It was a huge gift to make this journey with Jon White (that’s him above on the left), a friend and the musical director at our church.

After the overnight ride to Montgomery, Alabama to visit Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, Kelly Ingram Park and the Southern Poverty Law Center we drove to Selma to walk across the Edmond Pettus Bridge, site of the infamous Bloody Sunday in 1965.

We spent Friday night at a hotel in Jackson, Mississippi (best night’s sleep ever!) and began the next morning with a visit to the John Perkins Foundation for Reconciliation and Development.  Dr Perkins spent some time with our group and it’s always encouraging and challenging to hear him talk.

From Jackson we drove north to the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis.  The museum has been built into the Lorraine Motel where Dr King was assassinated outside of room 306 in 1968.  I’ve visited the museum once before and it’s always a sobering experience.  From the museum we drove a few miles to Slavehaven, a home that had been a stop on the underground railroad.  Given the brutal and tragic history of our nation’s slave trade, this stop seemed to be especially significant to many in our group.

For dinner some of us walked a few blocks to the Rendezvous, my favorite ribs joint in Memphis, and got a bunch of ribs, pulled pork and brisket to go.  After so much ugly history and intense conversations it was nice to sit outside with some good food and laugh with new friends.

We drove back towards Chicago through the night and arrived in Indiana on Sunday morning for a few hours of debriefing.  There were many significant moments on the trip but hearing how each of us was affected by what we’d experienced was especially eye-opening.

There is much more that needs to be said about this trip.  It was great to connect with friends from around the country (that’s Jon with Josef Rasheef who I’d just seen in Boston) and meet many other folks who I hope to see again.  I hope to get some time to reflect here about why the Gospel compels white Christians to take racism and white privilege far more seriously that we generally do; the Sankofa Journey has given me new ways to think about these things.  I return to work tomorrow- preparing sermons, planning budgets, meeting with church folks- with an important reminder of why the reconciling mission of our church is so important to me.