The enslaved Africans when they were working on plantations as well as in the homes of their masters, they would sing spirituals to communicate with each other, as well as to give them hope. Many of these spirituals had Christian and biblical messages.
One such spiritual, “I Got Shoes” was even sang by the Man in Black, Johnny Cash and starts with the first verse:
I got shoes you got shoes all God’s children got shoes
When I get to heaven gonna put on my shoes
I’m gonna walk all over God’s heaven heaven
Everybody talkin’ bout heaven ain’t goin’ there heaven heaven
Gonna walk all over God’s heaven
Many people remember Dr. King Jr. as leader in the Civil Rights movement, that he was all about racial integration and harmony but they like to forget his call for economic rights. He believed in a guaranteed income for all families and waged war in the ghettos of Chicago in the late 1960s through his Poor People’s Campaign. King’s dream for economic equality was guided by his interpretation of the Bible, where Jesus and the tradition of the Hebrew Bible called for justice to roll down like a stream. Guided by the biblical narrative and the theology of the sorrow songs, Dr. King worked for Christian justice and fought against economic injustice. Whether or not his economic solutions were ideologically correct are besides the point. What is important is that we recognize that he was driven by an ultimate concern: the plight of the poor.
Like the enslaved Africans who once sang “I Got Shoes” here in North America, the people of Korah, Ethiopia dream of having shoes. They are a marginalized community and there had, up until last month, been no website exposing their oppression. Please visit the Help Korah website and consider helping through blogging or donations.
Truth and Peace,
Rod
(To see this in its original context, go HERE)
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