John Lewis | Rev. C.T. Vivian
The transitional nature of death was all around us last week, and I find it liberating.
The great Civil Rights champion, Hon. John H. Lewis died Friday evening. Earlier on the same day another movement stalwart, C.T. Vivian passed away. My friend and brother of several decades past in the Moorish Science Temple, Sunni Karnatu-Bey, made his transition earlier last week. And last night I watched the Netflix film The Old Guard, about a small team of warrior immortals, directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood.
John Lewis’ steadfast reliance on nonviolence while putting himself in harm’s way time and again – getting into “good trouble” he called it – is a profound lesson in using mere flesh and blood to resist barbarous injustice. That he was able – unlike Medgar, Martin, Malcolm, Fred Hampton and others – to live to an old age has been a true gift. We got to see what a lifetime of radical adherence to a very public commitment beyond the personal looks like.
He lived for and by his principles. He suffered and sacrificed for them. And he bore it all with such grace, loving patience and steely power.
There are pictures of SCLC lieutenant Rev. C.T. Vivian, tall, erect, impeccably dressed and calmly defiant as he faced a local Alabama sheriff while leading a group registering to vote. The sheriff beat Vivian until blood dripped down his chin in front of news cameras, an image that helped to galvanize national support for the movement.
My spiritual brother Sunni did not live a public life, and the people touched by his passing are far fewer. First among the qualities that resound about him to me is his perennial good nature. I never saw him being angry or unpleasant to anyone. He was loyal and determined to give his best as a husband, father, business owner, movement comrade and friend. Sunni was not a leader or scholar in our circle, but he was always there to support, an original “ride or die” kinda brother. He was always ready to man the steering wheel of his van whenever it was needed, and any movement worth its salt needs someone capable and dependable on the logistics. Sunni was a soldier in our army, ready to add his broad shoulders to whatever activity was at hand…and with an ever ready smile.
What I am studying in these men is how to not succumb to anger, or how to differentiate anger from indignation, as Lewis put it. It’s what another friend of mine calls rage vs outrage. It’s channeling the power and force of anger, without making it personal, vindictive or revengeful. Both Lewis and Vivian relied on love as the core underpinning of nonviolent resistance.
Charlize Theron in The Old Guard
It’s not until the last third of The Old Guard that an answer is delivered to the question of whether several millennia spent warring has been worth it for the battle-weary immortals. Their leader, the eldest among them, portrayed by Charlize Theron, is despairing that the fight against evil has not fundamentally changed in all her years on earth. The answer comes from one of the people meticulously trying to capture them. I’ll let you learn it for yourself if you have not yet seen the film.
All these examples lead me to some of what I feel are the tenets of immortality:
- To quote Bruce Lee, “First live a life worth remembering.”
- Plan for the long haul. Don’t expect to see immediate results or get instant rewards.
- Putting our bodies and lives on the line is unavoidable and redemptive.
- Remember that what we know and do now has its roots in what has gone on before and a rippling effect in the lives of those yet to be born.
- Everything is grounded in love.
