Montgomery is the site of the famous bus boycott, which lasted from December 5, 1955, to December 20, 1956. For more than a year, Black residents of Montgomery chose to walk or share rides with each other rather than use the city buses. The boycott was sparked when Mrs. Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a city bus to a white passenger. Though it seemed to happen suddenly,  the boycott was the result of years of organizing by Black women in the community. They had documented instances of discrimination and abuse for years and had advocated with city officials to no avail. When these leaders learned of Mrs. Parks arrest, they were prepared to leap into action and mimeographed and distributed hundreds of flyers overnight.

Many of the leaders of the Civil Rights Movement were driven by their faith in Jesus, and when the Black community in Montgomery decided to embark on the bus boycott, they looked for a pastor to lead the movement. They enlisted the new pastor of Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, Martin Luther King, Jr., who was only 26 years old. Dr. King tells the story of the boycott in his book, Stride Toward Freedom. He writes about how he wrestled with whether the boycott was consistent with his Christian faith. He reasoned that "the basic aim was to refuse to cooperate with evil." He writes, "He who passively accepts evil is as much involved as he who helps to perpetrate it. He who accepts evil without protesting against it is really cooperating with it."

The bus boycott ultimately proved successful when the Supreme Court ruled in Browder v. Gayle, that Alabama's racial segregation laws for buses were unconstitutional. Throughout the boycott, the Black community was sustained through mass meetings in churches with worship and encouragement from spiritual leaders.

During our trip, we had the privilege of worshiping at Resurrection Catholic Church, led by Father Manuel. It was fun and enriching to experience a different style of worship and hear a sermon and prayers tailored for a different community.

"They seemed to speak more directly about current events at Resurrection. The prayer addressed political issues, but it didn't feel partisan to me. They were lifting up to God places where policy was unjustly causing pain to the community." - Heather