When we show up, we win!

CAJM Rally, March 10, 2025

 Adam J Shoemaker

To all my fellow CAJM family members, it is always an honor to stand before you, As I begin my remarks this evening, allow me to first bring you greetings from not just my own beloved congregation of St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church but also from our friends at St. Mark’s and Calvary Episcopal Churches—three churches who believe that we are better off when we work collectively—together—all proud CAJM congregations, who have just returned (and I mean just returned—like an hour ago!) from a four-day pilgrimage together traveling through some key civil rights sites from Atlanta to Montgomery and, just yesterday, Selma, Alabama, where, on a cold, grey day, we joined with tens of thousands of others on that sacred ground for the sixtieth anniversary jubilee march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge recalling that pivotal “bloody Sunday” when Alabama state troopers and white vigilante groups brutally attacked hundreds of peaceful protesters marching to Montgomery to advocate for voting rights. The police in Selma used tear gas, clubs, and bull whips to attack the marchers on that day, and many were left hospitalized. But the violence perpetrated on that bridge, like other more recent injustices we can all name, was captured on film and broadcast across the country shocking viewers and increasing support for civil rights leading ultimately to the passage of the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965.

And let me tell you, as you can imagine, it was a very moving and profound moment to commemorate that march yesterday afternoon alongside a very diverse group of so many others of faith and good will, from across our country, especially in light of where we find ourselves today. For civil rights are under attack across in a myriad of ways in our nation, with many in already marginalized communities in harm’s way—this is certainly true in state capitols like our own in Columbia and even in our Charleston and North Charleston communities—with not just people’s rights under threat but also with continuing threats to specific issues we hold dear as members of CAJM, from affordable housing to environmental justice to equity in our school system to the way our communities are policed. So much is on line these days.  

As I marched yesterday afternoon across that Edmund Pettus Bridge, I could not help but call to mind the challenging times we find ourselves in—the polarized, often cruel, and chaotic times in which live—a context that I believe calls us all to show up and show out like so many justice-minded folks who have gone before us. With that in mind, I would like to turn, for just a moment, to a short passage of scripture from my own Christian tradition that has always been very meaningful to me. It’s a rather well-known passage for church goers written by St. Paul, that reads, “therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us throw off the weight that hinders … and run with perseverance the race that has been set before us.” (Hebrews 12:1) 

“Let us throw off the race that hinders … and run with perseverance the race that has been set before us.” 

You see, I have always drawn strength from feeling surrounded by a “great cloud of witnesses” whom I would call “saints”: impactful ancestors in the faith, who have run the race of life in ages past amid their own weighty and overwhelming times; those like so many of the saints of the Civil Rights movement who have gone on before us.

Saints like Martin Luther King and Fanny Lou Hamer, Ralph Abernathy and Rosa Parks who pushed forward in faith, at great cost to themselves, giving their blood, sweat, and tears to help transform the world from the nightmare it so often is into something closer to the dream that God intends; saintly figures that I believe continue to speak to us and remind us, as this passage from St. Paul does, as I noted in a sermon not long ago, that sometimes we have to say “no” before we can say “yes”—sometimes we have to first “throw off the weight that hinders so that we can freely run with perseverance the race that has been set before us.”

One such saintly figure that reminds us of this, one prophetic person who helps to show us the way is a man who helped lead the march across the bridge in Selma sixty years ago: the late Congressman John Lewis. John Lewis was just 25 years old during that original march but already served, at the time, as the chair of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. And for leading that effort across the bridge, he was beaten and he suffered a concussion; he was trampled by horses and exposed to tear gas. But, as we all know, this fateful day was just one episode in a lengthy lifelong fight—all the days of this life—for civil rights.

For John Lewis gave of himself again and again and again for the well-being and care of the whole human family—he laid it all on the line—from his days as a student activist to his relentless pursuits for justice in the halls of Congress. And I believe, friends, that a man like John Lewis, undergirded by his faith in a God of love, never tired, never wavered, never backed away from showing up and standing up and saying “No!”—loudly and clearly—to any moral injustice, to any inequity—that threatened the human family, to help us all better “run with perseverance the race that has been set before us.”

In that spirit, Congressman Lewis once famously said, “If you see something that is not right, not fair, not just, then you have a moral obligation to do something about it . . . you have a moral obligation to get in good trouble, necessary trouble and help redeem the soul of America.”

And so, my friends, John Lewis’ prophetic example stands as a reminder to me—to all of us—that sometimes, perhaps oftentimes, we’ve got to show up and say “No” to so much of what we see going on around so we can better help to turn people around and say “Yes” . . . “Yes”. . . “Yes” to the godly vision of justice and equity for all; to that “beloved community” that we are all about as a part of the Charleston Area Justice Ministry. 

Let me take just a moment and count some of those ways as I consider our collective work as members of CAJM; work that I believe continues to make a real difference for so many of our neighbors.

I believe deeply—with every fiber of my being, not only as a priest and pastor but as a parent and person of faith—that in this day and age, as I heard it said in Selma yesterday, “mercy and grace” seem to have been put on trial by so many of our elected officials.

And so we’ve got to say, “No!”—“No!” to cruelty and mean-spiritedness because every human being should be treated with inherent worth, dignity, and respect.

We’ve got to say, “No!”, to repeated attacks on diversity, equity, and inclusion because these should be values we celebrate, not fear or use as convenient scapegoats.  

We’ve got to say, “No!”, to inequity in our Charleston County school system and to the continued lack of transparency in the way decisions are made that impact our teachers and ultimately the welfare of our kids because every child—every student—is precious and possesses promise that deserves to be equally invested in. 

We’ve got to say, “No!”, to continued racial bias in our police departments that sows distrust in our communities and diminishes black and brown lives because discrimination against anyone is discrimination against everyone.

We’ve got to say, “No!”, to environmental racism and a disregard of the eco-system of historic communities of color in our city because we are all interconnected.

We’ve got to say, “No!”, to communities that continue to lack enough affordable housing for hard-working folks to live in because we are so much better off when our wider community can make space for everyone.   

We’ve got to loudly and clearly say, “No!” “No!” “No!” to these and other injustices that tear at our communities, disparage the human family, and diminish the human person. So that we can help our neighbors and fellow citizens better turn around and say, “Yes!”—“yes” to a Charleston and North Charleston worthy of our highest aspirations; to a community full of justice and equity and the beloved community.

We must let our “No!” be “no” so that we can more clearly and freely “run with perseverance the race that has been set before us” and continue to advocate effectively for common sense solutions for the sake of the common good.

My friends, the powerful people in this world—the pharaohs of this world—can so often use the same old playbook. They seek to divide, disparage, discredit, and distract us. They seek to overwhelm us into passivity and inaction or turn us against our neighbors.

But that “great cloud of witnesses” who continues to walk with us—like that saint of the Civil Rights Movement John Lewis—urges us onward. For a saint like John Lewis urges us to show up, show out, and fight because when we show up, we win. When we show up, we win. When we show up we win! 

As a person faith, I am always called to be a person of hope. So let me conclude my remarks with this poignant word of hope and encouragement from Congressman Lewis that feels as relevant today as when he first uttered it:

“Do not get lost in a sea of despair. Be hopeful, be optimistic. Our struggle is not the struggle of a day, a week, a month, or a year, it is the struggle of a lifetime. Never ever be afraid to show up; stand up and make some noise; never ever be afraid to show up; stand up and get into good trouble, necessary trouble.”

For when we show up, we win! When we show up, we win! When we show up, we win!

Thank you CAJM!

© 2025 Adam J Shoemaker