As University chaplain, I am often asked about ways to remember and honor the life of a person after her death. I always say that the best way to remember a person is to advance the causes that claimed her passions.
Rosa Parks, often described as the "mother of the civil-rights movement," died earlier this week. Perceptively, Congressman John Lewis (D-Ga.) described the late Mrs. Parks as a founding mother of the New America. I agree.
Parks' activism and seminal role in sparking the modern civil-rights movement evolved the promises of liberty beyond the vision of the Founding Fathers. While there will be many laudatory editorials and numerous elegant eulogies in tribute to her life over the next few days, it seems to me that the best way to honor Parks is to take citizenship seriously. It was her passion.
Striding down Locust Walk a few weeks ago, I was buoyed by the eager Penn students exhorting their schoolmates and members of the community to register to vote. Parks knew well that the work of citizenship is ongoing. It requires a committed creativity and an intensive intentionality.
Student leadership in formative activities such as those organized and coordinated by Civic House, the Center for Community Partnerships, the Franklin Community and other student groups, as well as cultural and religious group events, are all examples of citizenship engagements that produce the kind of consciousness and action we so admired in Parks. These centers offer important opportunities to develop a solid knowledge base, the undergirding competencies of collaboration and outlets for structured periods of reflection on responsible citizenship.
Parks herself spent time learning about citizenship and activism. In addition to being an officer in the local NAACP, she enrolled in a course at the Highlander Folk School in Tennessee in the early 1950s. Incidentally, there is a Penn connection here. Clifford and Virginia Durr, arguably the whites who most actively supported equal rights in Alabama at that time, were the in-laws of former Penn President Sheldon Hackney. The Durrs arranged for Parks to spend time at the Highlander Folk School. It was an experience that greatly increased Parks' own growing commitment to citizenship education.
Citizenship is never just about voting. I learned this in a poignant fashion in the early '90s. I traveled to Haiti with a group of seven other clergy and lay people a few months after the first coup d'etat that ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide. Feeling expansive one evening after a meal with our hosts, I asked in contorted French what we Americans could do to help.
I'm sure my friends chuckled both at my French and my naive question, but mostly the question. After the laughter subsided, one of the hosts said to me, "Go back to your country and find out what is going on in your State Department. Fix that. If you can address that, don't worry about us; we can organize things here."
That night I went to bed gently chastened by people who knew that effective citizenship began with knowledge of the dynamic relationship among myriad forces and interests brought to bear on public policy. A new, deeper understanding of citizenship dawned in me even as the dark Haitian night enveloped me.
Historically, citizenship in this country has pivoted on race, class and gender. These categories have served to advance the interests of the powerful and to disenfranchise and limit the participation of the less powerful. Race, however, has been the central, dramatic and ongoing battle-line issue. I am convinced that in order to participate fully and responsibly in America, all of us need to know more about the continuing role of race in American life.
Here at Penn, courses in women's studies and African-American studies can strengthen understanding of citizenship for all students, regardless of race, class or gender. Courses about the many Latino groups in this country will help all of us to appreciate the past, present and future of this country. Campus presentations and special speakers on the topic are for everyone, not just people of color. All ethnic groups in America are flattened to fit in a lens of race, but to ignore the power of race in public and private life in America is to be as naive as I was that summer night on the balcony of a villa in Port-au-Prince.
Parks' decision not to give up her seat was an informed decision. She had been tired at the end of countless other days, so that December day in 1955 was not exceptional in that regard. What made it exceptional was not her tired feet, but rather a heart grown weary with the denial of citizenship rights and a will stoked to a fierce and focused flame. Parks had a vision of a capacious, robust and reformed America. Her vision was informed by her knowledge, her competence and her considered reflections on citizenship.
As we remember Rosa Parks, I encourage all of us to honor her by taking citizenship seriously. And then, don't forget to vote!
William Gipson is University chaplain.
