Tulsa churches express solidarity with BLM
TULSA — Several predominantly white churches are showing solidarity with those who support a Black Lives Matter street mural in the Greenwood District — and the movement behind it.
Fellowship Congregation al Church United Church of Christ, All Souls Unitarian, College Hill Presbyterian and St. Paul's United Methodist have each had a similar Black Lives Matter mural painted on the parking lots of their midtown churches.
With the painting of the bright yellow block wording on their properties, the congregations are having their say.
“We couldn't not do it. We are a church that feels very strongly that it is important to publicly make the stand that all of God's children are to be included,”
said Kathy Moore, senior minister of St. Paul's.
“When it became obvious that the Tulsa City Council, on the grounds of public policy, was going to take down the mural in Greenwood, there's a group of clergy that thought that symbol, that art, needs to continue to be expressed.”
The Tulsa City Council voted Sept .2 to recommend that the Black Lives Matter street painting on Greenwood Avenue be removed. A majority of council members recommended that a street improvement project be moved up from spring 2021 to October, removing the mural because it was painted without a city permit.
The Rev. Chris Moore, Fellowship Congregational's lead pastor, said the idea to place similar murals on church properties came to him while he was out riding his bike more than a week ago. He said he wanted to do something after learning about the Tulsa City Council's decision.
Moore said he began t he church mural project intentionally in the days surrounding the fourth anniversary the death of Terence Crutcher, a Black man who was killed by white Tulsa officer on Sept. 16, 2016.
Moore said the project's unveiling on Wednesday was fitting because Crutcher's killing was “something that took place in our own city, and that connects us to the larger awful story of violence against Black and brown bodies all across our country.”
He said the group behind the murals on religious properties is made up of mostly liberal, progressive congregations who acknowledge that there is much more work to done in the arena of racial injustice. The minister said the group had planned various activities focusing on the fight for racial equality but they were cancelled because of the COVID- 19 pandemic.
Moore said he expected more Tulsa houses of worship to paint the Black Lives Matter murals on their properties with several goals in mind.
“We wanted to have a symbolic catalyst from this statement, t hat we don't just stop with painting that on our parking lots but that it isa reminder to us as a congregation that we have work to do,” he said, adding that racial injustice is not a “Black problem, it is a human problem.”
Community responds
The Rev. Todd Freeman, pastor of College Hill Presbyterian, said to his knowledge, his is the first Presbyterian church in the country to paint Black Lives Matter on their church property.
“Social justice work has been a foundation of Presbyterian work so not to speak out and to be silent is to maintain the status quo,” Freeman said.
He said he received a call from a Black man who saw the mural in the church parking lot and wanted to express his gratitude for the church's support of the Black Lives Matter movement. Freeman said he also received a call from a white man who told him that churches shouldn't make statements on such matters.
The pastor said he and the man talked about the issue for a few minutes before the caller hung up in frustration.
Moore said most people have responded favorably to the project. On the other hand, he said he saw comments on social media that said “Churches shouldn't take sides” or “The church needs to stay out of it.” He said some who oppose the street art on a public street now seem to have a problem with it painted on private property as well.
The minister said he counters those refrains by suggesting that people recall that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said complacency among friends of the civil rights movement was just as bad as overt racism: “In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.”
At St. Paul's, Brown said numerous people have come to her church and thanked the house of worship for ensuring that the Black Lives Matter message is spread in the midtown area.
One detractor, a white man, did venture over to watch as the mural was being painted on Tuesday and he asked if the message was going to say “All Lives Matter,” a mantra often used to counter the Black Lives Matter message.
When them an saw the mural's ultimate wording, he reiterated that “All Lives Matter.”
“I said you are absolutely right, they do — but right now we are focusing on what is going on in our Black community in terms of racial in justice. He didn't really like that,” Brown said.
“It's important for us, at least it is for St. Paul's, to make people understand that this is not a political statement, this is a deep and profound theological statement.”
The Rev. Robert Turner is senior pastor of Vernon African Methodist Episcopal Church, a historic predominantly Black church on Greenwood Avenue near the Black Lives Matter street mural.
Turner, who is Black, said he was encouraged by the churches' show of solidarity.
“I'm always happy to see anyone proclaim `Black Lives Matter.' It is something that far too many predominantly white churches have been silent on,” he said.
“I hope that the members of this community put it in their hearts and I hope that the elected officials put the principles of Black Lives Matter in their policies. I hope that the police department puts the principle of Black Lives Matter in their practice and their training. It can move from being paint on a street or paint on asphalt to words imprinted on your soul.”