Many African Americans live in a state of ‘ignorance,’ must learn to forgive, seek healing and reconciliation
By Steve Waring Special to the Milwaukee Times
This the first installment of a continuing series of articles that will appear periodically in the Milwaukee Times on the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan’s two day visit to Milwaukee last week.
The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan, leader of the Nation of Islam, said he came with a message of peace on Aug. 12 at Jerusalem Missionary Baptist Church, 2505 W Cornell Street. He spoke the following night at Mercy Memorial Baptist Church, 2474 N. 37th Street as part of a two-day speaking engagement in Milwaukee in support of a march in Washington, D.C., on October 10, 2015 the 20th anniversary of the Million Man March. “Peace is what I offer,” he said after completing his introductory remarks, “Peace that only comes when man and woman are willing to submit their will to the will of God.” Minister Farrakhan, who turned 82 years old in May, is a gifted orator and public speaker who has many years’ experience.
Last Wednesday in Milwaukee, he used his voice like a finely-tuned musical instrument, raising and lowering the pitch of his voice and the cadence of his pronunciation with the vigor of a much younger man. He said that most African Americans lived in a state of ignorance and that lack of knowledge was the greatest obstacle to understanding the true nature of the world. “And that is why Jesus said you shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free,” he said. “He spoke that in the past, but the truth that would set you free would be coming in the future… You’re not free right now, so don’t claim that you know the truth and you’re not free.” Minister Farrakhan said that anyone who remained “the same old Negro that the white man made you” could not be free and therefore did not know Jesus. “They (white people) relegated us to subhuman status and today they rule us as though we are property,” he said.
“When you know Jesus… the world can’t make me bow.” Minister Farrakhan said he would pull no punches during his sermon and then called out a friendly greeting to the few white members in the congregation. “I am glad you are here, so you can hear me for yourselves,” he said to sustained applause and shouts of “amen.” His entire two-hour speech was frequently paused while various statements he made were greeted with vocal approval and occasional applause. Peace can only come, Minister Farrakhan said, “when we make peace with God. We can’t make peace with God on our terms. Peace with God demands that we submit our will to do his.” Once a person has made peace with God, Minister Farrakhan said, “It will be easier to make peace with your fellow man. We are the children of slaves, who were taught to call somebody else ‘master’. In addition to quoting from the Bible, Minister Farrakhan also quoted from the Koran.
“Those days of our calling anybody master but he who is master are over,” he said. “We’ve come to set our people free, from fear. It’s not the white man; it’s our fear of him that makes you less than a woman and less than the man that you could be. Fear chokes you, so that when you want to tell, the truth you muzzle your mouth, because you’re afraid of the consequences.” Minister Farrakhan said that on the night before he was assassinated, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., recommended an economic boycott by the black community in support of striking sanitation workers in Memphis. Minister Farrakhan proposed a nationwide boycott if the march on Washington, D.C. that he is organizing for October does not achieve its goals “Today our purchasing power is about $1 trillion a year and it doesn’t circulate in our community, not one time,” he said. He mocked those who claimed a job would make things right.
“Shut up!” he said to applause. “If you didn’t throw your money away you could create jobs. The government can’t do it anymore.” Minister Farrakhan proposed beginning the African American boycott with the Christmas shopping season. He said that Dr. King wanted to boycott Christmas in 1963 after the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing in Birmingham, Alabama that killed four little girls, but he was unable to get others in leadership in the black community to agree.
Minister Farrakhan was especially critical of African Americans who taught their children about “the big fat white man that lives at the North Pole. He kicked Jesus to the curb… and the worst thing is you facilitate this. ‘Mommy and Daddy didn’t have the money. But thank God for Santa’,” he said. Minister Farrakhan said that African Americans must learn to forgive the white race that enslaved them, but only after they ask for forgiveness. He also said that there must be healing and reconciliation among African Americans. “Can you forgive one another in the family for mistakes, hurtful things we have done?” he asked. “If we can forgive the white man who put you on a slave ship, then made you work from can’t see morning to can’t see night for 300 years to make him the richest man in the world… and you can forgive him? Why can’t you say to those you’ve offended, can you forgive me?”
