Rosa Parks

For those who are not familiar with her, Mrs. Rosa Parks passed away this past Monday at the ripe age of 92. Beyond her own family, this passing may not have meant much to many. She was simply an old woman who lived a long life and reached the end of her journey much like the rest of us, the Lord God willing.

Mrs. Parks, however, cannot be said to be just any old woman who finally reached the end. This woman, with no plan whatsoever, started a movement in 1955 that culminated in the long-overdue Civil Rights Act of 1964. And to hear her tell it, all she wanted to do was to ride the bus in Montgomery AL home with just a little peace and a little dignity.

I do not curse my skin color; I am caucasion. Think of it, though. The times that this incredible woman - and so many others like her - faced with courage and conviction, knowing full well that something was just not right. And as I reflect on those times, it suddenly occurs to me that they were not only fighting for - not equal rights, as Malcolm X was fond of saying - HUMAN rights; they were leading the way in a movement whose impact is so profound that I am not even sure we can appreciate it today ... at least not fully. And while there were certainly sympathetic whites during those days, there is no possible way we can understand the fear that far too many felt just in lying down in their own beds at the end of a long, hard day. No way.

So much that we take for granted in this life can never fully help us to appreciate what the Civil Rights movement meant then, or now. We have what we have and we expect it to always be there. We will not be able to fully measure its true value unless we no longer have it.

Christians can only hope to have the kind of impact for the Kingdom of Heaven that Mrs. Parks had for human dignity.

And to think ... all she wanted to do was sit down. And she did. And the world has not been the same since.