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Saying Goodbye to a Warrior Priest in a Pandemic
It’s written that it is “hard to say goodbye to yesterday.” But yesterday, Rev. Dr. Joesph Echols Lowery, in a death not related to Covid-19, moved from here to eternity.
Until yesterday, he was one of the few remaining architects of the civil rights movement that challenged and forced the cessation of the unequal treatment of Black people in the United States. This movement vicariously brought about equality to all minority groups in the country, including white women, or at least with more justice than had existed at the dawn of the 20th century. He was a man of the 20th century and was blessed to live until the 20th year of the 21st century.
Lowery’s passing pushed the civil rights triumphs further back into the yesterdays. Today’s up and coming young leaders shun the strategies of the Lowerys, Kings, and Abernathys, without realizing their significant accomplishments are the platform that launched today’s push for equality.
Dr. Lowery is one of the few civil rights leaders that I was fortunate to work alongside in the great struggle for civil rights for people of color in the US.
I first met him in 1977. He was 56 years old, in the prime of life, and the heir to the mantle of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Rev. Ralph David Abernathy. I was 26 years old, still wet behind the ears…
