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April 16
Bernadette of Lourdes, Molly Banks, the Battle of Megiddo, and the Letter From a Birmingham Jail.
David Barnhart
April 16, 2025
A bluebird mother building her nest. Birmingham, Alabama 2022. Own photo.
On this day in 1457, the Battle of Megiddo took place between Egyptian and Canaanite forces. Megiddo was a city which sat at an ancient trade crossroads and was a site of strategic importance in the ancient world. 1500 years later, the writer of Revelation wrote about a battle on the hill of Megiddo (Har Megiddo) which became known as “Armageddon.” The idea was that the violence of war would end at the place it was started.
On this day in 1963, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King wrote his “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,” which directly refuted 8 prominent white clergy who had condemned the nonviolent marches as “outsiders coming in” to disrupt the peace of Birmingham.
Today is the feast day, in the Roman Catholic Church, of Bernadette of Lourdes. She died on this day in 1879. As a teenager, she saw regular visions of a divine feminine being in a grotto near a stream. The lady was later identified as the Virgin Mary, who instructed her to build a shrine. Our Lady of Lourdes became an important pilgrimage site.
Today is also the feast day, in the Anglican Church, of Molly Brant, who died on this day in 1796. She was a Mohawk leader who joined the British side during the American Revolution, because she believed they would respect Iroquois liberty.
Reflection:
Dr. King took the eight clergymen to task for claiming that “outside agitators” had come to Alabama to stir up trouble:
Moreover, I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities and states. I cannot sit idly by in Atlanta and not be concerned about what happens in Birmingham. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial "outside agitator" idea. Anyone who lives inside the United States can never be considered an outsider anywhere within its bounds.
We continue to hear the “outside agitators” trope every time politicians claim that protesters are being “paid” or “bused in.” People in power often try to delegitimize protest by claiming that someone from “outside” is stirring up trouble, even as they infiltrate peaceful protests with agent provocateurs. (I used to be skeptical that agent provocateurs existed until I saw them with my own eyes at BLM protests.)
There are occasions when people witness injustice from afar and actually travel to join a multi-day protest, like at the Standing Rock protest or Occupy Wall Street, though these are more rare. Even so, Dr King’s words still echo in their words and actions.
Prayer: God of Prophets and Protest, we know that injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. The forces of oppression depend on our complacency to use our communities as laboratories for their experiments in tyranny. May no weapons prosper that are forged for injustice. Amen.