September 16

Hallie Quinn Brown, Anne Bradstreet, Oodgeroo Noonuccal, Cyprian, and the Cry of Delores

Author

David Barnhart
September 16, 2025

Squash tendrils, 2025. Own photo.

Today marks the anniversary of the Cry of Delores, the event that precipitated the Mexican War of Independence, in 1810. Father Miguel Hidalgo de Costilla rang his church bell and gave a speech that kicked off a decade of fighting until September 28, 1821. 

Today marks the death, in 1949, of Hallie Quinn Brown, educator, orator, and women’s and civil rights activist. She traveled the world eloquently sharing the testimony of Black women and set the precedent for modern praise of “Black excellence.” 

Today also marks the death, in 1672, of Anne Bradstreet, American Puritan, poet, and proto-feminist.

Today also marks the death, in 1993, of Oodgeroo Noonuccal, Aboriginal Australian poet and activist. She was unapologetically pro-Aboriginal in her writing and advocacy. 

Today is the Feast Day of Saint Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, who died on September 14, 258. 

Reflection: 

In a speech given in 1893, Hallie Quinn Brown said: 

“Talk not of the negro woman’s incapacity, of her inferiority, until the centuries of her hideous servitude have been succeeded by centuries of education, culture, and refinement, by which she may rise to the fullness of the stature of her highest ideal.” 

A poem in which Anne Bradstreet complains of sexism: 

“I am obnoxious to each carping tongue
Who says my hand a needle better fits.
A poet's pen all scorn I should thus wrong
For such despite they cast on female wits;
If what I do prove well, it won't advance,
They'll say it's stolen, or else, it was by chance.”

and

“Authority without wisdom is like a heavy axe without an edge, fitter to bruise than polish.”

Oodgeroo Noonuccal said: 

“I can’t afford the luxury of despair or pessimism. We still have to hope. We’re a timeless people, we’ve lived in a timeless land. We have suffered the invasion of two hundred years, and we’ll go on suffering. But we are going to survive.”

Cyprian wrote: 

“It is a bad world, Donatus, an incredibly bad world. But I have discovered in the midst of it a quiet and good people who have learned the great secret of life. They have found a joy and wisdom which is a thousand times better than any of the pleasures of our sinful life. They are despised and persecuted, but they care not. They are masters of their souls. They have overcome the world. These people, Donatus, are Christians. . . and I am one of them.”

and, fittingly for today: 

“Men imitate the gods whom they adore, and to such miserable beings their crimes become their religion.”

and

“[Christians] are not allowed to kill, but they must be ready to be put to death themselves… it is not permitted the guiltless to put even the guilty to death.”

Prayer: God of Life, we are in the midst of social and political forces that worship only power and death. Help humanity to turn away from this religion to one that brings life. Amen.