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The Help, injustice, and courage


I just saw the Help, a movie based on Kathryn Stockett's book of the same title about African American maids who came forward with their stories about working in white households in Jackson, Mississippi during the early 1960s. While non-black audiences like myself come out the theater sobbing and weeping in disgust and disbelief of the hostility towards another race, I've heard black audiences walked out tall and proud for what they and their race have lived through with dignity. Injustice disturbs our hearts. I wonder what book and/or movie the future generations will make about us and our injustice towards one another. Perhaps we also are too comfortable in our unjust acts. Courage was mentioned in two significant moments in the movie. Don't we all need some of that to do the right thing?

Disturb us, Lord, when
We are too well pleased with ourselves,
When our dreams have come true
Because we have dreamed too little,
When we arrived safely
Because we sailed too close to the shore.

Disturb us, Lord, when
With the abundance of things we possess
We have lost our thirst
For the waters of life;
Having fallen in love with life,
We have ceased to dream of eternity
And in our efforts to build a new earth,
We have allowed our vision
Of the new Heaven to dim.

Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly,
To venture on wider seas
Where storms will show your mastery;
Where losing sight of land,
We shall find the stars.

We ask You to push back
The horizons of our hopes;
And to push into the future
In strength, courage, hope, and love.

attributed - sir francis drake -1577
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